Those Challenging Cracks of Secularism: In and Beyond

by Oliver O. Nwachukwu

Overview

Lack of religious enthusiasm is a universal nemesis with long-ranging effects. In Those Challenging Cracks of Secularism, author Rev. Oliver O. Nwachukwu shows how secularism can further deepen dividing lines among people.

The negatives solicited by indifference to authentic religious values and the erroneous use of force to enlist membership by religious extremists are two extremities Those Challenging Cracks of Secularism opposes in the search for ultimate truth. Aggrieved by the negative effects of competing alliances on core Christian religious teachings and values, the book discusses the recent ecclesiastical wrangling in the Episcopal Church that began with the ordination of gay priests and blessing of same-sex union.

It further treats the recent clerical sex abuse scandal, allegations of cover-up, the financial burdens on the affected dioceses, as well as homosexuality in the priesthood. The mythological anabasis of the Old Testament books have often been interpreted wrongfully by fanatics to engage in senseless killings of innocent people in the name of God, something that has led to the mistaken practice of shutting religion off public places as private.

No one should be denied the privilege of close relationship with God through attitude of religious indifference. Economic obsessions, technological enslavement, proliferations of arms, racial intolerance and unbridled political correctness have diluted religious values so much that people are constantly burdened with mistrust and skepticism.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781491703700
Publisher:	iUniverse, Incorporated
Publication date:	01/09/2014
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	608
File size:	717 KB

Read an Excerpt

THOSE CHALLENGING CRACKS OF SECULARISM

IN AND BEYOND

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By OLIVER O. NWACHUKWU

iUniverse LLC

Copyright © 2014 Rev. Oliver O. Nwachukwu
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4917-0372-4

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CHAPTER 1

PROLEGOMENON

It began in the fall of 2006, some months after I had taken residence at St. Mary Nativity Church in Joliet with appointment at University of St. Francis. My contract with University of St. Francis had just ended and I was under a fresh negotiation for an adjunct position with Benedictine University in Lisle, for a course on World Religions in America. I visited University of St. Francis' library to research for books to be used, after I had signed the contract with Benedictine University. Already a primary text edited by Jacob Neusner had been selected in agreement with the former lecturer who was on one year leave. A secondary text by Franklin Frezier was added, but neither of the two in my estimation has solid Catholic backing. I decided to balance my choice of texts by including a strong Catholic perspective to the list of the books I needed. Not because of any bias about authors from other religious affiliations, but because of my commitment to Catholic philosophy of holistic education. After all, the course was in reality a sociological sampling of world religions, of which any credible author on the subject could satisfy the need. As I went through the book shelves in the university's library, I caught sight of a book titled, The New Faithful, written by Colleen Carroll. I glanced through some pages. It sounded interesting for a secondary literature for undergraduate students. I checked it out, and returned home with enthusiasm to settle with it. Carroll, who was in her twenties when she wrote the book in 2002, investigates why young Christian adults of her generation gravitate toward orthodoxy in their search to establish faith in Christ. Carroll quotes Mark Coomes, one of the interviewees of her book who drew much inspiration from Pope John Paul 11 for his passionate love of Christianity, to gain support for the new religious trend she observed among young Catholics committed to the faith.

Holding to the standard belief was Coomes' thing, for he argues that no one attracts youths to religious life by lowering the bar of religion but by raising it. Although Coomes was particularly concerned with vocations to religious life, the thought of lowering bars gripped me with excitement as I wandered deliriously in my head thinking of similar areas of lowering and raising bars. His observation struck me as something of wider coverage. In the eyes of my mind I applied the understanding to many places of interest. Too many events in our global society reinforced my conviction as I tried to rationalize the saying and stretched my imagination beyond the confines of religion. One after the other, incidents of similar undertaking in magnitude and importance queued up in my head to concur with Coomes' statement as typical.

