Calling Catholics ‘Weird’ Is Not New

This is not a political article; I simply want to connect recent campaigning tactics in the American presidential race where a candidate was called ‘weird’ with my assertion that the world also views authentic Catholics as ‘weird’.  The word weird is a synonym for “counter-cultural” because we refuse to follow the culture through the wide gate “that leads to destruction.

People who have been molded by modern culture disapprove of a faithful Catholic’s lifestyle choices and beliefs in all areas, from how we raise our families to how we pray. This was blatantly on display when the Democratic campaign and the media recently advanced the notion that the Republican vice-presidential candidate, J.D. Vance, was “weird”.

A recent convert to Catholicism, Vance found out how being a faithful Catholic these days seems weird to much of the world; whereas, longtime Catholics have always known about this animosity toward our beliefs. We have always been labeled “weird” because we believe in things that today’s godless society can’t comprehend, such as that the Holy Eucharist is the Real Presence of Christ, the baby in the womb is a person, and marriage is solely between a man and a woman.

Remember, it was just two months before that there was an onslaught of hate heaved on NFL player, Harrison Butker. He was nationally harangued for being an authentic Catholic who gave a commencement address at a devout Catholic college to faithful Catholic graduates about fundamental Catholic beliefs. No matter how common sense Butker’s speech was, the secular world could not allow Christian truths to have dominion over their anti-God agenda, and thus he came under fire for his truthful, inspiring commencement speech at Benedictine College which appealed to the graduating class to become Catholics that live up to the high ideals of our Faith.

These highly publicized name-calling examples illustrate the spiritual battle authentic Catholics have been in for quite some time. Catholicism was viewed by many Americans as “weird” way back at the start of our nation. The future second president of the United States, John Adams, attended a few Catholic Masses over a few years in the late 1700s and found it so weird that he wrote about the occasions using derogatory descriptions of the Mass and Catholics, such as:

• “The poor wretches fingering their beads, chanting Latin, not a word of which they understood…”
• “…their crossing themselves perpetually… their bowings and kneelings and genuflections before the altar…”
• “The dress of the priest…little images and crucifixes…wax candles lighted up…the picture of our Savior in a frame of marble over the altar and the blood dropping and streaming from his wounds…the music consisting of an organ, and a Choir of singers chanting…: Here is everything which can lay hold of the eye, ear, and imagination. Everything which can charm and bewitch the simple and the ignorant.”
• “A picture in tapestry was hung up, of a number of Jews stabbing the wafer…and blood gushing in streams from the bread. This insufferable piece of pious villainy shocked me beyond measure; but thousands were before it, on their knees, adoring.”
• “I could not help cursing the knavery of the priesthood and the brutal ignorance of the people…to detest and despise.” 

Two hundred years ago, Catholics were considered weird due primarily to our unique way of worshipping, as our traditional, virtuous ways of day-to-day living were actually much in line with greater society and thus not a cause for ridicule. However, nowadays, Catholics are seen as bizarre primarily because we live counter-cultural lives. Authentic Catholicism:

• RENOUNCES the culture imposing an anti-God gender ideology in preschools through graduate schools with immoral educators allowing children to be in opposite-sex restrooms, to join opposite-sex sports teams, and to be called by their so-called chosen pronouns.
• REJECTS the culture’s belief that sexual acts should be welcomed between any two consenting people regardless of their marriage status or sex, and that the preeminent way to “label” people needs to be regarding how they like to have sexual relations – such as “gay” if they like male-to-male anal sex or “LGBTQIA2S+” if they haven’t quite figured out what their preference is from their invented list of infinitely-possible acts.
• REPUDIATES the culture’s promotion of radical feminism which does not recognize and appreciate the distinctive, purposefully designed gifts of both sexes but aims to eradicate gender roles and destroy our Creator’s beautifully designed family unit.
• RESISTS the culture’s hedonistic philosophy and false messages of “love is love,” “live your truth,”and “God made me this way,” which arrogantly embrace a false version of reality while promoting the fabrications that God didn’t decide one’s sex at conception and that intimate homosexual relationships are natural and good, even though God said otherwise.
• REBUFFS the culture’s assumption that not only is it a fairy tale to believe in the possibility of unconditional love where a husband and wife commit to each other in a marriage ordained by God to last until death, but that if a marriage isn’t painless and effortless then the easy, appropriate solution is to divorce.

The world tells us that our opinions must conform to the secular values of the age, and if they don’t, then we are judgmental, close-minded extremists and should be silenced.  Saint Pope John Paul II back in 1994 identified the spiritual battle between Catholic families and society when he wrote his Letter to Families:

Unfortunately, various programs backed by very powerful resources…aim at the breakdown of the family. At times it appears that concerted efforts are being made to present as ‘normal’ and attractive, and even to glamorize, situations which are in fact ‘irregular.’  Indeed, they contradict ‘the truth and love’ which should inspire and guide relationships between men and women, thus causing tensions and divisions in families, with grave consequences particularly for children. The moral conscience becomes darkened; what is true, good, and beautiful is deformed; and freedom is replaced by what is actually enslavement.

If you are authentically Catholic, then you firmly believe Jesus Christ is the truth, and your lifestyle tries to live the truth as well as is willing to suffer for the truth. It is this obedience to Our Lord instead of obedience to the worldly culture that makes your opponents hate you and call you, “weird.”

Society is moving at an ever-increasing speed to the demonic side and at this rate no deviancy is too outrageous to assume won’t become commonplace in the near future. It’s bad enough that both social media and corporate media along with most politicians and entertainers spew unchristian values, but it’s worse that their godless propaganda has captured the eyes and ears of our younger generation.  Because of the culture’s moral decline and sexual debauchery, faithful Catholic parents have to work harder than ever to raise their children counter-culturally which includes teaching their sons and daughters why swimming against society’s tide might be scary and lonely, but it is worth it because at the end you’ll reach an eternal reward that those swimming with the tide will not.