Catching Foxes

Gomer is low-talking because he's the only one awake at his in-laws' house (I mean, it IS 9:30pm, after all). We discuss random stuff, rarely get to a point, and laugh along the way. Also, the ENDING IS WORTH IT!Sponsored By:CatholicStock: Use the Promo Code "foxes" to get 20% off your first token and support Catholic art the doesn't suck! Promo Code: foxesSupport Catching Foxes

Fradd was in Australia for six weeks and hit rock bottom, then went on Healing the Whole Person retreat with Sr. Miriam James (Gomer's hero) and God radically healed him. Then GOOGLE screwed him over. sad.Special Guest: Matt Fradd.Sponsored By:CatholicStock: Use the Promo Code "foxes" to get 20% off your first token and support Catholic art the doesn't suck! Promo Code: foxesSupport Catching FoxesLinks:(1) Update on Google Banning Me - YouTube — Just wanted to share some details from my recent experience getting banned from speaking at Google in San Francisco. With the threat of Youtube and Google suppressing Christian and Conservative voices on their platforms, I thought it might be beneficial to share exactly what happened and give my thoughts on the situation. (1) Why Google Banned Me From Speaking - YouTube — Here is where you can find my back and forth between me and Google as well as the Twitter thread they say violated their community guidelines: https://www.patreon.com/posts/28348530 Front Page - John Paul II Healing Center

I love the Stewart story! Conversion to Catholicism, dead-end unhappy life, a return to the land and farming, and pooping in a bucket, to discovering the grace of enough. Rest assured, her personal commitment to Christ will make you happy you suffered through Luke and me till the bitter end. She's amazing. Thanks to CatholicStock.com and The Catholic Card Game Generations Expansion!Sponsored By:The Catholic Card Game: Donate to the cause starting on July 11th.CatholicStock: Use the Promo Code "foxes" to get 20% off your first token and support Catholic art the doesn't suck! Promo Code: foxesSupport Catching FoxesLinks:About HaleyFountains of Carrots PodcastThe Grace of Enough — The Grace of Enough: Pursuing Less and Living More in a Throwaway Culture is the story of how my family made the radical decision to leave a secure life in the city, sell our house, get rid of most of our possessions, and move halfway across the country with three small children for a year long internship on a farm with no flushing toilets. We went from being the owners of a lovely little home in Florida to living in a 650 square foot apartment on a farm in Texas.

The Catholic Young Adult scene is filled with hookups. We ignore this, we aren't doing ministry of any sort. Then we dive into Healing and then Hope. At the end, it's a SHOCKING story of hope and prayer. Thanks to our sponsors, CatholicStock and The Catholic Cardgame: Generations Expansion (Now on Kickstarter)Sponsored By:CatholicStock: Use the Promo Code "foxes" to get 20% off your first token and support Catholic art the doesn't suck! Promo Code: foxesThe Catholic Card Game: Donate to the cause starting on July 11th.Support Catching FoxesLinks:Catching Foxes on Twitter: "Young Adult Ministry in a nutshell: everyone is screwing each other and nobody’s talking about it." — Young Adult Ministry in a nutshell: everyone is screwing each other and nobody’s talking about it. Catching Foxes on Twitter: "I’m serious about this. I (Luke)... — I’m serious about this. I (Luke) have noticed this as a common thing in Catholic young adult communities across the country. Everyone is engaging in morally illicit sexual activities and we don’t talk about it. The damage is and will continue to be catastrophic.

