Let Me Explain It More Slowly

Athol Kay is dead wrong.

Now hold on just a minute before getting too upset. Anybody who’s read this blog for any length of time knows that I have the utmost respect for Athol Kay, and I consider him personally to have done a world of good for my marriage, and I’m really glad that he’s finally able to support himself doing it. However, when it comes to Catholics and birth control he’s wrong: wrong on his advice, wrong in his approach, wrong in diagnosing the problem, and even wrong on the facts.

First, the situation:

If you write to me and say you’re a Catholic in a sexless marriage, primarily because your wife is terrified of having more children, that’s when I start experiencing a pain in my right temple that travels behind my right eye and makes it twitch a little.

The advice:

Then I’m going to say something like “Ahhh… have you considered birth control?”

Not only is this wrong, it’s exactly opposite of the correct advice for this situation.

The approach:

When I suggest birth control, please then don’t explain-to-me-more-slowly-that-you-are-Catholic-and-cannot-use-birth-control-and-need-a-different-answer-that-you-can-actually-use. I know that, I was purposely suggesting that you stop being miserable and start sinning a little.

Sinning a little is the wrong approach entirely.

Look being completely objective about this…

Athol is not being completely objective. He is giving advice from the perspective of an Atheist. It is logically incorrect to call that objective, as it is a perspective that very much has its own biases. Truly objective advice would consider that the couple in question is Catholic and adapt their situation, not try and push an Atheist and, frankly, Protestant-inspired answer on them. I love you Athol, but it’s true: Atheists are exactly 0% more objective than anybody else. That’s a big, fat, whopping zero. Also, while I won’t Athol of hating Catholics, for anybody to call his own perspective objective is insulting. Athol is better than that, usually, so I give him the benefit of the doubt of just slipping here.

The diagnosis:

if you have a religiously based cockblock stopping your sex life from being happy, then that’s the cause of the problem.

No, it isn’t. Athol’s commenters have diagnosed the problem more accurately. We’ll quote the earliest one on the list, Jason:

Athol, from the “red-pill” perspective, isn’t the wife’s refusal to use birth control/fear of pregnancy her “body agenda/rationalization hamster” saying to her husband “you don’t attract me enough to either want to have your babies or to otherwise lay you”? Wouldn’t the solution to the problem be less liberalization of religious practices and more “MAP”?

This is an excellent start.

The wrong facts:

Your options are either to do some fancy bible study to find a way to approve what you want to do sexually, dump that particular aspect of religious belief (which is exactly what 98% of Catholics in America do on the birth control issue), or dump the religion completely.

The 98% statistic is wrong. It’s been debunked in so many places that I’m not even going to bother to dredge up a link (commenters feel free to jump in). Google it. Please either stop quoting it in your arguments or stop expecting me to take you seriously.

Jason has hit the nail on the head here. If the unnamed man’s wife was into him, she wouldn’t mind the possibility of having more of his babies – at least not this the level of irrationality that swears off sex altogether. In fact, if she was really into him, she’d want it.

Let’s take the woman at her word for a moment and assume that she truly is afraid of getting pregnant, and hence he gets no sex. This is  an irrational fear – there’s a reason I used that word before. Some actual facts:

• A woman can only get pregnant during a particular window of her menstrual cycle. Assuming worst case scenarios, this window is about one week out of four. The other three weeks of the cycle, her chances of becoming pregnant are statistically insignificant. Yes, it happens. But not to anybody you know [if you think it happened to somebody you know, it's almost certain that in reality there's some reason why it actually was during her ovulation window and they just didn't know it].
• Natural Family Planning is based upon using actual body symptoms to know when this window is, and it works. When used correctly it’s 99.86% effective.
• Natural Family Planning is approved by the Catholic Church.

The first response of many non-Catholics is going to be to deny that NFP is effective. This is neither objective nor evidence based nor correct.

Furthermore, Athol’s advice is exactly opposite of what this man should be doing. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that in the situation he’s in, if he follows Athol’s advice, his marriage is doomed. He might as well file divorce papers and give it up. Note: his marriage is already in pretty bad shape, and it may not be salvageable; but following this advice guarantees that it’s done.

Being the religious head of the household is an alpha trait.

Wait, let me repeat that again – it’s important.

Being the religious head of the household is an alpha trait.

It’s a very alpha trait. Athol lives this in his own way, though it may not be obvious. His atheism gives direction to his household. They may not be atheists themselves (I recall reading on his blog some time ago that Jennifer was still quite Christian), but I guarantee you that his atheism tempers their religion and keeps it from boiling over. I guarantee you that they respect his atheism for its honesty, and for the fact that he won’t cave on what he believes just to make them happy.

Why should his unknown e-mailer cave on his religion to make his wife happy? Especially since if she’s honestly not using birth control, it’s because she’s tacitly accepted Catholic dogma as well. Face it: if she wanted to get it, she could – with our without his knowledge or permission. Birth control is cheap, it’s readily available, and it’s easy to get privately. Planned Parenthood will discretely mail it to you for $25 a month, or you can drop by and pick it up in person – no insurance required, no paperwork for anybody else to ever see.

Disagreeing with the church as an outsider is fine. This is America, it’s your right. Disagreeing with the church honestly as an insider is… well, I won’t say “fine,” but it won’t kill your credibility with your spouse. But doing it when you honestly believe church doctrine just so that you can get laid? You’ve just destroyed your religious cred, and failed a major shit test at the same time. No, birth control is not always a shit test – but if the man in question caved for the reasons Athol’s giving him, it would be failing a shit test even if the birth control situation wasn’t originally a shit test at all.

Pick up artists can get away with encouraging women to be sinful. The man in question could probably have gotten away with it if he’d done it very early in their relationship. But now that he’s established himself as honestly against birth control, he can’t do this and get away with it. If he does, he concedes all of his status as religious head of the family. After all, what good is the religious head of the family if he’s caving on questions of morality. It’s not worth arguing about whether it is or isn’t a question of morality: they believe that it is, so caving on it will have this effect.

Yes, I know – it’s fair for people (men and women both) to not want more kids. But to be frank, children happen even when birth control is involved. Birth control is seldom perfectly used - actual use failure rates on The Pill are around 15-20%. 40% of all abortions are performed on women who were using birth control at the time they conceived. I personally know a woman who got pregnant while using The Pill and condoms.

