CNA Staff, May 19, 2020 / 12:00 pm (CNA).- The Department of Labor (USDOL) issued new protections for federal employees and faith-based grant recipients last week, with religious freedom groups praising the move.
On Friday, Labor Secretary Eugene Scal… […]
CNA Staff, May 19, 2020 / 10:01 am (CNA).- Priests and brothers of the Redemptorist community who live and work at a Houston parish have tested positive for coronavirus, leading the parish to close after having reopened earlier this month.
Five out of… […]
Denver Newsroom, May 19, 2020 / 02:00 am (CNA).- What should you be doing right now?
If the answer is “not reading this article,” you might want to keep going.
If you’re reading this article because you’re distracting yourself from something that needs to be done, you might be struggling with something called acedia.
On March 2, just before the coronavirus pandemic caused shutdowns around the world, Fr. Harrison Ayre, a priest in the Diocese of Victoria, British Columbia, started tweeting about his experience with the vice of acedia.
Acedia (pronounced ‘uh-see-dee-uh’ in English) comes from the Greek word akēdeia, meaning “lack of care.” It is closely akin to the sin of “sloth”, but it is more complex than mere laziness or boredom.
According to St. Thomas Aquinas, acedia is a kind of sadness about things that are spiritual goods, or a “disgust with activity.”
“My one-phrase definition is: the inability to choose the good,” Ayre said. “It’s an affliction of the soul that attacks desire – our desire for the good.”
It manifests itself specifically in listlessness, distraction, and wanting to avoid the task at hand, Ayre noted. Paradoxically, it could look either like sitting around and doing nothing, or busying oneself with anything and everything but the task at hand.
Ayre, who is one-half of the podcast “Clerically Speaking” and has an active Twitter following, became well-known for his tweets about combatting acedia in the past few weeks. So much so, that some of his friends have dubbed his timeline “Acedia Twitter.”
“It always was something that’s been on my heart because I would say it’s one of those things that I struggle with a lot, so it definitely comes from experience,” Ayre said.
“I tweeted something about a month ago and then…I had a couple people ask me in the DMs, ‘Can you give me some practical tips on overcoming this?’” Ayre said.
Ayre thought he would just do a thread on the topic, but because so many people were asking questions and looking for more information, he decided to keep going.
He now tweets daily tips for identifying and overcoming acedia, as well as regular check-ins with his followers, asking them how they are doing and what specific struggles with acedia they have noticed lately.
“It kind of has just taken off,” he said. “Not like ‘blown up,’ but I’d say it gets pretty reasonable engagement every day whenever I would tweet about it, so it’s obviously touching people’s hearts, which has been a good thing.”
The “noonday devil”
In a 2015 book on the subject, Fr. Jean-Charles Nault, O.S.B., called acedia the “noonday devil”, because the temptation has a tendency to strike in the middle of the day.
The phrase has been used to describe acedia for centuries.
“It’s when even your bodily tendency is to be a little bit tired and a little restless at the day,” Ayre said.
Nault likened the experience to restless monks staring out of their cells (rooms), longing for escape.
“You’re in the desert, it’s hot, you’re in your cell, and the sun’s beating into your cell, and it can be a great temptation to want to leave the duty of the moment. That’s why it’s called the noonday devil,” Ayre said.
But for people who aren’t monks, what does acedia look like?
“Let’s say you’re at work and you know that the task you need to do right now is answer those 10 emails in your inbox. That is the most important thing for you to do in this moment,” Ayre said.
“But instead, you’re like, ‘I’m going to go make those photocopies,’ or, ‘I’m going to go to the water cooler to get some water and see if anyone’s there,’ or, ‘I’m going to browse the internet for a bit,’ or, ‘I’m just going to sit here and not do anything for 10 minutes.’”
“You’re doing stuff or not doing stuff, but you’re doing all those things to avoid the task of the moment. Acedia attacks what I’d say is the giftedness of the moment.”
For parents, Ayre said acedia might manifest itself in a temptation to stay in bed when the children are up at 3 a.m.
“Acedia would say: I’m going to stay in bed. I don’t care if they’re throwing up. I’m staying in bed,” he said. Combatting that temptation would look like: “you (get up) because you love them and it’s a good thing to do for them and it’s a sacrifice for their good.”
“It’s about accepting whatever has been thrown to us at the moment and not wanting to avoid it,” Ayre said.
