CTD6 – The Oasis of Lent – Crossing the Desert: Lent and Conversion with Deacon James Keating – Discerning Hearts Podcast

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Discerning Hearts.com presents Crossing the Desert, Medican James Keating.

Deacon Keating is a professor of spiritual theology at Kendrick Lennon Seminary in St.

Louis, Missouri.

He's the author of numerous books, including The Heart of the Diagnot, Remain in Me,

and Crossing the Desert, Lent and Conversion, the book on which this series is based.

He has done more than 400 workshops of moral theology and spirituality nationally and regularly

conducts retreats.

Crossing the Desert.

Medican James Keating, I'm your host, Chris McGregor.

Welcome back, Deacon Keating.

Thank you.

We've been traveling, essentially, through Crossing the Desert, your book on Lent and Conversion.

And in the chapter, The Desert of Sin, you make us aware that we never get to a point

in our lives where we can say we are perfectly virtuous.

Is there an end?

Well, the fulfillment of our lives as this response to Jesus, I mean, that's all our life is,

our life is this response to the love of God.

It's perfectly fulfilled only after death in heaven.

And we see this, of course, in the lives of many saints who still had great sorrow for

even their venial sins as death approached.

They did not get their act together perfectly, so to speak, and nobody can.

But the more and more we yield to Christ and the mystery of Christ on the cross and His

great love for us, obviously, the more and more we're going to offer to Him those very

serious sins, those mortal sins, those true sins that block our reception of the holiness

of God.

And so we're going to get better over time, and this is the really hopeful message of Catholic

moral teaching, is that over time, when we enter the fullness of our faith, we will not

be doing the same old sins, stuck in the same rot of sinfulness in five years, in two

years.

These realities will be healed in us, and it's crucial for us to know that we will not

perhaps become perfect, but we will certainly become better.

We will certainly become more adept at receiving the holiness of God.

In fact, this notion of perfection is crucial for us to reflect on just for a moment,

particularly in its aberration of perfectionism.

You see this a lot of times in marriage counseling, where one or the other spouse will demand that

the spouse is perfect, they don't use those words, because they know how ludicrous that

sounds.

Well, Bob is not perfect as a husband, well, of course he's not as human, but she will

still demand this in many ways, or a husband will demand of his wife to be perfect, particularly

I find, but the man, it's usually a superficial perfection regarding the way they look physically.

And so, you know, he will want her to have a certain hairstyle or lose certain weight

or have certain body type, and all of this projection of perfectionism.

On either side is simply a lack of spirituality.

See, we're looking for God all the time, because we were made for God, and marriages

such a close, symbolic vision of God, it's sort of a reflection of God, and this way

spouses are so hard on one another a lot of times, they project their need for divinity

onto their spouse, and the cure to that desire for perfection is prayer, is spirituality.

It seems simple, but it's absolutely true, that you have to stop and leave your husband

alone and leave your wife alone, and you have to go to the person, the only person who

will ever satisfy you to the point of rest, which is God.

Then your wife or your husband can take on those dimensions that are simply faithful to

what it means to be human, and they will be character dimensions or virtue dimensions,

and yes, there will be some vice and there will be some imperfections, but that's what

it means to be a faithful until death to you part as a human being.

The best cure to many, many marriage difficulties, and this is on an unconscious level, but that

the man has to go deep into his need for God.

The woman has to go deep into her need for God, and for goodness sake, leave your spouse

alone.

Of course you will call the spouse away from evil, in other words, you'd be a poor spouse

if you didn't call the spouse away from sin.

But all other types of realities, you didn't give me the house I deserve, you're not in

the perfect job that you want.

Again, you don't look the certain way that I want you to look.

All of that is simply baggage that you're imposing on a spouse, and probably depressing

him or her, and a reflection of your own depression, perhaps, because your own spiritual

life is shallow.

Part of that relationship that we have in marriage is that commitment to be faithful to them

and all things, wouldn't our intercessory prayer for them be part of that faithfulness?

The married couples don't really realize that this is the great power that's laying

dormant in their lives, to go before the blessed sacrament and intercede for your spouse,

and intercede all the time and often.

That's why you were given to one another.

You were given to one another so that you will grow in virtue together.

When we're immature, we think we're given to one another for one another's pleasure,

or as a diversion, or as a companion, or as a friend, or worse, a status symbol, all

sorts of mixed motivations for marriage.

