October 31, 2004

I have been quite busy lately preparing a weekly TV program for EWTN, which airs all over the country Sundays at 7 p.m. Eastern time. The program might logically have been called “Father Benedict Alive,” but the network chose to name it “Father Benedict Live.” It is, as the title suggests, a live program, to which viewers can phone in.
I confess to a certain amount of nervousness when I began. This is a time of conflict and disappointment, when people are unable to vote for leaders for whom they might otherwise have voted if it were not for the leaders’ inconceivable embracement of grossly immoral positions. All of this gives rise to much confusion and conflict. I am grateful to the pro-life movement that I am not essentially confused. The movement has made clear that there are non-negotiable issues, such as those concerned with human life.
Nonetheless, it is a difficult time for the Church, with scandals, religiously inadequate Catholic higher education in many places, and the decline in vocations. It is also a beautiful time. During my first program last Sunday, with the support of prayer from several communities of cloistered nuns around the country, I was able to speak to an audience of perhaps a million people in the United Sates alone, as well an unknown number in other countries. People from all over the U.S. phoned in with intelligent, well-thought-out questions.
While this is a time of battle and conflict, it is also a time to be hopeful. We must never enter a conflict with a hangdog, depressed attitude. That is the loser’s way. “If the trumpeter sounds an uncertain note, who will follow?” is an old saying. Now is a time for the sounding of sure and certain notes. Whatever happens in the immediate future, we must be absolutely convinced that the cause of God will triumph. It would be spiritually helpful to many people at this point to read the first psalm, which has much to say about the current political situation. Read it, and you will know what to do as you go into the voting booth—no matter what the outcome.
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