Punk Catholicism

Das Katholische Abenteuer: Eine Provokation

By Matthias Matussek

Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt

2011 2nd Edition

Rabaukenkatholizismus – punk Catholicism – is the curious epithet hurled at Matthias Matussek and the FSSPX in an editorial by one of the greats of the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, the leading paper of Germany. It is intended to stigmatize an aggressive and militant Catholicism, one more concerned with defending the Church and making the case for Christianity than with maintaining decorum and “civility” (a buzz word in the US these days). Now it would seem an unlikely insult, and an unlikely association, for Matthias Matussek, reporter, editor and commentator for the oh-so-progressive Der Spiegel magazine. For, as all those remotely familiar with German popular culture know,  the editorial approach of Der Spiegel to Christianity and specifically to Catholicism for fifty years and more has been clear and consistent: F—ck you!

Yet in this most unlikely of environments – both that of this specific magazine and of modern German popular “culture” in general – a new apologist for Catholicism has arisen.  In Das katholische Abenteuer Matussek presents his writings on faith, Catholicism and the spiritual. At first glance he seems to be a rather familiar type to the American reader: the conservative Catholic defender, a line starting in the 1970’s with Monsignor George A. Kelly’s Battle for the American Church, continuing with George Weigel, Deal Hudson and Fr. Richard Neuhaus and represented at the present day by Bill Donohue or, on the net, Mark Shea. Like them, Matussek battles for the popes and rebuts the attacks of the day against the Church. Especially in Germany there is much to do for a paladin of the Church. For years now the German media have been filled with carefully stoked rage against Pope Benedict, the “authoritarian” Church, priestly celibacy, the male priesthood etc. “Dissident” groups of laity and clergy (actually, members in good standing of the institutional Catholic Church) have joined in the fray. The response of the German episcopacy is as usual feeble and apologetic – extending offers of dialogue and even, at times, covert support. The response of the Vatican is only marginally more forceful.

Matussek will have none of this. He exalts John Paul II and Pope Benedict as modern day pillars of the faith.  He wades into the storm surrounding celibacy conjured up by the media from the scandals of child molestation that have also hit Germany. He defends the Church against the wilder charges of “pedophilia.”  The author, however, has little good to say about the German hierarchy and its minions – an episcopacy that Matussek, quoting Archbishop Dyba, describes as engaging in “Mephistophilian” maneuvers.  Going beyond the defensive, he advances arguments for the Catholic faith and for Christian morality. In so doing he witnesses to his own background and religious experiences.    But it is his aggressive, even bellicose advocacy on specific issues that has earned Matussek the honorable title of “hooligan” of the faith on the side of the FSSPX (the ultimate outcasts of the German Catholic Church and of German political life).  This is so even though Matussek’s ideas differ from theirs in most respects. For the media expects from Catholic representatives in Germany only nebulous, non-specific, pseudo-academic discourse – nothing that names names or challenges to specific action.

Matussek fills out his book with interviews with a variety of generally non-Catholic and non-believing authors in search of the presence of the “religious” in modern life. There is talk of Kierkegaard and Meister Eckhart, of Nietzsche and Marx. Similarly, Matussek includes essays on his encounters with popular religious movements and leaders outside the Western European paradigm; in Harlem, among Orthodox Jews, in Latin America etc. The author is evidently on a quest for intellectual openness to religion and an active faith he evidently does not find among the bureaucrats of the German Catholic Church or in the official “movements” of Catholicism.

It would seem that Matthias Matussek’s work should be receiving accolades on this side of the Atlantic from the Weigel/Hudson/ Shea crowd. And shouldn’t Fr. Fessio’s Ignatius Press be pushing a translation of the “conservative” equivalent of Martin Mosebach’s Heresy of Formlessness? One never knows, but I suspect this may be unlikely for several reasons. First, there is the question of style. Matthias Matussek is so immersed in the world of  contemporary German culture, politics and entertainment – his comments are of such a topical nature – that  copious footnotes would be required to convey the author’s meaning to the American reader. Second, the author’s theological opinions do show a certain vagueness. For example, Matussek evidently believes that universal salvation is Catholic doctrine. In another paragraph he writes of the destructive influence of St Augustine’s “theology of terror.” And while he was living in New York, he and his family would sometimes “go to mass” on Sunday with the Baptists in Harlem. Not that these views are original or aggressively advocated – they are typical of the ideas the Catholic “man in the street” in Germany might pick up from the German Church – but are perhaps surprising coming from a Catholic advocate.

But third – and most important – Matussek emphatically disagrees with the “Neocon” view of the United States as the promised land of Christianity. He does agree that religious belief has a far greater vitality here than in Germany – but he has come to view American religion as a sinister, fanatical force – advocating domestic violence, foreign wars and Matussek’s bête noir, capitalism.  Entirely in this spirit, Matussek associates the pro-lifers and fundamentalists he describes with terrorism, or insinuates that Sarah Palin incited or approved the assassination attempt on Gabrielle Giffords. In these essays the Catholic provocateur Matussek still remains close to the party line of Der Spiegel.

Now the Catholic Traditionalist, while rejecting many of the author’s specific characterizations and assertions, might be more tolerant than the “neocons” of the general views of Matussek. The identification of much of American fundamentalism with US and Israeli interventionist policies is scandalous. And capitalism indeed is becoming an ever more dubious force as it spins increasingly out of control. But moving beyond these controversies, a Traditionalist will find a wealth of insight scattered here and there throughout this book. In one interview, for example, Matussek and Rüdiger Safranski touch on the intriguing idea that the ”virtual” worlds created by the media and video games are displacing more and more the “religious imagination.” Matussek has fine passages taking up the plight of Christians in the Moslem world and waging a spirited, sarcastic battle with those who want to avoid any criticism of the “religion of peace.” In one unusual essay on the “End of the World,” Matussek evokes a real sense of doom:  the capitalist world as we know it may be coming to an end just as did the world of Soviet communism 20 years before.

On a positive note, Matussek tells the moving story of his youth, his family and especially of his father. It is almost a hymn to the intact Catholic pre-conciliar world.  Our author has found in the clergy of the German Church at least one hero: the late Archbishop Dyba of Fulda. The author records for our benefit a number of pungent utterances and observations of this isolated Catholic leader who broke ranks with the rest of the German hierarchy to help end the German Catholic Church’s practice of tacitly facilitating abortions.

I don’t think I need to rehearse some of the criticisms that could be made of Das katholische Abenteuer from the Traditionalist perspective. They should be obvious to most of the readers of this blog – I only need mention the author’s idiosyncratic theological and liturgical ideas. Let me conclude however, by remarking on what I like best in Matthias Matussek’s book: the well-chosen, almost Chestertonian title: The Catholic Adventure.  For in this day and age Catholicism truly is a great adventure, a dare and a modern  quest for the Holy Grail. I would hope that Matthias Matussek continues his explorations. He will find  that a more vital, fuller expression of faith exists not just on other continents or in other religions, but in the quiet following by devoted Catholic congregations of Catholic Tradition in liturgy, theology and morality.