What should the man in question do? He doesn’t have very many good options. If things have reached this point, his marriage is already in trouble. Even at the most sexless point in my marriage, Hermione still wanted to have my kids. Indeed, our first son was conceived at the tail end of the most sexless point in our marriage. Furthermore, the fact that things ever got to this point implies that he made a poor choice in partner to begin with. If she’s an honest believer and is really that upset about having more of his children, it’s seriously time to wonder if the existing kids are his. If I were him, I would be discretely getting paternity tests done.

First, he needs to work even harder at the MAP. Second, he needs to make a re-dedication to his religion (let’s assume that he honestly believes it; if he didn’t, he’d have already taken the easy path and gone with birth control) and make a show of it. After those steps are done – and only after those steps are done, he needs to double down on the no-birth control rule. If she continues to deny him sex, rather than getting upset he needs to treat her with contempt – more than a true neg, he needs to make it clear that he actually believes that she is taking advantage of his religious beliefs in order to deny her own husband sex. It’s a contemptible, despicable thing to do, and he should treat her appropriately. This will be far more effective if he can believably flirt (and no more) with women who are more attractive than her while in her presence.

If, at that point, the situation persists he needs to prepare himself for the fact that she is likely to initiate divorce on her own in the near future. Being Catholic, I don’t recommend that he initiates one or threatens her with one. But he should probably make initial contact with a lawyer, hide away a bit of money so that she can’t empty it from his bank accounts, and otherwise prepare for the coming storm. In 21st century America he can’t stop her if she decides to unilaterally divorce him, so he has to be prepared for it, Catholic or no.

Weekend Thoughts

A couple of thoughts for the weekend.

My wife had a one-on-one meeting with our priest this morning as part of our conversion to Catholicism. She came home and reported that he’d said the following (paraphrased):

You know, I’ve never had a woman come in here and tell me that she wants her husband to dominate her. But almost every single one has come in here and told me she wants her husband to lead. Sadly, the feminists in our church don’t seem to be able to understand the difference.

A few years ago I had a discussion with an old friend of mine. I’d known this guy since high school. He’s one of the two or three most natural alphas I’ve ever known, and he had quite the reputation in high school and afterward with the ladies. About four or five years ago, somewhat out of the blue (to me at least) he settled down and got married. Out of all the guys I know, he’s one that I think is actually fairly likely to stay married. He’s really settled down, for one. But he’s still got most of the alpha traits that probably attracted her in the first place. He relayed to me a conversation that he had with his minister (he’s protestant, but I don’t remember what denomination) during his premarital counseling. Again, this is paraphrased from memory.

My pastor told me to think of marriage like this. The wife gets one vote and the husband gets one vote plus a tie breaker. But the thing to remember is, the husband has a responsibility to use that vote only for what’s best for the family, not what’s best for himself.

Both thoughts are pretty much just traditionalist ways of explaining the captain and first officer model. Unfortunately, between declining church attendance and the feminization pussification of American churches, many Americans won’t even hear this message. Even more unfortunately, many of those who do hear it will dismiss it as old fashioned and out of touch.

On the other hand, Star Trek is such a huge part of our culture now that even non science fiction fans can relate to the metaphor. Just one more reason you should buy Athol’s book for all your married friends.

My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism – Conclusion and Summary

I haven’t really talked to my parents much about my conversion, but we had recently let them know that I will be baptized on Easter Sunday. My mother called me last Saturday and asked me why I’d picked the church we did. I told her it was a long answer. I’d have pointed her at this blog, except that I’ve made too many disparaging comments about my family here (one of the biggest reasons I post anonymously). I should’ve just told her that there was no way in hell I’d be caught dead at my brother’s church. It’s not really an explanation, but at least it’s true.

I was raised as a Methodist and found it to be nearly useless. Likewise, I found atheism and agnosticism to be unsatisfying.

I’ve come to believe over time that more defined religion is generally beneficial.

I believe Christianity to be both the most advanced and most beneficial major religion in the world today.

I have a lot of issues with some flavors of Christianity.

The Catholic church doesn’t suffer from most of these issues.

The Catholic church has other aspects that I see as good both for myself and for society.

I do still have issues with the church, and probably always will.

Nevertheless, I find it to be the best place to raise my children and strengthen my family against the storm of the modern world.

As I’ve noted elsewhere, in no way is this series an attempt to convert anybody. I’m not out to change anybody’s mind or win anybody’s approval. It is merely my story. Read it or don’t. Like it or don’t. Agree with it or don’t. Argue with it or don’t (I actually like those who do; reasoned argument is how I learn new things). It should be pretty clear by now that my conversion to Catholicism is largely for practical rather than theological reasons. Do I have huge amazing reservoirs of faith? No. I have issues with a lot of things. The Catholic God, though, will forgive me for that, even if He doesn’t approve. It is His nature.

The Whole Series

My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 1
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 2
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 3
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 4
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 5
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 6
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 7
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism – Conclusion and Summary

My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism – Part 7

Anybody still here? I think I heard an echo. Yes, this has gotten a bit long. I’m almost done, I promise.

The Catholic church is not perfect to my view. But then, nothing is. Our modern society has developed this ridiculous obsession with perfection. If things aren’t exactly perfect, we can’t take it. Car isn’t perfect? Trade it in before it’s paid off! House isn’t perfect? Trade up every few years as your income increases – it’s only resetting your 30 year mortgage. Marriage isn’t perfect? Try another one! Church isn’t perfect? Start another one across the street!

I can live with the imperfections of the Catholic church. But I still see some of them there.

The biggest blemish is that they haven’t handled the pedophilia scandals very well. Most of this is a PR issue, but there’s some validity to some of the criticisms laid before the church. The church is an institution of great power. They have a responsibility to take reasonable measures to ensure that children are safe. As a comparison, I’d look at the Boy Scouts. Another organization that was plagued by pedophilia scandals, the Boy Scouts responded quietly but rapidly and forcefully, and as a result you don’t hear much about it anymore except as off color jokes. Key policies that the Boy Scouts implemented include at least two adults present with any child at any time (if only one is there, that single adult can be accused, honestly or not, of suspect behavior), an extreme open door policy (parents being very welcome to see what’s going on at any time) and more. In short, they took it seriously and responded to the problem. Is it a perfect solution? No, it can’t be (see above). But they responded.