*We almost kept them all to Ten Minutes. * Luke: The Question of Scrupulosity Gomer Communication after 10 years of Marriage Joe: Dating Fast (how's your mom's car?) Betsy: Chernobyl show and any new (non-FIRE) Podcasts Mora: Catholics in the Public Square vs The Benedict Option When is Justice Appeased in Identity Politics Gomer: Fr. Morris leaves the priesthood Gomer: and is Puching McCarrick in the Face true justice? LIVE SHOWS Thank you, Alaska! We had a great time at The Heights and at Theresa's house! Get ready, St Louis, 'cuz you next! (July 23rd).Support Catching FoxesLinks:For the Catholic Suffering from Scruples — Scrupulosity might look foolish or even funny to outsiders, but for people gripped in its claws, it's hellish. I mean that literally: it feels like we are locked away from God and His love. Scrupulosity is a coil of fear, doubt, guilt, and despair. Ten Commandments for the Scrupulous — Below is a guide for folks who have this condition. It was written first by a Redemptorist priest, Father Don Miller, some thirty years ago, and has been amended by Father Thomas Santa. I hope it helps you if you're torturing yourself with thoughts rooted in scrupulosity. About Scrupulous Anonymous - Scrupulous Anonymous — Since 1964, a very important part of the mission of the Redemptorists and Liguori Publications is ministering to those afflicted with scrupulosity, a religious form of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD). We do this by publishing Scrupulous Anonymous Newsletter. Some people may be troubled about past sins, others agonize about problems of obedience and purity, and many worry about sin where there is no sin. Their fear and anxiety prevent them from making decisions lest they be wrong ones. Why I Wish Jonathan Morris Had Remained a Priest — Why I Wish Jonathan Morris Had Remained a Priest COMMENTARY: There are burdens, often undeserved, that accompany every path in life. The priesthood is no exception, and the burdens of our life are not without blessings.Dealing with Scruples - Catholicism.org — “A scruple is then an exaggerated, unreasonable fear of sinning where there is in reality no sin. This groundless fear of sinning causes doubt and trouble of mind. The scrupulous person becomes a prey to continual fear of sin, past, present and future, in the most innocuous circumstances. He is afflicted with endless doubt and mental anguish, causing a confusion of his judgment with regard to what is lawful and what is forbidden, between what is trivial and what is serious. His morbid fear of doing wrong only obscures his judgment and multiplies his doubts, and these in turn increase his fear, so that he comes to take alarm from quite insignificant and unreasonable motives.” Why Conservatives Struggle with Identity Politics | National Affairs — In this quasi-religious arena, innocent victims alone are hallowed; they alone receive what could be called "debt point" recognition. The rest — however much their legal, economic, or social status might indicate otherwise — have no legitimate voice. Indeed, their penance as transgressors is to listen to the innocents, and their lay responsibility in the liturgy of identity politics is to assent to the right of the innocents to tear down the civilizational temple their transgressors have built over the centuries — paid for, as it has been, not simply with money, but with the unearned suffering of the innocent scapegoats. Dead Conservative Memes Can't Defeat the Identity Politics Clerisy - The American Mind — Today, whether at conservative conferences or in conservative think tanks, the listener even moderately attentive to the conversation will hear of the perils of progressivism and of cultural Marxism, of the need to defend family values, of the importance of being pro-life, of the importance of free markets, and of the threat of multiculturalism. These terms—indeed the constellation these terms form—emerged during the Reagan Presidency, more than three decades ago. If the 2016 Presidential election tells us anything, it is that this verbiage has hardened into nearly lifeless political rhetoric, sustained on life support through institutional buy-in and the assurances of political philosophers sympathetic to conservatism who tirelessly promote the link between the veritable ideas they study and the political vocabulary that has been in place for decades is timeless.S2 E14: Bishop Barron: Catholicism and the Modern Age | Jordan Peterson — For Ep 14, we present Dr. Peterson’s highly anticipated conversation with Bishop Barron. True Grit (2010) - IMDb — Storyline Following the murder of her father by hired hand Tom Chaney, 14-year-old farm girl Mattie Ross sets out to capture the killer. To aid her, she hires the toughest U.S. marshal she can find, a man with "true grit," Reuben J. "Rooster" Cogburn. Mattie insists on accompanying Cogburn, whose drinking, sloth, and generally reprobate character do not augment her faith in him. Against his wishes, she joins him in his trek into the Indian Nations in search of Chaney. They are joined by Texas Ranger LaBoeuf, who wants Chaney for his own purposes. The unlikely trio find danger and surprises on the journey, and each has his or her "grit" tested.The Benedict Option: A Strategy for Christians in a Post-Christian Nation: Rod Dreher: 9780735213296: Amazon.com: Books — The Benedict Option: A Strategy for Christians in a Post-Christian Nation Hardcover – March 14, 2017 Stop Misunderstanding the Benedict Option — I’ve heard so many people characterize the Benedict Option as: “We can’t just retreat, give up, or bury our heads in the sand.” Many people have equated the Benedict Option with disengagement and withdraw. Here is the real basis of the Benedict Option: Given the profound crisis of culture (which has affected the Church as well), we cannot look to mainstream institutions for our future. Rather, we need to form intentional communities that more fully embody our Christian faith and in which we are willing to face the consequences of going against the stream. It is from such institutions that real cultural change will occur. Thus, the Benedict Option is all about being active and engaging the problems of society. It recognizes, however, that solutions will begin locally, in the relationships that we can influence. Rebuilding will begin there. Do we really think that our political, educational, and economic institutions will provide a secure future for the practice of our Christian faith?Benedict Option FAQ | The American ConservativeLuke on Twitter: "Lady liberty.… " — The Pose.

