One of my favorite treats are those dark chocolate morsels covered with sea salt. They’re a little like Jays potato chips, “you can’t eat just one.” Our Lord calls us to be salt. We are to add spiritual flavor to life. A great Catholic writer who always adds flavor to almost any topic is G.K. Chesterton, the modern English convert known as the Apostle of Common Sense. One of his great insights into the Catholic faith, an insight that perhaps many “cradle Catholics” miss, involves the human appetite for truth. It goes without saying, or perhaps it needs to be said, that there are many a “religious people”, who may even boast of leading roles in the church today, for whom an appetite for truth echoes more or less like my personal appetite for Brussel Sprouts, yuck. (unless of course they’re fried in a pan and smothered with olive oil and sea salt and garlic, but that’s a different story).

Because Chesterton was a popular Englishman, converting to Catholicism cost him a lot. He was willing to sacrifice a lot because he realized Catholicism’s enduring quality as the salt of the earth. He humbly admits that Catholicism, which took years for him to embrace was not right just when it agreed with his personal views, but one that was right, when he discovered he was wrong. It might take decades or even centuries, but sooner or latter the world comes around to accepting what Catholicism has been teaching. This way of looking at religion is worth noting because he points out an attitude about religion that can be found in many “practicing Catholics”. He uses a familiar word in a very unfamiliar way.

He frequently points out that true faith within the scope of the true church is not like “fashion”. When we think of “fashion” we think about the style of clothes or the way we wear our hair. Religious “fashion” bares some resemblance to that, but it’s coupled with “tradition”. But in Chesterton’s genius, religion as “fashion” or “tradition” is a bad thing. It’s bad because it makes religion as easy to change as we change the style of our clothes. I always get a kick out of seeing pictures of myself from the 70’s. It’s hard to admit, but I remember thinking I looked great in my light blue leisure suit and long hair. I thank God tattoos weren’t in back then.

Chesterton notices that new religions pop up to address local and contemporary issues, some of which can be very important. But as society conquers these troubling issues and moves on to the next, it is only Catholicism that endures long enough to be there when the world needs fixing again. I remember hearing a wonderful member of a church choir state rather emphatically that she cares little about what the priest preaches, as long as the choir sings delightful songs that please her heart. Music, although quite essential not only to our Catholic Mass, but to life in general, often captures a fashionable style or conveys a fashionable message while missing a more permanent eternal truth.

The spirit of Chesterton’s message about the negative meaning of “traditional faith” is much more captured when a young bride or groom say, “I want a traditional wedding because it’s what my parents want, I’m not really into church myself.” Or what St Elizabeth Ann Seton wrote when she was defending her decision to convert from Anglicanism. Her minister friend charged her, “How can you think of leaving the faith of your childhood?” She responded, that is like saying, “If a child is born in one town, that means that he will only find truth if he stays in that town.” What kind of “traditional Catholic” are you? Are you one who practices it because it is fashionable, or do you practice the traditional habit of seeking God’s truth for your life and for our world?