The Catholic church, on the other hand, has been slow to show that they take the problem seriously and it’s been a bit of a disaster.

Even the mighty Catholic church has allowed itself to be feminized, at least in the western world. Annulments are too easy to get. In the 1960s, there were about 300 annulments a year granted in the US. As of 1996, that had grown to over 60,000 a year. Many of those are from protestants converting to Catholicism (it’s easier to get your marriage recognized as invalid if you married outside the church), as I learned while going through RCIA and hearing deacons counseling divorced people on how to navigate the system. As somebody else noted (I think it was Dalrock, but I can’t find the post) churches love marriage more than they hate divorce. The Catholic church is better about it than most, but it’s not fully immune either.

I’m not a big fan of hulking bureaucracies. Not much for it, I just have to deal.

The rite of Confession will probably always be the most difficult practical part of being Catholic for me. Then again, it’s not meant to be easy.

I have problems with authority (unless I am the authority), and the Catholic church is very hierarchical and authority based. This will also be a struggle for me.

The emphasis that the church puts on humility and submission is very useful in some places. For example, it’s good at helping to keep a check on the very wealthy and powerful. But it’s also dangerous for people who are already poor and weak. Some percentage of those people need a little bit of confidence and self worth to move themselves up in the world, and such a powerful push for humility and submission can damage that. I don’t really have a solution to this issue, I just note it.

The Whole Series

My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 1
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 2
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 3
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 4
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 5
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 6
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 7
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism – Conclusion and Summary

My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism – Part 6

The Catholic church isn’t just able to bring good responses to some of my issues with Christianity. The church itself has a number of qualities that I find very valuable.

The Catholic church is highly resistant to change. It’s not that it doesn’t change. It just changes at a truly glacial pace. In my youth, I would have found this to be a bad thing. These days, I think it’s an extremely good thing. The church has a 2000 year history from which to understand that although technology changes, human nature doesn’t. People are still basically the same as they were a few thousand years ago. And every few generations we start to get some truly silly ideas in our head. Yes, I think ideas such as modern leftist feminism are significantly sillier than the idea that a Jew died on the cross for our sins and was resurrected 3 days later. Significantly. I believe that a good religion can provide a kind of inoculation against particularly harmful social ideas. A friend of mine called this the Snow Crash theory of religion after I explained it to him. After some thought I had to admit that he’s basically right, and that’s more or less where I even got the idea from. The story is kind of far fetched, and Neal Stephenson is a terrible writer. But I think the root concept of religion as a vaccine against true craziness has some real validity to it, and I think the Catholic church overall works better in that regard than just about any other religion due to various parts of its nature – due mostly to its slowness to change and the way it maintains rituals that have a powerful effect on the human psyche. Part of what I’m looking for, after all, is to inoculate my kids against our feminized society.

The Catholic church still has schools that are worth a damn. They may not be as good as I’d like (even they have been somewhat infected by the PC virus, banning physical punishment despite it being about the only thing that really works for boys) but they’re a lot better than the public schools. My wife and I aren’t quite ready to make the leap to home schooling if we can avoid it, but I’ll sell body parts before I let the public schools destroy my son the way they nearly did me. That is not an exaggeration. If the Catholic schools aren’t good enough, we’ll give home schooling a try. But we figure we’ll try them first. Oh, and our local Catholic school gives a pretty hefty discount to parish members. Multiply that by five kids planned for k-8, and it’s slightly fair to say that I’ve sold my soul for somewhere in the neighborhood of a quarter million dollars in today’s money and a far better youth and education for my children. My sister-in-law’s Catholic priest physics teacher uncle? He teaches at a (different) Catholic school, and he’s one of the best trained people I’ve ever met in classical philosophy and logic. Two thumbs way up. We’ve looked at the curriculum for the local school, too, and it’s significantly more advanced than what I did in the local public schools. This is a very big deal to me, and I think we’ve made a good choice for our children here. Most of all, the school is small enough that it’s unlikely to form the same kind of social cliques that were rampant in the public schools I attended. Other factors were very important, too, but this is probably the single biggest one that cemented me on the Catholics.

The Catholic church understands and emphasizes that it’s a human organization, and that it’s members and even its leaders are human beings who make mistakes. I believe that the scandals regarding pedophilia in the church have been blown a bit out of proportion by our sensationalist media. There’s nothing specific to the priesthood that encourages pedophilia. It is a position where a pedophile might actually have access to carry out his desires, so I’m not surprised that the very small percentage of our population with that problem is drawn there. The church’s reaction to it also is completely consistent with how the church treats priests who have committed other crimes. For one, the confidentiality of confession is absolute. Like it or not, that’s strictly necessary to make confession work. Take that away and it all breaks down. If a priest confesses pedophilia to another priest, that priest can’t report him. It’s against the vows. Second, the church has a longstanding policy of viewing all transgressions (even murder) as sins to be forgiven, perhaps with penance paid. Criminal punishment is left up to the secular governments. That’s basically the way the church works.

That said, I do think they could have handled the pedophilia issue better. One of the priests at our local church has suggested that the church should add windows to the confessional room so that parents can keep an eye inside. I agree with this proposal. It doesn’t breech confidentiality any more than one already can. All it lets you do is know who’s inside the confessional. You can tell that anyway if you just hang out outside and watch who goes in and out. But its existence would both reassure parents and force the small number of priests who are a problem to behave because they’re being watched.

I like the emphasis that the church places on the sanctity of both human life and human dignity. I agree with them on both counts. I’ve been somewhat wishy washy on the idea of abortion in the past, but I’ve pretty much come around to agree that it’s a terrible thing under pretty much any circumstances. I certainly believe that our current abortion numbers are a crime against humanity. There’s absolutely no good reason for a society as rich as ours to have a 30% abortion rate. Likewise, I believe that all human beings are worthy of a certain degree of dignity – and that in our modern world, it’s most often people robbing themselves of dignity, rather than others doing it. I’ve also come around to being completely against the death penalty. I’ve read too many stories of death row inmates being exonerated by modern forensic techniques (mostly DNA) both before and after their executions. The execution of even one innocent man is a tragedy beyond belief. I’m ashamed that I ever supported it.