As we grow in Christian maturity, we realize that God has given us one to the other, so

that we can help one another become saints.

That is the only reason Catholics should marry.

And everybody who's doing marriage formation today should be moving the engaged couple

in that direction.

With questions as obvious as, how will you help your future husband become a saint?

One of the ways, of course, is that we're going to intercede for this man or this woman

until we die.

But this question of holiness and moving away from sin has to be in the forefront, has

to be right on the table of marriage preparation.

Otherwise we will simply be marrying two Americans, two Americans who were influenced by the

popular culture of America as their vision of marriage.

A lot of priests joke that they'd rather do two hundred weeks than one wedding.

And the reason they joke that way is because they're sick and tired of the superficiality

of the wedding day, of the projections by the moms and the dads onto their children of

what they need in the country club and the limo, and this endless sense with the obsession

with the clothing.

And it ends at a party, and then it goes off onto some honeymoon, which you can't really

even call it a honeymoon anymore, it's more of a vacation because most of our kids are

in virgins anymore on their wedding night.

So there's no sense here that they're going to actually fully receive each other for

the first time and fully gift one another for the first time.

It's just a vacation.

They've been on other vacations before together, and it's really no big deal.

This one might cost more money because it had to be showy.

So this whole ludicrous parade of American Catholic weddings makes an authentically spiritual

priest sick in his heart, because he realizes that in witnessing this type of wedding,

that these two young people are in danger of, yes, perhaps staying married forever, but

staying married as Americans and not as helpmates to holiness.

This is the sadness of his heart.

It comes out in a joke, sort of black humor, I'd rather do 200 wakes than one wedding.

But what's really happening in his heart is this profound sadness that no matter how long

I spent with these kids and with their parents, nobody got it, nobody got that this wedding

was in Christ.

And so the whole movement of conversion that is necessary for the human has to begin to

take center stage in the formation of married couples.

They're getting married to assist one another in conversion from sin.

That's why God gave them to one another.

Conversion from sin is our goal.

We want to die in each other's arms as saints.

That's the whole point.

In our understanding of a sacramental marriage, it's imperative that we have an appreciation

of God's presence within that marriage.

No couple is going to make it till death do them part, unless there's some sense of

expediency that they need each other for some pragmatic reason.

There's some human affection that keeps them going.

But most people today are going to need to draw from the living spirit of God that's

in them to stay together, to learn how to forgive one another and not leave one another,

to learn how to reconcile and not draw a wedge between one another in revenge, but to

truly understand the mystery of forgiveness, which then opens up to yet another year of

living together.

And we only take it right day by day, month by month, year by year.

But we truly need the spirit of God because there's no cultural helps anymore.

To be married as a Catholic today, and if you ended up a week later or two weeks later

saying it was over, collectively the culture would sigh with boredom, and probably some

sense of efficiency, well, okay, you try that one now, move on to the next.

There's no cultural support for what we're doing.

So unless you actually have the intention of entering into a mystical marriage, a marriage

that there is deep shared prayer, a marriage that draws its strength from the interior dwelling

of the Holy Spirit, which is the spirit that kept Christ on the cross and the spirit that

deepened his joy at the resurrection.

Unless you draw from that interior spirit, just having Jesus as a model is not enough,

not today.

We have to move deeper than moral models.

We have to actually move deep into a mystical reciprocity.

My heart is yielding to the interior dwelling of the living God.

And the interior dwelling of the living God is gifting me with the strength and the

reasons to forgive and to stay with you.

And my spouse is undergoing the same mystical reciprocity.

Now what kind of marriage prep is needed for that?

A much different kind of Catholic marriage has to emerge than what we're used to today.

This marriage is to recover and to become sort of a beacon for others.

This has always been the case, though.

It's only been underscored by the cultural dissolution of its reverence for marriage.

This mystical element has always been the Catholic understanding of marriage.

But when the whole culture supported marriage, it became dormant in our consciousness that

we had to share and draw from the nuptial loving of Jesus Christ upon the cross.

That became dormant, since it was a social thing, and all of society agreed that couples

should at least really try to stay together.

There were lots of supports and culture and even the government.

But now that all that's been stripped away, then the mystical has to come roaring to

the fore again, or there'll be nothing to support us in our marriage.

