John Gibson has some fun with a picture from the Call to Action conferences. I haven't blogged about the larger than life puppets used at Mass there since CTA seems to do a good job of parodying themselves without my help.
TOR is giving away downloads of their book each week if you sign up at their site. The books come in PDF, html, and Mobi format. I have read the first two selections they have made available and enjoyed both novels so they are not just giving away stuff from the bottom of the pile. Baen Books has had their free library for awhile and I got introduced to some good authors and I later went on to buy some of their books and it looks like TOR will cause me to do the same.
I have seen reference to this story a great deal over the last couple of days and it makes me wonder about a couple of things. Number one why is it a story in the first place.
One thing to remember is that he did the same thing at World Youth Day in Germany almost three years ago. This article references the use then. So it kind of annoys me that the stories don't even reference the fact that he did the same thing already at the last World Youth Day. Back fin 2002 the Vatican used cell phone SMS to send out daily messages based on papal speeches and daily homilies and entered in with distribution deals with Verizon Wireless and other carriers.
The other thing that annoys me about the story is that there is always the air of "Pope of anti-science Catholics Church actually uses technology at times." That the story is suppose to be kind of funny using the humor of the disconnect. Pope + technology = funny. Oh well, I guess we will just continue to get stories like this every time the pope uses some form of new technology.
A reader sent me a link to the announcement is on the front page of this week's Sacred Heart Cathedral bulletin in Rochester.
College students from the Catholic Newman Community of the Eastman School of Music will present the
fourth annual "Concert at the Cathedral," today, May 4th,
at 2:00 PM. Come enjoy an afternoon of beautiful classi-
cal and sacred music performed by some of the most talented young musicians in the church today. This year the
event will honor all the ordained men and women who are
celebrating special anniversaries this year. A reception
will follow
the dedication and blessing of our new Cathedral Community
and its liturgical ministers
Another part of the bulletin requests:
During all Masses on the Feast of Pentecost
next weekend, May 10th and 11th.
Red clothing is requested.
Cool, I was thinking of wearing my tongues of fire hat to Mass Sunday. Though wearing color coded clothing to Mass seems rather odd to me unless it is vestments, but not out of the question. But please don't ask me to do this on Laetare and Gaudete Sunday.
I also found this interesting.
To help you enter into our blessing ritual next weekend, I will now describe the six stations at which we will
pray:
1. We will begin at the doors of the Cathedral where a
member of our Community will knock, symbolically seeking admission. The presider will then turn to the congregation in church and ask "why are you assembled in this
church today?" We will all answer “we have come at
God’s invitation to form a new community and worship our
maker as the Body of Christ.” Then the presider will welcome the community, acknowledging all involved in ministries of welcome, and we will all ask the Lord to bless the
doors of our church and keep them open always.
...
*
Please note that at each of the six stations the priest
will not only bless the sacred space but bless the members
of our community whose ministry helps to make the
space sacred for all of us.
I do wonder if I get my keyboard blessed if I can make a sacred space using the sacred spacebar.
Pick up your cross daily along with all the other ones in sight
A reader sent me a link to a video of pro-life display vandalism at Michelle Malkin's site.
It has happened again. In January 2006, pro-abortion thugs destroyed a pro-life memorial of wooden crosses at Louisiana State University. In April 2006, a nutball feminist professor at Northern Kentucky University led another destructive raid on a pro-life Cemetery of Innocents. And this week, at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point, pro-abortion vandals struck–pulling up hundreds of crosses from a display sponsored by Pointers for Life. College Republican Ryan Wrasse sent me a video of one of the pro-abortion thugs gone wild– a student government senator named Roderick King:
The display was rows of crosses called the Cemetery of the Innocents to commemorate babies killed by abortion.
Unbelievably, even after a university security guard showed up and told King to stop, he didn't, and the wimpy campus cop just let him continue ripping up crosses. King's illogical excuse was, "If there is a student on this campus that has had an abortion or that might be having an abortion, might be going through this, you want this up in front of them? Are you crazy?"
Well maybe the Security Guard thought he heard the guy name was Rodney King vice Roderick King. Seriously thought there is a large trend in vandalizing pro-life displays especially when they are rows of crosses. In my own diocese where they display multi rows of crosses once a year in front of the Mission of Nombre de Dios and Shrine of Our Lady of La Leche this has also happened.
You have to wonder what leads to this type of rage in the first place. It this some kind of rage of denial where some are outraged to see a symbolic representation of the reality of what abortion means. I also wonder if just using the representation of the cross in the first place adds to this anger? But a culture that supports killing the innocent is a violent culture in the first place so it isn't exactly a shock that someone who supports violence against the unborn will also react violently if reminded of this. They mostly play semantic games with words such as choice, tissue mass, product of conception, etc so they are not forced to confront their own views to their logical conclusion. Rows of crosses in memorial of the innocents surely jolts them and some become unhinged.
