Last month, local Catholic school officials announced they were closing one Sacramento school and folding it into another. Parents and students at St. Peter and All Hallows Elementary schools were not happy.

Officials assured them that it would be a new school - with a completely new name. But what?

The name of the school was picked by students. It will be called John Paul II Elementary School, becoming the first school in the state named after the former pontiff, according to the National Catholic Educational Association.

"It's a tremendous tribute to the pope," says Dom Puglisi, superintendent of Catholic schools for the Diocese of Sacramento. "Although it came from the kids, everybody else thought it was perfect."

At first, school and church officials were leaning toward calling the new school Blessed Sacrament. But a group of students - moved by coverage of John Paul II as he lay ill - came up with a name on their own. They told their parents and school administrators, who loved it.

Bishop William Weigand quickly signed off on it. [Source]

From the AJC:

Hours later, when I heard the news that Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger had been chosen, my heart sank. Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI, was the head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, a powerful arm of the Vatican, staunch defender of Roman rule. Of all the potential candidates to succeed John Paul II, he was among those most adamantly opposed to the reforms that I and other progressive Catholics believe are so badly needed if the church is to be true to its mission.

The image I had as the news sank in was of an iron drawbridge going up and clanging shut. My church was being hijacked --- the church of my childhood; the church where I had faithfully consecrated all the milestones in my life; the church to which my ancestors, including a Sacred Heart nun, a Jesuit priest and a cardinal, had given their lives --- and I was being faced with a decision I had been putting off for years. I thought of Magdalene at the empty tomb. "They have taken my Lord."

How melodramatic and silly this is. Amazing how the eevvvilllll and all powerful arm of Cardinal Ratzinger never managed to make it down to this dissenter. But this reaction is unfortunately common. I had gone to a later Mass last Sunday to a Church that I will never go to again. The priest described the news of when he heard the election of Josef Ratzinger is that he immediately shut off his car radio. He said he wished for a liberal pope and then went on about the common nonsense about divorce and remarriage, homosexuality and such and how the Church needed to be a family that embraces all. I guess a rebuke like "go and sin no more" falls on deaf ears to this priest. He then described what I remember as a fairly good NY Times article about Josef Ratzinger's experience as a child with Nazi rallies and then as a university professor with more student rallies and how these two groups were basically the same. The priest then described how this had hardened him and made him a hardliner to anybody would would dare to question. He then talked about accepting the new Pope because "it is" and that like a back ache or sore tooth we must learn to accept what is. If there had been another Mass I could have gone to we would have walked out at this point.

But there were grave deficiencies in his papacy as well, especially as he aged. He had blind spots, and he surrounded himself with people who would not challenge his views. In spite of his love for Mary, he refused to ordain women. In opposition to the advice of many of his bishops and the majority of U.S. Catholics, he condemned artificial contraception, inflicting untold burdens on people, contributing to the spread of AIDS and unwanted pregnancies. He refused to lift the ban on priestly celibacy (which has no basis in Scripture), thus contributing to a critical priest shortage and threatening the sacramental life of the church. He made Catholic theologians at Catholic universities sign orthodoxy statements. Pedophilia festered too long before it came to light. The list goes on.

The article ends with:

Lalor Cadley is a spiritual director, adult educator and freelance writer with an office in Decatur.

Spiritual director? Brings to mind the phrase physician heal thyself. She is a spiritual directory trained at the Centacle in Houston, Tx which is your typical retreat (from Catholicism) center. Labyrinths, Enneagram, Yoga, Pagan earth worship, and contemplative prayer as taught by the Carmelite saints. Well actually I was kidding about the "contemplative prayer as taught by the Carmelite saints", but you probably guessed that.

This retreat though cracked me up.

April 26, 2005 — Hunger of the People of God
Monika Hellwig, LL.B., Ph.D.

Minimum offering $15.00 includes lunch

Well it is a good thing that "Hunger of the People of God" includes lunch.

From God and the World

Your motto as a bishop runs "co-worker of the truth". How did you come by this expression?

I am of course, as is only right, a keen reader of Holy Scripture, and I came upon this phrase, which somehow fascinated me right from the beginning, in the Third Letter of John. Its meaning is in the first instance rather limited. Whoever receives the messengers of the good news becomes thereafter a fellow worker of the truth. And by accepting the messengers he himself is already sharing in this work, in this world.

I must say that I felt very strongly within myself the crisis of the claim of truth during the decades of my teaching work as a professor. What I feared was that the way we use the idea of the truth of Christianity was sheer arrogance, yes, and even a lack of respect for others The question was how far may we still use it?

I have really thoroughly explored this question. In the end I could see that if we abandon the concept of truth, then we abandon our foundation. For it is characteristic of Christianity, from the beginning, that the Christian faith does not primarily transmit practices or observances, as is the case with many other religions, which consist above all in the observance of certain ritual rules.

Christianity makes its appearance with the claim to tell us something about God and the world and ourselves-- something that is true and that enlightens us. On this basis I came to recognize that, in the crisis of an age in which we have have a great mass of communications about truth in natural science, but with respect to the questions essential for man we are sidelined into subjectivism, what we need above all is to seek anew for truth, with a new courage to recognize truth. In that way, this saying handed down from our origins, which I have chosen as my motto, defines something of the function of a priest and a theologian, to wit, that he should, in all humility, and knowing his own fallibility, seek to be a co-worker of the truth.

Today is international "Women are ignored by the male hierarchy and not allowed to make an impact day." Well actually today is the memorial for St. Catherine of Sienna, Virgin, Doctor of the Church. A lay women and Third Order Dominican who counseled popes and world leaders. I have often wonder if her mother Lapa Benincasa had been around today how she would have been treated. You can just imagine the reaction of those self appointed procreation police to the news that she was pregnant with her 23rd child. I have read stories around St. Blogs of women telling their stories about people making snide comments about the size of their families. Most recently Smockmama of Summa Mamas relayed a story of her dog's vet in response to her being pregnant with twins (number five and six). The history of the world and the Church in particular would have been quite different if Catherine's parents had been part of and bought into a contraceptive culture.

St. Catherine was the model reformer. A mystic with a deep contemplative prayer life who was active in the world. Totally obedient to Christ and his Church and rebuking those who were not living out those truths. Her efforts ended the Avignon papacy and returned the pope to Rome and she also worked to help heal the problems brought about by the election of an anti-pope. It really annoys me when I red Call to Action or VOTF types who bring up St. Catherine and pretend that they are following her example. Instead they are a mirror image in that instead of holding themselves and others to the truth as taught by the Church, they want to change what the Church teaches to bring it inline with their own thoughts.

You can read her spiritual masterpiece "The Dialogue" here to see exactly why she is a Doctor of the Church.

I like this nicely symbolic representation of her both holding up Christ on the cross and embracing the mitre worn by the pope.

Tom at Disputations as usual has interesting thoughts about St. Catherine.

Many of us who cling desperately to our Catholic Church for instruction, inspiration and support prayed that a new Pope would help heal the church's serious wounds and reconnect it more surely to modern realities.

Instead, the cardinals have chosen a good and holy man who, we are told, rather than reform the status quo will reaffirm it more insistently than before.

The current challenge of the church is twofold.

First, it must continue proclaiming the unalterable and unchallengeable truths of Christ, instructing us to love one another as we love ourselves and to collaborate in improving the world that God created but did not complete.

That includes the obligation to be generous to those in need, and to avoid unjust and unnecessary wars that kill innocent people.

To deny these eternal and unchangeable truths of Christ is to renounce the Catholic Church.

Ha, Ha, very funny Mario Cuomo talking about eternal and unchangeable truths. He was the first to trot out the "personally opposed to abortion, but ..." line. He didn't want to force his personal opinion against popular will when it comes to abortion, yet managed to when it came to vetoing the death penalty. Catholic teaching on one subject can fall to majority opinion, yet managed to trump popular opinion on another. Eternal truths didn't hold for much in Cuomo's speaking to and for homosexual activists.

I just love this part "the cardinals have chosen a good and holy man who, we are told, rather..." Just had to slip that one in.

Mario Cuomo also proves he is far from infallible when it comes to talking about infallibility.

The only formal exercise of papal infallibility in modern times was by Pope Pius XII and dealt with Mary, the mother of Christ. [Source]]

Jimmy Akin explains this popular myth that there are only two instances of Papal Infallibility in modern times here.

A social worker at a clinic connected with Providence Alaska Medical Center led a 15-year-old girl to seek an abortion, then arranged for her to obtain it in Seattle at government expense, all without her parents' knowledge or approval, a lawsuit filed last month alleges. Her boyfriend, 17, went with her.

The parents only found out when they became frantic because their daughter didn't come home one night in March 2003, according to the suit filed by Anchorage attorney Yale Metzger on behalf of the girl and her parents. An older daughter who knew about the abortion told them where she was, the suit says.

The suit names as defendants Sisters of Providence, doing business as Providence Health System Alaska and Providence Family Practice Center, as well as the social worker at the center.

The Daily News is not naming the plaintiffs because of the sensitive nature of the matter and the girl's age. She is now 17.

The unusual court case provides a look at how a young teenager can get an abortion without her parents' knowledge. It was filed March 3, just before the issue returned to public view. Alaska's Legislature passed a law in 1997 requiring that girls under 17 get approval either from their parents or a judge, but it has never taken effect because of court challenges. On April 13, the Alaska Supreme Court heard the latest round of arguments over whether the law should stand.

The girl in the lawsuit regrets her decision to have an abortion, Metzger said. "Whether you agree or disagree with parental consent or parental notification, this isn't the right way," he said. She and her parents are seeking unspecified damages for emotional distress.

Providence, as a Catholic institution, doesn't perform abortions but will refer patients to where they can get one, said spokeswoman Karina Jennings.

A staff member may bring up the option of an abortion if a patient indicates the pregnancy is unwanted, she said. It's a difficult area for workers whose role is to help the patient but who still must follow Catholic ethical and religious teachings, Jennings said.

"We believe we followed good sound medical practice in this case," Jennings said. She wouldn't discuss specifics. [Source]

What a bunch of crap. The goal is to help patients, but unfortunately we still must still follow Catholic teaching so we have to wiggle around the fact that we are a Catholic hospital. Of course they didn't explain how their help in this case caused the girl to regret the abortion she had.

Under their spiritual care services page they included the Catholic Mass but seem to have left off "Arranging travel to another state so that an abortion may be provided without informing the parents." Under spirituality they also offer 'sound' medical treatment like Music Thanatology. They offer to have harp player play at your beside as you die. I guess this is to help you transition to the dominant musical genre in Heaven since you always see Angels with harps. "A music vigil doesn't require a doctor's order." Well that is a good thing. Nothing worse than prescriptive harp playing.

Karen Gilley, RN
Music Thanatologist

Jimmy Akin posts about the wonders of the iPod and its usefulness in playing back both music and audio books. As for myself I have not yet become an iPod people. I check around my bed before going to sleep to make sure no one had hidden an iPod anywhere about. Though I do fear being the last person without an iPod and having people pointing their finger at me and making that screeching noise. Well actually I do not have anything against the iPod which is a good player with the best navigation capabilities available. It is just that I need to be able to listen to asf files and I have already ripped 300 of my CDs to wma format. I record the Laura Ingraham, Hugh Hewitt, and Dennis Praeger show via an internet stream ripper that converts the internet broadcasts into asf files. Skipping over the commercials I can listen to a three hour show in considerably less than two hours while doing my work. I also download the Catholic Answers' shows and convert them from their Real Audio format to mp3.

A commenter on Jimmy's post mentioned an ftp site with a bunch of Catholic specific audio including many of EWTN's shows in mp3 format. They also have Imitation of Christ in mp3 format.

Since I listen to a bunch of audio that has commercials in it I looked for and found a good software player that has a hotkey fast forward feature so that no matter what I am working on I can hit a simple key combination to advance through it. Jetaudio is really good for this and it will also play back mpeg video. I am really cheap so the majority of software I use is free. To show how cheap I am the stream rippers I have used have been in both Korean and Japanese and required some tinkering to get to work For the non geek For the less cheap non-geek there are programs available like Replay Radio. Like the SodakMonk I have been into digital audio for a fairly long time. Though I am glad I converted before the advent of Napster or I would of racked up even more sin in the way intellectual piracy. As it was I had to throw away about 500 cassette tapes that I had illegally recorded while at sea. Though I guess it was appropriate that I did mos of my pirating of music and software while at sea, Aarrr!

As part of my Rome Depot parody I did have a product that would be useful in this context.

iPope - Get connected and be not afraid.

Once upon a midnight dreary has a good roundup of Pope Benedict XVI editorial cartoons. This one is my favorite.