Secondary school classroom setup lightened up in my head as a case in point. In a typical classroom setting, two major classes of students stand out, honor and ordinary students. The honor students are commonly bombarded with challenging projects to keep them abreast the ladder of academic excellence. With chains of school projects, these honor students tend to be robbed of the usual ordinaries of their age. But they like it, and often embrace it with enthusiasm, knowing well that stars are not made by chance. As a matter of fact, these honor students feel bored and agitated when given less challenging projects. By the same token of presenting honor students with challenging projects, teachers try to accommodate less enthusiastic students with less challenging projects, using the process of scarf-folding to get them to the top, if possible. They assign them less demanding projects to stimulate them, and from there walk them up to the level of their intended academic stage. In that way, every member of the class is accommodated. Should the students in their respective projects score "A's," they are happy even though the levels of academic competence for which they are described as "A" students differ. On one hand, is the fantastic work of the honor students, and on the other, is the satisfactory work of ordinary students struggling to be in school. For the honor students, the bar is raised but for the unenthusiastic students, it is lowered to get them on board. Lowering the bar to accommodate less enthusiastic students has a short term advantage. If the lowering process continues indefinitely, it could lead to the production of mediocrity in the work force. To discourage complacency in mediocrity, a prolonged lowering of bars should be avoided, if the sole purpose is to accommodate and not to stimulate appetite for heights. Mediocrity limits exposure, and limited exposure drives limited maturation. Momentary incentive is not a solution to systemic problem but a way of wetting the appetite for excitement to finding solution to a problem. Exposure to challenges stimulates the appetite for great heights, for something to dream about or aspire to, and from there to develop appreciation for hard work. Many events in our world today point to bars raised and bars lowered, some of which will be highlighted in the course of this work.

The kind of youth orientation that Carroll references in her book is one that queries and repudiates relativism; a philosophical stand that rejects absolute truth. Relativism looks at things from an individualistic point of view. It is wholly subjective and arbitrary, leading to a sort of individualized religious rapprochement that weakens obligation to commonality by making common good less attractive. Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI have noted with concern that our generation is becoming increasingly resistant to absolute truth and susceptible to greater relativism. The danger of relativism lies heavily on overemphasis on subjectivity rather than on objectivity. For the relativists, life is only as you see it; my good is not your good and your good is not mine. Keeping to core articles of religious truth that are often rejected by relativists, is what the youths of Carroll's book are turning to. Why young minds of Colleen's book (that are ordinarily excited by negative innuendoes) should gravitate toward orthodoxy when assertive independence is a common place among young minds seems ironic. The easygoingness with which relativism associates matters, ordinarily appeals to young adults. After all, there are times when rigidity is as dangerous as flexibility, particularly when it is used to discourage instead of encourage association. Many of the ideological promises of relativism have often turned out illusory and self-defeating.

It is all part of the human nature that looks for short cuts, and when they are found, there is the problem of insatiability that makes relativism an endless inclination to endless subjective want. While objecting to objective truth, relativism invariably tries to make absolute, what is subjective. By resisting the temptation to relativism, these young adults opt for the objective truth in Christian orthodoxy. According to Carroll, relativism can lead people "to slip into a superficial mind-set and become consumed" about the appeal to the present. To be concerned with the present is a natural fact, commonly exercised under the pressures of immediate demands. But when such pressures are allowed to consume the person, the individual is rendered a slave to his cravings. Jesus does not deny the fact of human needs, but he warns against the danger of becoming a slave to them. Pray for daily bread but do not be over anxious about tomorrow (Matt 6:11, 25-32).

AN ASTONISHING ENCOUNTER

As I sat reading Carroll's book, the secretary of the parish in which I resided rang me. I hurried down stairs to her office, not knowing what to expect. Surprisingly, I was told that someone had telephoned, wanting to speak to a priest. I asked whether the pastor was not available to receive the call. She said that neither the pastor nor his associate was around. I told her to schedule an appointment for me to meet with the caller. She promptly had me down for the afternoon of that same day. As a matter of principle, I don't turn down requests to see a priest unless I'm unavoidably committed. Shortly after my discussion with the secretary, a young ruddy man in his mid-twenties with an appealing height appeared. I was delighted he kept to the time, though not for the "theological stuff" with which he peppered our meeting, however well-intentioned he thought of it; something I least expected. My client began by confessing he was not a Catholic but a Lutheran by birth. A nominal Lutheran, if you like, and if that alone is enough to describe his family's lukewarm affiliation with the Lutheran Church. Otherwise, my client was anything of his own religious making. I least expected his long ride into an uncultivated field of religious negatives which he handled with surprising eloquence. Unaware of what laid ahead, but sensing there were nuts to crack, I hooded myself in silence and got him seated to begin with. I shut the office door behind him to preserve our privacy; and then adjusted the pastor's seat to suit my height. Thereafter, I sat patiently to listen to his story as we headed off to an unknown religious destination.