I like that the priests who have talked before our RCIA classes have had the balls to stand up before a bunch of protestants and women and call divorce, abortion, adultery and premarital sex sinful. I like the shock on some of those women’s faces when they hear that stated so openly and plainly. Frankly, they need it.

I like the humility that the church essentially forces on its own leaders. It’s not perfect, but it places a good check on the very real power that they hold.

I like the church’s approach to charity. First, it simply does more charity than most protestant churches. Second, at least most of the time the charity is freely offered, rather than being contingent upon church attendance or converting to their own religion. Also, the charity isn’t dependent upon some church idea of who is worthy and who isn’t. It’s real charity, and I like that. I know there are exceptions to this (it’s a big, imperfect organization), but in general this is the case.

I like churches that look like churches, not shopping malls. The Catholics still do a pretty good job of this even with newer buildings. Many of their older buildings are simply breathtaking, even when they’re from a poorer parish.

In part 7 I’ll discuss some difficulties I still have with the church. Only time will tell if I’m ever able to move past them or not, but they’re not enough to keep me from signing on.

The Whole Series

My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 1
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 2
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 3
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 4
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 5
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 6
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 7
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism – Conclusion and Summary

My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism – Part 5

If you made it through the last installment, you’ll see that I have a pretty long list of issues with Christianity. But over time, I’ve come to realize something. Many of these issues aren’t actually issues with Christianity itself, but rather issues with protestantism.

I’m going to go through this in roughly the same order as the last post, so for some it might be helpful to pull them both up side by side.

Catholic dogma is that Jesus wasn’t just a man, but he was also a God. Also that he rose from the dead on the third day after his Crucifixion and ascended bodily into heaven after that. OK. I’ll admit it – I still have issues with that. But you know what? I can accept it, if not outright believe in it. As I said before, it’s a powerful story. I’m willing to just take it as a premise that can’t be proven and go from there. The only church that would call itself Christian that might not ask me to believe that is the Unitarian church, and that’s just kind of pointless. So OK, I’ll bite… but only if I can accept what follows.

As for the bible… the Catholic stance is that the bible is inerrant (without error), but only when it’s properly understood and interpreted by the church. Now, this may at first seem to open a can of worms of its own. But the church’s position basically is this: Jesus was part of an oral society. He taught orally. He instructed his apostles to teach orally. The scriptures of the New Testament were written down much after the fact in order to capture the oral Tradition of the church. The church itself has maintained that tradition, person to person, for 2000 years.

You know what? I can buy that. It matches with the known history of the documents we have today. Is the modern tradition of the church a perfect recreation of the traditions of 2000 years ago? I doubt it. It’s basically a 2000 year old game of telephone. I’m pretty sure that it’s not exactly what Jesus was teaching. I doubt the church would argue with that. They’d probably say that the teaching has evolved, guided by the Holy Spirit, to match the times. Fair enough, I can get behind that. I’m pretty solidly convinced that nobody else is going to be closer to what Jesus actually taught. This is where the idea that Catholics aren’t as big into the bible comes from. It’s not that they don’t honor it. They just claim that the bible captured church traditions rather than being the source of church traditions. Along these lines, they say that some parts of the bible were meant to be taken literally and some were meant to be metaphor, and the oral tradition of the church, handed down priest to priest for 2000 years tells us which was which. To me, this makes infinitely more sense than taking the bible literally. If you believe that the Holy Spirit really has guided the church, then this is pretty pure. Myself, I’m betting that the telephone game has distorted it somewhat… but I’m willing to live with that.

The Catholic church does not preach predestination and never really has. It’s a Protestant idea that came primarily from John Calvin. Free will is, in fact, very important to Catholic dogma in general. This is a big plus to me.

Likewise, the Catholic church doesn’t really have this idea of “being saved” simply by believing in Jesus. It’s not enough. You also have to make a true effort to live a good life, free from sin and doing good deeds. This is a very good social construct, as it encourages people to actually live their morality rather than skating by just because being a believer is good enough. Points here.

Even in the watered down form you find it in modern America, Catholicism asks something from its members. Catholicism doesn’t allow divorce (although I think it’s way too easy to get an annulment these days, especially in America… but it’s still better than the protestants). Catholicism expects you to confess your sins regularly, a painful but powerful act (and probably the single part of Catholicism that I’ll have the most trouble with). Catholicism expects you to do penance for those sins. Catholicism expects you to actually give up something for Lent, to contribute to charity, to show up to Mass regularly and on special holy days. Yes, there are lots of “bad Catholics” who don’t do these things. But the church still has the balls to stand up there and tell you that you should. It’s better than most. However, Catholicism also doesn’t ask so much of you that it’s absolutely draconian. None of this really will crush you.

The Catholic church has had its issues historically with science. Yes, we all remember Galileo. But it really shouldn’t have been a surprise to anybody that Pope Benedict recently called the conflict between creationism and evolution an absurdity. The modern church is very friendly to science, with one big caveat: science is there to tell us how the world works, religion is there to tell us how to make moral judgments about it. As a philosopher, I find this exactly right. Science is fantastic for finding out factual info. It provides no guidelines on its own for morality. My sister-in-law’s uncle (not my bitch sister-in-law, the other one) is a Catholic priest and a physics teacher. The church views these as compatible, and I approve.

The Catholic church is extremely consistent with its views. They’ve had 2000 years to practice and some of the biggest powerhouses in the history of philosophy to help them get it right. Most of the argument that people have with their views can fall into two categories: coming from a different set of first principles or letting their rationalization hamsters run loose because they don’t want to agree with the church. I doubt that there’s any other sizable organization on the planet that’s as consistent as the church. To be honest, I’m a little bit in awe of it, especially considering its raw size (there are over a billion Catholics in the world). Is it perfect? No. But it’s pretty good.

The Catholic church supports big families. If you’re going to claim birth control is a sin, you kind of have to. Works for us. I don’t think I really need to explain this one.