So this interiority, this truth of interiority, has to be at the core of marriage prep.

Not the model of Jesus, but the very sharing of the way of Jesus, from Jesus's own spirit.

That's what's going to keep us together.

We return in just a moment to crossing the desert, one in conversion, with Deacon James

Keating.

Hi, this is Chris McGregor from Descerning Hearts.

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We now return to Crossing the Desert, Light and Conversion with Deacon James Keating.

For those persons who are not in a relationship that leads to a vocational awareness and

marriage, for those persons, the cross really is that sign of faithfulness that they need

to draw on.

Yeah, they have to cling to that sense that when Jesus was most helpless, he did his

most powerful work.

And this goes back to the heart of your question about intercessory prayer.

When Jesus was most powerless, he did his most powerful work, just being faithful, pinned

to the cross, he saved us.

Salvation flowed from his heart when the sword lands to side and blood and water flowed

out.

The sacramental symbol that salvation was pouring out of his fidelity.

Now couples in very, very difficult marriages where they are estranged from each other emotionally,

what the church is asking them to do is to mystically unite themselves to this fidelity.

And to at least give Christ a chance to heal them, from within, to at least draw from the

power of his fidelity at the moment of the least power that he had at least in human terms.

Being now to the cross, to draw from that mystery of faithful love, even with the pain

that's involved.

Now of course whenever you talk this way about prayer, spirituality, mysticism, somebody's

going to raise their hand and simply say, well, are you trying to tell me that a wife

has to stay with a husband who's being beaten?

And the church is not mentally ill, it's not a ludicrous church.

The church says that woman must be safe, and she must find safety.

And if it means some type of long term separation, then the church will certainly say that

one is virtuous, tragic, but virtuous, at least he, the husband, hopefully is getting

help or being punished by the criminal system, but this woman is being faithful to her words,

words that she uttered in Christ, words that from the very beginning perhaps.

She knew would mean crucifixion, or for the husband who ends up marrying a woman who has

a tragic accident and becomes a paraplegic, and he has to stay with her until death

do them part.

When the church teaches that we should not divorce, and further we should not remarry if

we do divorce, the only reason it can teach that teaching is because it believes in the

very depths of its soul, that it is the power of Jesus' life, death, and resurrection

that is keeping us faithful.

Our puny power would have us out the door at the first sign of suffering, because we

are so wounded by sin.

The church again is not ignorant.

It is saying that you should not divorce, you cannot divorce if you have a legitimate

marriage in the church, because it is assuming that you love Jesus' mysteries.

It is assuming that you are drawing from those mysteries at the Eucharist.

It is assuming that you are pouring over the Word of God and becoming one who possesses

the mind of Christ.

It is assuming that you are not satisfied with simply being an American, which has no

salvific meaning whatsoever.

It is assuming that you believe what you say when you want to get married in the church.

It is assuming all these things.

Now if you present yourself for marriage and you have not let conversion affect you,

you are a liar.

If you present yourself for marriage and you have no affection and love at all for

Jesus Christ and it is a family tradition, you are a liar.

If you present yourself for marriage in the church and you at least do not aspire to

understand and to take on the teachings of the church and to be open to conversion in

the presence of the priest or the other formaters of marriage, your liar.

And you need to be converted.

This is not the justice of the peace.

This is not a place for someone to be married simply because it is a pretty building and

you get the license at the end.

This is a place of crucifixion.

By someone once said to me about the bride, they said when a bride comes to the back of

the church and on her wedding day and looks at the groom and she starts coming down the

aisle, they said no bride ever looks at the stations of the cross.

But you should.

Every bride in every groom should look at the stations of the cross because you are about

to enter intimacy with Jesus in his very passion, in his very self giving, in his very

self donation.

He wants to live that mystery over again in you to understand the privilege of that kind

of marriage.

He wants to live his mysteries over again in you.

And if you say yes, he will make you a saint.

If it takes a year of marriage preparation, take the year.

If it takes two years to understand these mysteries, take the two years.

If it takes three, take three, you are not wasting your time.

You are receiving the greatest of gifts from the church.

You are receiving your identity as a bride in a groom who draw their meaning, not from

some simple, simplistic, anemic understanding of love that is given to us by the American

popular culture.

But you are receiving the very meaning of your love from love itself.

Demand this kind of formation, demand it.