According to my client, religion was never a major factor in his family. From childhood his grandmother had counseled his mother not to force any religion on him but to allow him the choice of making the decision when he grew up. Ever since the instruction was passed, my ruddy client of appealing height was left without affiliation to any religion. How is one to ignite the faith for the next generation if it is not nurtured in people from infancy? Delayed gratification is dream denied, just as procrastination is assassination of aspiration. Who has penetrated the mind of God as to know when one is matured to accept God who is timeless, and who accepts all people as they are (Acts 10:28, 34-35)? Conversion by coercion is admittedly incompatible with the spirit of Christ's humble ministry. Nevertheless, the idea of force must be properly contextualized to avoid misunderstanding that could lead to generational fidelity-rift between children and parents, mentors and mentorees. Any counseling that fans religious indifference indirectly widens the gap between one generation and the other. Rather than igniting the fundamental Christian relationship in my client as a credible path to faith, my client's mentors took to trivializing faith-coordinates by starting him off on a faith-journey with heads full of reservations about religion. Having thus initiated the young man into constructing religious skepticism on liberal ticket, my client ended up abandoning all religions. To start off one's faith-journey with trivialization of core religious elements, is to place religion on a path to self-defeat. Religion, as the Second Vatican Council explains, makes human journey on earth less miserable and burdensome. I find nothing to be lost exposing a child to Christian spirituality and family religious tradition.

In the Old Testament story about a Maccabean Jewish woman, we find a big contrast between the counsel this courageous lady gave her children and the one rendered by the grandmother of my client. Whereas the Maccabean woman bestirred her womanly heart with manly courage to pressure her children not to violate the religious tradition of their ancestors, the grandmother of my client ignited an attitude of religious indifference to the religious formation of her grandchild (2 Macc 7:1, 20-31). Whereas she was graced with religious education, she thought it a disservice to accord the same opportunity to her grandchild during his formative stage. No faith-aspirant succeeds in the journey of faith unaccompanied by the assistance of others, just as no instructional material, however good it might be, can guarantee 'A' scores for all the students in a class. No father can guarantee what his child will be at growth, however good that father might be. Knowledge is an assemblage of series of discoveries in an unbounded learning activity. Every generation builds on the legacy of the generations prior to it. A timely directive is a precautionary antidote to possible waywardness. With that snippy counsel, my client was veered off the path to authentic spirituality for a spirituality that overlooks the connection between Christ and his body, the Church. St. Augustine echoes the obvious truth in 1 John 4:20 when he states: "Make man your way and you shall arrive at God." One cannot hope to arrive at God by avoiding contact other human persons created in God's image.

Like a human embryo that needs a womb for nurturance, my client appeared to have needed a religious womb for the start of his religious life, an environmental womb where he could feel the warmth of God's love nurtured and protected. He got the environment, his Christian family but not the womb for the nurturance he needed to establish a firm Christian faith. He was certainly blessed with a Christian-family heritage, but the blessing was rendered inefficacious by his mentors who turned indifferent to their faith-obligation, leading to his faith-development. Thus, he was left alone in the search for spiritual nurturance for his faith-affirmation, believing that the earth can be turned into heaven at some future date by sheer fortune of chance. Jesus did not think it light that children should be denied access to the grace of God: "Let the children come to me;" he says, "do not prevent them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these" (Mark 10:14; Mat 19:14; Luke 18:16). Christ's warm embrace of children is a classical illustration of God's eagerness to protect, educate and commune with us. That invitation is, in a way, an invitation to all persons, young and old alike; we are all children of God (Matt 11:28). Infants need Christ as much as adults. Parenthood is a response to the invitation developed around the exemplary life of Christ, who sought out and organized people around himself as the way to God (John 14:6). Hence, the Scripture describes humans as branches that cannot be separated from the main tree for life and productivity (John 15:1-5).