First, Fergalicious. Then, Twittermaggedon. Finally, Luke asks Gomer how we can, outside of faith sharing groups (buy my book!), actually grow in our faith. Gomer lies in order to answer this question. In the end, you'll be enriched, engaged, and engorged on Glory. Also, OJ SIMPSON AND BILL COSBY ARE ON TWITTER!!! HAPPY FATHERS DAY!Support Catching Foxes

Twitter Rage, Coping Mechanisms, and Evangelical Gomer and the FIRE movementSupport Catching FoxesLinks:Playing with FIRE — The DocumentaryRetirement Calculator — Watching my retirement age decrease as I increased my savings showed me the power of our savings rate and the real possibility of early retirement. I come back to this tool often to check my assumptions or just for encouragement. We hope you will too. 100 | Welcome to the FI Community ChooseFI — Brad and Jonathan look back at the ChooseFI’s growth during the past 100 episodes and hit the highlights of financial independence for new community members and recap their own financial independence journeys. Welcome To Financial Independence! | ChooseFI — Explore Beginners Guide This guide will walk you through the basics of financial independence but if something doesn’t fit for your life that’s ok. This is your journey and your life. Use the tips you find helpful and toss the rest. We know as a group we can get a little extreme (ok, a lot extreme), but our community is full of diverse and wonderful people. There is no one way to reach financial independence. Check out our guide for beginners. Prefer a more visual version? Check out our illustrated How of FI series.The Shockingly Simple Math Behind Early Retirement — If you are spending 100% (or more) of your income, you will never be prepared to retire, unless someone else is doing the saving for you (wealthy parents, social security, pension fund, etc.). So your work career will be Infinite. If you are spending 0% of your income (you live for free somehow), and can maintain this after retirement, you can retire right now. So your working career can be Zero. In between, there are some very interesting considerations. As soon as you start saving and investing your money, it starts earning money all by itself. Then the earnings on those earnings start earning their own money. It can quickly become a runaway exponential snowball of income. As soon as this income is enough to pay for your living expenses, while leaving enough of the gains invested each year to keep up with inflation, you are ready to retire.Stock Series — Stock Series. 'Nuff said.FIRE Explained — Playing with FIRE — Refreshingly, the mechanics of FIRE not being conveyed by formal experts in a dry text book fashion. More powerfully, they are being illustrated through the real-life examples of the interesting but ordinary folks of FIRE who come in all shapes and sizes. FIRE principles tend to be presented in plain language for easy implementation. Practical categories like reduced housing expense, car expense, sound investment strategy and tax optimization are delivered in easy to digest posts, interviews and stories.

Backstory on Jesse Straight: My wife and I are Catholic converts from evangelicalism (though my wife was baptized Orthodox, then raised Presbyterian). Easter Sunday 2009 my wife and I entered the church. On Easter Monday 2009 we started our farm. I am a suburban kid who started a sustainable farm (i.e., no farming experience) through the influence of Wendell Berry and Joel Salatin. Since 2012 our only source of income. My wife is at home with our 6 kids under 9--feel your pain Gomer. Gomer, I have noted you have sometimes brought up Wendell Berry, distributivism, and issues about our modern food system. And you guys are interested in the anima technica vacua, which would be related to our alienation from the food, farming, and natural world that sustains us 3 times/day! You have touched on it, but you have not taken on the conversation of how Catholics ought to think about food and farming. And this could also fit nicely into your "don't put me in a Catholic box" theme of the show--thinking carefully about food and farming is not the sole territory of secular liberals--Catholics should be leading the charge! You can see more about us here: www.ncregister.com/daily-news/catholic-family-goes-back-to-nature-harvesting-gods-good-earth-and-faith https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mD5jnxhne7o&feature=youtu.be And here is where I went head to head with R.R. Reno of First Things. (I have a lot of respect for Reno and think he is right on most things, but here I think I was dead right!) https://www.firstthings.com/article/2014/03/inequality-and-agency https://www.firstthings.com/article/2014/05/lettersSupport Catching FoxesLinks:Meet the Farmers | Pasture Raised | Whiffletree Farm | Internships | United States — Meet the Farmers - The Straights. Jesse Straight, farmer and founder of Whiffletree Farm, was born and raised in Fauquier County, graduating from Fauquier High School in 2000. After finishing studies in religion and pre-med at