...But yeah--I guess what's especially strange for me is hearing people who were raised Catholic talk about the Church as if it's a group of people in a room, who may be "supportive" or may be not. When to me, it's the Bride of Christ or it's nothing. If I had to pick a religion based on which people were more awesome, there's just no way I'd be Catholic. If it's a bunch of people in "the bright room called day" of history, why on earth would anyone convert?
If the Catholic Church is just your experience, you should stop. Because that bunch of people has done horrible things. That bunch of people is not a good-enough grounding for ethics.
Speaking on the day that the Archbishop of Canterbury met Benedict XVI in Rome, Cardinal Walter Kasper, the president of the Pontifical Council of Christian Unity, said it was time for Anglicanism to "clarify its identity".
He told the Catholic Herald: "Ultimately, it is a question of the identity of the Anglican Church. Where does it belong?
"Does it belong more to the churches of the first millennium -Catholic and Orthodox - or does it belong more to the Protestant churches of the 16th century? At the moment it is somewhere in between, but it must clarify its identity now and that will not be possible without certain difficult decisions."
It is a good question, but is it answerable? Back when the Anglican three branch theory was somewhat plausible and didn't make you laugh out loud thinking about it this would have been a very good question. Nowadays the branch theory could be used to describe the multiple branches within Anglicanism itself. Whenever two or three Anglican/Episcopalians gather in his name they form another province.
There is no single hierarchy that can speak for Anglicanism and even in days of a more unified Anglican identity the Archbishop of Canterbury was still a figurehead since every national/regional church has its own autonomy. In Orthodoxy even with the different national Orthodox churches there are always possibilities of them coming back into full Communion with the Church as has happened in the past. Anglicanism like Protestantism in general I don't see how this type of large movement can happen. The Lutheran-Catholic Dialogue as certainly made some advancements as far as agreement on some areas of theology, but of course even this is accepted by only a segment of Lutheranism.
The whole structure of Protestantism leads to individualism and for the foreseeable future it is going to be individual converts who will decide to come in the Church or the occasional rare occurrence of an individual congregation coming into full Communion with the Church. This is not to say that ecumenism on a larger level is pointless since it can lead to clarity even in disagreements and when there is unity in agreements that is all the better. But even if the Archbishop of Canterbury started to move Anglicanism in a Catholic direction and eliminated the multiple barriers that currently exist, just how many would go along with him?
Recently I read that Monsignor Robert Hugh Benson who was the son the Archbishop of Canterbury and a convert to the Catholic Church referred to ecumenism as YouComeInism. Pretty triumphalistic, but also pretty funny.
To help the Los Angeles archdiocese pay off the “crippling debt” accrued from sexual abuse settlements, Cardinal Roger Mahony will soon announce that his new $200 million Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in downtown Los Angeles will now be called Auto Zone's Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels.
Mahony said the unobtrusive naming rights are the best way to ease its financial recovery from the settlements.
According to the March 14 Tidings, the archdiocesan newspaper, from two sexual abuse settlements – last year’s “global settlement” of 508 cases and a December 2006 settlement of 45 cases – the archdiocese has agreed to pay $720 million over the next few years. That coupled with the skyrocketing costs of the Cathedral inspired the naming rights breakthrough.
Mahony said the Church will be back in the black soon enough, after this idea.
A few other "untraditional" changes to the Cathedral is a bowl of holy water which is kept near each entrance to the church will have a small tasteful sign underneath that "Evian" is the official water used for holy water.
...
Actually if they did sell the name of the Cathedral in L.A. I am sure Progressive Auto Insurance would be an apt sponsor.
Russell Shaw writes an absolutely great article on clericalism at Inside Catholic. This is the first of a multi part series on clericalism. The article has a great balance in explaining this with the necessary caveats in that clericalism is a distortion of the role of the priesthood and condemning clericalism does not mean blurring the lines between the priesthood of the faithful and the ordained priesthood. I also likes the examples he used to explain clericalism which made me to see more fully what this term means.
We can forget about the dangers of clericalism when what we mostly see is the danger of those that seem to be reducing the role of priests to some kind of sacramental dispenser.
It also seems to me that the women's ordination movement is also a form of clericalism. Where these women seem to think that the only way to serve the Church is via the priesthood only. In this day and age of specialists this is no surprise since we can see the priesthood as the ultimate religious specialist and we forget that holiness is not caused by our vocational state in life, but by fully responding with love to the vocation we have. The Devil tempts priests and religious by making them long for the lay life and the Devil tempts the laity to long for the priesthood and religious life even when they don't have a vocation to it.
