The Son of God, so full of purpose that He forgets to eat, so seized by love that ordinary schedules collapse, so intent on mercy that He becomes inconvenient — is declared mentally unsound by those who know Him best.
The Gospel is not the story of a God who fits inside human reason. It is the story of Reason Himself being judged unreasonable.
And I, who think myself quite sensible, stand uncomfortably close to the relatives.
“If Boston is the fault line of the child sexual-abuse scandal that has convulsed the Roman Catholic Church, then few places have felt the aftershocks more deeply than the Diocese of Amarillo.”
Each day, I read a paragraph from the encyclical Dilexi te and weave a quotation from it into that day’s Lectio Divina.
Memorial in the Grotto of St. Mary’s Cathedral. The inscription says: “In memory of the death of innocence of the victims of clergy sexual abuse. When innocence dies…a life stops. It is essential that we never forget.”
“ Indeed, ‘it frequently becomes clear that, in practice, human rights are not equal for all.’”
Does my faith—this January pillar of our Centennial—shape my mind so deeply that I notice when dignity is not equal for all, and refuse to let our “serious mistake” become “normal” in my way of seeing people?
2. Meditatio – Meditation
There is a great deal going on in my mind.
“Bishop Matthiesen — a shepherd whose legacy in our diocese still asks hard questions of us today. May truth, healing, and justice be the final word.” Photo used by permission of Douglas Kirkland/Corbis via Getty Images
Storms outside. Storms inside.
I find myself measuring decisions, weighing prudence, wondering about unity, order, authority, safety, responsibility — all the things a “reasonable” mind likes to hold together like neatly stacked books.
But the Gospel whispers a disquieting question: What if the mind, left to itself, is not the safest guide?
Above: The Tribute to Bishop Matthiesen Below: A Fallen Centennial Banner
History is full of moments when people acted with excellent logic and poor wisdom. When calculation drowned out conscience. When order was preserved but love was postponed. When something looked perfectly sensible — and proved spiritually disastrous.
And here is my own paradox:
I worry about other people’s one-track thinking, yet my own mind runs on a single rail just as stubbornly. I say I am seeking truth, but often I am simply replaying the same argument in a louder tone.
Chesterton would laugh and say: The problem is not that my mind is too small — it is that it is closed.
Christ is called “out of his mind” because He lives from the Father’s will, not from social approval. He acts from love that interrupts plans, not from plans that manage love.
So perhaps the real danger is not losing my mind — but never allowing Christ to disturb it.
3. Contemplatio (Chestertonian Synthesis)
A tribute, built for Bishop Matthiesen, while John Salazar—a convicted pedophile priest whom Matthiesen kept in ministry against the counsel of cardinal archbishops, giving Salazar a “second chance.” That second chance resulted in the sexual assault of youth in our own diocese. And just before he was defrocked and sent to prison, he raised this monument in Bishop Matthiesen’s honor. Its presence remains a painful reminder of “serious mistakes” that harmed the very flock Bishop Matthiesen was meant to protect.
The Christian life is the grand and holy adventure of allowing God to rearrange the furniture of the mind.
Christ does not smash reason; He redeems it. He does not abolish thought; He baptizes it.
But He insists that the mind must kneel before mystery.
The relatives say, “He is out of his mind.” The Church says, “Have the mind of Christ.”
To follow Him is to risk being misunderstood. To resist Him is to remain comfortably sane — and spiritually asleep.
The saints were not irrational. They were God-rational.
And that is the only sanity that survives eternity.
4. Oratio — Prayer
Lord Jesus, whose love looked like madness to the world,
Rescue my mind from pride, from narrowness, from the illusion that I see the whole picture.
Disturb my conclusions when they lack charity. Correct my judgments when they lack mercy. Humble my reasoning when it forgets You.
Give me not a smaller mind, but a surrendered one.
Let me think with Your Heart and reason with Your Cross.
Amen.
5. Actio — Action (Laudato Si’ & Synodality)
Modern anthropocentrism has paradoxically ended up prizing technical thought over reality, since “the technological mind sees nature as an insensate order, as a cold body of facts, as a mere ‘given’, as an object of utility, as raw material to be hammered into useful shape; it views the cosmos similarly as a mere ‘space’ into which objects can be thrown with complete indifference”.
Today I will practice holy listening: Before defending my position, I will first ask, “What am I not seeing?”
6. Song Pairing
🎶 “Out of My Mind” (John Mayer)
Sometimes spiritual growth feels like losing control — because grace is loosening my grip on my own conclusions.
7. Movie Pairing
🎬Movie:A Beautiful Mind (2001)
A story about perception, reality, and learning to live beyond the tyranny of one’s own thoughts — a parable for the soul that must learn to trust love more than its fears.
