Not for the Faint of Heart
I have ventured into regions of the blogworld that while fascinating have caused me to blanch and retreat homeward quickly. I'm certain that a great many have read the debates of the neocons and the radtrads or whatever each calls the other. I find myself appalled and feel the necessity to retreat to prayer. Yes, I know there are divisions and disagreements, but somehow I find this particular rift with a sometimes-sense of triumphalism on one side or the other particularly sad and disturbing. I disagree with a great many Catholics on a very large number of issues, and yet, I feel no need to be right at the expense of others. It seems that such an attitude is not shared throughout the world of reasoned argumentation. I see and understand points on both sides, but the extremes of either side are unpleasant in the extreme and do not help their cause or the cause of Christ Himself who must be wounded over this division and this insistence upon difference. If a person chooses to attend a Tridentine Mass and thinks all manner of error about Vatican II, then so be it. Still, this person is a brother in the Lord and needs to be loved.
Now, to give credit, there are a great many who are capable of civil disagreement without ad hominem arguments and attacks. I had no idea things were quite so ugly out there. Perhaps because I am not of an argumentative nature (Okay Tom, stop laughing) when my views differ and they have not been requested by others, then I keep them to myself. (See St. Josemaria Escriva's Seventeen Evidences of a Lack of Humility No. 5).
I don't know, it just saddens me greatly to see such unpleasantness within the Body of Christ. I am not naive enough to believe that everything goes forever smoothly, but the degree of rancor and unpleasantness suggests the resurrection of the Reformation. I mean after all folks, the Campos group in Brazil (Lefebvrists of some stripe) have been reunited with Rome--all things are possible through Christ who strengthens us.