It is ironic that sometimes clericalism is used to support blurring the lines between the laity and the priesthood as for example Bishop Clark has managed to do in his diocese. He uses the term ministerium which is also used by many Protestants to do some of this blurring I must admit when I saw the term ministerium today in a headline in association to the bishops ministerium event I thought that the word was a contraction for minimizing the magisterium.
The fourth-annual ministerium event brought together people who serve in various leadership positions across the diocese. Participants are invited by Bishop Clark, who had introduced the term ministerium -- Latin for "body of ministers" -- in 2001 to define those who exercise an official of ecclesial ministry. This group is inclusive of ordained priests and deacons, and also such people who are considered lay ecclesial ministers: women religious, pastoral administrators, pastoral associates, religious-education coordinators, youth ministers, hospital chaplains, campus ministers, prison chaplains, Catholic-school principals, parish volunteers with significant ministerial responsibilities and diocesan employees.
Under Canon Law to be chaplain in the first place you must be an ordained priest. It really isn't correct to term lay volunteers to these ministries as chaplains. The definition of ministry in this context is a mirror form of clericalism where to be doing something for the Church this means physically doing something for the local diocese as an employee or volunteer to the parish or diocese. Lay apologists, the faithful praying at home for the Church, etc, are left out of this equation. This is like the distorted meaning of active participation meaning physically doing something during Mass.
Time Magazine asks in an actually readable story Is Liberal Catholicism Dead? Even though it quotes the usual suspects it brings up some interesting points such as how the progressives in their positions have done nothing to distinguish themselves from liberal Protestantism. I don't think however that the Pope speaking out on sex abuse has changed the dynamic. Groups such as VOTF who latched on to priestly sexual abuse to advance their own agenda were never really influential and peaked pretty quickly as far as membership goes.
I think though that the real question is was liberal Catholicism ever alive in the first place. Any movement whether it arises on the so-called right or the left that denies some doctrines or diminishes them and places too much emphasis on another can never be truly alive. Only the truth is alive. When truth and error are mixed in we don't get something fully alive, but something stillborn that can never successfully reproduce itself. The birth defect of error ensures that while it might cause a commotion for a time, that without a true promotion of the faith it is bound to die out. The Church has bounded over constant heresies and while they might have tossed the Ark of the Church about the Church always stayed on course since the Holy Spirit is her steersman.
Modernism has not brought the Church to the world, but tried to bring the world into the Church. Modernism has worked like a canal lock, but instead of raising the world to the Church, has tried to lower the Church to the world. This equivocation has been detrimental in vocations. Why answer the call of sacrifice when all forms of sacrifice and self-restraint are suppose to be a sign of an unbalanced personality. Where sin becomes just guilt to be overcome on a psychologists couch and not the confessional.
There has been talk about the graying of the Call to Action crowd and the same thing for those convents and monasteries that have in most ways abandoned the faith for a bunch of modernist pottage. It is always a temptation to follow something new that seems exciting at the time if you are on the cusp of some new fad. The pride of thinking that your insights into the faith despite the fact that they contradict the constant teaching of the Church is what is in fact true. In a culture of constant change and invention it is attractive to invent something new when it comes to the faith. This is an easy path since it is much harder to truly absorb the faith and to meditate on it and to perhaps even illumine the mysteries of the faith further in contemplation. So while it is exciting to be involved in the latest theology that brings much itch to the ears, later generations will see it as the fad it was; though this won't keep them from following a different fad.
We are not exactly conditioned to giving our fiat to the Church when we are buffeted about by the winds of rugged individualism. That to be an individual it to have an opinion different from other individuals. Though mostly this gets played out by doing exactly the same thing as a bunch of other individuals who are proclaiming their individuality. I do thank God for my own experience in the military since it removed so many false ideas from when I was a wannabe hippie. It prepared me for the Church militant where I could both be fully alive as a person and also a part of the body of Christ. That obedience to Christ and his Church is a joy and I have not lost any freedom, but only gained true freedom by doing what I ought.
Last week at Ten Reasons Rich Leonardi posted an article from one of Bishop Clark's pastoral administrator.
As pastoral administrator of St. Mary's Church in Rochester, I have been blessed with the responsibility for the pastoral and administrative care of a Roman Catholic community of 900 families who gather for worship in a beautiful city-center church. I collaborate with a talented pastoral staff including a full-time priest and a retired priest who serves us voluntarily.
I can't imagine a better place to be. We are in a city that is showing such positive signs of new life. Our church tradition has a rich and beautiful wealth of spirituality, theology and liturgy. We are in a diocese that has a courageous, encouraging leader in Bishop Matthew Clark.