According to Nault, the battle against acedia is about accepting the full gift of one’s vocation in life.
“The ‘noonday devil’ can be vanquished only by accepting the love of God and the sublimity of our vocation, which, in turn, gives rise to the joy of true Christian freedom,” he wrote.
Why acedia matters in the spiritual life
Why does something that might seem like mere distraction in mundane tasks matter so much in the spiritual life?
“I would call (acedia) the temptation of our age, because our age is very dependent on this idea of distraction – of moving my attention to something that is not what we need to do right now,” Ayre said.
And that matters for the spiritual life because “at the heart of every sin, and then every temptation, is to deny the good of a thing – its proper end,” Ayre noted.
“Gluttony comes with taking in a good, which is food, and overusing it, right? Or envy is seeing a good that has happened to someone else and then twisting it and wanting it to be your own,” he said.
“Every sin wants to twist the good, and acedia, it’s saying: ‘I don’t want to recognize the good of what I have right here, right now.’ It creates a sense of dissatisfaction of what’s been given me.”
And the present moment matters, Ayre said, because it’s where God can be found.
“Our work of the moment is the precise place that we find God…because God shows himself through things, that’s how God works. So, if we’re trying to say, ‘I’m going to distract myself, I’m going to check Instagram instead of working on my emails or my Word document or whatever’, what I’m saying is: ‘I don’t want to encounter God through my task, through the work of the moment.’”
Overcoming acedia
Combatting acedia isn’t about white-knuckling through distracted thoughts and forcing yourself back to the present moment. Ayre said that properly ordering one’s day, and giving things their proper place, can go a long way in combating acedia in one’s life.
“It’s not wrong to go on Instagram and Twitter. Obviously I don’t think that, that’d be really weird,” Ayre (@FrHarrison) said.
“But do I do that in a rightly ordered way? So, for example, I’ll do my office work for half an hour, and then I’m going to take a five minute break and check up on my texts and my WhatsApp and get those things done, and then I’m going to go back to my task.”
“Acedia really gets fought when you start to organize your day properly. It doesn’t mean we’re going to live strict monastic schedules,” he said. “But I always say: if you can find those three or four most important tasks of your day and order them properly, then everything else will fall into place around that. And you’ll stop going to your phone as much, because the reason we go to our phone is because we don’t actually see the gift of the moment.”
It’s also about making time for prayer and proper rest and leisure in the day too, Ayre said.
“Find stuff you really enjoy to do and actually give yourself permission to do it, because acedia makes us think that we can’t enjoy anything,” he said, such as reading a good book or watching a good movie or spending an hour playing an enjoyable video game.
“Acedia plagues us because sometimes we forget how to enjoy the good things of life. Choosing a good that we enjoy helps remind us of God’s goodness,” Ayre added in a May 9 tweet.
In another recent tweet, Ayre also compared overcoming acedia to a Seinfeld episode, in which George Costanza decides to be “opposite George” – he does the opposite of his normal tendencies, and is surprised to find his life improved.
“(George) meets some girls in a bar and he goes, ‘Hi, I’m unemployed and I live with my parents.’ And they loved him because he was so honest,” Ayre said.
“While beforehand, he wouldn’t have done that. He would probably come up with these weird stories about why he was staying at his parents place. And so he found that ‘opposite George’ was leading to a lot of success for him.”
Fighting acedia can be similar, he said. “Sometimes the best thing to do is to do the opposite. So if you find that you’re just slothful in general, and doing anything with remote physical activity is something difficult to do, the opposite thing to do would be to go for a walk,” he said.
When is it acedia, and when is it depression?
Acedia and depression seem to have some things in common, including a lack of desire to do one’s normal activities.
Ayre said he has been asked before about the difference between acedia and depression.
“I’m not a counselor or a clinical psychologist or something like that,” Ayre said, but “personally, I do think there sometimes can be a connection between the two… I think people ask this question because they see a real similarity between the two, and there may be even a connection at times.”
Ayre added that he has never experienced clinical depression himself, and encouraged anyone who was concerned that they might be going through something more than just acedia to talk to their priest and to a mental health professional.
“I’d say if there is almost a lack of desire to do anything in life, that’s probably a good sign that it’s deeper than acedia and that it perhaps needs medical attention,” Ayre said.
“With acedia, you’re often able to function, but maybe not function to the extent that you ought to,” Ayre said.