Christopher at Against the Grain provides an excellent roundup of various statements the then-Cardinal Ratzinger made in the past concerning the Jewish people. Christopher also has up the Pope Benedict XVI Fan Club page and I just have to get me one of those "Cafeteria Is Closed" large coffee mugs.

Amy Welborn posts a part of today's General Audience where the Pope explains the reason he choose Benedict. To see a video of this event go to tv.reuters.com and look under Channel and Vatican for "Pope's First General Audience."

Both Tom at Disputations and Oswald Sobrino of Catholic Analysis of the concept that the new Pope thinks that the Church must become smaller and purer.

One of the many common statements made about our new Pope in his role as prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the faith is this bit of boilerplate "enforcer of the church's doctrinal purity." This is said as if this statement itself is a condemnation. Why is it that liberals never describe the EPA as the "enforcer of environmental purity?" That they will fight to reduce some contaminate to a 12 parts per million but rail at the though of uncontaminated and pure doctrine. Why is purity important in your drinking water and not also in your doctrine? If knowing the truth so that you may prepare to live with God forever is important, then there should be an equal fight to retain doctrinal purity with no contaminates. "For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?"

Pope Benedict XVI nailed it when he discussed the "Dictatorship of relativism." Progressives want relativism so that they may first say their belief has equal footing to any other belief. Though relatively clean water they wouldn't accept. Give me both clean water and clean doctrine so that when we drink at the wells of Holy Mother Church that we won't be slowly poisoned. I am all for zero parts per million of heresy in our doctrine.

An Air Force Academy chaplain’s call for cadets to evangelize bunkmates during basic training was appropriate and consistent with federal workplace rules, the Air Force said Tuesday.

Maj. Warren “Chappy” Watties’ message has been described by Yale University Divinity School as part of “stridently evangelical themes” during basic training that encouraged divisions rather than unity and spiritual awareness.

The Air Force said Watties, the service’s chaplain of the year in 2004, acted properly because Air Force regulations allow chaplains to evangelize in the performance of their duties to those unaffiliated with another religion.

“Chaplain Watties’ messages and sermons were deemed to be appropriate encouragement to his congregation to share their religious convictions, when invited and in an appropriate manner, consistent with rules governing the federal workplace,” the Air Force said in a statement in response to The Gazette’s written questions. [Source]

Always good to know that spreading the Gospel is still not against government regulations.

SecretAgentMan outdoes himself in the most accurate translation of what happened on Meet the Press this Sunday. I heard a large chunk of this played on the radio and SAM has nailed Russert's very annoying attitude and his post kept me laughing all the way through.

Many blogs (for example Cnytr) have been pointing to the Pope Benedict XVI Bear. This is fairly appropriate since the Pope has a bear on his Coat of Arms. Now some people are against the Pope having a bear on his arms, but I totally support his right to bear arms.

But we must not forget his predecessor Pope John Paul II the Great Bear.

Also of course there is the old joke about "Gladly the cross-eyed bear"

Dawn Eden gives a well deserved fisking to a post in Planned Parenthood's SaveRoe blog. Planned Parenthood all upset about Focus on the Family's Operation Ultrasound which is working to equip 650 crisis pregnancy centers with ultrasound machines by the 2010 using privately raised money.

For all the talk about pro-choice I guess this does not include a visual choice. Reality must be hidden at all cost.

NARAL's director of government relations had previously said concerning ultrasound machines

"They don't want them to go to Planned Parenthood, where they'll get their full range of options. They just want them to go to crisis pregnancy centers, where women will be exposed to this weapon at taxpayer's expense."

Well this time the machines are provided from private sources yet they are complaining that the amount raised will be more than they get from the federal government. Not surprising when showing the truth as something can be described as a weapon.

Here is a picture of an Aviation Ordanceman loading and doing the final check on a ultrasound machine weapon to be dropped on emergency pregnancy resource centers.

Jayson Franklin has a fun Catholic Podcast called The Catholic Cast. In his latest podcast he interviews David Bawden aka Pope Michael I. This is a very interesting interview that shows that "Pope Michael I" is a very nice but deluded man. Victor Lams has also composed some theme music for Jayson which is pretty good.

Jayson previously had elicited names for his podcast when he considered changing the name of his show. I had suggested to him “Pod Casti Connubii” in honor of Pius XI encyclical.

You can find other Catholic Podcasts available at Disciples with Microphones. Personally I am waiting for Fr. Sibley to come out with a PODcast in which each week he details the latest sighting o Pious Overly-Devotional(POD) behavior. Though he has been making available MP3s of his homilies (which are excellent and delivered in the manner of Fr. Corapi).

If you are unfamiliar with the term Podcasting then information is available here.

With the heightened media coverage on the Catholic Church over the last couple of weeks we have had many pundits from the main stream media talk about the priest shortage in the United States and they offer their predictable suggestions. They usually frame it in the fact that the Catholic Church is a sacramental church and will die without priests who they see merely as sacramental deliveries systems. We get the normal if only they changed the discipline of priestly celibacy. If only they ordained women to the priesthood. If only they would stop being decisive about abortion, contraception, and homosexuality.

Now I find all of this highly ironic, especially coming from such outlets as the L.A. Times. I find this ironic since almost all of the main stream media is suffering from a readership/viewership crisis. They have embraced the very progressive agenda they want the Catholic Church to adopt and it has resulted in a decrease in the amount of people they can reach. In the broadcast media only Fox News has been on the increase while cable news pioneer CNN has been on a rapid decline. The L.A. Times has been in a free fall with its subscription level. If a very liberal paper can't gain readers in what is suppose to be an area that is such a bastion of liberals why in the world should anybody care about any advice they offer to the Catholic Church about a vocation shortage. They of course make the case that this has happened because of the broadening of the media market. They would find the argument laughable (and rightly so) if someone said the decline in vocations was because of the number of competing religious entities. If I were to give them advice as to how to increase their reach they would ignore me since I am not part of their organization, yet they have no problems as non-Catholics to give advice as to how the Catholic Church is run.

Many have mentioned the fact that we have never had a vocation crisis, but instead have had a failure of some to recognize their own vocations. This failure is also specifically geographical. CatholicNewsGeek reports about Casoni a very small town in Italy where one out of 80 people become priests. There has been a boom in vocations in places like India and Africa and around the U.S. their are pockets of healthy increases in the number of seminarians. Now going by the MSM playbook they would expect that these increases would be in places that most closely embrace the progressive agenda or have watered-down Catholic teaching to some degree.

The opposite though is in fact true. That in diocese noted for their adherence to the magisterium, that they are not only increasing the number of seminarians but in some cases are building new seminaries. Yesterday I asked readers if they knew the number of seminarians in L.A. One reader said he called the diocesan office and the the lady who answered was evasive and would not answer. I had no problem obtaining these numbers for the other diocese who prominently listed these statistics. I found out via a reader that the number of seminarians that were to become priests in the L.A. diocese was 63 with 32 of them being foreign born. Over half of the people enrolled in their seminary are from other dioceses. In 1999 L.A. had 63 people in their seminary so the number has not changed since then. Denver had 63 four years ago and now has increased it to 83.

It would be great if the next time some MSM pundit asked a Catholic about the priest shortage that they in turn asked them about the MSM readership/viewership shortage. In fact we could term it a "Communication Crisis" and say that they need to change their dogmatic teaching about radical feminism, abortion on demand, homosexual acts so that the main stream media could actually identify with the main stream audience. That they are out of touch and need to conform to what the majority of their audience believes.

For the Pope Benedict XVI section of this weeks carnival we have:

Dunmoose the Ageless asks that you join him in praying the Litany of the Saints for the start of Pope Benedict XVI pontificate.

DeoOmnisGloria Was Pope Benedict XVI (Ratzinger) a "Hitler Youth"?

Living Catholicism looks at Pope Benedict XVI and Young People

Lane Core Jr posts an appropriate and timely sermon by Msgr. Ronald Knox on praying for the Holy Father.

Herb Ely posts about Justice Anne Burke and the National review board and the positive signs that our new Pope will take this problem seriously.

Chris at Veritas proposes that Benedict has the most theological acumen of any pope in centuries.

Nathan at Fides, Spes, Caritas looks at the Holy Father's pre-conclave statement about the "Dictatorship of Relativism" and ties our subconscious belief in the existence of absolute evil in the horror genre.

Here are some other reflections:

Kevin Miller at Heart, Mind and Strength gives us A reflection on what Jesus means in this Sunday’s Gospel when he calls himself “the way.”

Rob at Justice Knight look at the question of Ebay and the selling of consecrated hosts and how to be handle this sad situation.

Alicia in response to an email she received looks at the significant differences between non-violence and pacifism.

A Penitent Blogger has reflection on the challenging places we may find ourselves doing the work of Christ in the Belly of the Beast.

Mark at CowPi Journal asks the question Do you pray in the front or back room of the house in your heart? and reflects on a answer.

Nârwen at Quenta Nârwenion does something totally unexpected and posts a meditation by Venerable John Henry Newman. (Just tweaking you Donna :) and did you know there are 29 more days tell St. Neri's feast day?)

Can anybody tell me the total number of seminarians for the Diocese of Los Angeles. I have had zero luck finding a current number via search engines and you would think it was a state secret on the diocesan web site. Other dioceses I looked at had the number of seminarians prominently displayed. I could only find the number for 1999 which was 63. Even a Tidings article which contained many statistics about priests and religious totally left out seminarians.

I have a review of a exciting new product that helps calculate the number of times a person needs to be forgiven up at Spero News.

Lots of other good articles from some of St. Blog's finest and others also up at Spero News.

When I was in High School I once tried out for a job at another High School's radio station. It turned out that the try out was actually for an announcer for the cities High School football teams. I walked in unaware of this and they sat me down in front of a screen showing a football game and to narrate the action. At the time I knew little about football and I tried to improvise and to do my best. It was pretty embarrassing trying to provide commentary on something you knew next to nothing about.

Now you might ask about why I mentioned this episode? I immediately though about this humbling experience after reading the Time magazine article The Conquest of Rome: The stealth campaign for Ratzinger began 18 months ago. An inside look at how he won. I would hope that the writer of this story would feel as silly as I did commenting on what I knew nothing about. I at least had the advantage of knowing I was totally out of my depths and was winging it. Most religious coverage unfortunatelly does not see this simple fact. Anybody who could write about Cardinal Ratzinger campaigning and positioning for Pope just proves their ignorance in trying to cast everything into a politically liberal/conservative dynamic.

Smockmomma at Summa Mamas has the best caption for this photo "there's no place like rome, there's no place like rome" Her title doesn't say it three times and possibly like me doesn't want him clicking those shoes together three times. I want him to stick around for a bit. Papabile now blogging at Romanitas has some background information about the red shoes. Fr. Tucker also has some interesting questions about Pope Benedict's Pallium.

Though the red shoes do beg the question about where he got them. Did the papal apartment land on some wicked witch somewhere? (Insert your own Sister Chittister joke here) Maybe though the Wizard of Oz comparison can be illustrative about Pope Benedict XVI. Like the Wizard of Oz the media has built a false and terrifying image of then Cardinal Ratzinger that was meant to scare people with his power. "Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain" is what the media has tried to do. Though in this case it was them that put the false curtain around him in the first place. You could hear them chanting "Ratzinger head of the CDF, oh my" The media has built up a straw man, only in this case it is them that have been lacking in brains. With all of the Wizard of Oz comparisons could his motto be Toto Tuus?

From an article in the NY Times about yesterday's press conference with Pope Benedict XVI.

Ms. Macher said he was modest, not at all showy for a man of his position, with a dry sense of humor.

"Someone lost his dog and put up a sign: Has anyone seen this German Shepherd?" she recalled. "He came in and said, 'No, no, it's not me. I'm here.' It was really funny - it surprised us. I think he is going to surprise us."

Also here is the text of the Pope's homily today at his inauguration Mass.

Med student Dev Thakur is back with a newly renamed blog "Against a dictatorship of relativism." Great title and a nice Mitre tip to the words of our new Pope!

Also check out apologist extraordinaire Dr. Marcellino D'Ambrosio site called The Crossroad Initiative which also include a page on our new Pope. You can also sign up for their weekly email list which includes commentary on the liturgical readings each Sunday.

Here are some blogs that I have added to my blogroll.

I went to RCIA with Rachel who run's the History Buff blog. Her conversion story here proves Cardinal Newman's adage about "to be deep in history is to cease to be Protestant." She also maintains www.thehistorybuff.com.

Rome - The Vatican, in response to growing expectations of many Roman Catholics, is likely to consider lifting the Church's ban on communion for divorcees, a senior cardinal was quoted Saturday as saying.

"It is a delicate issue which the Church will have to discuss, question and confront itself with," Spain's Cardinal Julian Herranz told Italy's La Repubblica daily.

The Church will take "into account the expectations, the many social, theological and human nuances linked to such an important issue," the cardinal said.