Parental attachment to kids is so strong that parents are willing to walk with their children through valleys of discomfort. The willingness to walk through the valleys of discomfort with children ensures protection from anti-religious modeling. This is the sacrifice George T. Montague compares to the persecution of Christians at the time when John wrote the book of Revelation:

If our problem is not persecution, is it perhaps seduction? ... God's Word challenges us in our situation just as it did in theirs.... We can see in the local and worldwide conflicts and tribulations of our day the same kind of call to conversion, not only of "others," but of ourselves as well.

At the crucial stage of my client's formative relationship with God (a formation that would eventually lead to his future recognition of God in other persons), his family stayed clear under pressures of bias and misconceptions to allow circumstances dictate the course of his future approach to religion. With screwed assumptions that are totally incongruous with scriptural demands and ecclesia wants, they alienated my client from the God he was inclined by nature to know. Being apprehensive of the negative external activities of some church members, his mentors failed to see God's hand in the myriad of other positive exemplifications of other church members. John F. Kennedy once said: "A child miseducated is a child lost." Christian faith is a gift to be embraced and not a problem to be solved. How is faith to be embraced when it is not modeled? Modeling inspires admiration, and admiration begets fellowship. An authentic spiritual-growth formation accommodates no attitude of indifference to the essentials of religion. Rather, it encourages commitment to whatever will enable the beneficiary to rightly assess the ultimate validity of the truth of religion intended as necessary. And once the truth about religion has been established, the undertaker can discern its form and appreciate its content at growth. Instead of assisting my client to understand the ultimate truth of religion, his mentors took to condemnation before prosecution, while still expecting a smooth transition at growth. Because he was started off on a faulty premise, he accepted misconception for truth to create occasion for the devil to make victim of his heart (cf. 1 Peter 5:8-9). The devil that Peter speaks about in his first letter, is the adversary Paul echoes in the letter to the Ephesians when he says: "Our struggle is not against enemies of blood and flesh but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places" (Eph 6:12). Of these adversaries, the worst are the negatives we accommodate as real to weigh down our spiritual self. These negatives operate, as it were, not in isolation, but through the agency of adversaries in human that incite divisions and profane thoughts of irresponsible acts.

(Continues...)

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Excerpted from THOSE CHALLENGING CRACKS OF SECULARISM by OLIVER O. NWACHUKWU. Copyright © 2014 Rev. Oliver O. Nwachukwu. Excerpted by permission of iUniverse LLC.
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Table of Contents

Contents

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS, xiii,
INTRODUCTION, xv,
CHAPTER ONE, 1,
CHAPTER TWO, 19,
CHAPTER THREE, 26,
CHAPTER FOUR, 40,
CHAPTER FIVE, 55,
CHAPTER SIX, 71,
CHAPTER SEVEN, 86,
CHAPTER EIGHT, 107,
CHAPTER NINE, 119,
CHAPTER TEN, 130,
CHAPTER ELEVEN, 152,
CHAPTER TWELVE, 167,
CHAPTER THIRTEEN, 187,
CHAPTER FOURTEEN, 197,
CHAPTER FIFTEEN, 215,
CHAPTER SIXTEEN, 236,
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN, 254,
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN, 264,
CHAPTER NINETEEN, 281,
CHAPTER TWENTY, 292,
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE, 304,
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO, 319,
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE, 331,
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR, 339,
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE, 357,
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX, 371,
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN, 391,
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT, 426,
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE, 445,
CHAPTER THIRTY, 458,
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE, 475,
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO, 489,
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE, 513,
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR, 533,
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE, 544,
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX, 562,
Selected Bibliography, 573,