Traditionally, the leader of a parish would have been an ordained priest. At present, only an ordained priest may preside at Eucharist, give absolution and anoint the sick. However, as a lay pastoral leader, I do not feel less capable in serving the community in most other ways. Readily we seek to offer care, compassion and spiritual guidance, as well as teaching and administrative leadership.
The sure sign of the progressive is to use the words "at present." But as Chesterton noted on modernists is that they might as well call themselves Thurdayites. I idea of the constant teaching of the Church changing in a contradictory way to me is a nightmare and certainly nothing to hope for. To paraphrase Flannery O'Connor if the Church can change her doctrines than the Hell with her. This of course does not apply to the development of doctrine, but a democratic view of doctrine where the Holy Spirit doesn't get a vote. Where Apostolic Tradition doesn't get a proxy vote. Were the Church to do such a thing I would have no choice but cynicism and atheism since the Church is all or nothing. This is something I will never loose any sleep over since with Peter I would say "Where would I go, you have the words of eternal life."
I do wonder what metrics she uses for evidence of positive signs of new life, I get the feeling our understanding on what constitute new life would vary. The only real metric is one that we can't know in this life and that is just how many of the parishioners make it to Heaven. The training for life in Christ seems to me to be the fundamental purpose of a diocese just as it is the fundamental concern of parents to raise their children in Christ.
I would think that a diocese that has to resort to pastoral administrators which as Rich mentioned is canonically legitimate only under temporary and exceptional circumstances. I also would think that the response to vocations in the priestly and religious life would be an important indicator of new life. When your vocation chart represents the flat line of an EKG connected to someone dead you might think their might be a problem there or maybe resorting to pastoral administrators is the same thing as the plot of Weekend at Bernie. We're alive here!, just don't look too closely. As many have mentioned there is no vocation crisis, their is a response to vocation crisis. When the priesthood and religious life becomes just social work why not just be a social worker for better pay and conditions? By theological diminishing the ordained faithful and raising the priesthood of the faithful to an equal level why exactly should we be surprised that answering to the vocational call is met with resistance?
Other metrics I would look at for seeing if a diocese is truly alive is Mass attendance, lines for Confession, a falling divorce rate, etc. The metric for most people seems to be how faithful is the Catholic Church to them and not how faithful they are to the Catholic Church. There is only vibrant orthodoxy and vibrant heterodoxy is an oxymoron. But even orthodoxy can be lived in an unorthodox manner when it becomes a narrowing instead of the large thumping creature that it is since it is the very heartbeat of truth. Pope Benedict when speaking to Catholic educators said that Catholic education can not "be equated simply with orthodoxy of course content." Orthodoxy of course content is the foundation to be built upon and when it is not, as modernism demonstrates, it is the foundation built on rocky ground that Jesus preached about.
When I think of liberalism/modernism/progressivism or whatever ism it is going by I can only think of what G.K. Chesterton said.
“A dead thing can go with the stream, but only a living thing can go against it.”
King: What about how he's handled the Rev. [Jeremiah] Wright thing?
Moore: Jeez, you know, I mean I go to Mass still. I'm a practicing Catholic. I've been that way all my life. But if I had -- if I had gotten up every time I heard a priest from the pulpit in my travels around the country say things like I've heard them say, that birth control is a sin, that women should not be priests, that women should have a different role in church ...
King: You'd be walking out all the time?
Moore: I would have been walking out so much -- that would have been so much aerobic activity for me ... I wouldn't look like this.
I thinks I will call BS on this. Either that or I would like a list of churches he has attended that actually mention birth control and women's ordination. But even if true it can't me much of a shock or surprise to hear a homily that actually teaches what the Church teaches.
Though what is really ridiculous is his comparison of Wright's rants with the constant teaching of the Catholic Church. As if the Church teaching against contraception is the same thing as saying that the government invented AIDS to kill black people. This is just relativism used to divert a question. Just like when Obama was asked about Ayers he said he was also friends with Sen. Coburn as if being friends with a pro-life senator is the same thing as opening your senate campaign in the home of a unrepentant domestic terrorist. In Moore's case just mentioning the Catholic Church is sure to get no follow up from Larry King since the Catholic Church is the epitome of evil for liberals.
WASHINGTON (CNS) - In an effort to block posthumous rebaptisms by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Catholic dioceses throughout the world have been directed by the Vatican not to give information in parish registers to the Mormons' Genealogical Society of Utah.
An April 5 letter from the Vatican Congregation for Clergy, obtained by Catholic News Service in late April, asks episcopal conferences to direct all bishops to keep the Latter-day Saints from microfilming and digitizing information contained in those registers.