The paper reported that prior to his election Pope Benedict XVI himself had prepared a draft document on lifting the ban on divorcees receiving communion imposed by the Church, which does not recognize divorce.

As head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith, the then-cardinal Joseph Ratzinger argued that Catholics who were abandoned by their spouses and thus "forced" into divorce were "guiltless" and should not be excluded from the holy sacraments, the newspaper said. [Source]

What complete and utter nonsense that comes under the rubric of reporting. There is no Communion ban on those who are separated from a spouse and are not living as husband or wife with somebody else. The ban now and forever will be for those who have divorced and remarried without first having a declaration of nullity which is a determination that a sacramental marriage had truly never been entered to in the first place.

This is what then Cardinal Ratzinger actually wrote as head of the CDF in response to questions posed.

...Members of the faithful who live together as husband and wife with persons other than their legitimate spouses may not receive Holy Communion. Should they judge it possible to do so, pastors and confessors, given the gravity of the matter and the spiritual good of these persons(10) as well as the common good of the Church, have the serious duty to admonish them that such a judgment of conscience openly contradicts the Church's teaching(11). Pastors in their teaching must also remind the faithful entrusted to their care of this doctrine.

This does not mean that the Church does not take to heart the situation of these faithful, who moreover are not excluded from ecclesial communion. She is concerned to accompany them pastorally and invite them to share in the life of the Church in the measure that is compatible with the dispositions of divine law, from which the Church has no power to dispense(12). On the other hand, it is necessary to instruct these faithful so that they do not think their participation in the life of the Church is reduced exclusively to the question of the reception of the Eucharist. The faithful are to be helped to deepen their understanding of the value of sharing in the sacrifice of Christ in the Mass, of spiritual communion(13), of prayer, of meditation on the Word of God, and of works of charity and justice(14).

7. The mistaken conviction of a divorced and remarried person that he may receive Holy Communion normally presupposes that personal conscience is considered in the final analysis to be able, on the basis of one's own convictions(15), to come to a decision about the existence or absence of a previous marriage and the value of the new union. However, such a position is inadmissable(16). Marriage, in fact, because it is both the image of the spousal relationship between Christ and his Church as well as the fundamental core and an important factor in the life of civil society, is essentially a public reality.

8. It is certainly true that a judgment about one's own dispositions for the reception of Holy Communion must be made by a properly formed moral conscience. But it is equally true that the consent that is the foundation of marriage is not simply a private decision since it creates a specifically ecclesial and social situation for the spouses, both individually and as a couple. Thus the judgment of conscience of one's own marital situation does not regard only the immediate relationship between man and God, as if one could prescind from the Church's mediation, that also includes canonical laws binding in conscience. Not to recognise this essential aspect would mean in fact to deny that marriage is a reality of the Church, that is to say, a sacrament.

Last night Fr. Fessio was on the Hugh Hewitt show in an interview that lasted the first hour. This was absolutely great radio, especially to hear the always wonderful Fr. Fessio discuss the Catholic understanding about contraception on the national air waves. The beginning of the interview started with this.

Fr. Fessio: And I've known him for 33 years. I've seen him in all sorts of situations. I've been with him long periods of time, formally and informally, and I can say unqualifiedly, he's a man of God. He's Christ-like, he's soft-spoken, he's gentle. I've never heard a word of anger from his mouth. That's the one un-Christlike part. But he's a real gentleman. Absolutely nothing at all like the caricature.

Wow according to Fr. Fessio he is Sweet XVI and never been pissed."

Generalissimo from the Hugh Hewitt show has transcribed the whole interview at his blog Radioblogger.com and I strongly advise you to read the whole thing. I have said before that Hugh's radio show is my favorite on talk radio and I really cool when he spent his whole show on Tuesday accepting only calls from Catholic about our new Pope.

Today being the high secular feast called Earth Day, let's give a standing 0 for God. O LORD AND RULER

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the Spirit of God was moving over the face of the waters.And God said, "Let there be light"; and there was light. And God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day.And God said, "Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters." And God made the firmament and separated the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament. And it was so. And God called the firmament Heaven. And there was evening and there was morning, a second day. And God said, "Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear." And it was so. God called the dry land Earth, and the waters that were gathered together he called Seas. And God saw that it was good. And God said, "Let the earth put forth vegetation, plants yielding seed, and fruit trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind, upon the earth." And it was so.The earth brought forth vegetation, plants yielding seed according to their own kinds, and trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.

God as creator and artist is pretty good. I mean when you literally have nothing to work with, he has done a pretty good job. Plus if your a collector and admirer you can just never collect all of his stuff.

Yesterday John Gibson gave use a visual study in contrasts between two group of women and their reactions to Pope Benedict X VI. This was quite illustrative and today Matt C. Abbott brings us a great story about a youth rally for our new Pope in from of the same Cathedral in Chicago that the group of dissident nuns had been picketing earlier this week. The pictures he has of the event are just great. Of course Matt also seems to be the only one to cover this. A simple Google search for this event only shows up his URL. The protest event earlier this week garnered an much larger collection of stories Google News.

Every time I see our new Pope's picture on the web or on my computer's wallpaper I still get this feeling of both joy and surprise. I didn't really know what to make of most of the conclave media analysis other then that I suspected that most of the common knowledge was going to turn our wrong. One oft piece of analysis was that if a pope was selected fairly quickly that it would be Josef Ratzinger. When my wife called to tell me about the first puffs of white smoke I raced home from work with that thought in mind that it might actually be Cardinal Ratzinger. I certainly wasn't in the mode for the extremely slow deliverance of the news by Cardinal Jorge Arturo Medina Estevez. I considered his pauses more than just showmanship but a form of torture. Though when I heard the word Josef I knew instantly what had just happened.

The question I wondered though is how it happened. We all hear such negative news stories about our Cardinals that we forget that the majority of news stories are negative or manipulative of information. That the media's common portrayal of Cardinal Ratzinger was known by the Cardinals who knew him to be totally spin. Still knowing the media outcry that would pursue you could certainly come to the conclusion that it was something more than just a block of Cardinals throwing their support around Josef Ratzinger, but that the Holy Spirit had stiffened their spines. Some have called his election to the papacy Pope John Paul II's first miracle of intercession. I certainly like that view.

A reader of mine named Fred has an alternative and plausible explanation.

Did you hear that some liberal cardinals misunderstood the rules for the conclave? Apparently confused by watching hours of Survivor, liberal cardinals thought that they were voting Ratzinger *off the island*.

Now as thrilled as I am though about our new Pope I am totally with Dale Price when he says SuperPope does not exist. Dale rightly puts it all in perspective when he says "Things will get better. But far more slowly than any of us want them to. Patience, people." I wrote previously that it didn't matter how many tools the late and great John Paul II gave us that they don't have much affect where they are not implemented. My joy is tempered with the reality of the situation, but we need to step up in prayer and action to help implement what JP2 called a new springtime for the Church. He said it conditionally because it was conditional on us to implement it.

Around St. Blogs there have been various attempt to come up with a new slogan for Pope Benedict XVI along the lines of the easily chantable "John Paul II, We Love YOU!" Nancy C. Brown at Flying Stars has come up with what I think is the best attempt so far.

BXVI, we love you, guy.

The Angry Twins have also come up with a few of their own slogans. My favorite being the first on the list.

Thank you G for our Papa B!

Zorak at E-Pression has come up with a great ditty to our new Pope sung to the music of the Mickey Mouse Club. I think that if I ever met Zorak and the Old Oligarch that I would have to be warned like the hyenas in "Who Killed Roger Rabbit" who were continuously in danger of laughing themselves to death.

Since Pope Benedict XVI has a email address for us to send him a greeting. Many including myself have wondered about papal spam. Rick Lugari at Unam Santum has a funny take on a possible example. As for me I was wondering what he is going to think after his thousandths spam email from Nigeria? Now I am sure he wouldn't think that Cardinal Arinze was behind it or that the good Cardinal had any sour grapes (in fact I bet he is sighing with relief).

Maybe just possibly his Holiness being aware of spam is a good thing. It is certainly a reminder of the work the Church has ahead of it. Spam is a good cultural barometer when it comes down to it. I also wonder if he gets junk mail. "We noticed that recently you have become pope and so we are offering you a pre-approved line of credit at a low introductory rate!"

I have updated my Now with B16 post with more information and a new offer.

By the way Christopher's Ratzinger Fan Club page is finally back up after the massive server hit he had and he has a new post up.

You might have been told in the past that Humanae Vitaemins were not good for you or that if your conscience decided you didn't need Humanae Vitaemins you could safely ignore them. Latest cultural medical studies have proven the link between lack of Humanae Vitaemins and the lack of children. These studies show the extreme cultural malnutrition from not getting their *RDA of required spiritual nutrition.

Now with B16, Ut Unum Sintrum, has all the required nutrients you have relied on in the past and more. B16 works well with and expands with needed daily intake such as VII and JP2 (Beta-Karoltene) and will not interfere in any way with them. In fact the synergetic effect will only enhance your spiritual metabolism.

The B16 caplets have a special smooth coating allowing you to swallow them without any water. Yet it is true with B16 you do not have to water it down in any way. Our B16 is doctrinally pure with no heretical impurities such as those found in anti-Humanae Vitaemins.

Studies have conclusively proven that people taking B16 daily will continue to have smooth running and orthodox metabolism for years to come. B16 in trials has proven not to be harsh or difficult as had been initially reported.

We are also introducing Ut Unum Sintrum for children since your children are never too young to start off with proper spiritual growth. Parents will be pleased to know that our Humanae Vitaemins are not sugar coated, just like everything else we offer with B16 in it. Guaranteed not to cause truth decay or any form of spiritual rot. The children's tablets come in fun shapes like German Shepherds and Rottweilers.

*Ratzinger Daily Allowance

Here is a headline in my local paper.

Bishop finds nothing severe about new pope

Galeone challenges view of Ratzinger as a harsh enforcer.

Though the article itself is not bad and manages only to interview Catholics happy with our new Holy Father.

I am certainly glad to wake up and to realize that this is now day two of the papacy of Benedict XVI and that his election hadn't been a Dallas dream-sequence. I still feel like I am on a coffee IV and my cheeks are cramping up from smiling nonstop since white smoke first appeared. The last two nights I have hardly slept at all. Yesterday I woke up a 6 am to turn on the TV to see black smoke and thought it would be another long day of anticipation. I have been more excited then when I had first found out that I had made Chief while in the Navy. I just feel a joy that goes beyond myself. A joy for the whole Church. I am sure I would have felt pretty much the same no matter who ascended the chair of Peter, yet I do love he fact that it was Josef Ratzinger a man that I had already deeply respected and loved.

Now though we have to suffer through all the charges that will be leveled at him. They have and will repeat endlessly that he is a lightning rod. In a way that is true. A lighting rod gets struck by light since it is firmly anchored in the ground. Pope Benedict XVI is firmly anchored in the ground. He is firmly anchored in Christ and that as he said in his pre-conclave homily that the Church "must not be subject to the changing winds of ideological fashion." Our new Holy Father will also not be blown about by these ideological winds. It is only those who are not connected to the ground that are safe from lightning. Those that are ideologically free-floating will not be hit by light coming from Heaven.

There is also being repeated that this is a "transitioning papacy." Again they are right, yet not in the way that they meant it. The mission of the Church is to transition us to heaven. The Holy Father's job as head of the Church is to help prepare the way and to lead the members of the Church towards their final transition. To remind us that we are but pilgrims and that we must work and be ready for what God has in store for us. ‘Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, Nor have entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for those who love Him.’ But God has revealed them to us through His Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God"

That he is a divisive figure and a hard liner. The reality of the charge is that truth does have edges and lines. G.K. Chesterton said "Art, like morality, consists of drawing the line somewhere." The truth does have hard lines and not some fuzzy boundaries imperceptible to the moral eye or whose outlines changes based on the moral eye of the beholder. That he is divisive is true in sense that truth is divisive. Our intellects our fallen and unfortunately there is not unanimity on what is the truth. Pontius Pilate is the patron saint of way too many people. Jesus said "I did not come to bring peace, but a sword." and "Do you think that I have come to give peace on earth? No, I tell you, but rather division; for henceforth in one house there will be five divided, three against two and two against three; they will be divided, father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against her mother, mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against his mother-in-law."

They have and will charge that he is against ecumenism and will move the Church backwards in relation to other churches. A charge that of course Protestant ministers who had worked with Cardinal Ratzinger will find funny. In his book "God and the World" he was asked about the patriarch Jacob who had more or less described the time when the Redeemer would come and whether the application of these and other prophesies were fabricated retrospectively in response to Jesus.

