I sometimes remark to people that I think I might be called to the Catholic priesthood or that if I were to be blessed with a wife that I would love to have six to eight children. These two things are sure to elicit pause, shock, a gaping-mouth, snickers, or a combination of all these things. Within the reactions to both these things I think we can see several very deadly symptoms within our culture. In no way am I blaming friends who might exhibit such reactions; I do myself. But, nevertheless, they are symptoms of certain negative attitudes we hold.
The reaction to talk of the priesthood often occurs in this manner: "Don't go into the priesthood, you are too good for it." The assumption is that my time and energy would be better spent pursuing other avenues. Religion is okay on Sunday but to make it your life is a bit too much according to this view. Possibly those who react in this manner don't understand how faith would explain this choice to me. When a young man chooses to enter the priesthood, he is not simply choosing another career path; rather his choice is an answer to a call. He believes that God has called him to the priesthood through the Church. To deny this call would be to deny the will of God.
But this reaction has something deeper and more sinister at its core. Within this reaction is the effect of the Western World's reaction against religion in a vehement secularism. Religion is something fine and noble on Sunday morning. If it happens to move into the rest of the week, it has broken through the little box in which we desire to keep it; it has become something public. A man of the cloth is a very public representation of religion. He cannot simply be religious on Sunday but is called to live it in a very public manner, dedicating his life to his faith. Whereas Thomas can safely return to the 'real' world on Monday, going back to his nine to five job and keeping religion in its proper place, Reverend Jim's 'job' or rather vocation consists precisely in publicly living his faith.
At the same time those who react to mention of the priesthood find something totally foreign about vowing to remain celibate for life. The truth is there is something totally scandalous about this proposition but it has nothing to do with giving up sex. Rather it has something to do with forsaking the great good of marriage. People fail to see this; rather they wonder how a man could give up sex for his whole life. Here one sees sex made into an essential need and good of man. With sex posited as an end of life, giving it up seems totally antithetical to living the good life. This reveals the tawdry nature of our culture, placing a misconceived notion of sex at an all too an important level, and thus being unable to reconcile a sacrifice of it.
The second reaction, the one elicited by saying I desire a large family, likely arises from the same sort of core. This reaction can be described as the anti-natal nature of our culture. Children have become things to be had, like a nice new shiny car or a new house. Our own terminology belies this fact; we say that we want to have a child or want so many children. After they are born, they are programmed into our lives and often as easily programmed out as we shuttle them to day-care (we, ourselves, are products of this as well) and sit them in front of the television to vegetate and stay out of our hair. Opposed to this is the notion that children are gifts, to be accepted as the beautiful fruits of love, and to be treated as such. Rather than scheduling them around our careers and desires, in this view, careers and desires are sacrificed around their needs.
Human beings are exactly that, beings, not things. They have a certain irreducible dignity. Children, the most helpless of us, then need to be safeguarded against being conceived as things. When viewed as expensive toys to be obtained when so desired, they are opened up to serious abuse and we are opened to the serious problem of an anti-natal culture. It is a culture to which our education leads us easily. Rightly, we are taught to aim high. We are being trained to be the elite in whatever fields we happen to enter. To choose otherwise, to choose to be first a mother or a father, or God-forbid a homemaker, is considered weak and lacking in value. Like the choice of religious life, young men and especially young women who elect to put careers on hold or to take less prestigious jobs in order to be with family are considered to be squandering opportunities, to be wasting potential. And here lies the heart of the problem. How can we fail to be an anti-natal society or even an anti-religious society when such noble choices are scoffed at and ridiculed? When we fail to see the virtue in sacrificing dreams and goals for the beautiful and good, we shut down the spiritual and transcendent side of our nature and devolve into self-centeredness.