The Catholic church more than any except perhaps the Orthodox churches maintains a high degree of ritual in what it does. Excess ritual is often associated with paganism and cults, and for good reason. But the rituals capture us because they speak to something fundamental in the human psyche. Even if you believe that the Mass and the Eucharist are a bunch of hogwash, the rituals associated with them are pretty useful as a kind of meditation period – much like the rituals that Buddhist monks go through, only in larger groups. Indeed, all of the seven sacraments serve as pretty powerful rituals to accomplish specific purposes within the human psyche. Baptism as a ritual helps cement your status part of the tribe. Confirmation serves as a rite of passage (something our society is sorely lacking). Making marriage a sacramental ritual emphasizes the importance the church places on family. I find this extremely useful, even if a part of me does think it’s all a bit irrational.

Christianity itself could, to some degree, be called the biggest cult of personality of all time – if you consider the big man, JC himself, to be the alpha at the top. But he’s been elsewhere for about 2000 years, and in that time the church has become a large bureaucracy. I’m not overly fond of big bureaucracies… but they’re better than cults of personality. The church has a lot of rules in place specifically to prevent it from becoming too much of that. 2000 years of history will help you figure out that kind of thing.

The church doesn’t claim it’s getting “closer” to the original teachings of Christ. It claims they are the original teachings of Christ, and always have been. They certainly have a better claim to it than anybody else.

This installment has been a response to a bunch of negative ideas about Christianity. The next installment will focus more on positive traits of the church that I find very appealing.

The Whole Series

My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 1
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 2
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 3
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 4
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 5
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 6
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 7
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism – Conclusion and Summary

My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism – Part 4

Sometimes the things that may or may not be true are the things a man needs to believe in the most. That people are basically good; that honor, courage, and virtue mean everything; that power and money, money and power mean nothing; that good always triumphs over evil; and I want you to remember this, that love… true love never dies. You remember that, boy. You remember that. Doesn’t matter if it’s true or not. You see, a man should believe in those things, because those are the things worth believing in.

–Hub McCann, “Secondhand Lions”

In part 3 I mentioned that I believe Christianity can be objectively shown to be both better and more advanced than competing religions. Despite that, I still have issues with it.

I have no question that a man named Jesus (or, more accurately, the Hebrew equivalent) lived in the Holy Lands at some point during the reign of Augustus, gathered some disciples around him, and taught more or less as he’s represented in the Gospels. His crucifixion is probably the single most believable part of the story. Here comes this guy who at one and the same time is stirring up trouble against the local religious authorities and is spouting off a lot of stuff that sounds like it’s undermining the authority of the Roman overlords? Oh yeah, I’m sure they crucified that guy. OK, so there’s not a lot of corroborating historical evidence to back up a lot of the specifics. There’s not really much to go against it, either, so I don’t really see much of a reason to discount the basics of the biblical story.

Was he the son of God? Did he rise from the dead on the third day? I have trouble with those, I’ll admit. That may seem strange for someone who’s in the process of converting to Christianity. But the thing is, I’m not really sure it matters. It’s a powerful story even if it’s only metaphor – or even if it was made up after the fact by his disciples in an attempt to bolster their fledgling faith. As I’ve said already, a large part of my own journey to religion is practical. Some will find this offensive. Many will find it unconvincing. Others will scoff. I don’t really care. I’m not writing this to soothe your feelings. I’m not writing it to convince you. I’m sure as hell not writing it for your approval. It’s just my story as it is. I have difficulty with these elements, but I can live with them.

I have serious trouble believing that the bible is the literal word of God. Not to make to light a point of it… but if it’s the literal word of God, which version is the right one? And don’t hand me an English translation, because I’m not buying it. The original books of the bible were written in three different languages (Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek) at different times and places by different people. For some books of the bible, there are multiple versions in the original language. Which one should we use for the translation? Biblical scholars don’t always agree. The Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, and Protestant bibles don’t even have the same number of books.

I refuse to accept the idea of predestination. This isn’t just a selfish need to feel like I have some degree of control over my own life (I’ll admit to a little of that). Whether free will is real or not, I believe that we must act as if it is. If we stop acting as though we believe in free will, society fundamentally breaks down. This is one of the many cultural/religious issues that the Islamic Middle East faces that keeps it from rising above its current problems (I say that as an observation, not a moral judgment). If you don’t believe in free will, then you stop caring about the choices you make. Morality as we know it breaks down because nobody has any real responsibility for anything. I reject predestination completely, and everything that comes with it.

I outright reject any faith that preaches that God has already chosen who will be “saved” and who won’t. If God has preselected whom He’s given Grace to and whom He hasn’t, and everybody else is just fucked even if they try their best to live a good life and follow His teachings… well, that God’s an asshole, and He’s not worth of my belief or worship. And if that’s really how He is, then I’ll stand before Him on judgment day and tell Him to his face as He casts me into the fiery pits of hell. So be it.

I find no benefit in any religion that doesn’t ask something from its members. Modern protestantism, especially in America, is so pathetically lame. A quote from a friend’s Facebook page recently: ”For lent I’m going to give up self-loathing and being so hard on myself about everything.” Really? Wow, what a sacrifice. For those wondering, yes, it’s from a girl’s page. I say girl even though she’s in her 20s because… well, it should be obvious. Or as Dalrock has pointed out repeatedly, they can’t even condemn divorce anymore. Our churches have become so feminized and so overrun by the self-obsessed Baby Boomers that they’re mostly just intolerable. No wonder membership is declining.

I can’t join a faith that doesn’t have a basic respect for science. Yes, our society has swallowed a lot of pseudoscientific crap. But real science – the kind that, you know, follows the actual scientific method – has been the single greatest tool humanity has ever known for removing misery, poverty, starvation, and premature death. Sorry if this offends some of my readers (OK, I’m really not all that sorry), but the evidence for evolution is pretty overwhelming. Massively overwhelming. You’ve probably used a product within the last month that wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for our modern understanding of evolution. Evolution as a theory may have problems, but if it does, it’s the kind of problems that, say, cause the theory of Newtonian Gravity to get modified into General Relativity, not the kind of problems that cause it to go away altogether. Seriously, there’s very little in the world of science that’s as strongly supported as the basic tenants of evolution. Not that evolution has to be counter to faith at all, anyway. Replace the idea of “random change” in evolution with “change guided by the hand of God” and really, what’s the problem? Oh, right… the bible is literal truth. Yeah. Have fun with that.