Now let's take the prophet Isaiah. The original text in face reads "Drop down righteousness, O Heavens." Only after righteousness had come in the guise of a particular person did the Christians read this text with a personalized reference. Thus in this relationship of a agreement between Old and New Testaments we can see how the word of Scripture offers a progressive way. The words go to meet him; they seek him out where he is still in obscurity.

It is of course possible to read the Old Testament so that it is not directed toward Christ; it does not point quite unequivocally to Christ. And if Jews cannot see the promises as being fulfilled in him, this is not just ill will on their part, but genuinely because of the obscurity of the texts and the tension in their relationship between these texts and the figure of Jesus. Jesus brings a new meaning to these texts -- yet it is he who first gives them their proper coherence and relevance and significance.

There are perfectly good reasons, then, for denying that the Old Testament refers to Christ and for saying, No, that is not what he said. And there are also good reasons for referring it to him--that is what the dispute between Jews and Christians is about. But this is not all. A great part of the purely historical and critical exegesis, likewise, does not read the Old Testament in the sense of pointing the way forward; it regards the Christian interpretation of it as being inconsistent with the original meaning, or at any rate as going far behind it.

One would have to add this: The Old Testament is not an oracle; it is a path. We still have the freedom to reject it. I would say that the very fact that this freedom is open is us is a guarantee that the texts will stand on their own. ...

And from the message given at the first Mass in the Sistine Chapel today.

"With this awareness, I address myself to everyone, even to those who follow other religions or who are simply seeking an answer to the fundamental questions of life and have not yet found it. I address everyone with simplicity and affection, to assure them that the Church wants to continue to build an open and sincere dialogue with them, in a search for the true good of mankind and of society.

I think this is indicative of his understanding of other religions and that while he totally holds to Catholic truth, he understands the reasons that separate us and thus can move the Church forward in healing those divisions. A path that will follow what this predecessor and friend Pope John Paul II started

I think some were surprised that his first words were not Anathema Sit and that he has not excommunicated half of the Church. That there has been a straw man built around him when he acted as the prefect for the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith is something the world is going to learn. That behind this great theologian and intellectual is a warm and humble man and he will not be at all what they expected. Again reading through his book "God and the World" I thought it was quite illustrative how he would answer questions. The interviewer Peter Seewald at times I found to ask some very annoying questions, especially in the way that some questions were phrased. The responses from then Cardinal Ratzinger were always patient and while he obviously disagreed with how some questions were framed; his response was totally in answering the question in such a way that even though I believe he demolished the ideas of the some of the questions, it was never directed as an attack at the questioner. The way he answered the questions reminded me of some of the old Japanese Samurai movies where in a duel you would see both men bring up their sword in air almost simultaneously. There would be a look of surprise on one of them when they realized that something just happened, but they were not sure what -- just before their head fell off. I am not implying violence in the way the then Cardinal answered, but that they were clean strokes that surprised the questioner who would see that his own argument was insufficient.

Here is one case in point from the same book.

With the coming of Christ, the Old Testament laws, not only certain laws of ritual sacrifice but also that wretched "and eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth", have been superseded. Do we not find ourselves having to say that Christ corrects himself?

Here again, I would want to talk about traveling a historical path. "An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth" sounds frightful, but after all it was at first a principle of justice that contained and directed vengeance. The retaliation must correspond to the offense; it must not run out of control but be limited to what has been done. In that sense, this was a step forward to something that in fact is still recognized in the administration of justice. Besides this progress in legal thinking, we would, of course, have to add that it is only through a love that breaks the chain of reprisal that anything new can ever really come into being.

In the course of this conversation we have already dealt with the saying "I have not come to abolish the law, but to fulfill it" Where the question of the Temple sacrifices is concerned, we confront this saying in quite concreted terms. The sacrificial offerings were always on a substitute. And when the one comes who gives the real thing, and who thereby brings man to the point of being able to give himself to God, then the whole meaning of those sacrificial procedures has been fulfilled in him. Now, the whole of what the Temple represented, and was meant to be is present in him as the living Temple. Thus something is not simply done away with, but its goal is brought to achievement.

In this way what the Temple was trying to do is still present in the Eucharist. But now in that meaningful form to which earlier rites were only preliminary approaches. So I would not sat that God got it right the second time. We wee, rather, how he allows men at first those forms they cannot yet get beyond, as part of a path that carries within it its own inner dynamic and necessarily leads them farther on. What this path truly signified is now fulfilled and receives it rightful place.

I will leave you with something else he said during his message this morning.

"Dear Ones, this intimate recognition for a gift of divine mercy prevails in my heart in spite of everything. I consider this a grace obtained for me by my venerated predecessor, John Paul II. It seems I can feel his strong hand squeezing mine; I seem to see his smiling eyes and listen to his words, addressed to me especially at this moment: 'Do not be afraid!'

From Fr. Greeley's latest article.

ROME — I don't think it likely that Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger will be able to assemble the 77 votes he will need to become pope.

and

Nonetheless it does suggest that should he be elected (which I repeat I don't expect) he should be given a chance to prove who and what he is.

The article itself is somewhat positive or at least as positive as Fr. Greeley could be. Which of course means that while somewhat praising Cardinal Ratzinger he also managed to bash the "romantic spirituality" of John Paul II.

This is one of the those days that it would take a lot to get me down. I went to go wash my car and on the way back something broke and I spent most of the afternoon waiting for a tow and for it to be fixed. Maybe Satan was having a go a trying to knock my mode down on level because what broke was the serpentine drive. Some people emailed my that my blog was mentioned on MSNBC today. When I got home I had a message from a producer from Connected Coast to Coast but since I got back so late I wasn't available for an interview slot they had. Even with the car problem and the near miss of my 15 seconds of fame I am still pretty ecstatic. I am off to go to a Mass to honor our new Holy Father Benedict XVI and maybe I will come down of a Ratzinger high within the next day or two.

I wonder how long it will take for the election of a new pope to appear on the National Catholic Reporter's site? As of 2 pm Easter time still no story. I don't think I will sign up for their breaking news alerts if they can't even mention Pope Benedict XVI over an hour after the announcement was made. Maybe someone should call 9-11 to send a emergency team with defibrillators to their headquarters.

Right now I am so full of adrenaline I think I could explode. Thank you Lord for Pope Benedict XVI. All of the news build up about Cardinal Ratzinger appearing to be favored I took with a large grain of salt. I have had nothing but admiration for this man as I have read his books since coming into the Catholic Church. His insights and understanding about the problems the Church faces in the modern world are excellent. His book on the liturgy, which I think should be required reading, is magnificent in his presentation of what should be the "reform of the reform" when it comes to the liturgy. His announcement as Pope to me is like Charlie Brown finally getting to kick the football that Lucy was holding. How many times did we hear "enter a pope, leave a cardinal" or that probably somebody who we don't even expect will be elected pope. I am currently in the middle of his book "God and the World" which is a fairly long book where he answers questions put to him by Peter Seewald. Reading the answers he gave I often though what a magnificent pope he would make.

Of course besides having this wonderful man as Pope we get the added bonus of him really annoying the dissidents. Probably one of the quietest place on earth was the offices of the National Catholic Reporter. For myself I was jumping up and down and screaming with excitement when his name was announced. All those who had hoped for changes in the doctrines of the Catholic Church now know that it isn't going to happen any time soon. No matter though who was elected this would have been true, it is just that they now realize it and once again will have to fallback to "maybe the next pope." position

Before I started reading Catholic blogs I had been following Christopher Blosser's Cardinal Ratzinger Fan Club, which for some reason is unavailable (possibly all of a sudden having millions of hits might have something to do with it). I am all for the Pope Benedict XVI fan club.

Here is a post I did before that included our new Holy Father is his superhero persona as "Magisterial Man."

The press coverage of the Church and the conclave just keeps getting funnier and funnier. First Cardinal Ratzinger's wonderful pre-conclave homily was referred to as a "hard line stance" in this article.

In 1994, when Pope John Paul II declared the church had no authority to ordain women, it was Cardinal Ratzinger who sought to quell the outcries by invoking a variation of infallibility that seemed to stretch the traditional definition.

Several Catholic observers were not so surprised by the policy, but by the Vatican's swift stroke in closing the debate. Robert McClory, author of Power and the Papacy: The People and Politics Behind the Doctrine of Infallibility, commented: "The pope said nobody's supposed to talk about it any more, which is what you tell your six-year-old kid when he wants to go to McDonald's in the middle of the night. You can't deal with adults that way."

Infallibility is a subtle idea that has turned into a blunt instrument, he says. "It's a nuclear weapon and you if use it, you blow yourself up, too."

Wow a nuclear option for the papacy. I guess when Stalin asked how many divisions the Pope had he didn't know about the nuclear papal infallibility weapon. Of course the nuclear weapon was developed in the Trinity project and papal infallibility was developed by the Most Holy Trinity.

Margaret O'Gara, professor of theology at the University of St. Michael's College in Toronto, did her thesis on papal infallibility, and now she teaches it.

"Infallibility is a misleading, confusing word," she says. "At its best, it means praise of God, that God is helping. That is different from, 'God is helping me and you better listen'."

Various readers have sent me links to news stories bout the Women's Ordination Movement and a group of nuns who have been protesting the conclave in Chicago.

Here is a video news report covering the protest and the release of what they said was pink smoke on protest. The event was called “Open the Conclave with Pink Smoke.” You can see the joy of the women, nuns, and a reporter from the National Catholic Reporter at this event. That is just as long as your definition of joy includes the ability to curdle milk at 100 paces.

It is not surprising hat they are confused on this issue since they can't even get pink smoke the right color. Less you think that maybe these are just some Catholics who fully believe in the Church, but just think it is wrong about women's ordination. They also support programs to eliminate "heterosexism" (read gay rights) and they are of course also aligned with abortion supporters such as Kissling's CFFC.

Now I do wonder why women might aspire to be priests and one day the papacy? If you can be disobedient to the pope you can't really see the papacy as being all that important. If they can be disobedient then how could they expect people to be obedient to them at some future date. I remember hearing a story by Fr.Regis Scanlon where he told of an instance where his superior said it was alright for him to dissent from the pope. When the superior later told him to do something he said "I dissent." The superior was shocked and told him you can't do that. To which he replied "I you can dissent from the pope, I can dissent from you."

Now there is an area that aspiring women priests could move into that as of yet does not seem to be occupied. Where are the women anti-popes. There are plenty of colorful and wacky male anti-popes. I mean how can we take women's ordination seriously if they can't even put forward a good anti-pope?

Update: There are some good comments made on this post, but the following one really cracked me up.

It's like "I Dream of Jeannie" but... heretical!

There is just something so cool as a convert in seeing your first black smoke. The anticipation mixed with the let down that we don't yet have a new pope. Also fun is the media freaking out with no way to know about how the voting is going. That they have to wait just like everybody else for the first whiffs of white smoke. It is also nice that the conclave doesn't have any resemblance to a presidential election. No Cardinal exit polls. No world maps divided up into red and blue countries. No dirty tricksters slashing the Cardinals tires on the way to vote. No reports that Cardinal Arinze and other African cardinals were disenfranchised from being able to vote.

I am just thankful thought that the conclave isn't in the U.S. You just know the EPA would force them to put scrubbers in the chimneys to prevent any black smoke from going into the atmosphere.

There has been some pretty strange tie in articles about popes and conclaves, but this article about an exotic dancer turned papal historian is rather strange. Her interest in popes started with her interesting in reading about poisoners. I wouldn't give much credence though to her book "The Deaths of the Popes" since she comes to the conclusion that John Paul I was poisoned to cover up a Vatican banking scandal.

My first article is up at Spero News and it is a parody news story asking "Is Jesus mainstream enough?"

John Gibson at Musings of an Expagan ponders the question about needing to go to confession when confession times are normally so limited.

Perhaps I am a bit off on this, but I have made an informal study of the surrounding parishes in our area. It seems that most confession times are on Saturday afternoon and "By Appointment." So If am to serve Mass on Saturday morning where the heck is one supposed to go to get a confession on Friday Night? Since I take Paul’s admonishment that to partake of the Body and Blood unworthily is to eat and drink damnation, what do I do? Easy. I ask for confession and get a bit miffed when the Priest asks me if I know about the regularly scheduled times for confession.

So… The chicken and egg question today: Is the lack of use of the Sacrament of Penance or Reconciliation due to the fact that times are not available or is it due to the lack of instruction on the need for this sacrament?

Build it and they will come? If you increase confession times will people flock to confess?

I think the "build it they will come" idea is correct. At my parish they have confession before each Mass which is twice daily and four times on Sunday. There is always somebody in line and our pastor will hold off Mass as long as possible to try to see everyone in line. I have occasionally been to other parishes during the short time frame confession is available on Saturday evening and rarely have seen more than just a few people in line. This is of course only antidotal information, but what I describe seems prevalent by what I have read.