But depression’s symptoms will likely be more severe, he added.
If one is thinking “’I just, I can’t even get out of bed to go to work anymore.’ That’s not acedia anymore. That is a sense of, ‘I don’t have the tools necessary to get through day to day life.’”
Corona and acedia: How the “new normal” impacts distraction
When the coronavirus pandemic shut down most of the United States and the world, nearly everyone’s daily routine was dramatically upended.
Non-essential workers either worked from home or were laid off. Essential workers kept at it, albeit with either adjusted commutes or schedules or safety protocols in place. Almost all businesses including bars and restaurants and hair salons, were closed.
Busy people who normally had lots of places to go and things to do suddenly found themselves with something they hadn’t had in a while: time.
“I think for most of us, we probably fell into it in a pretty extreme way for about that first month,” Ayre said. “I think it was the fog of the moment. We didn’t know what to do with our lives. We didn’t know what to do with this time. The future is uncertain…and you just wander throughout the day and you do your things but you don’t have a real target of life. So I think in that sense it was bad.”
But people adjusting to working from home or going out far less have “time and space to get our lives in order,” he said.
“I’m hearing people say they’ve been attacking acedia now by picking up a chore every day. Whereas before, they didn’t have time to pick a chore every day. Or they’re cooking more because they’re not running to five different appointments at night, so they’re not just grabbing McDonald’s quickly as they’re running to the next thing.”
“They’re having time to do the things that are necessary in life; the busyness stopped. When we were so busy, we were not able to see what is essential,” he said. Ayre said he is hearing from families that they are realizing the slowness of life right now has actually been very good for their kids as well.
“I’ve heard from families saying, ‘I never realized I didn’t have to take the kids to three things every night.’ And they love it. They love the slowness. Their kids are playing on the front yards again, and the kids are happy.”
Ayre said he hopes that one lesson people are able to take away from the extra time they have been given during this pandemic is the need to contemplate God and what is most essential in their lives, which is in itself a big step in fighting acedia.
“I really hope and pray that we can learn our lesson from this, that we don’t need to be this busy. And then when you start to choose these essential things, acedia will rip itself from your life, because you’ll see – I’m doing what is essential. And a full life makes it easier to choose the good and see the good. It’s like that meme, right? ‘Nature is healing itself.’ In a way, it is.”
For those looking to dive deeper into acedia, Fr. Ayre recommended Nault’s book, as well as “Acedia and Its Discontents: Metaphysical Boredom in an Empire of Desire” by R.J. Snell, and “Acedia & Me” by Kathleen Norris.
CNA Staff, May 19, 2020 / 12:10 am (CNA).- A federal judge has blocked the North Carolina governor’s order limiting most church services to 10 people or fewer, saying it was a double standard to limit religious services but not similar activities… […]
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CNA Staff, May 18, 2020 / 11:21 am (CNA).- Bishop David O’Connell of Trenton lamented Thursday that the US Congress’ latest coronavirus relief bill would bar private schools’ access to financial relief.
The New Jersey Catholic Conference is encouraging Catholics to ask their Senators and Representatives to include aid for private school families in the stimulus.
The Health and Economic Recovery Omnibus Emergency Solutions (Heroes) Act, H.R. 6800, passed the House May 15, but it is not expected to pass the Senate.
The bill would provide funding for state and local governments, assistance to hospitals, direct payments to American families along with funding unemployment insurance. Moreover, it would extend unemployment benefits, expand the payroll protection program, and increase funding for food stamps. It would also set up a strategic plan for testing for the virus. The bill fails to put Hyde protections in critical spots, thereby allowing for taxpayer funding of abortions.
Bishop O’Connell wrote May 14 that the Heroes Act “would prohibit nonpublic schools including our Catholic schools in the Diocese of Trenton from accessing any portion of the proposed $200 billion including in the legislation for education.”
“Our Catholic schools struggle to stay open as it is, and the pandemic will impact them negatively,” he added.
The bishop directed the people of his local Church to a message prepared by the state Catholic conference to be sent to senators and representatives which notes that “the devastating economic effects of the COVID-19 virus have reached nearly every sector of American society. The Catholic schools in the United States have been severely impacted as well, and their centuries-long tradition of serving families from all walks of life is now imperiled.”
