Under the Fir Tree

There’s a way of longing for God that can become a way of avoiding Him. It usually begins sincerely enough. We want something pure. Silence instead of noise. Prayer instead of distraction. Truth instead of compromise. We want to love God without all the interference that seems to come between us and Him: other people’s moods, their weaknesses, their demands, the pettiness of institutions, the tedious work that still needs doing, the brother who irritates us, the family member who disappoints us, the Church in all her bewildering humanity. If only we could get past all that. Then, perhaps, we could finally give ourselves to God. It’s a seductive thought because there’s something true inside it. Solitude matters. Silence matters. The saints fled into deserts for good reasons. There are forms of noise that dull the soul and relationships that can deform it. Christ Himself withdrew to lonely places to pray. But He always came back. Back to the crowds. Back to misunderstanding. Back to Pete...

There’s a way of talking about chastity that can make Catholicism sound mainly concerned with keeping teenagers from having sex. How far is too far? What counts as a mortal sin? Where exactly is the line? How long can you kiss? Where can your hands go? At what point should somebody’s father emerge silently from the woods? Some of those questions have real answers, and boundaries matter. But they’re too small to carry the Catholic vision of chastity. The deeper question is what kind of man you’re becoming. More specifically: Are you becoming the kind of man who can receive another person as a gift, desire her without possessing her, see her clearly without consuming her, and love her without using her? That’s harder. And it’s much more beautiful. Your Body Is Good Christianity begins somewhere modern people sometimes find surprising: the body is good. God made it. Male and female He created us. The Son of God took flesh. Jesus ate, slept, worked, wept, suffered, touched people, died bod...