HEY YOU CATS, WHAZZZZZUP WIT YOUCAT ?

I. One of numerous disasters coming with the wake of Vatican II was that cornball attempt to get hip with the kidz. Everything from cartoon Jesus to children gathering around the altar at Mass, from Jesus Christ Superstar performed at school plays to the kindergarten krap of felt banners, right down to the utter embarrassment of acoustic guitar singing circles: "One bread, one body..." (shudder). Now I'm certainly not going to lay entire blame on this kitsch for my abandoning the Faith as a young lad. Nevertheless, upon reflection, the only effect all this had was to make me recoil from any kind of religiosity. Catholicism and cheese don't mix. Teenagers, even younger kids, know this by natural instinct, at least based upon my observation and "life experience" (wince). If today they mock or laugh at some hokey piece of Crayola "Catholic" artwork, I'd gleefully join in on the fun. If they are averse from going to Mass because holding hands during the Our Father makes them feel awkward or stupid, I fully understand this aversion. Who can blame them? They're absolutely correct.

 

II. When considering the past, I frequently wonder that, had good catechesis been my experience, instead of being a "participant" in those dreadful classes on "World Religions", or if I'd known a traditional and - yes - tough priest to look up to and model myself after, I might not had turned out to be a self-absorbed-know-it-all teenager (as a child, TH2 was naive and impressionable to a degree more than most, a mind easily moulded). At age 15, would have I've intentionally gotten bombed by drinking a mickey of lemon gin at that field party? Still remember that evening. A cool and clear night in - probably - October. Stars clearly visible in the sky, the fire we made, Rush's Permanent Waves on the boom box, the billowing clouds of cigarette smoke, the vomiting, and that cute rocker chick who not so affectionately called me a "tool". Somebody phoned the cops and we scattered, myself hightailing it into a ravine. Never told the parents about that one. So, you younger Catholics, take it from this Gen-X punk who was subjected to the comfy chair Inquisition imposed by the Nu-Church hipsters: Stay out of trouble!

 

III. It is in the context of the aforementioned that this blogger deems the whole YOUCAT endeavour to be an exercise in futility. That is, making Catholicism "relevant" to the younger crowd. Evidently, YOUCAT is supposed to be some modishly slick sounding acronym, short for YOUth CATechism. Sounds silly to me. Just the self-centralizing acronym itself is a giveaway, i.e. Catholicism tailored for "YOU". Even the promotional video is off-putting. The syrupy music isn't working either, though this repellent reaction may be due my preference for progressive rock. And why does the book cover have to be a gaudy yellow colour? Is that supposed to add some kind of pizazz? Why not good and reliable black or dark red? YOUCAT even cites Kierkegaard. Listen, the Dane was an mesmerizing existentialist, but let's face it, he was no fan of natural theology. Let the young people ponder Sickness Unto Death on their own time, or in a philosophy course, or whatever. Stick with the essentials. It is a catechism, yes? Why all the flash?

 

IV. Unsurprisingly, earlier this year problems were discovered in YOUCAT's commentaries on contraception.[1] In response to that controversy, and other apparent problems, a protest group has arisen, with its own website, petitioning for a YOUCAT recall. Content at that website also includes a series of objections, "compiled through the cooperative efforts of more than twenty-five Catholic theologians, scholars, clergy, seminary instructors, and lay Catholics involved in various Catholic apostolates". These compilers wish to remain anonymous, "fearing to be dismissed from their posts".

 

V. At this point in the post the reader is probably thinking the remainder will be a critical analysis of YOUCAT. Nope. Let's do a 180. Here we focus on the Recall because a howler occurs in a discussion from one of its objections. There are a total of six, and the commentaries do seem more or less adequate, except for one assertion made in Objection No. 4, relating to the Creation account in Genesis 1. It reads:

Objection #4. YOUCAT Places greater weight on modern scientific speculation than on the Church Fathers’ unanimous interpretations of the first chapters of Genesis.

Then we find these critical remarks:

...a note in the margin of page 37 [of YOUCAT] defines "creationism" as "the idea that God himself by his direct action created the world all at once, as if the book of Genesis were an eyewitness account." But the authors of YOUCAT do not tell their young readers that virtually all of the Fathers and Doctors of the Church took this "naïve" view, including the greatest Doctors of the Church, men like St. Basil the Great, St. John Chrysostom, and St. Ambrose.