The order came in light of "grave reservations" expressed in a Jan. 29 letter from the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the clergy congregation's letter said.
Father James Massa, executive director of the U.S. bishops' Secretariat of Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs, said the step was taken to prevent the Latter-day Saints from using records -- such as baptismal documentation -- to posthumously baptize by proxy the ancestors of church members.
Posthumous baptisms by proxy have been a common practice for the Latter-day Saints -- commonly known as Mormons -- for more than a century, allowing the church's faithful to have their ancestors baptized into their faith so they may be united in the afterlife, said Mike Otterson, a spokesman in the church's Salt Lake City headquarters.
In a telephone interview with CNS May 1, Otterson said he wanted a chance to review the contents of the letter before commenting on how it will affect the Mormons' relationship with the Catholic Church.
"This dicastery is bringing this matter to the attention of the various conferences of bishops," the letter reads. "The congregation requests that the conference notifies each diocesan bishop in order to ensure that such a detrimental practice is not permitted in his territory, due to the confidentiality of the faithful and so as not to cooperate with the erroneous practices of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints."
Gut Check: Confronting Love, Work, and Manhood in Your Twenties is a interesting new book by Tarek Saab. I only recently became aware of Mr. Saab as I heard him being interviewed on several Catholic podcasts and he presents an interesting story. One of his claims for fame is that he was a contestant on the reality show The Apprentice and he advanced fairly far before being fired by Donald Trump. I've never seen the show since so-called reality shows aren't my thing. But the book itself only talks very peripherally about his experience on the show and the book addresses much more serious topics.
Tarek Saab is the son of a Lebanese father and American mother and grew up Catholic. The book mostly begins with his experiences in college and the story he tells will be familiar to many. His schooling becomes a time when faith is put on the back burner and partying and chasing after women becomes the number one priority. Though Tarek never quite loses his faith in school and would still attend Mass as more of a social thing than out of any love for the Mass. While going to school at times he evaluates his life and sees the wrong in it and then sets himself out on the right path only to stumble and fall back once again into familiar habits. Something else that many of us can relate to. He relates these periods of self-reflection and the pursuit of a belief in God.
This book follows around the course of a conversion story, but it is not an overtly apologetic one of coming to fully believe in specific doctrines and making the case for them. His story is more of someone who never quite leaves faith out of his life, but at the same time never fully lets his faith enter into his whole life. He kept his faith in a sphere separate and groups of friends within each sphere. After college he enters a Fortune 500 company and is soon on the fast track in the corporate life.
Reading through the book I was reminded of St. Augustine's "Give me chastity and continence, but not yet.", something that he also later goes on and quotes in the book. He writes in a forthright manner and is quite frank on his failings and the various episodes in his life before his fuller conversion. I found his spiritual biography to be quite insightful with many things to ponder. You could see the hound of Heaven following him and while at first he was not fully living a life as a Catholic, his Catholic faith was always there even if in a weakened state. This is a good reminder to those with children who have left the practice of the faith or have only made it a cultural expression. God is always pursuing is and there are those moments of grace when we slow down and actually let him catch us.
I found this to be a quite enjoyable read and Tarek is a good writer who could write about himself without at the same time making the book all about himself and making his story relatable to others.
Ian of Aquinas and More has started a group humor blog called Stuff Catholics Like with several contributors from the funny side of St. Blogs. My first contribution to this blog is posted.
I don't know anything about Providence
College in Rhode Island, but this
article by their president Rev. Brian J. Shanley
is pretty excellent.
He reflects on one Pope Benedict said on a Catholic education and its ends
and I certainly agree with what Rev. Shanley writes on the subject.
It is that time of year again depending on what diocese you live in. Tonight if the Vigil of the Ascension Rant for Catholic bloggers living in diocese that have moved Ascension Thursday to Sunday.
Fr. Erik Richtseig has a good natured rant on the subject which I totally agree with. The Apostles didn't meet in the upper room for six days and so this Holy Day of Obligation math doesn't quite work out. I think that bishops who have decided this for their diocese should have to annually explain why this is too much of an imposition on Ash Wednesday. I would love to hear the argument why this is a good idea when on a non-Holy Day of Obligation like Ash Wednesday people seem to come out of the woodwork to get to Mass. Besides I totally hate the idea of a Holy Day of Obligation being seen as a imposition in the first place.
It is also annoying that in a universal Church I will watch the Pope on TV tomorrow celebrating the Ascension while I will have to wait for Sunday and of course in the Liturgy of the Hours you have to branch off from the normal course of readings for a little detour.