Being a convert I have sometimes wondered how this wonderful sacrament got so deemphasized? It seems doubtful that parishes just all of a sudden switched from having confession generally available to the model we have now. It would seem more likely that people had already started to less frequently go to confession and because of this trend that parishes started to diminish the amount of time confession was available. That the demand for confession was reduced over time because sins themselves had become deemphasized. Cut out sins and you cut out the need for confession. Original sin becomes original complex in this highly therapeutic culture. People will get in line to broadcast their most intimate details on Oprah or Dr. Phil, but will run screaming at the thought of a confessional and confessing their sins to a priest. We have analyzed that having guilt is an underlying cause itself that must be eliminated and ignore the fact that it is a symptom normally of sinful activity.

Regardless of how we got to this point the question is how we can reverse it. There has to be both an effort to make it generally available and for Catholics to understand that they need it. I am convinced that a new springtime for the Church will not blossom until such time as Catholic generally return to confession. Unfortunately confession is just seen mostly as "just so pre-Vatican II" and many priests discouraged the use of regular confession in the case of venial sins. Most of us will readily admit to being sinners in some generic capacity, but it seems another story to admit to individual sins.

We are currently in the year of the Eucharist as proclaimed by our late Holy Father. I think we need a year of mercy to concentrate on the sacrament of confession. People definitely need to be catechized to see the link between confession and the Eucharist. To properly prepare ourselves for worthy reception. I would love to see an encyclical letter written on the subject to emphasize once again this wonderful sacrament of mercy. I also realize though that even when the Vatican has lead on important subjects that unfortunately they are largely ignored or not really implemented a the diocesan and parish level. But even a small amount of people regularly returning to confession will have a large impact on their lives and consequently the life of the Church.

The question though is what is the best method to get American to frequent the confessional? In this fast food culture maybe we could appeal to a fast food idea like drive thru confession. I propose a new company called Jiffy Shriven after the Old English term to go to confession.

Here would be my logo.

And a sample drive thru.

And to easily remind people when to return to confession, the following sticker could be placed on the driver side windshield.

While your there they could also check your holy water font or holy water bottle level to see if more fluids need to be added. Though you won't have to worry about them trying to hawk other sacrament while there. You won't hear "I noticed you are not looking so well. We can give you final unction as part of a package deal."

DAILY Photo by John Godbey Mother Theodora of Merrillville, Ind., with the icon she painted for Annunciation of the Lord Catholic Church.

The lofty met the mundane as two artists spread wallpaper paste on a round board and then gently laid on the surface a canvas image of Christ.

At Annunciation of the Lord Catholic Church, Mother Theodora of Merrillville, Ind., and Elias Katsaros of Huntsville worked swiftly to position the artwork.

Their fingers smoothed the stylized face and hands of Christ and stuck the edges down firmly.

The artists were readying the circular icon and three triangular paintings of angels for a wooden frame and their place above the altar at Annunciation.

Theodora, 35, a Romanian Orthodox nun who wears a traditional black habit, created the icon as a commission. Her work for Annunciation links an ancient tradition to a modern church. [Source]

From this article about Dr. Margarita Go-Sinco Holmes, who is the Philippine's equivalent of Dr. Ruth, about her speaking at a Catholic University in Cebu.

"Surprisingly, the strongest objections came from lay people, not from the theologians or priests. You know, we are practically the only Catholic country in this globe that treats the topic of reproductive health conservatively." In this seminar, the topics discussed covered a broad spectrum of, gender issues, orientation, Adolescent Reproductive Health and STD/HIV/AIDS impact and prevention.

Sound familiar? She is being sponsored by the Ford Foundation which is also the biggest sponsor for Catholics For A Free Choice (CFFC).

A conservative Catholic group is lashing out at Seattle University for picking former Gov. Gary Locke to deliver this year's commencement speech, saying his support for abortion rights, same-sex partner benefits and other causes clashes with church doctrine.

In a statement on the Jesuit university's Web site this week, the school's president, the Rev. Stephen J. Sundborg, praised Locke for his work to improve education, welfare reform and trade. "The integrity and compassion that underlie (his) accomplishments exemplify the values of Seattle University," Sundborg said.

However, Sundborg's decision drew blistering comments from Patrick J. Reilly, president of the Cardinal Newman Society based in Manassas, Va.

"Integrity and compassion? Not from a Catholic point of view!" Reilly said in a statement on his group's Web site. "Locke is a steadfast enemy of defenseless preborn children and all those who would protect their lives."

Sundborg was traveling Friday and not available for comment.

Locke, a Democrat whose second term ended in January, said the criticism didn't faze him.

"That's what a university is all about," he told The Associated Press in a phone interview Friday from San Francisco, where he was on a business trip. "Universities are to foster examination of divergent views and critical thinking." [Source]

I think to differentiate between old school faithful Jesus and some of the modern incarnation is to identify some of the modern new strain (and more virulent ) as Jeebuits after what Homer Simpson would cry out in times of trouble "Help! Save me Jeebus!" The Society of Jeebus would be a much more accurate moniker to identify these members who have traded a beautiful Jesuit tradition for a microwaved bowl of pottage. A modern Saint Xavier would not have went of to Japan (at least at first) but would have started his missionary endeavors at Jeebuit run colleges and universities.

"Cuz JEEBUS said if we don't do what's in the book we ain't goin up to heabin."

Not to be missed is Karen Hall's post that contained this wonderful tidbit.

As I've learned many times in my life, God can work with anything. So without a bunch of pope-hating Jesuits that I met along the way, my now very orthodox butt would probably still be an arrogant agnostic.

Mother Angelica's Poor Clares of Perpetual Adoration is having a vocation crisis. Luckily Bishop Olmstead has offered them a place for a new foundation because with over 40 nuns they "were bursting at the seams." Their crisis seems to have been avoided for now. Desert nuns via Quodlibeta.

Cardinal Arinze keynote address for the 2005 Gateway Liturgical Conference is available here [PDF ] via Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam. His address called "Liturgical norms and liturgical piety" is really worth reading as it addresses everything from the reasons for liturgical norms to questions about formalism. He gives a good overview of the reasons for liturgy and answers questions about those concerned with "making the Mass interesting." He also addresses liturgical dance with the Latin rite and the question about what is possibly seen as liturgical dance in parts of Africa and Asia. If two thumbs up was a liturgical posture, then that is what I would give his address. This address appears to have been faxed to Archbishop Burke since Cardinal Arinze was unable to attend the conference in light of the Pope's death.

Here is a summary of the address from the St. Louis review.

Update: AMDG has transcibed the address and it is in the extended section.

For those who are here because of this article in Slate , I would direct you also to Christopher Blosser's "The Cardinal Ratzinger's Fan Club" for complete information on the good Cardinal.

Here is an article about a company giving "free" cards of the pope that were described as a "closely guarded" image of the pontiff "near the very end." The photo is actually of the Pope during the start of his papacy taken in Canada. The free cards were mainly a gimmicked to try to sell $11 rosaries that were supposedly blessed by a Roman Catholic priest Fr. Balish. The Rev. Ralph Wiatrowski of the Cleveland diocese said no priest named Balish appears in the official directory of the American Catholic Church.

A couple of sample ads said.

Free: This is the closely guarded photograph of the late beloved Pope John Paul II taken by an official Vatican photographer. It appears at the top of the special large hymnal size Prayer Card.

The Vatican has authorized the release of the Prayer Cards to the general public through the exclusive Universal Museum Collections. To get a special prayer card and the papal Rosary delivered to your home call the National Direct Hotline 1-800-236-7918, ask for Dept. PE4347.

A representative for Universal Museum Collections said they will not run the ad again because of reader complaints. This was of course marketing fraud saying that the Vatican had authorized exclusive release of these prayer cards. The added bit about them being blessed by some fictitious priest with holy water from Rome is just plain scummy in their attempt to capitalize on the Pope's death.

The Catholic community in Mumbai believes that Cardinal Ivan Dias who is one of the probables in the race for Papacy, would make history, if elected, as he would be the first one from Asia to grace the seat that has been the fount of 2005 years of Christianity. Dias was a close friend of Pope John Paul II, and the only Asian seriously in the running to succeed him. As the Archbishop of Mumbai, Dias, even though one of the dark horses to become the next leader of the Roman Catholic church, has a huge support rallying behind him from all quarters. Cardinal Dias has spent over three decades outside India, much of it as the Pope's emissary around the world, reinforcing the Vatican's conservative messages on issues such as homosexuality and abortion. But since his return to Mumbai eight years ago, [Source]

If Cardinal Ivan Dias was elected we would probably have to suffer through many "The Catholic Church has outsourced the pope" jokes. "You have reached Liturgical Support, press one to report a liturgical abuse."

Update: From an article by John L. Allen, Jr. about negative conclave campaigning that includes reports that Cardinal Dias has diabetes.

In my experience, a safe rule of thumb is to assume such whispering campaigns are false until proof to the contrary emerges. Dias, for example, told a friend in Rome yesterday that he was surprised to read in the papers that he has diabetes, because it’s the first he’s heard of it. (This is reminiscent of John Paul II’s standard line when reporters would ask about his health. “I don’t know,” he would quip. “I haven’t read the newspapers yet.”)

The-new-pope.com
Papabile
The Pope Blog: Conclave Edition
Fr. Neuhaus' Rome Diary

PORTLAND, ORE. - The Oregon Supreme Court on Thursday voided nearly 3,000 marriage licenses issued to gay and lesbian couples last year in Multnomah County, ruling that a single county did not have the authority to act on a statewide issue.

The court, in bolstering its conclusion, noted that Oregonians in November passed a constitutional amendment defining marriage as strictly a heterosexual institution. Oregon was one of 11 states to pass such an amendment.

Conservative groups said the court ruling on top of the voter-approved amendment resolves the issue of same-sex marriage in the state.

"It's over and done," said Tim Nashif, director of the Defense of Marriage Coalition. "Marriage has been protected in Oregon." [Source]

Count me as presently surprised that the Oregon Supreme Court, which has acted as judicial activists in the past, could not find a pretext on which to rule on the validity of the "marriage" licenses.

PLANS to tell teachers to drop terms such as "Holy Ghost" and "Old Testament" from religious education lessons have been postponed after they were branded a move too far in political correctness.

Guidelines drawn up for schools in Norfolk listed a host of terminology and images, which were to be banned for fear of frightening children, or portraying offensive images of various religions.

Under the recommendations, communion bread and wine would no longer be referred to as the "body and blood of Christ", to avoid "cannibalistic" connotations.

The phrase "Holy Ghost" was said to imply "a trivial and spooky concept" and so should be substituted with "Holy Spirit", said the guidelines.
And the Old Testament should not be referred to, as it made the Bible sound out-of-date.

The guidelines were drawn up by the Norfolk Agreed Syllabus conference, which described them as "a useful thing to help teachers prevent making mistakes".

But last night, Norfolk County Council said it was reviewing the policy after it was met by a barrage of criticism.

Maybe they can get a marketing consultant to change the name of the Old Testament as in the case of used cars becoming pre-owned cars. Maybe the "Classic Testament", "Oldie-but-a-Goodie" Testament, or "God's plan: Volume 1." Possibly they could hype it as a prequel to the New (and improved!) Testament.

Not referring to the body and blood of Christ in a religious education class is unbelievably stupid. What passes for religious education must be incredibly vapid if what they teach about the Eucharist makes it hard for children to differentiate between what first century Pagans accused the Church of doing. What in the world were they going to refer to it as?

The guidelines also warned against linking Islam with terrorism and violence by showing "photographs of Muslims holding swords and Kalashnikovs".

Mr Seaton said it was patronising to young people to assume they could not distinguish between pictures of sword-bearing gods, and people practising the religion in everyday life [Source]

Always good to know that someone brandishing a Kalashnikov is "practising the religion in everyday life".

From an article about the three nuns whose contracts were not renewed as campus ministers.

The demonstrators chanted "Support our Sisters" and "Become a Nun, Save the Church, Get Fired" as they marched and then concluded with a recitation of the Lord's Prayer. Most of the protesters were members of Voice of the Faithful, a lay group critical of Murphy's handling of the clerical sex abuse scandal, and were joined by other nuns, a dozen students and Rabbi Meir Mitelman, the Jewish chaplain at Hofstra's Interfaith Center.

They are trying to frame their 'firing' as age discrimination instead of what truly happened. That they are being let go because of their Catholic truth discrimination. In a previous article Sister Riordan had said:

... she always kept an open mind when she counseled students of all religions and many nonbelievers on tough issues such as abortion, gay rights and premarital sex.

The nun fears her replacements will be less available to students and that the young clerics' more conservative views could turn troubled students away.

The fact that Long Island's chapter of VOTF is supporting them is not exactly a ringing endorsement of their orthodoxy. In relation to their Bishop William Murphy:

Later in the day, Murphy's press office released a statement praising the contribution of the religious orders in the diocese and saying the bishop was "personally upset" about the dismay over the dismissals.

