Danny DeVito

Believe it or not, I had a conversation this evening on the way home from that same family-owned and operated restaurant that I mentioned below. Well, actually, that's not the unbelievable part. What is unbelievable, to this reporter, at least, is that I had a conversation about the future of the Church (go figure, I know), that made me think of Danny DeVito. Take a moment and try to figure it out. When you've given up, join me in the following paragraph:

My pastor and I were talking a bit about change. Change is an oft-discussed topic, with us. It usually seems that the Church will have to change to remain alive in this country. And that's when Danny DeVito came onto the scene. I instantly remembered the line, "If we don't change, we wither and die." As it turns out, after a bit of research, that was not actually the line that Danny DeVito spoke at a certain point in the movie Twins (which you may consider a "Bro. Pat Pick," if you'd like), but the idea was the same. What he said, for the record, was "If we don't negotiate, we wither and die." And so, long story short, perhaps that is a fact. A fact that applies as equally to people as to societies and, yes, even the Church.

I, for one, don't want to see the Church in America wither and die. I'm rather fond of the Church, to be perfectly honest. As I once told our beloved Fr. Victor (whose English, "está mejorando"), the mindset of too many people in these parts, clergy and lay alike, has been, "this is the way things are, because it's the way things always were, and this is the way things will always be." On the other hand, I am reminded of a prayer that we say at our perpetual novena every Wednesday, which says that our Founder, St. Joseph Marello, combined, "faithfulness to the Church with zealous attention to the signs of the times." We would all to well, I think, to imitate such an example.