Sydney, Apr. 30, 2008 (CWNews.com) - Cardinal George Pell of Sydney has argued against the adoption of a bill of rights for Australia, saying that he fears the eruption of "culture wars" that would be settled by arbitrary court decisions rather than the normal democratic process.
In an address to the Brisbane Institute, the cardinal pointed to the controversial judicial decisions that have given rise to fierce political divisions in the United States and Canada. "We don't have a culture war here in Australia in the way the United States does, but a bill or charter of rights could help provoke one," he said, according to a report in Western Australia.
Court rulings on human-rights issues have frequently thwarted the popular will, Cardinal Pell observed. "Rights are best protected by the common law and by parliament when the people are equally aware of their responsibilities," he argued.
A reader let me know about Fr. Paul McNellis, S.J. who was a Green Beret in Vietnam, an AP freelancer there, refugee worker on the Cambodian frontier during the Killing Fields, Jesuit priest, and philosophy professor at Boston College.
He is also totally faithful to the Church and yesterday he was award the Mary Kaye Waldron Award at BC which is the highest honor students can bestow on a teacher.
If Vince Fiore had any doubts that he was being called to the priesthood, they ended when he saw Pope John Paul at World Youth Day in 2002.
The Sault Ste. Marie man attended a papal mass at Downsview Park, in Toronto’s north end. An estimated 800,000 people were there, but the St. Mary’s College graduate felt the Holy Father directed his homily straight at his heart.
“Do not be afraid to follow Christ on the royal road of the cross,” he said.
That’s all Fiore needed to hear.
“I thought, ‘All right, no more hesitating. I’m going to go for it,’” he said.
“Now here I am.”
Jean-Louis Plouffe, bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Sault Ste. Marie, will ordain Fiore on Friday at St. Gregory’s Catholic church.
Fiore, 35, is the first Sault man to be ordained in more than a decade.
“It is my way of saying, ‘I love you, Jesus. I am totally yours,’” said Fiore.
“Becoming a priest is an expression of my love for the one who spared nothing by laying down his own life for love of me.”
You can read the rest here. There have also been several stories of men contacting seminaries and diocese in the wake of Pope Benedict's visit here.
“The Catholic Church clearly teaches that abortion is a grave offense against the will of God. Throughout my years as Archbishop of New York, I have repeated this teaching in sermons, articles, addresses, and interviews without hesitation or compromise of any kind. Thus it was that I had an understanding with Mr. Rudolph Giuliani, when I became Archbishop of New York and he was serving as Mayor of New York, that he was not to receive the Eucharist because of his well-known support of abortion. I deeply regret that Mr. Giuliani received the Eucharist during the Papal visit here in New York, and I will be seeking a meeting with him to insist that he abide by our understanding.”
During his presidential campaign he was not receiving Communion and now it looks like that was more of a tactic to prevent John Kerry type coverage than any real obedience. Bravo to Cardinal Egan for saying this publicly and for meeting with Mr. Giuliani at a later date.
I have seen a lot of news stores and editorials lately trying to infer that since a bunch of pro-abortion politicians received Communion at Papal masses that somehow this was connected with a softening of the Pope's opinion on the subject as if he had anything to do with what happened. This is what he wrote previously to Cardinal McCarrick in Worthiness to Receive Holy Communion: General Principles.
5. Regarding the grave sin of abortion or euthanasia, when a person’s formal cooperation becomes manifest (understood, in the case of a Catholic politician, as his consistently campaigning and voting for permissive abortion and euthanasia laws), his Pastor should meet with him, instructing him about the Church’s teaching, informing him that he is not to present himself for Holy Communion until he brings to an end the objective situation of sin, and warning him that he will otherwise be denied the Eucharist.
6. When "these precautionary measures have not had their effect or in which they were not possible," and the person in question, with obstinate persistence, still presents himself to receive the Holy Eucharist, "the minister of Holy Communion must refuse to distribute it" (cf. Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts Declaration "Holy Communion and Divorced, Civilly Remarried Catholics" [2002], nos. 3-4). This decision, properly speaking, is not a sanction or a penalty. Nor is the minister of Holy Communion passing judgment on the person’s subjective guilt, but rather is reacting to the person’s public unworthiness to receive Holy Communion due to an objective situation of sin.
I am not sure why it seems that so few bishops seem to be concerned with the souls of pro-abortion politicians receiving Communion. You would think that there would be more concern for the person committing an act of sacrilege by receiving Communion unworthily. It is an act of charity to prevent a public sinner from receiving Communion and from eating and drinking judgment upon themselves as St. Paul said.