UVa, marrying his wife Liz, and working in Charlottesville, Jesse read a book by Wendell Berry that inspired him to learn more about farming through reading, visiting farmers, and making forays into small farming ventures. In April 2009 Jesse and Liz moved back to Warrenton to be near his family and old friends, and to start their farm business! They were happy to return to Warrenton but did not know all the ways in which they would be so well befriended and cared for here. By 2012 the business was in need of additional acreage and so the Straights moved to Whiffletree Farm, where they have been ever since.Why Organic, Sustainable Farming Matters | Portrait of a Farmer - YouTube — Most pro-organic documentaries make their point by taking stabs at the cruelty and other evils involved in the world of industrialized farming. In this short documentary portrait, Jesse Straight, owner of Whiffletree Farm, shows us a different approach. As he gestures to the beautiful landscapes that surround us he explains, "being a farmer is special because this is my office. You spend your day making animals happy...you get to do things that help the things around you thrive". Catholic Family Goes Back to Nature: Harvesting God’s Good Earth — and Faith — Converting to Catholicism was a major life change for Jesse Straight and his wife, Liz, but not in ways they could have anticipated. The couple and family now live on the 80-acre Whiffletree Farm in Warrenton, Virginia, and they use farming to honor God through raising stock and feeding the community.  Letters by Various | Articles | First Things — Now this brings us to the crux of the matter. Am I right? Are conventional farming and agribusiness, as they relate to stewardship and health, so bad? And is small-scale, sustainable farming so good? If Reno wants to dismiss the ethical dimension of this issue, he will have to convince me that what happens in a confined poultry house from start to finish—and its complete impact on land, chicken, farmer, eater, community—is ­ethically defensible, especially in the face of the viable and sensible alternatives offered by operations like my own. (Some naysayers argue that you cannot “feed the world” with my kind of farming. This is not true, but I will not take up that extended argument here.) Inequality and Agency by R. R. Reno | Articles | First Things — esse Straight appreciates my analysis of elite self-regard and the ways the upper crust is reinterpreting morality to serve itself. But he runs the Whiffletree Farm in Warrenton, Virginia, where he raises organic free-range pigs, cattle, and chickens. This makes him less than happy with my “habit of, while poking fun at and exposing some of the frivolous, self-righteous, and self-indulgent ways of the elite, flippantly citing their ‘separate cuisine of organic, locally sourced food’ or ‘gourmet pickles,’ etc.” Farming Practices | Pasture Raised | Whiffletree Farm | Internships | United States — We raise chicken, eggs, turkey, pork and beef all on pasture and without any GMO feed, chemicals, hormones, or antibiotics (except in rare life-threatening situations for our cattle).  Our goal is to farm in a way that is good for all parties involved: the land, the animals, our families, our customers, and our community.  We do that by respecting the needs of the land and the animals, working in coordination with nature.   Monopsony - Wikipedia — In economics, a monopsony (from Ancient Greek μόνος (mónos) "single" + ὀψωνία (opsōnía) "purchase") is a market structure in which a single buyer substantially controls the market as the major purchaser of goods and services offered by many would-be sellers. In the microeconomic theory of monopsony, a single entity is assumed to have market power over sellers as the only purchaser of a good or service, much in the same manner that a monopolist can influence the price for its buyers in a monopoly, in which only one seller faces many buyers. Wendell Berry - Wikipedia — Wendell Erdman Berry (born August 5, 1934) is an American novelist, poet, essayist, environmental activist, cultural critic, and farmer.[1] He is an elected member of the Fellowship of Southern Writers, a recipient of The National Humanities Medal, and the Jefferson Lecturer for 2012. He is also a 2013 Fellow of The American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Berry was named the recipient of the 2013 Richard C. Holbrooke Distinguished Achievement Award.[2] On January 28, 2015, he became the first living writer to be inducted into the Kentucky Writers Hall of Fame.