Update: Here is an editorial about Father Barr who is intent on fixing campus ministry in Long Island. Look like he is on the right track. [Via Gen X Revert]

Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger – nicknamed 'God's Rottweiler' during a long tenure as the late pope's guardian of Catholic doctrine – is a polarising influence on the pre-conclave negotiations, Italian newspapers have reports. [Source]

Wow, Cardinal Ratzinger's nicknames just don't stop coming. He must have more nicknames than all of the other Cardinals combined. Though 'God's Rottweiler' is much preferable to God's French Poodle or some other poofy dog. I have read in previous stories that his nickname was John Paul III, The Enforcer, Panzerkardinal (Iron Cardinal), Cardinal No By his various nicknames you would assume he could either star as a James Bond villain or in a old school Clint Eastwood movie (when Clint use to kill bad guys and not disabled persons).

Update: On the Dennis Prager show today he had on John L. Allen Jr. of the National Catholic Interview and when asked how different groups in the Church think of Cardinal Ratzinger he replied. "Liberals in the Church consider him the Darth Vader of Roman Catholicism"

Here is another new site in preparation for the conclave. Pope-U-Lator

Roman Catholics believe that when the 115 guys in red socks go into the secretive Conclave, they will be guided by God Himself in their election of the new Pope. Since there are 1.1 billion Catholics on the planet, there are two questions that will fascinate the world in the next few days. Who will be elected as the new Pope? and What name will the new Pope select for himself?

Fill out the short questionnaire on the Pope-U-Lator and five Papabiles are shown based on your criteria. I got Cardinal Arinze ad #1 in response to mine.

There is also the Name-U-Lator to let you choose a papal name. If you choose progressive agenda you get:

Look. Why don't you people give up?

If you want priestesses, gay marriage, contraception, abortion, euthanasia, a 4th person in the Divine Trinity or whatever floats your boat, just join a Protestant Church.

If you want to stick with plain old Christianity, you are going to have to face the fact that the Pope is the guardian of the Deposit of Faith. He can't just make up a new dogma when he feels like it. He can't ordain ladies, nor can he reverse the constant Church teaching against contraception and abortion. It's just not going to happen.

The one for a conservative papal name is also funny. All of this is in good fun and the site has the following disclaimer.

Your use of this website is conditioned upon your acceptance of the following terms of use:

* You agree to view the contents of this site with a somewhat developed sense of humor

and

* You realize that the creators of this site hold the Holy Father - Pope John Paul II - in utmost reverence, believe that the papacy was instituted by Christ, and are abjectly faithful to the Magisterium.

The site also lists the Whapters, Fr. Sibley's and my blog on it.

The following headline make me laugh out loud "Women will do the housekeeping while cardinals pray for guidance." The article has the normal charges of "all-boys' network" and also says "There are in 2005 very few other self-regarding organizations or institutions in the world which would feel comfortable confining women to this tea-making and housemaid role."

I knew the news coverage leading up the to conclave was going to be purgatorial with reporters cheerleading for their progressive view of what the Church should be. Reuters carries an articled titled "Catholic feminists hope for change under next pope." Sorry ladies, but you will be disappointed. The article also mentions that these same feminists want abortion.

If you hope in the pope for a slippery slope you will mope and feel like a dope because you can't wear a cope.

Catholic women are already performing many of the duties of deacons, such as ministering to the poor and sick, and should be allowed to answer calls to the ministry, they say.

Now of course they are pressing for a backdoor to the priesthood by first becoming deacons. Their of course is nothing to prevent them from doing the large majority of the ministries of a deacon. Extraordinary Eucharistic Ministers can bring the Eucharist to those unable to attend Mass. There is some crossover of priests and deacons in regards to the ministry, such as a deacon can give a homily and some blessings such as to assist at and bless marriages and lead burial rites. Outside of the liturgy though what exactly is there to bar women from ministry? From working with the poor, in evangelization, or any other ministry. If you are already doing ministry then what is the big deal about having the title of deacon? If you are truly doing Christ's work how would that matter?

"Some days and some hours I have great hopes" about change under the next pope, said Regina Nicolosi, a 62-year-old woman from the U.S. state of Minnesota who plans to be ordained -- without church approval -- as a deacon this summer.

Even if you truly believed that ordination was a matter of current discipline and not doctrine do they really think that disobedience is just as long as you think you are right? If so I will really have to reevaluate the examples of many saints in the Church. When they were unfairly punished they considered submission to be more important than just being right. That they accepted sometimes unjust actions by their superiors as a chance to both grow in humility and holiness.

What is with the strange linkage of women's ordination and abortion? That you want the right to kill a human being in your womb at the same time as to have the right to confect the Eucharistic elements. That you want the dignity of being a priest of God at the same time that you would denounce the dignity of the unborn child created by God.

But Catholic feminists say they are drawing more support from women outside Western countries. They also say that if the next pope were to ordain women, it would be a powerful symbol to developing countries of how women are viewed by the church.

"What a spectacular statement this would make around the world about the dignity of women," said Phyllis Zagano, a religious studies professor at Hofstra University in New York.

The dignity of women is not dependent on them being able to become priests. This is a degrading utilitarian view of women that only sees them as dignified by the work they do and not by who they are and that we are all created in the image and likeness of God. Why is it that the liberal cry for dignity always results in a less dignified view of the human person?

More complaints about orthodox seminarians.

"I am concerned, and I don't want to isolate this clericalism to Rome," said the Rev. Tom Splain, an American professor of cultural anthropology at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome. "It's on the increase in all of our seminaries. Kind of a return to piety, kind of a superficial piety. ... What happens in Rome is you have a greater percentage of those types."

Splain, who teaches many of these students at Gregorian, believes the church should discuss issues like ordaining female priests and permitting condom use. He and other critics, including some cardinals, worry the strict doctrine enforced by John Paul has left the church increasingly out of touch with modern realities, especially in the developed world, where in some countries church attendance fell during his 26 years as pope.

The young seminarians and priests who come to study in Rome are "careerists," he said, who spend very little of their careers in contact with regular parishioners and their problems.

The Rev. Gerald O'Collins, an Australian professor of theology at Gregorian, said he had noted a "shift to the right" among students.

"I think there is a doctrinaire feeling among a lot of seminarians," said O'Collins, who has been teaching 35 years and, in spite of his anxiety over the seminarians of today, is not a particular advocate of liberalism. "And a bishop sending someone here is going to pick the reliable, safe ones. ... I think pastoral experience is a great reality teacher. They can't live like that. In the pastorial situation, they've got to be wise and helpful."

You would think by the opinions of these men that believing what the Church actually teaches is some kind of disease. Orthodoxy is passed of as "those types." If these professors had their way "those types" of seminarians would be forced when walking through the streets to shout our "unclean" as they go. To the modern mind what is more leprous than orthodoxy, the contagion to be avoided an any cost. That "pastorial experience" will cure them of silly ideas about fidelity, chastity and the moral teachings of the Church.

It is no surprise that Newsday takes a sneering approach to the seminarian interviewed who gave what they say is the "party-line approach" and "spoke as one voice." They must have been especially frustrated that the seminarian from the Sudan would not bite on the question about condom approval. "

One young deacon, from Ireland, forcefully told a reporter that he didn't think an interview should focus any longer on the issue of condoms and HIV.

I do wonder what they consider forcefully as, I doubt if it would coincide with mine.

From another article about what people want the new pope to be:

Here's my question:

Once the mourning ends, a new pope is chosen and this great yet diverse body of believers begins to look ahead, can unity flourish again?

Final answer, or a start?

Bishop Peter Jugis offered the quiet dignity appropriate for the first Sunday after the death of Pope John Paul II.

He struck just the right soft-spoken note in praising the pontiff as a man whose gift for language and love of people helped him touch the world. The pope's physical suffering and death, Jugis told the St. Patrick gathering, deepened our affection for him.

Now here's where it gets interesting. And harder.

Jugis said he has already been asked what direction the church might take now.

His answer?

"The direction of Jesus Christ," he declared.

Now that is a great answer. The rest of the the article is typical boilerplate, though he did have to wait for the third Catholic he interviewed to get someone who might agree with him on "celibacy for priests, women in the priesthood, birth control, gays, stem-cell research, Holy Communion for politicians who support abortion rights"

First they called it Physician assisted suicide and now it is "Aided-suicide." Wow that just sounds so much better and it really changes the morality of helping people to kill themselves.

"We are trying to bring the everyday practice of aid in dying out of the shadows, into the light of public scrutiny," said Levine, who pursued the concept of assisted suicide after the death of his terminally ill grandmother.

Supporters, who included a wildly varied parade of hospice workers, doctors, attorneys, religious and community-group representatives, hope to win some GOP backing and push the measure through to Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who would face a dilemma as a Catholic and social moderate.

Arnold Schwarzenegger has yet to face a moral dilemma or wrestle with one and lose. When asked previously about his positions contrary to the Catholic faith he replied "That's easy, I never had one sleepless night over it" Maybe Arnold can deliver the death prescriptions personally and tell them "your 'e terminated."

"It's never right to commit, encourage, endorse or assist suicide for persons of any age or stage of life," said Ned Dolejsi, executive director of the California Catholic Conference, which includes the Archdiocese of Los Angeles.

Instead, he said, legislators should "work together to deal with the real issues of health care, death and dying in our society."

There has been some speculation as to what name a new pope would choose or whether he might also choose a double name. A pope with a good sense a humor could possibly pick a name that would really tweak anti-Catholics and those who see the Catholic Church in the Book of Revelations. Here are some ideas. We have had a various Pope Sixtus's so why not a new tradition with a triple name like "Sixtus Sixtus, Sixtus." We have also had a Pope Markus so how about a "Markus Beast" along the same lines. Or maybe just Pope Babylon. Of course a Swedish pope could name himself "Leif Behind." It would be really fun watching all the people preparing for the end of the world and think what it would do for the manufacturers of bomb shelters.

The unfortunate side effect would be more Left Behind books, but then again they just don't stop anyway. They are like Freddy Krueger on steroids. Just when you think they published the last one, then out comes another one. Speaking of Jerry Jenkins and Tim LaHaye I recently saw this quote"a mishmash of myth, silliness, and misrepresentations of Scripture." No it wasn't a Amazon.com book review of their series, it was Mr. Jenkins critique of NBC's apocalyptic miniseries, Revelations. Talk about irony.

Today my parish, Immaculate Conception in Jacksonville, had a special funeral Mass for Teresa Marie Schindler Schiavo. This Mass was coordinated by the Justice Coalition and was attended by Bob and Mary Schindler. The Justice Coalition is headquartered here in Jacksonville, Fl and my pastor Fr. Leon gave them permission to hold it at Immaculate Conception. I would guess that the reason it was held there is that this church is the most beautiful church in the diocese. Fr. Leon told me before that reporters often call him for statements on events because they assume that because of the beauty of this church that it must be the Cathedral for the diocese. Strange how the beauty of church architecture is suppose to be so subjective, yet secular sources don't seem to have any problem discerning beauty in church architecture.

The Mass was packed today and was standing room only. They also had cameras from the local media present. The Mass was said by our assistant pastor Fr. Keene who beautifully chanted the Mass as he usually does and it was concelebrated by 8 or 9 other priests. Fr. Keene is someone I greatly admire for the way that he prays the Mass and his homilies are usually chock full of the Early Church Fathers and normally containd other keen insights (which is to be expected considering his last name.) Initially I was disappointed when I saw that another priest was to give the homily. I have heard this other priest, whose name escapes me, before and though his homilies are good - Fr. Keene's are superb. Today though he delivered an outstanding homily by weaving together the stories of Terri and the Pope. He made the usual connections that have been discussed in St. Blogs and when on to expound about the opening words of John Paul II's pontificate "be not afraid." He said that too many bishops, priests, and laity unfortunately seem to be afraid to speak out and to follow the example of the Holy Father who lived this "every day of his life." He discussed how Jesus death gave us the Eucharist, the Pope gave us this year of the Eucharist, and Terri was able to receive the Precious Blood prior to her passing.

Bob and Mary Schindler were the ones who took the gifts up to the altar and at the end of the Mass Bob Schindler gave a short talk. He mentioned that since Terri's death that they had received or 10,000 cards and letters in condolences. He read one letter from a Vietnam veteran who had sent them a Purple Heart for Terri. The veteran had received it for being shot in the head during the Vietnam War. The letter said that since some civilians received the Purple Heart in the aftermath of 9-11 that it was appropriate for Terri who was killed by "domestic terrorism" by the mechanism of "judicial homicide." I think it is a myth though that civilians received the Purple Heart since the law was changed in 1997 to exclude civilians. Regardless, it was heartbreaking watching Bob Schindler read the letter as he was having difficulties holding back the tears while doing so. He thanked those that supported them and helped them out and that he was greatly thankful for the help that was received. When he was done speaking he received a standing ovation for about five minutes. I am not exactly a fan of applause at Mass, but if there is anytime that it was appropriate - this was it. Seeing this couple who are true witnesses to the faith is just so inspiring. Two people who never intended to be in the spotlight, but who responded and valiantly fought to try to save their daughters.