The issue of scandal is only secondary and the primary reason to withhold Communion is out of love for the person who is currently in a state unworthy to receive Communion. Exactly how are they going to repent when the issue is not given the weight it deserves. Somebody who constantly votes for the Culture of Death and is allowed to go on as if it is no big deal has little reason to take the Church's disciplines in regard to Communion seriously. The idea that they should themselves not present themselves for Communion is of course what should happen, but for the most part his is not happening.
The supporters of the Culture of Death enjoy it when pro-Culture of Death politicians receive Communion since they can then infer that it is not that big of deal and that this issue is just one of many. Just look at all of the news stories and blog posts by dissidents who are in fact inferring this.
It seems from an observers point of view that this subject is just kind of icky for may bishops who don't want to be seen as taking a political action. What those who would actually feel this way don't understand is that their receiving Communion is also seen as a poetical statement. Though their largest concern should be the care of souls under their care. Though we should also be lifting up our bishops in prayer along with those Culture of Death polls.
Pastor John Hagee with a "Thank you, Pope Benedict"
Surely his meeting with Deal Hudson has born some fruit. My headline was just in fun and not representative of the article.
Do you go to Eucharist Adoration on a regular basis and yet don't feel that you are advancing as much in sanctity that you would want to? You try to be humble before the Lord and just let him speak to you through silence and his awesome sacramental presence, but if just does not seem to be enough?
If so don't worry since this is a common experience. Now in the spiritual life there are not any real shortcuts to holiness. Prayer and reception of the sacraments are of course necessary first steps. Confession on a regular schedule and receiving the Eucharist will of course keep you on the road to holiness as long as the life you are living is not putting a lie to your piety.
But when it comes to Eucharistic Adoration you would like to give yourself a boost. In your daily life you develop blockages to the power of the sacrament and so what you need is something to reduce those blockages of venial sin and to promote Eucharistic Adoration and being more like Jesus. What you need is a formula with Sacrament Promotion Factor (SPF). The higher the SPF rating of a formula the better.
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The Last Secret of Fatima is a new book by Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, the Vatican Secretary of State that is mainly a discussion of his three visits with Carmelite nun and seer Sister Lúcia of Jesus and of the Immaculate Heart. This book will be coming out on May 6th.
Not many books get an introduction written by Pope Benedict XVI, but this one does. The Last Secret of Fatima delves into the story of Fatima, the three secrets, and the various controversies that surround them - especially the third secret. Though Fatima is not the only focus of this book. The book is actually an interview by an American Adrian Walker a theologian living in Europe and who was also the translator for the English version of Pope Benedict's XVI. In some ways this book is similar to the book length interviews by Peter Seeward of then-Cardinal Ratzinger, except much more focused on one topic.
This book mainly expects the reader to already be familiar with the overall details of Fatima and the visit of Mary to the three peasant children Lucia, Francisco, and Jacinta. While there is some discussion of the history of Fatima the book concentrates on events since then. Cardinal Bertone entered the picture while working at the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith was sent by Pope John Paul II to speak to Sister Lucia. This was prior to the beatifications of Blessed Francisco Marto and Blessed Jacinta Marto and the subsequent release of the third secret of Fatima. Pope John Paul II who was shot on the anniversary of Fatima always held that it was Our Lady who guided the bullet and prevented his death. This conviction lead him to place a part of the bullet in the crown of Our Lady of Fatima in Portugal.
Ever since people first learned that there was third secret of Fatima there has of course been plenty of speculation as to what it contained and many of these speculations were rather apocalyptic. There was also speculation that there also might have been a forth secret being held at the Vatican. For this and other reasons Cardinal Bertone spoke with Sister Lucia to verify the document they held was the same one that she wrote and that it was indeed complete. She verified this along with other matters concerning the consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. It is rather sad that so much attention has been paid to less consequential details when the message of Our Lady of Fatima which highlights the Gospel and gives a call to repentance is ignored.
While the fact that Sister Lucia confirmed the third secret along the the consecration of Russia being accepted by Mary has been released in the past, what I found most intriguing about the book was the personage of Cardinal Bertone himself along with his impression of Sister Lucia herself. The humility of Sister Lucia comes across in the pages of the book along with something of her personality. While she wrote four books on her life in connection with Fatima and corresponded in countless letters throughout her life you don't get to see an outsider's viewpoint. Cardinal Bertone was certainly impressed by her and said he would testify to her heroic sanctity if called on to do so. He also thought it was evident that Sister Lucia had continued to have visions of Mary over the years, but this was something that she would not verify or talk about with him.
