What Western European cultures are fascinated by, and what the rest of the world is not.
Terry Mattingly's Get Religion blog, which have linked in here on the side, states something that we've already stated, but in a more in-depth article.
Or maybe it's something we've posed as a question.
Christianity is not a European religion. Indeed, Europeans, in the form of Romans and Greeks, at first opposed it.
Christianity, and certainly the original form of Christianity, Apostolic Christianity, of which all the Orthodox and Catholics are part, came out of the Middle East and in fact it never left it. The first Catholics, which is to say the first Christians, were at the very first all in the Roman province of Palestine. Pretty soon they were in Syria, where they were first called Christians, and Egypt. In the Apostolic Age Christianity, which again is to say Catholicism, made it all the way to India, and of course it also made it to Rome. Rome was the early site of the head of the Church, because it was the center of the most powerful secular entity in the world, the Roman Empire, but other localities were major diocesan seats as well. The last Apostolic Christian church in North Africa prevailed until the 1400s, the same century that the Moors were expelled from Spain, and the same century that the Church was established in Sub Sarah Africa. Catholicism was so strong in Angola that pre Revolution slave rebellion in the Southern English Colonies of North America saw a Catholic Angolan band rise up and bolt for Catholic Florida.
So why, some of us have asked, is there so much attention on homosexuality in today's Church?
Seem unconnected? It isn't.
Homosexuality is relatively rare in the world, but it is most common in European cultures. There are a number of reasons for this. For one thing, the Western world is rich, and it's used its wealth in pecular ways impacting living arrangements. Basic aspects of adult life common throughout human history and in every culture have been badly warped in post World War Two, or maybe post World War One, or maybe as part of the Enlightenment, European cultured world. While consumption of food, working, and the basic reproductive nature of humans is the same at an elemental level for people everywhere, and at all times, in the rich society of post 1945 Western Culture, there's an entertainment element to all of it. People do these things to be "fulfilled", which in the end often tends to mean that their reproductive organs pretty much play the same role as a Nintendo joystick. People have completely lost the connective and reproductive aspect to sex itself, which naturally leads to all sorts of bored playing with it. We have, in this context, all become characters on MXC.
Additionally, as the West developed it got into warehousing of men, and sometimes women, for various reasons. In the movie version of Pasternak's classic, Dr. Zhivago, the Orthodox Priest, in taking Lara's confession, warned her that sex was strong and that "only marriage can contain it". As we've built societies that postpone marriage by operation of social pressure and economics, we can't be surprised that premarital sex became common. Likewise, as we warehoused young men in various fashion. . .all male schools, all male institutions, etc., a certain percentage seek relief where they can find it. Like most disordered behavior, the initial inclination probably isn't really very strong, but once people find relief in it, that takes over. People don't take up drinking a quart of Jim Beam all in one setting.
So at this point the rich West has a pretty messed up relationship with sex in general, and for that matter, with nature and life in general.
And it's in a rocketing decline.
So why so much attention to the Fr. James Martin's of the world? Why does the Papacy address this small demographic rather than, so far, addressing the effective schism of the German church, which has gone even further?
Mattingly notes:
"The Church of Africa is the voice of the poor, the simple and the small," wrote Cardinal Robert Sarah of Guinea, the former head of the Vatican's Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments. "It has the task of announcing the Word of God in front of Western Christians who, because they are rich, equipped with multiple skills in philosophy, theological, biblical and canonical sciences, believe they are evolved, modern and wise in the wisdom of the world."
Mattingly also notes:
Catholic debates over LGBTQ+ issues are crucial, he [ Rev. Chris Ritter] said, "because if you want to spot low-fertility, low-faith cultures in Europe and elsewhere, you look at how and when they legalized and legitimized same-sex marriage. That will give you a good idea of what is happening. … Just look for large numbers of secular old people."
And that gets back to what I noted the other day. The West, in every fashion, is in decline. By mid-century that will be more obvious than it is now, and that's not long. In our feebleness, we've become self obsessed and lost a grasp of the existential.
This won't last forever. Our self extermination by confusing entertainment with living is assuring it will not. And, by extension, the unique tragedy of homosexuality, and the related plagues that endorsing rather than sympathizing with that tragedy has brought on, won't last long as major issues much longer either. Society really doesn't need to be wringing its hands so much over this.
For that matter, we can suppose it won't be long until the occupant of St. Peter's Chair was born in Africa once again. . .and that will not be a bad thing.