It’s a lot to ask of a religion, but I’m much more comfortable something that’s internally consistent. Yes, with Christianity I’m being asked to accept a few things as basic premises that I have a bit of trouble with. But thanks to Gödel’s first incompleteness theorem (summed up for the lay person: any logical system that is internally consistent will always have premises that are unprovable but are nonetheless true within that system) we know that this is pretty unavoidable. I have little stomach for those who can’t be intellectually honest with themselves about where their theories and philosophies lead them.

I really have come to believe that elements of our culture and government have been deliberately designed to keep families small and help break them apart, and we’re looking for institutions that counter that. Specifically, my wife and I want a big family (not too huge, 4-5 kids; more on that in a separate post someday), so we want a community that’s supportive and understanding of that. In this day and age, anything more than 2 or 3 kids is kind of rare, and almost looked down upon. We also want a place that is very firm in supporting marriage – not divorce.

I have come to believe that rituals are an important part of culture and religion and that our society is seriously lacking in them. Yes, they’re completely irrational and don’t serve much of an objective purpose. But I believe that the human psyche needs them nonetheless.

I’m not at all interested in a cult of personality. An example? My idiot brother and his bitch tried to bail on my wedding reception in order to go to the going away party for the pastor of their church. A pastor who was run out of the church because his wife had committed suicide because he was cheating on her, and he had the balls to show up at church within weeks of her death with another woman. Oh, he’s a pretty alpha guy alright, I’ll admit that without having ever met him. Living proof of Roissy’s maxim that if you’re alpha enough you can get away with anything. But disgusting and repugnant. I’ll pass, thank you very much. An alpha minister is OK, I just expect him to be a moral and spiritual leader as part of it, not just a douchebag.

I have no patience for those who claim that they’re getting “closer to the original teachings of Christ.” Right. And how, exactly, do you know? Were you there? No, of course you weren’t. Your hamster is just spinning away to rationalize your own interpretation of Christ’s teachings. I even say this as one who’s been partially guilty of this in the past. Sure, we have some interesting historical documents that have turned up recently that give us a new perspective on the early church. There’s no reason whatsoever to believe that they’re any more authentic than the scriptures that have been passed down over the centuries. If anything, those who formalized the canon at the Council of Nicea were probably in a better position to decide that than we are today, given that they were much closer to the source and had access to a whole lot more documentation that has since been lost to us. Also, they were living in a Christian tradition that had had much less time to evolve. I doubt that they were perfect in their decisions, but I even more doubt that we’re going to be able to be more perfect 1700 years later.

In Part 5 I’ll explore how I believe Catholicism in particular has answers to most of these issues.

The Whole Series

My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 1
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 2
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 3
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 4
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 5
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 6
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 7
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism – Conclusion and Summary

Lent Update

As it happens, on day one (Wednesday), my wife was very sore from the gym and asked me if I could survive the first day. I figured sure – if I can’t make it one day, what’s the point?

Then she woke up in the middle of the night with a nasty stomach virus.

Needless to say, she wasn’t in the mood and I didn’t want what she had, either. So nothing there until she was feeling better on Friday night. Not the worst things could have been by any stretch, but I wasn’t expecting to face the trial right out of the gate, either. So be it, not a big deal.

Unfortunately, my wife’s PCOS is kicking up again. She hasn’t had a period in some time now, and along with that, her sex drive is dropping off to near nothing again. Thankfully, she’s been really great about it and letting me have what I need anyway since she got over the illness. But that’s another issue to deal with, and one reason we’re also targeting diet and exercise as part of our Lent this year.

Then tonight I came down with what she had anyway. I think I caught it from our son. He got it on Saturday and now I’ve got it. Seems to imply a two day incubation period. And anybody who has small children will tell you that they’re nasty and they spread germs like you wouldn’t believe. Tonight is proving to be very difficult, as the discomfort and urges are coming on top of feeling totally awful. And I haven’t even asked my wife for anything. I’m sure she’d find the idea revolting with me being this sick.

A quick note, however, to all the women out there who poke fun of male sexuality, think it’s funny to sexually tease men, just plain think it’s wrong how much men want sex, or preach the horrid evil of masturbation: you have obviously never experienced the testicular pain that can accompany pure abstention. I don’t know what percentage of men would experience it, much less those who would get it after a mere three days, but I’m certain I’m not the only one. Let me assure you that it is real, and that if I weren’t married or at least sexually active, I wouldn’t even be trying this.

I guess it’s obvious by now that my calling in life is NOT to be a priest.

My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism – Part 3

Some religions are better than others in objectively identifiable ways.

Some religions are more advanced than others in objectively measurable ways.

If you’re still here, then good. You haven’t let the multicultural PC crowd crush all of your capability for rational thought yet. If we’re willing to set aside our preconceptions and give it honest thought, a study of comparative religions will show us that we can compare religions objectively and conclude that in a very meaningful sense some are better than others. We can also say, in a very different meaningful sense that some are more advanced than others. These are separate methods of comparison, but both are useful and meaningful.

Before we delve too deeply into this, an important note has to be made. All of the world’s dominant religions have been around for a very long time. In the time that they’ve been around, they haven’t remained constant. At times they’re not even constant from place to place within the same time period (witness modern Christianity, which currently exists in dozens, if not hundreds, of different flavors). Therefore, at times we’ll have to be fairly specific about what flavor of a given religion we’re referring to at any point in the discussion. But even when the flavors differ (again, Christianity in the modern world is a good example) sometimes we can lump them together for the purposes of discussion because they share many of the same fundamental traits.

Also, although I’ll briefly mention some others, most of the discussion will follow the evolution of the religions of western civilization. The main reason for this is that the evolutionary chain of advancement is fairly clear. Eastern religions largely followed an entirely different path of evolution, which is interesting in its own right but will mostly just serve to clutter the discussion.