The message asks the legislators to consider including equitable service provision for the private school community, “consistent with previous emergency disaster legislation”; direct aid to private school families in the form of scholarships, and tax credits for scholarship granting organizations; and tax credits or deductions for private school tuition and expenses.
The Heroes Act passed by House by a 208-199 vote. It was supported by one Republican, and 14 Democrats voted against the bill.
The White House has already said it will veto the Heroes Act, and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has declared it dead on arrival in the chamber, saying that “I don’t think we have felt yet the urgency of acting immediately.”
Senators have already said that a bill would not pass the chamber before Memorial Day, according to The Hill.
In the Cares Act, the first stimulus bill that passed Congress in March, Planned Parenthood was left out of emergency small business loans because of a 500-employee limit for non-profits to be eligible for Paycheck Protection Program loans. The current bill amends the regulations to allow for Planned Parenthood to access PPP loans.
Hyde protections are not included in the legislation’s funding of state and local governments, and are not attached to subsidies for COBRA premiums or other coverage for furloughed workers that could include abortion coverage.
CNA Staff, May 18, 2020 / 10:30 am (CNA).- New Mexico has agreed to apply the same reopening criteria to churches as it does to retail businesses, after the governor issued updated safety regulations for the coronavirus pandemic.
“Grea… […]
Denver, Colo., May 17, 2020 / 06:21 am (CNA).- After a pornography tycoon donated millions to an international abortion group, one non-profit youth initiative warned of a dangerous link between the two industries.
Lindsay Fay, a mission team manager for The Culture Project, highlighted the connection between pornography and abortion. She told CNA that while both industries claim to emphasize sexual empowerment and women’s rights, they instead do a great deal of harm to human dignity.
“[In] the pornography industry and the abortion industry, [they promote] … empowerment for women, but it is actually a false form of empowerment. There really is an enslavement to feeling the pressure to end the pregnancy or end a human life,” she said.
Since 1995, Marie Stopes International (MSI) has received over $9 million in donations from Phil Harvey, the CEO of Adam & Eve – a large erotica distributor. The donations to MSI are received in cash and supplies.
Established as a mail-order firm in 1971, Adam & Eve brought in around $72 million dollars last year. The company donates about 25% of its annual profit through Harvey’s charitable foundation, DKT International – a non-profit focusing on abortion and contraceptives.
Harvey is a board member of MSI, which promotes contraception and abortion worldwide. In 2019, MSI was responsible for about 5 million abortions globally.
MSI defended Harvey’s contributions.
“Phil Harvey has spent his life defending sexual and reproductive health and rights, and has played a significant role in expanding access for women across the world. We are proud that he continues to contribute to the organisation,” the group said, according to the Daily Mail.
Fay said it is a cultural misunderstanding that either pornography or abortion is empowering for women. She said both industries rest on a false understanding of sexual liberty and human dignity.
“Both of those industries rest on the [idea] that we can do what we want with our sexuality regardless of the cost. Unfortunately, some of those decisions have led to the ending of human life.”
She pointed to studies showing that pornography increases demand for human sex trafficking. About 30% of all internet traffic is pornography, and about 1 in 3 Americans seek out pornography at least once a month, she added.
“Pornography fuels the demand for sexual exploitation,” she said. “What most people don’t know is that pornography often uses women and children who are forced or coerced to be filmed.”
“The biggest connection between pornography and abortion is human trafficking, which is pretty ironic because almost anyone in our world will be able to look at human trafficking and say this is dehumanizing.”
A 2017 survey by the Family Research Council interviewed 66 women who survived sex trafficking. More than half of the women said they had abortions while being trafficked. One in three reported having more than one abortion.
“When it comes to pornography or when it comes to abortion, those things are seen as no big deal or unrelated or unconnected. But, in this case, pornography demands and fuels human trafficking,” she said.
The Culture Project is a non-profit that promotes sexual integrity and human dignity by sending mission teams to different communities across the country. Trained young adult missionaries speak to young people in classroom settings or witness to individuals outside of abortion facilities. They currently have teams in cities including Cleveland, Los Angeles, and Philadelphia.
Fay said the missionaries discuss topics including the damage caused by pornography and how sexual exploitation can lead to abortion.
“Whenever a human person is devalued and not respected, it kind of breeds a culture that accepts things like abortion or other forms of dehumanization,” she said.