[3] Wendell Berry's Integrative Philosophy of Life and Energy | Justmeans — Wendell Berry's definition of community has become the standard in many contexts: "... the commonwealth and common interests, commonly understood, of people living together in a place and wishing to continue to do so. To put it another way, community is a locally understood interdependence of local people, local culture, local economy, and local nature." G.K. Chesterton's Distributism — Our separation of economy from the home is part of a long fragmentation process. Each of the modern ideas that might have once been part of this complete breakfast have come to claim that they are complete all by themselves. We have separated everything from everything else. We have accomplished this by separating everything from the home. Feminism has separated women from the home. Capitalism has separated men from the home. Socialism has separated education from the home. Manufacturing has separated craftsmanship from the home. The news and entertainment industry has separated originality and creativity from the home, rendering us into passive and malleable consumers rather than active citizens. Three Works on Distributism: G. K. Chesterton: 9781449511227: Amazon.com: Books — Three Works on Distributism Paperback – September 14, 2009 Principles | New Catholic Land Movement — Mission: To renew Catholic culture by restoring families on the land Goals: (a) Assist Catholic families and individuals onto the land (b) Train Catholic families and individuals in the arts of farming (c) Publish texts relating to Catholic culture and rural life. (d) Establish a New Catholic Land Movement Institute (e) Culivate Catholic culture on the farms of members. (f) Establish a funding  and farm-link service to assist Catholic families and individuals in transitioning to rural life.Polyface Farm - We Are Your Clean Meat Connection — To Develop Environmentally, Economically, and Emotionally Enhancing Agricultural Prototypes and Facilitate Their Duplication Throughout the World. "Polyfaces" | documentary on Joel Salatin — 'Polyfaces' is an exciting upcoming documentary that features one of the world's best farms in action. It reveals how the Salatin family and their team are healing the land, regenerating the local economy, inspiring people all around the world, and feeding 5,000 families ethically produced, nutrient-dense foods. If you Eat, Buy, or Grow food then this is a film you must see!

30 minutes of chatting, followed by 45 minutes of discussion about Bishop Robert Barron's "Letter to a Suffering Church". Prayer for a Suffering Church Lord Jesus Christ, through your Incarnation you accepted a human nature and lived a real, human life. Setting aside the glory of your divinity, you met us face to face in the vulnerability of our humanity. Though without sin, you accepted sinners, offering forgiveness and placing yourself before even the most unworthy as a servant and a friend. You became small and weak in the estimation of the powerful, so that you might elevate to glory the small and weak of the world. Your descent into our nature was not without risk, as it exposed you to the assaults of the darkest and most terrifying of humanity’s fallen desires—our cruelty and narrowness, our deceptions and our denials. All this culminated in the cross, where your divine love was met with the full fury of our malice, our violence, and our estrangement from your grace. You offered yourself to us with innocence and receptivity, and this was met with the abuse of your body, humiliation and mockery, betrayal and isolation, torture and death. All this—even the dereliction of feeling abandoned by God—you accepted. You became a victim, so that all those victimized since the beginning of the world would know you as their advocate. You went into the darkness, so that all those compelled into the dark by human wickedness would discover in you a radiant light. Grant we pray, O Lord, healing for all victims of sexual abuse. Purify your Church of corruption. Bring justice to those who have been wronged. Grant consolation to all who are afflicted. Cast your light to banish the shadows of deception. Manifest to all your advocacy of those who have been so cruelly hurt, and your judgment upon those who, having perpetrated such crimes, remain unrepentant. Compel those in your Church whom you have entrusted to safeguard the innocent and act on behalf of the victims to be vigilant and zealous in their duties. Restore faith to those from whom it has been stolen, and hope to those who have despaired. Christ the Victim, we call out to you! Strengthen your faithful to accept the mission placed before us, a mission of holiness and truth. Inspire us to become advocates of those who have been harmed. Grant us strength to fight for justice. Impart to us courage so that we might forthrightly face the challenges to come. Raise up saints from your Church, and grant us the grace to become the saints you desire us to be. This we ask of you, who live and reign with the Father and the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever. Amen.Support Catching FoxesLinks:Letter to a Suffering Church: A Bishop Speaks on the Sexual Abuse Crisis — In this stirring manifesto, Bishop Robert Barron, founder of Word on Fire Catholic Ministries and Auxiliary Bishop of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, explains why this is not the time to leave, but the time to stay and fight. Reading the current crisis through the lenses of Scripture and Church history, Bishop Barron shows that we have faced such egregious scandals before; that the spiritual treasures of the Church were preserved by holy men and women who recommitted themselves to fighting evil; and that there is a clear path forward for us today. 