If you're spiritually and mentally and affectively healthy, you will demand this depth of formation

even if it takes years.

Six months to prepare for a marriage that's supposed to last forever, six months in a culture

like this, that's laughable, totally laughable.

We will never get these mysteries in six months.

Let us be generous at least to the Lord and let us be at least filled with enough self-love

to take as long as it takes to be affected by Jesus' love itself as we prepare to love

our spouse until death do us part.

I was struck when you were speaking of the stations of the cross because in that union

that occurs between a man and woman in that sacrament of marriage, the station of the

cross is not the type of burden that even Christ had to carry when he had to carry his cross

alone, at least in marriage you have each other to assist one another.

In marriage we are one another's crosses and we do help one another carry the cross.

That's the great mystery of the interpenetrating intimacy of the spouses.

It's like we cause one another to suffer and yet we are also the ones who heal.

And in Christ, of course he's moving us to ask for forgiveness after we heard our spouse

and he's also moving us to assist our spouse with any other kind of crosses that they bear,

whether it's health or psychic or emotional or perhaps it's about a family crisis or a professional

or career crisis, I mean the spouse is the gift, the gift that brings healing primarily

just through listening, but the gift that brings healing that has been given to you by Christ

himself so that you will not be alone.

And so it is a great paradox and yet at the same time we draw great solace from the fact

that I will not be carrying my cross alone.

This is our mutual cross.

If you even imagine it that way, both of you, the groom and the bride, shouldering it both

together as you go up the hill, you're helping one another.

In Christ though, you're not just helping one another as nice people or as people who

have read self-help books or take an active listening classes.

You're helping one another in Christ, which means you're helping one another from the

very depths of your mutual reception of Jesus in prayer.

That's where the real, unique and substantive help is coming from.

Because the reason why we come to the church to be married, the way we process to the

altar to receive the sacrament, it's not just the bride and the groom, but it's essential

to have the cloud of witnesses there, isn't it?

The community is there obviously for reasons of the law, I mean at least the people that

you choose to be in your wedding party, but these witnesses that are with you, friends,

family, years where we can talk about the emulation.

Here's where we can talk about the moral modeling.

Hopefully some of these people gave you a glimpse of the depth that marriage can go to.

They weren't your official formatures that you got when you registered to get married

and you spent six months with the priest or the deacon or the lay team.

But somewhere in the back of your mind and hopefully in your heart, the marriage of

your aunt Teresa, to Uncle Willie, became iconic to you.

They'd suffered greatly, they had deep joys.

They were very upfront that they drew their love from Christ.

But these people who gather around you at your wedding day were your original formatures,

hopefully.

And of course, my sympathies go out to anyone who's just simply had a family or friends

that were just obsessed with the superficiality of the American cultural understanding of

marriage.

And they're the ones, they're the ones that are on your wedding day.

I remember after some of the weddings I presided at finding beer cans in the back of a

church and realizing how sad it was that these people, so-called friends, could not even

think of the welfare of the bride in the groom long enough to prevent them from following

their own bent disorders to drink during the ceremony.

Hopefully, that this cloud of witnesses that is yours, at least one or two of those couples,

were living this life of depth with Christ and they become your role models and they become

the ones that perhaps you go to for counseling.

But most definitely, if you have none of those in your family, then you can draw from the

saints.

Particularly someone like St. Giannamola, a married physician, and the lovely marriage that

she had with her husband, and all that she gave for her children.

If there are people around you that are living, there are certainly brothers and sisters

in Christ who have been canonized.

You can have access to their understanding of marriage, and it's been lots of time

with them.

That alone will be healing for you.

We're out of time for this segment, Deakin Keating, do you have any final thoughts?

Just in terms of this sense of preparation for vocation, to really fix your minds and

your hearts on the idea that Christ is giving you a vocation, because this is the easiest

route for you to be reached by Him in His desire to forgive and convert you from sin.

That is the only goal.

Let Him reach you in your vocation so that He can forgive and convert you from sin.

Thank you, Deakin Keating.

Thank you.

We've been listening to Crossing the Desert with Deakin James Keating.

To hear and or to download this conversation, along with hundreds of other spiritual

formation programs, visit DeserningHearts.com, or you can find it within the free Deserning

Hearts app or wherever you download your favorite podcast.

This has been a production of Deserning Hearts.

I'm your host, Chris McGregor.

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