The interviewer asked good questions that covered a range of topics concerning Fatima and Cardinal Bertone was always up to the task of providing a in depth answer along with his own insights. Along the way their were excellent discussion on apparitions, devotions, and how they fit in within Church teaching and the difference between public and private revelation. Many behind the scenes details are supplied about the beatification of Francisco and Jacinta and the decision that it was time to release the third secret of Fatima. Besides Pope John Paul II then-Cardinal Ratzinger also is prominent in this book, especially since he was the one who wrote the theological commentary that accompanied the third secret and is an appendix at the end of the book. The later chapters start to range away from Fatima and become more of a straight interview with the Cardinal. This though is a good thing and I really came to appreciate this Salesian Cardinal both for his intellect and his good humor. Especially since even as Secretary of State he does not have the diplomats ways of talking and was quite frank in answering various questions throughout the book.
I doubt thought the the information given in this book will do much to convince those who think that the Vatican is hiding another secret, altered the one that was released, or think that the consecration of Russia has not yet been done. Though for the rest of us that are not so conspiracy minded I can certainly recommend this book even for those who are not interested in the various controversies surrounding Fatima.
One of the things I enjoy about reading G.K. Chesterton is that it gives a lie to the idea that the 1960's was some kind of real fault point in thinking and morality when the reality is that the views so exemplified by the sixties were already in full swing for quite a while before. You can read Chesterton as if he was writing today and if if you just replace the names used with people living today it would be as if he was still writing books and columns.
For example I am reading All Things Considered which is a book of essays on various topics. I found one paragraph to be the perfect description of the so-called new atheists.
A man who has lived
and loved falls down dead and the worms eat him. That is Materialism if you like. That is Atheism if you like. If mankind has believed in spite of that, it can believe in spite of
anything. But why our human lot is made any more hopeless because we know the names of all the worms who eat him, or the names of all the parts of him that they eat, is
to a thoughtful mind somewhat difficult to discover. My chief objection to these semi-scientific revolutionists is that they are not at all revolutionary. They are the party of
platitude. They do not shake religion: rather religion seems to shake them.
The sentence "They do not shake religion: rather religion seems to shake them" has to be the perfect description of Hitchens, Dawkins, and others and explains their diatribes much better than simply a defense of atheism.
I also found this line to be pretty funny.
Blessed are they who have not seen and yet
have believed: a passage which some have considered as a prophecy of modern journalism.
Here is something that will never make it to a Law & Order episode or in fact any script.
Santiago, Apr 25, 2008 / 02:21 pm (CNA).- A group called the Insurrectionalist Federation has claimed responsibility for an attack on the University of Los Andes in Santiago, Chile in which a homemade explosive device was detonated in one of the bathrooms.
The group in question sent a statement to a local radio station claiming responsibility for the attack as a rejection of the Constitutional Court’s ruling to prohibit distribution of the morning-after pill at public health facilities. One of the most reknown professors at the university is a member of the High Court.
Dallas, Apr 25, 2008 / 08:50 pm (CNA).- Yoko Ono, the widow of Beatles singer and songwriter John Lennon, has with several others filed several lawsuits challenging the use and critique of Lennon’s song “Imagine” in the documentary “Expelled.” One lawsuit seeks a preliminary injunction that, the film’s producers claim, could remove the film from theaters.
Well if she is responsible for John Lennon can we sue her for his imagine no religion? You know that is really hurtful for us religious types especially when he says it is easy to do. Then he even tries to take away from us believers living in the eternal now by saying only atheists like him are "Living for today." Besides Monks and many in religious life don't have to imagine no possessions since they have gone beyond that. I bet Yoko is really really glad John Lennon only imagined no possessions instead of actually giving away all of his possessions. But then again it is always easier being a dreamer than actually living the dream.
A former atheist who after spending forty years in the wilderness finds himself
with both astonishment and joy a member of the Catholic Church. This blog presents my hopefully humorous and sometimes serious take on things religious, political, and whatever else crosses my mind. My conversion story
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Blessed Miguel Pro, S.J.
Known as "God's Jester" was a martyr for the faith and a man of wisdom, fun, tricks, poetry, song, and dance. Thus seemed an appropriate Patron Saint of this blog.
The Curt Jester: Disturbingly Funny --Mark Shea
EX-cellent blog --Jimmy Akin
One wag has even posted a list of the Top Ten signs that someone is in the grip of "motu-mania," -- John Allen Jr.
Brilliance abounds --Victor Lams
The Curt Jester is a blog of wise-ass musings on the media, politics, and things "Papist." The Revealer
Not all the Jester’s lines hit their target. --Commonweal
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Comments (2)
Saab as I heard him being interviewed on several Catholic podcasts and he presents an interesting story. One of his claims for fame is that he was a contestant on the reality show The Apprentice and he advanced fairly far before being fired by Donald Trump. I've never seen the show since so-called reality shows aren't my thing. But the book itself only talks very peripherally about his experience on the show and the book addresses much more serious topics.
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