1 Samuel 3-4 RSVCE - Samuel’s Calling and Prophetic - Bible Gateway — 11 Then the Lord said to Samuel, “Behold, I am about to do a thing in Israel, at which the two ears of every one that hears it will tingle. 12 On that day I will fulfil against Eli all that I have spoken concerning his house, from beginning to end. 13 And I tell him that I am about to punish his house for ever, for the iniquity which he knew, because his sons were blaspheming God, and he did not restrain them. 14 Therefore I swear to the house of Eli that the iniquity of Eli’s house shall not be expiated by sacrifice or offering for ever.”Genesis 19 RSVCE - The Depravity of Sodom - The two angels - Bible Gateway — But before they lay down, the men of the city, the men of Sodom, both young and old, all the people to the last man, surrounded the house; 5 and they called to Lot, “Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us, that we may know them.” 6 Lot went out of the door to the men, shut the door after him, 7 and said, “I beg you, my brothers, do not act so wickedly. 8 Behold, I have two daughters who have not known man; let me bring them out to you, and do to them as you please; only do nothing to these men, for they have come under the shelter of my roof.”Luke 18:15-17 RSVCE - Jesus Blesses Little Children - Now - Bible Gateway — 15 Now they were bringing even infants to him that he might touch them; and when the disciples saw it, they rebuked them. 16 But Jesus called them to him, saying, “Let the children come to me, and do not hinder them; for to such belongs the kingdom of God. 17 Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it.”

Luke delays recording to attend a concert and relive the early 2000's, we blame the clergy for speaker-culture, we talk the crappy Atlantic article, we BRIEFLY discuss the terrible Game of Thrones ending; Oh look, Fr Dave is the new FUS President! Then, Gomer's rapid fire: financial independence, peeing, Luke has anger issues, and our Live Show in Appleton was fun! Here's this gem from Nat'l Catholic Reporter Like too many boomer authors, he jumps from a whim to ontology in the twinkling of an eye: The priesthood did not work for Carroll, so the priesthood is the problem and must be abolished. It would be sad if he believed this and did not publish this rubbish. As he does publish it, his influence is pernicious. Support Catching FoxesLinks:mewithoutYouThe Catholic Church Should Abolish the Priesthood - The Atlantic — What remains of the connection to Jesus once the organizational apparatus disappears? That is what I asked myself in the summer before I resigned from the priesthood all those years ago—a summer spent at a Benedictine monastery on a hill between Jerusalem and Bethlehem. I came to realize that the question answers itself. The Church, whatever else it may be, is not the organizational apparatus. It is a community of memory, keeping alive the story of Jesus Christ. The Church is an in-the-flesh connection to him—or it is nothing. The Church is the fellowship of those who follow him, of those who seek to imitate him—a fellowship, to repeat the earliest words ever used about us, of “those that loved him at the first and did not let go of their affection for him.” Abolish the Priesthood? A Young Priest Responds — "Abolish the Priesthood? A Young Priest Responds- The Catholic priesthood will outlast all those who call for its abolition" Fr. Dominic BouckThe Case Against Abolishing the Priesthood | America Magazine — In the Dec. 11, 2000, issue of The New Yorker, the magazine’s revered literary critic James Wood began his review of the writings of J. F. Powers with a blunt question, “Does anyone, really, like priests?” I read that article a few months after my ordination to the priesthood. I found it hard to understand not only how an intelligent person could write a sentence like that, but how a prestigious magazine could print it. James Carroll's call to 'Abolish the Priesthood' is misguided and tiresome | National Catholic Reporter — Carroll's embrace of theology is thoroughly opportunistic. At one point, he yearns for the pre-Constantinian church of Jesus' early followers, but later he states, "When the Catholic imagination, swayed by Augustine, demonized the sexual restlessness built into the human condition, self-denial was put forward as the way to happiness. But sexual renunciation as an ethical standard has collapsed among Catholics, not because of pressures from a hedonistic 'secular' modernity but because of its inhumane and irrational weight." But it is in the Gospels themselves that Jesus advocates self-denial, encourages the unmarried to remain celibate, and tells his followers to take up their cross and follow him. Following Jesus can lead down many different paths, but none of them have to do with sexual liberationism.