Dan McGuire - Marching Orders: A Tactical Plan for Converting the World to Christ

Marching

Orders

A tactical plan for Converting

the world to Christ

Dan M c Guire

Imprimatur

Rev. Jay H. Peterson

Vicar General, Diocese of Great Falls-Billings

Nihil Obstat

Most Rev. Michael W. Warfel

Bishop, Diocese of Great Falls-Billings

2015 Dan McGuire

All rights reserved. Except for quotations, no part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, uploading to the Internet, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher.

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To the souls of all the faithful departed;

but two in particular who are in need of prayers.

Thanks to my wife Kristen and son Sean

for their help in editing and reviewing the content of this book.

Introduction

Most everyone has heard of medieval knights in shining armor. Far fewer know that knighthood and chivalry were informed by Catholicism. The gospel ethics of charity, goodness, uprightness, fairness, and noble conduct were meant to transform the warrior into a force for goodas much as was possible for one whose reason for existence was to kill his fellow man. Actual knighthood was far different than the symbolic or honorific knighthood we think of today. Military conflict and war were part of the warp and weft of life in medieval times and affected the daily lives of most people.

I chose a military theme for this book fully aware of this difficulty. I did so in order to stress a present-day reality: as long as we inhabit this pilgrim life on Earth, we are engaged in spiritual combat.

Another reality is that the orders of knighthood (and ranks of the military) were and are male bastions; however, men are, sadly, significantly absent in the life of the Catholic Church today. Women far outnumber men in active participation at Mass and in the other sacraments. Aside from those ordained to ministry, most of the people active in the Church today are women. They serve as extraordinary ministers of holy Communion, catechists, sacristans, and lectors far more often than men do. In prayer groups, adult education, devotional societies, and the pro-life and social justice movements, women comprise the majority of members and leaders.

On one hand, this is a good thing. It allows them to become involved, exercise leadership, and foster good works in a manner that, in the past, had been mostly missing. On the other hand, it gives the impression that religious concerns and activities are for the ladies, and the males are left to the realm of televised sports and video games. This is an impression the culture is swift to embrace and foster.

This book is my own small effort to awaken that other half of the people of God and encourage them to shoulder their share of the burden. Men have been fed the idea that religion is all about feelings, what I call the group hugs and bubblegum school of faith. To those men who went through CCD or Catholic school in the late sixties and early seventies, this likely sounds familiar. Talk about an inversion of reality!

The Feminization of Religion

How many times have you heard other men say, or even thought to yourself, that religion is feminine? After all, its about warm, fuzzy feelings, and thats the wifes department. Men seek cold hard facts, empirical evidence, logic and reason, not sentiment. Lets face it, how manly can faith be when in order to be in charge you have to be celibate and wear a robe?

How did we get this way? How can a Church that inspired saints like Augustine, Anselm, and Aquinas be about warm fuzzies instead of rigorous, reasoned thought? How did a Church that invented the university become a place devoid of fact, evidence, and examination? There was a time when the brightest minds in the world were concentrated in the Church and founded universities in Paris and Bologna. Theology was considered the queen of the sciences. The suspicion with which many contemporary people view religion is a false view fostered by our popular culture.

How did a Church built on the blood of martyrs become a bunch of sissies? There was a time when the heroism and courage of martyrs were the stuff of songs. Men and women were hailed for having the courage and strength to be a Christian in the face of torture and death. Now if a man says he loves the Lord, his manhood is likely to be seen as deficient (professional athletes excepted).

There are feminine as well as masculine aspects to the Faith, and the true interior life embraces both. Both men and women must participate in the interior life, and each is more naturally responsive to different aspects. The male is more drawn to the active aspects: battle for self-mastery, spiritual combat, and even asceticism. The woman is more drawn to the abandonment of self, sometimes directly to God but often also to the needs of others. She is more naturally vulnerable and receptive. Each aspect is necessary, and we seem to be designed so that there is an aspect that appeals to our nature.

These natural tendencies or inclinations can assist people in their conversion by providing a ready entry to the interior life. In Gods magnificent plan, his grace builds on the human nature already present and raises it to a higher level. He takes us at whatever level he finds us and raises us up. He wants to raise us eventually to himself in the divine adoption that makes us sons and daughters of God. When Sacred Scripture tells us we have been made sons of God, it means that, through Christ, we are given the ability to have a father-son relationship with God almighty. It is possible, and it is free; but it is not easy. It is a fight and must be understood as such. Note the words of Pope Paul VI:

This kingdom and this salvation, which are the key words of Jesus Christs evangelization, are available to every human being as grace and mercy, and yet at the same time each individual must gain them by forcethey belong to the violent, says the Lord, through toil and suffering, through a life lived according to the gospel, through abnegation and the cross, through the spirit of the beatitudes. But above all each individual gains them through a total interior renewal which the gospel calls metanoia ; it is a radical conversion, a profound change of mind and heart ( Evangelium Nuntiandi ).

Spiritual Combat

The primary spiritual combat of the twenty-first century is the battle against unbelief and apathy. The Church has been called to a New Evangelization; the response is spiritual combat. Evangelization in the modern world requires a proactive mindset. There are varied forces at work that turn people away from religious faith. Effective evangelization involves not only identifying and reducing these forces but engaging in an internal and external battle against them in your own life. For this reason, the military mindset can be of particular help in addressing the spiritual needs of twenty-first-century men. The spiritual life is a battle and must be approached as such.

This is a handbook for the New Evangelization. It is aimed at men, exhorting them to active participation in the Church Militant alongside their mothers, wives, and daughters. They need to serve in a manner fitting for men. The Church needs its men, and they need to answer the call to arms. All people are called to evangelize. This entails a personal conversion and spreading the good news of salvation through Jesus Christ. The word gospel means good news .