Some of my best friends are grumpy old men. So the question arises: Can they be saints? Let’s hope so. Keep in mind, gentle reader, that not so long ago a concerned lady, a scholar of note, asked me whether the NOR itself had fallen into the hands of grumpy old men!

Are there tell-tale signs that someone is, in fact, a grumpy old man (GOM)? Mind you, this quarrelsome category overlaps that of ROMEOS, retired old men eating out. Well, here’s one sign. If asked, in a friendly fashion, “how are you doing?” a GOM will not reply “Fantastic.” Much less will he say, as might a Brit, “Tickety-boo.” Expect instead “Fair to middling.”

Here’s a second, and systemic, sign. A GOM is more inclined to dogmatic pessimism than to dogmatic optimism. This inclination can even lead him to overlook the home truth that any sustained inquiry into what’s wrong with the world should lead him to a “time out” for self-examination.

To be sure, the dogmatic optimist is not without fault. He or she fails to notice that there’s a lot wrong with the world. And he or she never bothers to ask what’s in those handbaskets that folks are running around with or where they are heading.

Of course, not all old men are grumpy. Some dream great dreams, as Scripture testifies. “And it shall come to pass in the last days, says God, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your young men shall see visions, your old men shall dream dreams” (Acts 2:17). We are enjoined as well to “Rise up before the hoary head, and honor the person of the aged man” (Leviticus 19:32).

Thomas Aquinas, the Common Doctor, takes pains to distinguish between age and the wisdom that suits it. He writes that “The aged should be honored because old age is a sign of virtue, though this sign fails at times,” and citing Wisdom 4: 8-9 he notes that “‘venerable old age is not that of long time, nor counted by the number of years; but the understanding of a man is gray hairs, and a spotless life is old age’” (ST II-II, q. 63, a. 3). Sadly, Thomas himself only lived to be 49 years old.

As always, discernment is in order. Consider the case of St. Gregory Nazianzen (330-390). Gregory the Theologian, as the Church calls him, suffered from chronically poor health. Doubtless it had prematurely aged him. Against his wishes he was chosen to preside over a contested synod, but as tensions mounted he unexpectedly resigned the post.

Did grumpiness come into play? He later wrote, grumpily, “I feel disposed to shun every Conference of Bishops, because I have never yet seen a Synod that came to a happy end. They do not solve problems, they increase them.” He added that “if a man tries to act as mediator he is more likely to draw fire on himself than he is to reconcile the parties” (McGuckin, xiv). But wait! Grumpy though he seems to have been, Gregory is a saint!

The Lord writes straight with crooked lines. Surely we can learn from even grumpy old men. We are not yet sure just what today’s synodality will mean for us. But the Spirit is at work in the Church. Our call is to serve the Spirit rather than our own factionalized agendas. Would not Satan, malicious rather than grumpy, lead astray if possible even the elect?