I’m sharing The Introverted Apostle, Episode 2, because it gently explodes the myth that the Church is powered only by the loudest voices in the room. I love how it frames how we are Church—together. As I move through the day wearing different shades of introversion (reserved, anxious, thinking, social), this episode helped me see each not as a defect to overcome, but as a gift to be offered—in concert with the gifts of extroverts. The Body of Christ needs both the quiet heart and the bold tongue. Give it a listen. I suspect you’ll recognize yourself somewhere in it—and find where you belong in the Body of Christ.
Here is one of those modern miracles that does not involve thunder, but does involve truth. In the latest CAPN: The WTC – The Podcast, you’ll hear the very personal story that set Karlynn Hochstein on the unlikely (and very Catholic) road to becoming our Diocese of Amarillo’s Director of Family Life. It is the sort of story that reminds us that vocations are rarely born in comfort, but almost always in conviction. And it also explains why I’ll be at St. Mary’s Cathedral next Saturday at 10:00 a.m. for the Respect Life Mass—because when faith becomes flesh in real lives, the only reasonable response is to show up. Give it a listen. Truth, like grace, works best when it’s personal.
Subject: A Request to Be Heard in the Spirit of Synodality During Our Centennial
Your Excellency Bishop Zurek,
I write to you with respect and with a sincere desire to remain in communion with the Church during this Centennial year of the Diocese of Amarillo.
As we approach the Centennial celebrations and the Respect Life Mass, I find myself holding an interior conflict that I cannot ignore in conscience. In prayer, particularly through Lectio Divina on the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord, I was struck by the single word spoken by Christ to John the Baptist: “Allow it.” Those words have stayed with me.
They raise a question in my heart: what does the Church allow herself to hear, and whom does she allow herself to accompany?
I desire to celebrate our Centennial and to stand in solidarity with the Church’s witness to the dignity of life. At the same time, I struggle to do so without any space for synodality regarding the Diocese of Amarillo’s Tribute to Bishop Matthiesen, especially in light of what has been acknowledged as a “serious mistake” during that period of our history. The continued silence around this tribute weighs heavily on me, not as an accusation, but as a pastoral wound.
Recently, Pope Leo reminded the Church that “abuse itself causes a deep wound, which may last a lifetime; but often the greater scandal is that the door was closed and victims were not welcomed or accompanied with the closeness of authentic pastors.” He shared the testimony of a victim who said that the most painful part was that no bishop wanted to listen. The Holy Father emphasized that listening is profoundly important and asked the Church to deepen dialogue and implement synodality.
It is in this spirit that I write. I am not asking for condemnation, nor am I asking for erasure of history. I am asking whether there can be listening—whether synodality can be allowed—so that the Centennial truly reflects the four pillars we have named: faith, hope, communion, and mission.
I want to be present at the Respect Life Mass and to celebrate our Centennial in good conscience. But I also want to know that the Church I love is willing to listen to those for whom this tribute remains a source of pain, confusion, and exclusion.
Your Excellency, I remain obedient to your pastoral authority, but I also remain compelled by conscience and prayer to ask that this conversation be allowed to take place. I believe that such listening would not diminish our celebration, but purify it.
Thank you for taking the time to read this letter. Please know of my prayers for you and for our Diocese during this significant year.
Respectfully in Christ,
Darrell
My Story
Photo used by permission of Douglas Kirkland/Corbis via Getty Images
Memorial in the Grotto of St. Mary’s Cathedral. The inscription says: “In memory of the death of innocence of the victims of clergy sexual abuse. When innocence dies…a life stops. It is essential that we never forget.“
I was one of “the few” Bishop Zurek spoke of in this letter. He first posted it in August of 2019, and in response to my, “calling out all the more“, he kept reposting it atop the diocesan news page until December 11, 2019. There it remains to this day.
Fr. Ed Graff, brought here from Philadelphia by Bishop Matthiesen, was arrested in 2002 for sexually assaulting a minor and died later that year in jail. Despite the harm linked to his ministry, he was buried in an honored section of Llano Cemetery among our pioneering clergy — a decision that continues to wound survivors and raise hard questions for our diocese.
Bishop Matthiesen, who rode the white horse of public activism even as he brought abusive priests into our diocese such as John Salazar—wounds that still mark us today. I spoke with him often, pleading with him to reconsider his “no regrets” about bringing those priests here…
Bishop Zurek, who told the Diocese of Amarillo he had “no facts” about the Philadelphia report even as Amarillo’s connection to that tragedy was headline news. When I continued to speak out, as Bishop Yanta had once urged me to do, he later wrote that I was not among the faithful and loyal disciples whom the Lord Jesus desires.