This is followed by a quote from St. John Chrysostom (Homilies on Genesis, 2:2), who also "expressed the common view of all of the Fathers and Doctors". The issue is not with Chrysostom's exegetical extract as such. Rather, it relates to evident ignorance or, at minimum, a misunderstanding of the recent history of Catholic exegesis on the part of the petitioners.

VI. True, "naive" is an inaccurate descriptor of exegeses done by the Church Fathers/Doctors, as it is argued. Yet the petitioners still give an impression that the Fathers/Doctors subscribed to Creationism, which they did not, since that term more properly belongs Protestantism, as in the works of James Ussher (1581-1656) or John Lightfoot (1602-1675). The accurate and correct word to use here is Concordism, meaning the reading of some scientific cosmogenesis into Genesis 1, i.e. introducing science, however indirectly, when explaining the biblical account of Creation. Why Concordism is a fallacy is clear enough: the Bible does not teach science. It is not a textbook, in a astronomical or biogeophysical sense, on how all that is came to be. Thing is, Concordism was an error persistent from the beginning, if you'll excuse the pun. Circa 1900, prominent exegetes Fr. Franz von Hummelauer and Fr. Marie-Joseph Lagrange made a shocking admission: the previous 1800 years of Catholic exegesis on Creation in Genesis 1 was not credible, unpersuasive. Why? Concordism. Fr. Stanley Jaki explained further:

Concordism kept a hold on the minds of most Catholic theologians and in fact became a quasi-official position in Catholic seminaries. Concordism, which produced an immense literature, fell merely into official disfavor with the publication November 18, 1893, of Leo XIII's Encyclical Providentissimus Deus on the interpretation of the Scriptures. The Pope emphasized that the inspired authors did not mean to teach about the workings of nature... the subsequent grappling of theologians and exegetes with this task did not improve a bit on the dismal picture that had emerged from their previous efforts.[2]

Fr. Hummelauer, a Jesuit incidentally, helped Pope Leo XIII draft that encyclical. Not only SS. Basil, Ambrose and Chrysostom, but also SS. Augustine and Aquinas[3] were derelict in that they proposed scientific parallels, however circuitous, with the Creation account.

VII. Fr. Jaki, in my opinion one the greatest thinkers of the twentieth century, tells of the proper context to which Genesis 1 must be considered:

The unusually systematic character of Genesis 1 should suggest that it contains a literary device to make very explicitly the message about the total dependence of all on God. Written as Genesis 1 was in such a way as to instruct and enlighten the uneducated, that device had to such as to be instinctively grasped by them [the Hebrews]... Contrary to preconceived notions about the irremediable primitiveness of the biblical world view, it has one major advantage over all those scientific world views.[...and it is here where the Recall people should take note] It represents an all which has a dynamic character, or an all that is not at the mercy of the fallible character of precise confines, however sophisticated. For that world view is anchored in an elemental conviction about the all which rests on God's omnipotence. Such an all is presented to man not so much as a unit to be circumnavigated easily by the mind's eye but rather as a horizon that challenges the mind to see beyond the apparent boundaries and forces him to pursue it as it keeps escaping his grasp for one reason or another. At the same time it also assures the mind that the all is never lost while one constantly loses hold of its actual confines.[4]

So it seems that a correction or clarification is in order. Beforehand, however, this writer highly advises the compilers of the YOUCAT objections to first read Fr. Jaki's Genesis 1 Through the Ages.

NOTES / REFERENCES

1. See various reports: D. Kerr, "World Youth Day catechism suggests endorsement of 'contraceptive methods'", Catholic News Agency, April 11, 2011; J.H. Westen, "Italian version of official World Youth Day Catechism errs on contraception: report", LifeSite News, April 11, 2011; M.A. Kreitzer, "Catholics demand recall of Youth Catechism", Spero News, August 15, 2011.

2. S.L. Jaki, Genesis 1 Through the Ages (London: Thomas More Press, 1992), p. 238.

3. Cf. ibid., p. 242. See also Sum. theol., i, qq. 65-74, passim.

4. Ibid. pp. 63, 285. See also Fr. Jaki's analysis in his Angels, Apes and Men (Peru, IL: Sherwood Sugden & Company, 1990), pp. 199-203. Originally published in 1984.

HEY YOU CATS, WHAZZZZZUP WIT YOUCAT ?