tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4213316015209503694.post8017744762339322206..comments2024-01-22T01:52:37.473-06:00Comments on RENEGADE TRADS: A Three-Point PlanA Sinnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05083094677310915678noreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4213316015209503694.post-48628286263853351322010-04-02T17:26:49.904-05:002010-04-02T17:26:49.904-05:00I agree, using sports as a litmus test isnt going ...I agree, using sports as a litmus test isnt going to get you anywhere.<br /><br />Usually a sports-team has one leader (the Captain or whatever) and all the other guys are betas following him. That's sort of the whole point. They may still be masculine, but they aren't leaders.<br /><br />We're not getting many "Captains" in the seminaries, that's for sure. We're getting a lot of cronies.<br /><br />Furthermore, trying to "man up" the priesthood by concentrating on all sorts of external stereotypes shows an utter lack of understanding of masculinity and manhood, I would agree. <br /><br />In cases like that, it's almost like someone with a fetish for jocks is directing the whole thing...<br /><br />It's all very disturbing.A Sinnerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05083094677310915678noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4213316015209503694.post-89362790147854284132010-04-02T17:14:14.758-05:002010-04-02T17:14:14.758-05:00re: 'alpha males': I have this suspicion t...re: 'alpha males': I have this suspicion that "manly priest" is seminary-code for "no homo". I used to hang out with seminarians. They were real boneheads, but were very interested in sports. I don't play a mean game of b-ball because I'm vertically and horizontally challenged, but I do my best. But I played along with them. Seems though that the seminary selected men who were physically adept but intellectually vacuous.<br /><br />Sometimes I'll come across articles in conservative Catholic papers that make seminarians out to be All-American quarterbacks. This is laughable, as anyone who has experience with real seminarians knows. Still, why do people nurse this ridiculous idea that sports=manly=heterosexual? This strange prejudice needs to be set right, or else people are going to be very disappointed in their "reform" of the seminaries.sortacatholicnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4213316015209503694.post-13134505480452567512010-04-02T16:31:21.436-05:002010-04-02T16:31:21.436-05:00I've come more or less to this "localized...I've come more or less to this "localized" view in an odd way. I grew up (in a fallen away "Catholic" family) hearing about how miracles were these bizarre happenings, and for a long time that was the idea I had of them (even when I had fallen away myself). But over the course of these past 3 years, since my reconversion, I've com eto believe that the biggest miracles, perhaps are very trivial, commonplace things. Not that I'm taking anything away from Fatima-type miracles, but I believe we witness the most extraordinary miracles each and every day and we pay no heed to them, either because they happen right in front of us with regularity, or because we ascribe them to ourselves. I think I'll stick to a comment I made in one of my first posts on my blog: God is manifest in the small things.Marco da Vinhahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06092410765851812842noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4213316015209503694.post-82856439842901074122010-04-02T16:26:06.870-05:002010-04-02T16:26:06.870-05:00I'd tend to agree. More and more I'm feeli...I'd tend to agree. More and more I'm feeling like, however I end up serving the Church, it will be locally, in my stomping grounds, among "my people" as it were. The missionary calling is very particular, and not everyone has it. The detachment from family, old friends, and outside social networks is one of the huge problems I see in the secular clergy that I've discussed here before.A Sinnerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05083094677310915678noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4213316015209503694.post-62628488920696750212010-04-02T15:56:54.891-05:002010-04-02T15:56:54.891-05:00Vocation semminars and the such just seem ridiculo...Vocation semminars and the such just seem ridiculous to me. To think that it's something "marketable", that if you present it in just the right light that people will want it just goes to show how much the predominent American consumerist mindset has infected the Western world (if not all the world).<br />I was talking about this the other day with a friend, and I believe that vocations are quite a natural (read: normal) thing considered that the person grows up in an environment/community where their faith is practiced. If one is a man, and was brought up in the Faith since a child, and has served as altar boy or whathaveyou, and is used to a priest being part of the local diocesan life, would it not be natural for him to one day discover a calling if he indeed had a certain zeal for the Lord? And I don't mean just with priests, I refer to religious as well. I think that (and again, this is just me theorizing all the way, so take it for what it's worth), contrary to what happens nowadays, where you have people going halfway across the globe if need be to answer a religious call (looking for just the right fit), in a "healthier" environment people with a calling would tend to seek the religious orders they'd have contact with locally (be they active or contemplative).<br /><br />Anyway, just my 2 cents.Marco da Vinhahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06092410765851812842noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4213316015209503694.post-58387966903900872982010-04-02T11:00:38.046-05:002010-04-02T11:00:38.046-05:00I think what the author was trying to get at was s...I think what the author was trying to get at was simply the idea of Clericalism. Ordination effects a change in terms of ministerial powers and role, but not human nature, if you see what I mean.<br /><br />Permanent deacons (who also receive a character) seem to "get" this...but priests in seminary are still inculcated with these arrogant ideas that put them on a separate plane of existence from other people even outside their ministerial functions.<br /><br />It goes to some of their heads (as a crutch for already low self-esteem, very often) and this is a huge problem. It becomes an all-encompassing Identity.<br /><br />And unfortunately this "identity politics" of priest "set apart" or "different" from the laity even outside specific priestly duties...is being, if anything, MORE zealously emphasized by the conservative young hot-heads going into the priesthood these days. <br /><br />And this is unfortunately being used by recruiters in all the immature fantasy Ad Campaigns for vocations where the priest is portrayed basically like some sort of Super-Hero, or Secret Agent, or Neo from the Matrix! It's very disturbing to see something like:<br />http://www.danperlman.net/priest.jpg<br /><br />And the adulation and deference they receive from obsequious laity does nothing to help.<br /><br />This elitism that develops is the problem. Clericalism is the scourge.A Sinnerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05083094677310915678noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4213316015209503694.post-27168106789635568762010-04-02T10:34:49.828-05:002010-04-02T10:34:49.828-05:00"put an end to the equally fatal notion that ..."put an end to the equally fatal notion that ordination effects a great change in the relationship of a priest to the rest of the human race."<br /><br />STFU. Ordination does effect a great change in the relationship of a priest to the rest of humanity, fool!<br /><br />Mr.T as bishop!<br /><br />He'll lay the smack-down.Tonynoreply@blogger.com