This week I have something a little different for you. I have been thinking about the visible/invisible Church controversy. What? You’ve never heard of the visible/invisible Church controversy? It’s an old Reformation canard. The visible Church is full of popes, bishops, clergy and other sinners. God puts up with it. The invisible Church is the true Church. It is holy and good and full of sweetness, light and saints. 

All true Christians, no matter what interesting denomination they inhabit, are united in this true, invisible Church. Catholics believe that this is pretty much hooey. It is for sinners like me that the Lord died and rose. 

The Church is the body of Christ. Bodies are visible. Sacraments are visible. Large people like myself are visible. An invisible body is not a real body and an invisible Church is not a real Church. Until the 1960's, the Church was plenty visible. One would see habited nuns walking two by two making some people nervous. It was common to see priests out in Roman collars, doing things like riding buses. (Little known fact: priests were not allowed to own cars for the first five years of their priesthood! They walked, rode public transportation, or mooched rides from parishioners. Even then, if a woman was in the front seat of the car, father rode in the back seat, or vice versa!)  Priests would even be seen publicly wearing cassocks, and, heaven forfend, strange hats!) We were visible to the point of embarrassing. 

Catholic families were just as obvious. You could go into any  restaurant on Friday and there, huddled in the corner at the extra large table, might be a family of 8 or 9, eating cheap breaded fish sticks or meatless spaghetti and making the Sign of the Cross. Catholics could always be spotted in public by scapulars, holy medals and odd gestures, such as grace before meals, even in public eateries, or bowing their heads at the name of Jesus. If you had a foreman at work who cursed a lot, you could actually get a stiff neck. I had one such foreman. The men tipped their hats as they passed in front of a church. Women would rummage in purses for tissue paper to cover their heads before dropping into the nearby parish. Catholics had too many children, were always fasting at odd times, bowing, wearing strange jewelry. They were just plain odd. 

Then came the glorious sixties which improved our lives so dramatically. The sixties gave us color television,  recreational pharmaceuticals and the “glorious golden pill” as the Singing Nun called it. (See my last article.) Everything was recreational. The gangs, drug cartels, incurable STD’s, skyrocketing divorce and nuclear terrorism came later. But the sixties were glorious. Everything was going to get better. Priests, nuns and the rank and file decided that in the “Spirit of Vatican II” (whatever that was) we could now blend in. Nuns doffed their habits in favor of floral print blouses and Moe Howard hair cuts. Many is the time I have heard someone gasp, “You mean she’s a nun!?!

We priests were not nearly as successful at blending in. We would tell people, “Oh you don’t have to call me ‘father.’ Just call me Fred. (or whatever),” and we got rid of our Roman collars in favor of polyester knit shirts, but you can always tell a priest. He may have on some “normal” shirt but he has black shoes, socks, and pants. He has no wife to tell him, “You’re not going out dressed like that!”  And the laity followed our lead. They stopped being publicly Catholic. The campaign was wonderfully successful. Catholics now divorce, have abortions, commit adultery, lie, cheat, steal and run for political office at the same rate as non-Catholics. 

Maybe I am being a little negative. I remember once quoting a statistic that only 26% of Catholics believe in the Real Presence of our Lord in the Eucharist.. Someone corrected me saying, “Oh no, Father 100% of Catholics believe in the Real Presence.” What he meant is that if you don’t believe in it then you are not quite Catholic.  All Catholics believe in the Real Presence, about three quarters of those who think they are Catholic are in fact not as Catholic as they think! 

Fear not! The Rev. Know it all is here to help. I have devised the Catholic quiz. This quiz will not tell you if you are going to heaven or hell. It will not tell you if you are in a state of grace. Only God and a good examination of conscience can do that. It is just designed to help you ask yourself if you are living the Catholic way of life publicly, the only way it can be lived. 

1) I go to Mass

1. everyday 
2. every Sunday 
3. once a month 
4. once a year 
5. when my wife makes me or the kids have some part in a play or something like that, and then only if I don’t have to wear a tie. 

 2) I receive Holy Communion

1. daily 
2. weekly 
3. monthly 
4. annually 
5. when lemmings migrate 

3) I go to Confession, (or Penance, or Reconciliation or whatever we’re calling it these days.)

1. weekly 
2. monthly 
3. annually 
4. When the doctor says he needs to see me fast and I should pay up  my medical bills as soon as possible 

4) I use artificial contraception

1. never 
2. not any more 
3. mind your own business 

5) I refrain form sexual activity outside the confines of a sacramental marriage.

1. always 
2. usually 
3. You’ll be hearing from my lawyer 

6) I abstain from meat or perform some other penance on Friday.

1.  always 
2.  I thought we didn’t have to do that any more 

 7) I pray with my spouse and or children.

1.   daily 
2.   What? That’s just embarrassing. 

 8) I pray privately.

1.   daily 
2.   occasionally 
3.   When the car brakes have failed on a hill or there is a lot of turbulence on the flight. 

 9) I read the Bible and other spiritual reading such as the lives and writings of the saints and study the Catechism.

1.  daily 
2.  weekly 
3.  when I am stranded on a desert Island and there is nothing else to read. 

 10) I give to the poor and help support the work of the church.

1.  regularly 
2.  when I win big at the track or need a tax deduction. 

 11) I volunteer to serve the poor and help at church.

1. regularly 
2. When my kid has some stupid service project and my spouse has to work and can’t do it so I have to and I am going to miss my favorite television program because I can’t program the stupid recorder. 

These are merely a few indications of how well we are living the Catholic life. I would not go so far as to boot you from the assembly, nor burn you at the stake (they won’t let me) but I would suggest that the Catholic life makes sense and will improve my life, and the life of those I love and may even help me attain eternal salvation. So learn to program the video recorder or the Tivo and live a rich satisfying life that glorifies God and blesses the world. It will not even interfere with prime time TV.

Sincerely,

Rev. Know-It-All