2013 Catholic Post of the Year Goes To Greg Hillis

It is popular to say how wonderful it is that young people are so open and tolerant and etc. I usually find the opposite to be the case.

It seems older people that have been around the block a few times , been knocked down , endured some heartache , have  some world experience outside their comfort zone , and have sinned themselves are far more tolerant. Tolerance does not mean accepting anything under the sun but I find  older folks often extend mercy more than younger even when they disagree.

To get the point when you are younger it seems YOU GOT IT ALL FIGURED OUT which also means you view those that don't agree with you as morons. . That is one reason why I sort of shake my head when people say young folks are the prophetic voice of the Church. Well maybe so but often not.

At least that was the case for me. I was a pretty annoying young Catholic that thought communion in the hand was sketchy , the priest should make everyone kneel for communion , and altar girls was the most horrible thing under the sun. Now I still hold those positions to a certain degree but I learned some good people disagree and I don't need to make World War III over these issues. Needless to say there were more " liberal " young folks that I knew that held the opposite positions and never realized how truly intolerant they were to folks that disagreed. Again a mirror image of me at a certain age.

I suspect older people ( and by this I think approaching 40 is when it might happen ) just want some PEACE , and to be honest the Church is the last place where we want another battle. We can have that at home or in the workplace .

Which brings us to what I thought was the most excellent Catholic post of 2013  in the very crowded Catholic blogsphere on how yes we are a BIG CHURCH that has many often conflicting views. It s written from a personal look myself in the mirror viewpoint. He is a  educated man that  had Pope Francis shock his world. Which this Pope is good at doing.

So  Greg Hillis and his post What "It is everybody's church!" Teaches Me: A Confession get in my mind the best 2013 Catholic post of 2013.

In the end there is room in our Faith for the Archdiocese of the Military and lets say Pax Chirsti

There is room for the Catholics at the Action Inst and let say Catholic worker.

There is room for those that like the " regular Mass " , the Latin Mass , and yes ( gulp ) I will say it Lifeteen Masses .

The Bishops and Popes , which are so vogue to bash , seem to get this and embrace the contributions of all of these. That might be because they realize they are not of the Church of whats happening now but   get the whole concept of the democracy of the dead and how by their vows they enter the living history of the Church that goes back to the apostles . Our history show therefore a dynamic and in the trenches  way of Faith that is while Orthodox is not cookie cutter.

Again I am not saying anything goes. I am not going to be singing CALL TO ACTION praises anytime soon. But Catholicism allows a huge range of theological , political , social ,  economic thought.

Let us on both on  the " right " and "left"  be very wary of saying you are not welcomed to the Eucharistic sacrifice unless it is a very core belief..

There are indeed some issue that Catholicism must not compromise as the Bride of Christ. But again there are many issues where we have no business denying the Eucharistic table of our Lord too because of disagreement.

And for that reason Greg Hillis get Catholic post of the year for reminding of us that.