For a long time, I was convinced that only weirdos were called to take Christianity seriously. That sounds harsh and judgmental, but in my defense, there are a lot of weird Christians. This isn’t anything new; Jesus spent most of his time on earth hanging out with the social outcasts, the weirdos of his day, and for the last 2,000 years, Christianity has embraced those on the fringes of society. The result, at least in my mind, was a religion full of weirdos. By that logic, I figured that, since I’m not a weirdo, I’m not called to take Christianity seriously or follow Jesus.
““As a result, plenty of people are content to write off the Catholic Church by its stereotypes, and society is full of rhetoric that consistently paints religious people in a bad light.”
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I was wrong. I am weirdo. And I am called to follow Him. Now I’m not saying that God only calls weirdos, but I am saying that I certainly don’t break the stereotype. Furthermore, if you look around at groups of faithful, young, intelligent Catholics, you’ll find tons of weirdos. The result is that many people, inside and outside of the Catholic Church, come to believe the stereotype. It doesn’t help that the very structure of Catholicism can seem designed to breed weirdos: it’s full of secrecy and strange smoke and odd rules about sex. At times, it can seem like the Church is designed to attract weird people and then make them weirder. As a result, plenty of people are content to write off the Catholic Church by its stereotypes, and society is full of rhetoric that consistently paints religious people in bad light.
Here’s the truth: there is no shortage of…unique Catholics. But contrary to what society or even those within the Church want to tell you, I don’t think that’s such a bad thing. For one, society’s disdain for the uniqueness of Catholics can be hypocritical. Social media is full of people urging one another to be true to themselves and to fight conformity, but Catholics are derided or mocked for their refusal to conform. Our culture promotes pseudo-countercultural movements (like being hipster) while it simultaneously attacks ideologies that are actually countercultural. Ironically, the very people praising non-conformity miss the fact that some of the most unique, countercultural people are faithful Catholics. Even within the Church, there is often an unspoken pressure for young Catholics to not be “too” Catholic, too overtly or outspokenly faithful. While some think that “playing it cool” could make the Church more attractive, this approach could be lethal.
That is because uniqueness—authentic uniqueness, not the hipster uniqueness that can be found in every nook and cranny in Portland—is the stuff of Saints. Many writers have said that true holiness is about becoming yourself. If that’s true, then it makes sense that holy people don’t really blend in with the crowd. We were made to be unique individuals, and when we are the people we were made to be, we’re going to be a little unique. (I’m not claiming to be holy - I’m just saying I’ve got the unique part down pat.) If you look at the saints, this holds true. The lives of the saints are often shockingly different from one another, illustrating that sanctity runs contrary to conformity. For example, Anthony of Padua got sick of nobody listening to him, so he started preaching to the fish. That’s weird. St. Philip Neri once shaved off the right half of his beard so people wouldn’t take him too seriously. St. Therese of Lisieux was meek and gentle; St. Nicholas (aka Santa) punched a man during a gathering of bishops and spent a night in jail. God’s chosen ones come in all shapes in sizes. He calls all of us, and we’re all a little odd.
Society also freaks out about weird holy people because they don’t understand Christ, and true holiness divorced from Christ makes no sense. Take Mother Teresa. Most called her a living saint, yet a variety of atheists slandered her, condemned her, and compared her to Satan. Why? Because Mother Teresa was too Christlike to possibly comprehend without comprehending Christ. Her critics made up a million selfish motivations to explain the way she lived her life because they couldn’t figure out what her real reward was. They assumed she was driven by ulterior motivations. No one, they argued, could be that... good. True holiness is incomprehensible to those who don’t understand Jesus. When confronted with inexplicable goodness, the world naturally tries to explain it away with explicable badness.
I’m not saying that holiness necessarily makes you weird. As Fr. Mike Schmitz said, “I’ve met a lot of weird holy people, but most of them were weird before they were holy.” Nor am I saying that everyone who’s weird is also holy. I am saying that society tends to hyper-focus on the fact that Christians are weird. This weirdness comes in part from being ourselves. That’s a major aspect of holiness. It also comes from the countercultural nature of Christ’s message—anyone who wants to reject the culture in favor of Christ appears to be out of their mind. But I also think that some of this has to do with the devil.
I know, I know. Bringing up Satan. I sound like one of those weirdos from church. Oh wait—
Here’s the deal. The devil doesn’t just dance around in a red unitard with horns and a pitchfork. That would be too easy (and too funny). Instead, he gets in our heads. As C.S. Lewis points out in The Screwtape Letters, one way the devil does this is by convincing us that everyone at church is weird. If we think weirdness and holiness are inseparable, we’ll be deterred from our desire for holiness by our desire to be normal. I’ve been there before. I rationalized not living a Christian life by telling myself I was normal, and therefore not obligated to follow God. Looking back on it, I can see my exorbitant pride and selfishness. Yet how often are our impulses to follow God curbed by the fear that we’ll be seen as a “Jesus-freak”? The enemy benefits from that. By sheer pride, he can convince us to never even try to follow God.
““As a College we didn’t get to where we are now by inching away from our Catholicism.”
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One last note. As the College reviews and examines its own Catholic identity, it’s all too easy to fall into the same trap. It would be easy to sacrifice our Catholic identity in the name of attracting more diverse applicants, gaining prestige, or earning respect in the increasingly secular world of academia. Whether we admit it or not, the same self-consciousness that prevents a college freshman from standing up for his or her faith can be found at an institutional level. There’s a fear of being “too Catholic.” There’s a worry that outsiders will stereotype us, laugh at us, and judge us. As a College, we didn’t get to where we are now by inching away from our Catholicism. In fact, Holy Cross has a long and storied history of embracing Catholicism, even when it wasn’t popular: the College is only in Worcester because Bishop Fenwick was run out of Boston by an anti-Catholic mob, and we chose the Crusader mascot in 1925 to anger the KKK, who had been attacking Catholic schools. Both instances highlight how, instead of shying away from our faith, we have embraced it. I urge all those involved in reviewing the school’s Catholic identity to do the same. Do not be afraid.
All I can say is this: maybe we’re not all called to be weirdos (most of us already are a little weird) but we are all called to holiness. So let’s embrace that and live for Christ—in all the wild weirdness that that may entail.