When I say that one religion is better than another I mean that it has measurably better results for society. We can measure in a lot of ways, but I like to use the following question. How well does a society that follows religion X fare at meeting the basic, necessary needs of its citizenry? This isn’t always straightforward to answer, but we can get a pretty good idea of it by looking at things like mortality rates, starvation rates and poverty rates. Notice that I’ve left off things like GDP, GNP and average income. Many religious people would argue that making us all wealthier doesn’t necessarily make us better off. From a religious point of view, I think this is fair. I do think, however, that having fewer people die and live in abject misery is an objectively good thing that almost all religious people would agree upon. Otherwise, what’s all that charity for? I’m also well aware that there are a lot of other factors that determine the success of a society. However, I believe that culture is a major one, and that religion is the largest component of culture.

When I say that one religion is more advanced than another, I mean that it’s introduced some novel concept. Not just a new flavor on something, like “Oh, we have a thunder god and a lightning god!” But a radical (at the time of introduction) new concept that fundamentally changed the way people thought about religion. As I’ll discuss in more detail later, a study of the history of religion reveals several massive leaps forward in religious understanding.

Now that we understand our terms, let’s look at the major religions of the world, both now and historically. Most modern hunter gatherer tribes still follow basically the “nature spirit” template of religion. Each animal has its spirit, each aspect of nature (wind, rain, lightning, etc) has a spirit, and so forth. This is not a very sophisticated religion at all. Most of us will be the most familiar with the native American flavors of this, but it essentially survives in other forms today. Shinto is a more modernized and advanced form of this as well. It’s not very advanced because it doesn’t offer us much in the way of new and original thought. By my measure, it’s not really a very good religion either, because it rarely brings groups much out of the hunter-gatherer stage, which is a pretty brutal stage of civilization. Nature spirit religions don’t really have a lot in the way of morality to offer, and what they do have basically boils down to, “don’t piss off the spirits because then they’ll deny you food, shelter, water, or clothing.”

Pantheistic paganism is the next evolution. Instead of a unique spirit for every aspect of nature, mankind has advanced to perceiving distinct “gods” that govern entire realms of responsibility. Instead of a spirit inside each animal, now we have a goddess of the hunt (Diana). Or instead of a spirit for each river and lake, now we have a generalized god of the sea (Poseidon). It is a bit more advanced, but not much. It shows a little bit more abstract reasoning. It’s also a little bit easier to organize. With fewer deities around, we can standardize our practice more easily around the few that are left. But it doesn’t really get us a lot more than that. Morality hasn’t advanced much. It can still be summed up as, “Don’t stand on the top of the mountain in a thunderstorm cursing Zeus.” It’s a bit more noticeably better than nature spirit religions, because this kind of religion brought forth almost every major ancient agricultural society. The human race survived better and flourished more under these systems than it had before them.

Judaism is where things start to get interesting. It is important to note, however, that Judaism did not just spring into being in full form. Over a period of about a thousand years it evolved from a cult of one specific god out of a pantheon into something much more advanced. Later, it retrofitted some of the advanced concepts of Christianity (at least into Jewish culture, if not directly into the religion). But let’s start with the ancient times first. Judaism began essentially as a cult of the god Yhwh. Take a close look at the ten commandments (some of the oldest written religious text around), particularly the first commandment.

I am the Lord your God, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery;  you shall have no other gods before me.

The second part of that was very important in ancient times. In its very oldest incarnation, Judaism didn’t deny the existence of other gods. It merely demanded that its adherents not worship other gods. In this sense, it wasn’t much different from the other religions of the time, instead being yet another case of, “Our god is better than your god.” But over time they made two fundamental and distinct breakthroughs that really set Judaism apart from the pantheistic pagan religions. First, and best known, it eventually made the switch to true monotheism, claiming that the Jewish God (now a proper noun) was the only God, creator of all things. Second, it made the leap to a non-anthropomorphic god. Despite the early verses of Genesis that tell us that God made man in his own image, Jewish tradition (going way back, but not quite to the beginning) is that God is an abstract being. God is everywhere, and in everything. He’s not contained in this or that statue, or this or that temple. We can’t draw make idols of him because it would be blasphemous to make idols of a being that has no physical form for us to see. He’s beyond our understanding. This is a really big leap in abstraction. On its own, it doesn’t necessarily make the religion better or worse than any other, but it’s clearly more advanced in terms of its thinking.

Was Judaism much better than pantheistic paganism? I would argue that it was, but only somewhat. Set aside the Roman Empire for the moment, which is more or less a historical anomaly. It’s also debatable as to whether the Empire increased or decreased human misery. The Romans themselves were obviously better off, but they rather clearly got that way by making everybody they conquered much worse off. Other than that one exception, the best that pantheistic paganism was able to consistently achieve in the western world was city-state level civilizations that occasionally progressed to smallish “empires” like the Macedonian empire or the Egyptian empire. Yes, I know the Macedonian empire at its peak was quite large geographically, but it didn’t hold together long enough to really matter. Judaism never got much beyond that point either. At its height, the ancient nation of Israel was still pretty small compared to anything else. But the Jewish religion does seem to have one very interesting factor that I believe makes it somewhat better than the pagan religions. Throughout the millennia since the ancient nation of Israel was finally conquered and dispersed, Jews have survived and even thrived as a subculture in almost every part of the western world, against almost all kinds of intolerance and persecution. At times, it’s enough to make one think that they really must be God’s chosen people to survive all of that.

However, around 2000 years ago Christianity took the human race on another religious quantum leap. Christianity is far more advanced than Judaism, in so many interesting ways that it’s hard to tell where to start.

The most radical concept at the time would have to be Christ’s so called 11th Commandment: “Love thy neighbor as thyself.” This was a massively revolutionary idea, and not just in terms of religion. It especially stands out if we place it in context of the time Jesus taught. The Hebrews of Palestine at the time were one of many peoples highly oppressed by the Roman Empire very near the peak of its power. Like many subjugated peoples, the Romans were basically squeezing every last bit of profit they could out of the province, completely uncaring of how it affected the native people. But even besides the Romans, it was a brutal world. People generally helped their families, and their close communities (say, the village they lived in). Beyond that, it was more or less a world of take what you can, when you can, and from whom you can. Then all of a sudden here comes this crazy man with a message of loving your neighbor and turning the other cheek. This was literally viewed as crazy talk by the people of the time.

