(a) We offend against hope if we think truth is so remote and hard to find that we can settle for an uncritical acceptance of whatever congenial liberal theological opinions surface at the Glad Day bookstore or in the local gay-friendly “it doesn’t matter what you do as long as you’re sincere” Christian assembly (be it liberal Protestant or liberal Catholic).
(b) We offend against hope if we think truth is so remote and hard to find that we can settle for an uncritical acceptance of ordinary dogmatic Catholic parish moral teaching, not bothering to read our Thomas Merton, not bothering to pray for help, not bothering to talk with monks. (How do you talk with monks, by the way? You start by looking up the Benedictines on the Web. Getting a phone number is easy. Getting to a monastery is not so easy, but hey, there is a Greyhound service from Toronto Coach Station into at least one of the places, south of the USA border, you may want to reach.)
(c) We offend against hope if we think that the present unhappy state of the Church—racked by sexual-abuse scandals, unwilling to talk candidly about homosexuality in ordinary parish life—is permanent.