Disillusionment seems to be a recurring theme in my life these days. Everything from conversations I've been having with my daughter about her work on Evelyn Waugh and Cervantes, to a discussion on Maclin Horton's blog about disappointments in implementing lifestyles and values, to the Church's reading of Ecclesiastes in the Office of Readings.
I have seen everything that is done under the sun; and behold, all is vanity and a striving after wind. What is crooked cannot be made straight,and what is lacking cannot be numbered. (Eccl. 1:14-15, RSV)In my years as an active Catholic I have been involved in various efforts at personal, social and cultural renewal--the Charismatic Renewal, pro-life activism, home schooling, Caelum et Terra, St. Anthony's Parish in Milwaukee, St. Blog's parish, Secular Franciscans. I've watched other movements closely and with sympathy--the efforts to reform the liturgical reform, etc. I have experienced great blessings in each one, but also some pretty profound disappointments. In so many cases the flesh, the world, and the devil seem to have won a victory, or at least sapped the movement of its energy. I myself have found it difficult, and sometimes impossible, to fully implement even my most cherished spiritual values in the face of the complexities and ambiguities of life among a depraved generation--the depravity of which I am not completely free.
At the talk the other day by Fr. Rosetti of the St. Luke's Institute he said that cynicism is a disease. My kids can tell you that cynicism is something that I react strongly against because I sense that it is true.
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