Christianity also brought with it a level of morality that was slightly more advanced than, “Just make God happy, whatever he happens to ask for.” Christianity didn’t invent the idea of sin (a lot of fundamentalist Jewish cults of the day were preaching the idea), but the idea of forgiveness of sins for those who truly repented and made an honest effort not to do it again… that was pretty big, too. Christianity eventually brought another major evolution in morality, with the help of Plato and Aristotle. Note that every other religion we’ve discussed so far has made the point that being a moral person means doing what God (or the gods) say. OK, Christianity basically does this, too. But there’s a subtle distinction. In the older religions, it was right and moral because God said so. In Christianity, God said so because it was right and moral. In other words, Christianity evolved an idea that morality exists in the abstract whether or not God is there to teach it to us. This is an important distinction. The pantheistic view is one of the easiest ways to illustrate it. If being good is just doing whatever makes Zeus happy, well, what kind of morality is that? It really isn’t much of one. Why does Zeus get to decide what’s right and wrong? Because he’s the biggest badass? No, Christianity tells us. God gets to decide not because he’s the biggest badass (although he is, of course), but because he’s the wisest and has a clear view of what’s truly moral. To be sure, Christianity hasn’t always adopted this view. Also, it didn’t completely invent it on its own (as I mentioned, it had some help from the Hellenistic philosophers). But it’s a strong undercurrent throughout most of Christian doctrine, even when it’s not explicitly stated. Another point worth mentioning is that modern Judaism has reincorporated much of this concept from it’s child, and become a more advanced religion for it.

Christianity was the first major western religion that not only welcomed but openly recruited ethnic outsiders. To this day, it’s not exactly easy to convert to Judaism. It’s doable, but they make you work for it. Christianity changed that very early on, openly welcoming and recruiting non-Jews. This, also, is a bigger advancement than it may seem to modern eyes. Yes, Christianity, like all religions, represents some form of tribalism. You’re a part of our Christian tribe now, so you’re OK. But it’s tribalism at a much more abstract level. No longer is your “tribe” so dependent upon your ethnicity. Now your faith can determine it instead. We all know that this is imperfectly executed, but it’s a major advancement in ideas nonetheless.

Christianity, more than any other major world religion, has also proven very adaptable. To be sure, it has struggled somewhat in the modern era. But over the course of 2000 years, it has adapted to some amazing situations. You can see this almost right out of the gate. As someone familiar with classical history, to my eyes it is very rightly called the Roman Catholic Church. Confronted with competing religions, Christianity co-opted their celebrations, feast days, symbols, and even some ideas and made them its own. Again, its parent religion has done this as well to some degree – but nowhere near to the same extent.

Christianity is also the only modern major world religion that from the very beginning demanded strict monogamy. Judaism does now, but in its early days it was OK with polygamy. And yes, I know that there have been offshoots of Christianity that allowed polygamy. They have never been mainstream Christianity. (As an aside, I don’t consider Mormonism to be Christianity for a variety of reasons. I would considerate as separate and distinct from Christianity as Christianity is from Judaism.) Even tolerance of divorce is recent in terms of Christian history. I don’t think I need to explain to the manosphere that although this may be detrimental to a few individuals, it’s a huge bonus for society at large.

Is it better than other religions using the criteria I’ve outlined? I think the answer is somewhat mixed historically, but most of that mix depends on some specific flavorings of Christianity. The Middle Ages obviously were not the best times for human misery. But then, it was also a time when the church was extremely corrupt and materialistic. On the other hand, the modern western world was built on the shoulders of Christianity, and it’s unquestionably the golden age of human history as far as a time and place of low human misery.

Islam, frankly, is a step backwards in terms of how advanced it is. It’s much more similar to Judaism than it is to Christianity, despite accepting Christ as a prophet. It’s moral code is fairly modern (don’t laugh; compared to the Greeks and the Romans, it is fairly modern) and in keeping with the other religions of the book (up until their liberalization about a century or so ago), but it doesn’t really offer anything obviously new. Also, I’m not at all a fan of Islamic acceptance of polygamy. This is fundamentally not a good thing for society. Is Islam better than other religions? It did fairly well in the Middle Ages, but the Islamic world has been in decline ever since. The biggest issue that Islam suffers from is its lack of adaptability. It did well at the right time and place, but it can’t adapt to a changing world.

This post is already running really long, so I’m going to go ahead and wrap it up rather than delving deeper. But the short version is this: I believe that Christianity (or at least flavors of it) is both the most advanced religion that the world has seen to date and also the best religion the world has seen to date, in terms of how that religion benefits society. Part 4 will delve more into Christianity and some problems I have with it and/or various flavors of it.

The Whole Series

My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 1
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 2
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 3
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 4
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 5
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 6
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism Part 7
My Long and Winding Road to Catholicism – Conclusion and Summary

Rite of Election

One of the things about the Catholic church that I like is its heavy use of ritual. It’s ridiculed a lot for that, especially from protestants (who despite their ridicule, and largely dropping the rituals originally, are now adding them back) and by SWPL types who mock the irrationality of it all. Yes, it’s irrational. So are human beings. Our psyches have a deep rooted need for ritual, and modern society is sorely lacking in them.

One part of the process of converting to Catholicism (or going through confirmation if you were born Catholic) is called the Rite of Election. Basically, you go to a ceremony in front of the local Bishop that’s almost but not quite like Mass (there is no communion, for example) and everybody who is going to be baptized and/or confirmed formally goes up and adds their names to the book, which is then presented to the Bishop, etc. Very Roman, very Catholic, very ritualistic.

Typically it’s done on the first weekend of Lent, so we had it done for us yesterday. And here I go, walking up in front of everybody. I get to the baptismal font, dip my fingers in the water, do the cross sign, and turn to shake hands with the Bishop.

That’s when I realized my fly was down.

Thankfully, my shirt had it concealed. I shook his hand and smiled, made my mark in the book, turned and walked back to my seat and sat down. After the whole ceremony was done I managed to find a clear spot in the hall and quickly zip it up, with nobody the wiser. Even my wife wouldn’t have noticed if I hadn’t told her later.

The moral? Sometimes the right solution is just to play it off like nothing whatsoever is wrong. Oh, and shaking the bishops hand with your fly down is both very amusing and very embarrassing.