“The Culture Project is a movement of young people set out on mission to restore culture. We proclaim the inherent dignity of the human person and the richness of living a life of sexual integrity, inviting our culture to become fully alive.”
Denver Newsroom, May 16, 2020 / 03:00 am (CNA).- An American documentarian says her work is the fruit of a divine calling that began with an encounter with Pope St. John Paul II. She said she hopes her films will help others grow close to Christ.
Her most recent film, a documentary on the life Blessed Solanus Casey, will premiere on the EWTN television network May 26, and is now available online.
Erin Berghouse, president of Ahava Productions, said, shortly after a revival of faith in the late 90s, she felt that God was calling her to pursue a career in music and, later in life, short films.
“Ahava Productions is a film production company that began really out of following a mission that God placed on our hearts,” she told CNA.
“My hope was to create movies that move us closer to Christ and to reflect the beauty of the Catholic Church. [Evangelization] with art, all the different art forms: music [and] the highest quality of visual art.”
Berghouse, who is also a mother of six, rediscovered her faith in 1999 when she saw John Paul II speak in St. Louis. It was through his “Letter to Artists,’ issued in April 1999, that she decided to use music to serve the Church. In 2014, she founded Ahava Productions, which released its first film in 2015.
Ahava’s upcoming documentary on Casey is a perfect example of the inspirational story which brings people close to God, Berghouse said.
A 28-minute documentary on Blessed Solanus Casey, the film will air on EWTN on May 26 and 27. It is narrated by Cardinal James Harvey, an American cardinal and the archpriest of the Basilica of Saint Paul Outside the Walls.
The documentary will highlight the stories that led to his beatification, the history of his life, and his impact on the lives of others.
The son of Irish immigrant parents, the Capuchin Franciscan was born in 1870 on a Wisconsin farm, which also became the home of 15 other brothers and sisters. Having witnessed a brutal murder on the railroad in 1891, the 21-year-old evaluated his life and decided to become a priest. He entered Saint Francis De Sales Seminary in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Many miraculous healings have been attributed to Casey – both during his life and after – including restoration of sight, healing from alcoholism, and the healing of ichthyosis. He also spent a great deal of time witnessing and providing aid to the sick.
“Father Solanus, what a beautiful priest, what a beautiful role model, what an inspiration. [There are] so many words to describe his amazing impact,” Berghous said.
“[He is] one of the most humble, loving priests,” she added.
Berghouse was first introduced to Casey in 2015 when she was asked to pray to the Capuchin on behalf of a friend. She then attended the beatification ceremony in Detroit’s Ford Field in 2017, an event she said was proof of Casey’s influence on the world. Nearly 70,000 people attended.
She said she felt like the Blessed Mother was calling her to do the film, and that it felt like Casey had spiritually accompanied her during post-production. The more she learned about Casey, the more she loved him, Berghouse said, noting that, through his intercession, the priest taught her how to pray.
“I can say with complete confidence that to learn about him is to love him. Once you learn and love him, you will start to learn his teachings. He had a specific way that he would teach people to pray and to come to God and how we must thank him and do acts of mercy,” she said.
Berghouse said Casey, who lived through the Depression, both World Wars, and contracted serious illnesses himself – is the perfect saint for the coronavirus pandemic.
During the Great Depression, she said, the heads of major automotive companies would request Casey to remember their employees in the intentions of Mass and ask the Capuchin for advice on how to help their workers. She said, during today’s difficult pandemic, people should rely on him again.
“Here we stand today in the midst of the chaos of COVID. He still intercedes for us. He still can lead us to the place where we can find the most confidence and love in God and strength in knowing that what he has planned for us is already something that we should be thankful for,” she said.
Berghouse hopes the documentary will influence its audience to rely on Casey’s intercession, but also be a source of inspiration. She said Casey’s life is a reflection of God’s providence and the hope this brings.
“[We] participate in the call to create a documentary of his life because it was a life that was filled with immense beauty [and] hope. It continues to lead us closer to Christ by what he experienced, what he taught, and what he continues to share, even after he is no longer here,” she said.
“I think what we see in his life is an immense promise of hope and God’s plan for who we are, wherever that is, whatever it is, God has a plan.”
CNA Staff, May 15, 2020 / 02:01 pm (CNA).- Specific guidelines for reopening churches during the coronavirus pandemic were excluded from a set of documents released by the CDC this week, possibly due to religious freedom concerns, according to a report… […]
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