The president of the Justice Coalition, Ted Hires, spoke after Bob Schindler. He gave a passionate speech about what happened to Terri and talked about how the Schindler's were going to be working in the future to "prevent anybody else from being starved to death." He mentioned that those who participated in the death of Terri will one day meet justice. This was the first time I have ever heard a number of Catholics shout out "amen."

The Schindler's witness reminds me of the story of Joseph when he was tossed down a well and later sold into slavery by this brothers. When Joseph later revealed himself to his brothers he said "As for you, you meant evil against me; but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today." Evil also lead to the death of Terri, but God will use it for good and through the instrumentality of Terri's story will save others who might have otherwise died. There are already stories that witness to this truth. This family is truly a witness to the faith as evidenced by the statement made after Terri had died.

Throughout this ordeal, we are reminded of the words of Jesus on the cross: “Father forgive them for they know not what they do.” Our family seeks forgiveness for anything that we have done in standing for Terri’s life that has not demonstrated the love and compassion required of us by our faith.

NEW YORK (Roto Reuters) Vatican spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Valls who told reporters the cardinals had decided unanimously to give no more interviews or meet the media before they are locked in the conclave that will pick the next pope. In response Reuters CEO Tom Glocer held a press conference today stating that "Reuters will follow suit and also have a conclave related news blackout during the time up to and including the conclave. We really don't have any news to report so this will not be much different than our normal coverage. Don't worry though we will still be publishing our editorial pieces a.k.a news stories to our subscribers. There are plenty of opposing opinions from members of the Catholic church that we can query in the days to come."

Other news organizations such as the Associated Press our also following Reuters lead and will stick to non-stories such as questioning parishioners of various Catholic churches to show how divided the church really is. A spokesman for AP CEO Tom Curley had this to say "We will lay off real news and will be concentrating on polling data asking solid questions about abortion, contraception, homosexuality, equality for women in the priesthood. Which is off course our regular coverage. We will also be working in stories about how beloved and admired the previous pope was and why the next one should be totally different. If only Pope John Paul II had been more progressive his funeral would not have only reached two billion households."

Students will have the chance to reflect about the Virgin Mary and her role in the Christian church on Wednesday and Thursday.

Vanderbilt theologian Robin Jensen has organized a Mary conference, "The Virgin Mary in Orthodox, Catholic, and Protestant Traditions," which will be held at the Vanderbilt Divinity School and two local churches.

Jensen is a professor of the history of Christian art and worship at the Divinity School and teaches a popular course about Mary. She said she believes that as Christian women expand their leadership within the church, they are looking to Mary for inspiration.

"We've moved away from Mary as the feminine face of the church to Mary as a model of Christian discipleship. This creates a way for women to see themselves in leadership position in churches," Jensen said.

Jensen says that writings by the late Pope John Paul II and books like "The Da Vinci Code" have helped spark interest in Mary as the feminine icon of Christianity.

"If you look at what Mary says in Luke 1, it's quite astonishingly powerful, independent-minded and prophetic," Jensen said. "It's hardly the words of someone who is submissive." [Source]

While I like the concept of this conference calling Mary "independent-minded" has got to be one of dumbest things I have ever read concerning her. "Let it be done according to they word" is independent-minded? Total submission and faithfulness to God is actually dependent since we all are totally dependent on God and Mary fully lived that truth. When Mary was forthright in her request at the wedding of Cana it was because she had absolute trust that Jesus would answer her intercession and not because she was being daring and independent. Some people try to pigeon hole Mary as some kind of proto-modern-feminist which just totally misses the point. I just can't imagine modern feminists saying they were the handmaiden of anyone, much less God. It is of course easier to try to paint her in the light of modern sensibilities instead of following the blazing trail of her total discipleship, humility, and trust in God.

The comment about the Da Vinci Code is also just plain strange. As far as I know Dan Brown avoided any mention of Mary and concentrated on his twisted view of Mary Magdalene's relationship with Jesus. His writing about the "divine feminine" avoided the issue of the Mother of the divine Jesus Christ.

None of this is surprising considering that this is sponsored by a "Religion, Gender, and Sexuality" program which links to such fun stuff as "Cabrini: a Pacific Northwest gathering lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered Quakers" - who knew?

Clayton Emmer at The Weight of Glory has come up with some song parodies from The Sound of Music related to media darling Fr. Richard McBrien in "The Sound of McBrien." Now I would really like to be able to sing "So long, farewell, auf Wiedersehen, adieu" when it come to Fr. McBrien, but in the spirit of Clayton's post here is my own song parody.

My Dissident Things

Discounting Moses and tradition outgrow
Advice that I pedal and warm fuzzy hymnals
Orthodox theologians tied up with strings
These are a few of my favorite things

The O'Reilly Factor and shows by the oodles
No Incense or Mass bells just NCR doodles
Contraception and condoms or tie it with strings
These are a few of my favorite things

Women in white Chasubles with blue satin sashes
Snowflakes colored vestments that show off eyelashes
Guitars and drummers doing "On Eagles Wings"
These are a few of my favorite things

Abortion, contraception and morality ceased
Dissenting sisters and disobedient priests
Thinking about wearing the Fisherman's ring
These are a few of my favorite things

When the Pope writes
When the Vatican speaks
When I'm feeling sad
I simply remember my favorite things
And then I don't feel so bad

As we now look forward to the start of the conclave and the election of a new pope our minds naturally ponder the attributes of what we think are the important qualities for the new pope to have and what are the most important issues that need to be addressed. First and foremost is that he is able to answer the same question Jesus put to St. Peter, "Do you love me?" and to be able to answer truthfully "Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you." That he would love God with all his heart, soul, and might. This is of course also the basic requirement that all of us should have. Whenever we see lists of what makes a good bishop we should also see that largely they apply to us, though possible on a smaller scale. Whether we are in charge of a diocese or a family the same basic requirements hold forth.

Jesus goes on to tell St. Peter "Feed my sheep" so obviously this is a major part of the charism of the Pope. I think that one of the greater issues that confronts the life of the Church is catechesis. There has definitely been improvements since the "God is love" Jesus coloring book approach to teaching the faith in the sixties and seventies. Many sheep have spiritually died of starvation from the measly diet from some Catholic schools, theologians, and homilies. Bad enough is the watered down version of the faith, though worse is the injection of theological poisons that not only do not nourished but can hasten spiritual death. The Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) put out by our late Holy Father was a good start. If only it was implemented into more curriculums. I know one priest in my diocese who runs a Catholic school who has admitted and perhaps even bragged that he has never read the CCC and complained of it being 800 pages long. I guess we can leave out the Bible if the main criterion is page count. This dismissal of the CCC is from what I have read and heard unfortunately common.

I have often heard that heterodoxy is its own cure, that it dies off naturally as evidenced by religious orders who embrace it. This view though encourages a laissez-faire approach to dissent since it almost ignores the importance of the souls of those who embrace it or those they influence. That as long as a heresy is not spreading it is no problem. This is a serious lack of charity to those holding these views. A new Pope though is not going to be able to solve these problems by himself. The Pope gave us Ex Corde Ecclesia to try to reign in the problems of dissent in our Catholic Universities, but since the large majority of bishops have done nothing to implement it this movement for reform has been ineffective. A good shepherd when he sees that one of his sheep is sick will first remove him from the rest of the flock so that the disease might not be communicated to the flock. The shepherd then does what he can to heal the sick sheep and when it is again healthy allows it to return to the rest of the flock. A good shepherd must chase the wolves away from his flock and not invite them in especially to teach. Too many Catholic institutions are willing to give honors to wolves. This is I think a good parallel of what should be done to known dissenters. That out of love we hopefully only temporality remove them from the flock to care for them. This is both charitable to the dissenter, but also to those they might infect. This does not mean a start of a new inquisition or the pope going "all medieval" on some dissenters (though the thought of Fr. McBrien in an Iron Maiden gives me some (disordered) pleasure), but that he make known to the various congregations and their heads that he appoints that dissent should not be ignored. The National Catholic Reporter published a list of people who had been disciplined by the Vatican in the last 26 years and to my mind it is unfortunate that this list is way too short for such a long period of time. Any efforts along this way of course will be labeled by the media as a crackdown or other pejoratives, but getting the disapproval of the media to my mind is positive affirmation that you are on the right track. Pope's generally have to die first to get the media to say something nice about them.

Another major issue is secularism and Fr. Jim Tucker makes a good case for why he says this it the "Number One Challenge for the Next Pope." This is of course an issue that effects both evangelism and those who already identify themselves as Catholics. We are increasingly able to pretend that we are totally independent of God and our spiritual life is smothered by this radical independence and consuming materialism. Also of course dangerous is this idea of being "spiritual" without any real commitment or any kind of accountability. Fr. Jim though goes more in depth and says it much better and also includes some good suggestions.

Anything that impedes the spread of the Gospel to all corners of the world also needs to be addressed. There is a total lack of religious freedom in many parts of the world. Countries like China with their faux government sponsored churches such as the Patriotic Catholic Church allow you only to believe what they consider to be in their best interests. In Europe actually believing that homosexual acts is gravely disordered will also keep you from being appointed a commissioner such as the case of Rocco Buttiglione. In many Islamic countries not only is the Gospel not allowed to be preached, but conversion can result in your arrest and execution. Christian-Muslim relations will become increasingly strained especially in Africa with expanding Christian churches side by side with heavily islamic cultures. In the U.S. we have freedom of religion unless you are up for appointment as a federal judge and you actually believe that abortion is morally wrong.

From the beginning the Church has always battled the culture of death that surrounds it. The largely Pagan culture that Christianity was birthed in had to be preached about the dignity of human life. Not much has changed it is just that we just kill our newborns in a more antiseptic environment. There are increasing threats to the dignity of human life with abortion, euthanasia, cloning, and the use of embryonic human beings as mere parts for treatments.

I do not envy the great responsibility that the Cardinal-electors have in selecting a new pope. I can only say that if I were a Cardinal that I would immediately take off the list anybody who wanted to be pope. Wanting this gigantic weight surely shows that they do not have the full understanding of what being the Vicar of Christ truly means. The weight of responsibility for parish priests and even more so for bishops is heavy enough in working to guard the flock. A world-wide flock is an order of magnitude that would weigh heavily on the shoulder of the one to carry it.

Here is an interesting post by an Episcopal priest on the Pope's funeral.

Another moment that really impressed me was the Litany Of The Saints at the very end of the mass. In the litany a long list of saints was read out with the crowd responding in Latin “Pray For Us.” The tune was very beautiful and the cantor exquisite and the melodic response of thousands of voices, “Pray For Us” seemed to me to distill the longing of the human heart to the purest essence. Again the setting made something familiar come to life.

The cult of saints is one of the elements in Roman Catholic religion with which Protestants are most uncomfortable. The practice of seeking the intercession of the saints surely can lead to misunderstandings that border on the worst kind of magical religion and come very near to polytheism. This is not the official theology. I am catholic minded enough to accept the official theology which is that seeking the intercession of the saints is nothing more than asking friends to pray for us. It is just that these friends happen to be on the other side of death praising God in the church triumphant. I have enough Reformation antibodies in my theological blood stream to be allergic to the practice and such litanies are not part of my personal piety. They make me uncomfortable. Though when the priest that sponsored for ordination died I found myself without thinking asking him to intercede for me that I might be as faithful as he was. But what does this mean? Is there not a danger of losing track of Jesus Christ as the one and only mediator?

As this long list of saints was being read off in St. Peter’s square to the millions gathered there and the millions watching, each well known name followed by the deeply echoing petition, “Pray For Us,” the penny dropped for me that these people being mentioned whose prayers were being beseeched with great feeling were people whose names and histories were intimately known. Many of them had been martyred for the faith in Rome and were buried beneath the feet of the crowd. They were real people whose lives of holiness were well known who left friends and companions behind, who by their courage and witness had kept the faith alive in their time. Oh, Perpetua, Felicitas, Caspar, Vincentia and on and on. I wish I could call to mind all the names. But it was not a plea for magical people with magical powers to perform some wonder unrelated to our own relationship to Christ. It was a plea to friends known for their faithfulness, for their lives of holiness and costly sacrifice, friends not absent but nearby, underfoot in one sense, yet united to us in a living communion, to be in solidarity with us and beseech our only mediator and saviour to help us in our time to keep the faith as they have. It need not be a slip into magical religion but the legitimate cry of the human heart to friends in the faith whose faith strengthens us in a moment of weakness and need, to pray for us. How natural to say “John Paul II, pray for us.”

