Fr. Thomas M. Pastorius
May 22, 2016
Spiritual Ponderings
Wisdom of Fulton Sheen
 
“If you don't behave as you believe, you will end by believing as you behave.” -  Fulton J. Sheen.  The wisdom of Archbishop Fulton Sheen has always impressed me.  He had a way of explaining things about religion and the modern world that made me think about the world and faith in new ways.  The following quotes continue to be from his book: Thoughts for Daily Living and are in bold.  My commentary will once again be in normal font.
 
We are living in what might be called a Period of Drive.  The snow piles in drifts according to the variations of the winds.  So, too, in certain moments of history minds are driven by every wind of doctrine and theory imaginable, lacking all standards by which to judge and evaluate what is happening to them.
                The thing that scares me the most about modern society is that we are losing the ability to have a philosophical argument – an argument that is guided and governed by the rules of reason.  What has been taken for granted for so long like the bodily differences between the sexes are being dismissed in favor of thoughts and feelings that cannot be grounded in reality. 
                At one moment people are amazed at the complexity and structure of the universe and in the next or very same moment the same people are declaring that there is no order at all to the universe.  A drunk driver can be convicted of killing two people if he causes a crash in which a mother and her unborn child are killed even if the mother was on her way to an abortion clinic.  A school nurse cannot give Tylenol to a child without parent’s permission but a child can go and have an abortion without parental consent.  Instead of trying to figure out what is right.  People are striving to do what they want and then finding ways to justify it to themselves.
 
                The great difference between a Christian or moral civilization and our post-Christian civilization is this: The former regarded the world as a scaffolding up through which souls climbed to the Kingdom of Heaven.  When the last soul shall have climbed up through it, the scaffolding will be torn down and burned with feverent fire, not because it is base, but simply because it had done its work—it has brought us back again to God.  This meant that there was always a set of values and a cargo of judgments by which the actions of the political and economic and social world could be judged at any one moment.  These measurements were distance from the world in which we moved, just as the tape-measure is apart for the cloth.  One knew whether or not he was making progress because there was always a fixed point of arrival.
                Another big problem in the world today is that so few people think heaven exists.  When talking to people about heaven, it becomes a place where they earthly desires are fulfilled and not the home of God.  I am convince that there are many people in life who are going to be invited into heaven, walk-in and get upset with God because an end table is not where they think it should be and they are going to demand that God move it and God instead is going to tell them to go to hell because it is house.  Others will find themselves in hell because they will choose to go there if they think they can find fulfillment.  Catholics we train ourselves (or reorient)to learn to love the things of heaven like peace, forgiveness, hope, love, joy, etc. 
 
In our contemporary civilization, there are no fixed points.  We keep changing them and calling them progress.  It is like playing basketball with a changing target; the point of the game at one moment is shooting the ball through the hoop, the next minute it is to hit the referee; the next moment it is to hit a movable basket which changes is location like a mechanical rabbit at a dog track.  Nobody seems to be sure about the purpose of life hence many become discouraged about living any trip loses its zest unless there is a destination.
                If anyone can decide what is right or wrong or what is the purpose of life then life will never be enjoyable because people will always move the goal posts on us.  Rules help us enjoy the game as they direct us to develop different skill levels.  
 
                To get out of the mess the world is in, the man has to realize three things (1) He was not made for drifting, but for self-perfection and happiness. (2)This happiness can be thwarted freely by consenting to imperfection, to evil, and to sin. (3) but even when we consent to evil, there is still a way out and that is by having recourse to the Divine.  This is sanctity, not politics.