I especially enjoyed the part about "Reformation antibodies in my theological blood stream" of which I can partly relate to. Some devotional practices can still cause some of my old atheist antibodies to react and to release chemical shouts of "Beware superstition!". I can intellectually accept certain devotional practices, but old allergic reactions can step in from fully engaging in them without feeling a little uncomfortable. I can watch my wife touch the sandals of Jesus on the Pieta in our Church and can both want to follow her example and at the same time feel a little bit queasy about it. Having an intellectual belief in something is not the same thing as to be totally down with it. I have grown more comfortable with time asking the intercession of the saints, but it is still like first learning to ride a bicycle where you have to concentrate on what you are doing to keep moving along. Though I have found asking Pope John Paul II to pray for me very comfortable. I hope I am not presumptuous in being on a first name basis with him who I simply address as Karol. I have a feeling he doesn't mind and besides "Pope John Paul II the Great" is a mouthful.

Papa-lu at Papa Familias appropriately has the Carnival for Il Papa a collection of posts from various bloggers on Pope John Paul II.

One of the consequences of the pope's death might be on the career of Gene Greytak. Who is Gene Greytak you might ask, well he is the Catholic actor who has played Pope John Paul II so many times that he even has a set of vestments from the Pope's tailor Gamarelli.

His movie appearances where he played the pope are.

Miss Cast Away (2004)
Just the Ticket (1999)
Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult (1994)
Sister Act (1992)
Hot Shots! (1991)
Repossessed (1990)

And on TV he played the pope in

"The Wayans Bros."
"Picket Fences"
"Murphy Brown"
"The Golden Girls"
"Just the Ten of Us"
"ALF"
"Night Court"

Gene Greytak

One of the amazing things about the press coverage of the Pope's death is that you can find beautiful articles like "Sore feet, soaring heart" in the Oregonian of all papers.

Of course most of the coverage has been the usual crap where for an alleged balance they want to both praise and denigrate the Pope at the same time. That everything much be crouched in political terms. One of the Angry Twins relate how he was interviewed by three separate media outlets and that their resulting quotes were totally misrepresented in all three cases (though one promised to run a retraction after he complained.)

The success of Pope John Paul II's ministry can be attributed to his commitment to prayer, Bishop Victor Galeone told a crowd at Friday night's Mass for the Pope in St. Augustine.

"Where Jesus was, the servant John Paul was in prayer," said Galeone, the leader of North Florida's more than 162,000 Roman Catholics.

More than 525 people packed the Cathedral-Basilica of St. Augustine, the mother church of Florida Catholics, to remember the pope who died April 2.

As testament to the prayer commitment of the pope throughout his lifetime, Galeone drew on stories told by papal biographer, George Weigel, senior fellow of Washington's Ethics and Public Policy Center.

Weigel is the author of "Witness to Hope: The Biography of Pope John Paul II."

Galeone related a story of the pope as a student told by a former roommate. The roommate said that he would go out for cigarettes in the morning and his roommate, the future pope, would be in prayer. When the roommate returned much later, the future pope was still in prayer.

Another story was that of the pope as a young priest, Karol Wojtyla. He was on a kayaking vacation with friends when he learned of his appointment as auxiliary bishop of Krakow, Poland. and asked to be let into the chapel so he could pray.

Hours later, he was prostrate in prayer, and when asked if he wanted dinner, he said no. However, he did ask that he be allowed to stay in prayer in the chapel until it was time for his departure home. [Source]

The sun is seen shining through a flag with a picture of the late Pope John Paul II in Krakow, Poland April 8, 2005. REUTERS/Tobias Schwarz

Radioblogger has the transcript from when Jimmy Akin appeared on the Hugh Hewitt show debating SSPX member Professor David Alan White from the Naval Academy. Jimmy unfortunately was not on all that long, but another person named Dwight Rabuse (who I guess has his own weekend talk show) also debated the professor on the fact that SSPX is in schism.

Hugh had also read an excellent email from a priest currently in Rome. The email was written by Fr. Mitchell who is part of Bishop Fabian Bruskewitz's diocese. CatholicNewsGeek has an introduction to Fr. Mitchell and posts the letter in full, which is well worth reading.

Mary H has a great post and reflection about who will be our next pope.

I was thinking of starting a Novena tomorrow in preparation of the conclave. There does not seem to be any universal memorials for a saint on the 18th of this month and wondered if you might have any appropriate suggestions for praying for our Cardinals as they move to elect our next pope.

I was thinking just how appropriate the double naming of Pope John Paul II was

Like John throughout his life he took Mary into both his heart and his home. As a mystical theologian he preached some of the deep mysteries of God that betrayed his utter love and devotion of God. John beautifully told us of Jesus as the bread of life and of the meaning of the Eucharist and our Holy Father both preached about and loved Christ in the Blessed Sacrament and that that he wrote about this awesome mystery. It was no coincidence that he would die in a year he had proclaimed as the Year of the Eucharist. John told us how Jesus had elevated marriage by performing his first public miracle at the Wedding of Cana. The Pope throughout his life he both honored and worked towards preserving the sanctity of marriage. That as a pastor he counseled and prepared married couples and even as Pope he still performed marriages. He truly saw the family as what Vatican II called the Domestic Church and during the year he proclaimed the year of the family he wrote a Letter to Families. St. John gave us a Gospel which from the first line proclaimed some of the deepest mysteries of the Most Holy Trinity, the Pope in preparation for the new millennium gave us the year of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit to reflect on the deep well of mystery of the Holy Trinity. John the disciple who Jesus loved laid close to the heart of Jesus at the Last Supper. Is there any doubt that throughout this life that Pope John Paul II did not also do the same?

Like Paul he traveled throughout the world preaching the Gospel. St. Paul was the most traveled apostle and the Pope was the most traveled Pope. Wherever those two went they also left behind disciples. That Christ was imaged and preached to the world by these two wonderful men. He suffered through various persecutions like living through oppressive regimes, being shot and offered it all for the love of Christ. St. Paul laundry list of persecutions was long indeed. This Holy Father truly lived St. Paul's statement "Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I complete what is lacking in Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church." Like St. Paul preached to the people of Athens, the Pope adapted the Gospel to preach to those who had embraced other philosophies. St. Paul considered himself a father to his flocks around the world and the Holy Father was truly a papa to us who constantly was concerned and prayed for us.

But most of all the Holy Father imaged Christ. Jesus started out vibrant in his ministry and the first apparent end was on the cross as he suffered for the love of us. The Pope also started out physically vibrant when he was elected and even though he suffered from age and disease he also did not come down off the Cross. Pope John Paul II truly was another Christ, a Vicar of Christ who will not soon be forgotten.

I am sure that I have only touched on a small number of the possible parallels and if any come to your mind please comment on them.

Fr. Rob Johansen reports on another case of death by dehydration currently being done to 85 year-old Mae Margourik of LaGrange, Georgia. [Source]

BlogssforTerri has more.

There have been many comments on the Clinton comments on Air Force One in regards to the Pope saying he had a "mixed legacy", but not much on the following comment.

Clinton was also asked about his first flight aboard Air Force One since the end of his presidency: "I never thought I'd be on this plane again - I had a good time.

Wow that's a ringing endorsement of how much hope he has in Hillary winning the presidency if he never thought he would fly on Air Force One again. For once I hope he is right.

I have been considering how silly it is to get worked up over the suggestions of non-Catholics in the qualities of the next pope and what should be changed. If you are not a Catholic or possibly even a theist why should you believe that the Holy Spirit both guards and inspires the Catholic Church. You would see it as only a human institution and human institutions change with time in what they believe as truth. If modern society sees no problem with same-sex activity or same-sex marriage then why should a human institution be any different. All the things accepted in modern society they believe should also be accepted in the Church.

To accept the fact that the Catholic Church is something totally different and that it does not respond to the winds of societal change in regards to the truth is a fact that they are not willing to accept, at least as of yet. The reason that the Catholic Church receives most of the broadsides of negative opinion is the very fact that they see in some way the odd quality of it in that it does not bend to the pressure of modernity. The Church will not always teach the fullness of the truths from its treasury, but it will not replace the treasury with a bowl of pottage as these commentators might wish. Sometimes a shining city set on a hill must be stamped out to conform to the rest of the dingy environment around it. In a way these attitudes are a back-handed compliment to the Church. Once when Cardinal O'Connor was a little down about homosexual activists from Act Up who were desecrating the Eucharist. Fr. Groeschel told him to "Cheer up, at least they know it is the Catholic Church they must attack."

So it is really quite understandable the opinions of these pundits who see the Church as nothing more than a club and that some rule changes need to be made. So it is quite understandable their commentary considering the understanding they have and it would only be odd if non-Catholics actually understood the nature of the Church. Some will understand what the Church believes about itself, but this does not necessarily lead them accepting it. For example writer extraordinaire Mark Steyn "gets it" about the Church, though he isn't Catholic.

Dissident Catholics though are another story since they are suppose to accept that not only is the Holy Spirit guarding and proclaiming the truth through its Church today, but that it has done so since it came into existence as blood and water flowed from Christ's side. They are always saying that they have a prophetic voice, as if any Old Testament prophet was ever killed because they were preaching the same message as the society around them. They were killed precisely because they were calling the nation of Israel back to the truth since they had fallen to the idolatry of their neighbors. I could just hear Call To Action in the context of those times. "We will not have equality until women Levite's can enter the Holy of Holies. In fact all tribes should be able to offer sacrifices and not just this Male Levite dominated hierarchy that suppresses the gift of women and of other tribes." At least then the earth would have opened and swallowed them up.

When you just ignore the teaching authority of the Church over your own "prophetic" understanding then you no longer need a magisterium. When you can ignore that the Pope had closed the subject concerning women's ordination, then you also have no need of a pope. Why do they look on the election of a new pope hoping that he will change doctrines when they don't even accept the authority of our late Holy Father? Obedience only when you agree with someone is no obedience at all. When you can ignore Church tradition and also ignore the writings of the Fathers of The Church (or only selectively parse them) then you also don't have any need of tradition. Cardinal John Henry Newman famously said "To be deep in history is to cease to be Protestant." The opposite is also true. To be shallow in history is to cease to be Catholic. If you truly believe that the Holy Spirit is guiding the Church in the acceptance of homosexuality, abortion and women's ordination, then you must also believe that the Holy Spirit is working in just about every Church but the Catholic and Orthodox churches. That these other church's are more spirit filled. Why would you want to be part of a church that you believe to be fundamentally wrong on some of the most important questions concerning life and marriage. A church they believe has been discriminating against women and those with same-sex attraction for two thousand years. A church that automatically excommunicates those who are involved in the direct procurement of an abortion. A church that calls contraception gravely sinful To them this is not a church that needs just a little theological bondo to make it look nicer to the modern world, but one that need a whole new chassis and totally different accessories. Of course if you can ignore the Pope and the magisterium then you can discard them and the landscape is littered with churches that have done exactly that. So why don't they simply join an Episcopal church that might have some Catholics trappings that they are comfortable with and none of that teaching authority jazz that interferes with their own understandings? Or if no church currently teaches what they want then start their own? Especially since they believe they are being guided by the Holy Spirit and that they know better. Martin Luther was at least honest in understanding that his view of the nature of the church was at odds with the Catholic Church. They need to understand that even if they haven't left the church there are in virtual schism. I have no desire that anybody leave the Catholic Church, only that they truly join it in its fullness.

BRASILIA, Brazil - A Brazilian cardinal criticized President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva for defending abortion and gay rights, calling Silva "chaotic, not Catholic," in an interview published Wednesday.

"A Catholic cannot be in favor of abortion," Rio de Janeiro Cardinal Eusebio Scheid told the Estado de S. Paulo newspaper in Rome, where he arrived Tuesday for the conclave to chose a new pope.

Scheid, 72, said he was perplexed by the defense of gay rights by Silva and his leftist Workers Party.

"His relations with gays - who approved all that? He left us all rather confused," Scheid was quoted as saying.

Silva is to attend the funeral of Pope John Paul II, amid speculation that Sao Paulo cardinal Claudio Hummes could be chosen the next pope. Silva has said he is hoping a Brazilian will be named.

Scheid praised Silva for attending the funeral, but added: "He expects political dividends from this."

Considered a conservative, Scheid said Silva - a grade-school dropout from Brazil's poor Northeast - had an "illogical" and "uncultivated" Catholic faith.

"He was born in the working class, with all its confusions. He never had a proper formation and deepening of his faith," Scheid told Estado. "He and the Holy Spirit don't understand each other."

Scheid, who has good relations with Silva, said politicians in general were untrustworthy.

"They say one thing now and something else tomorrow," he was quoted as saying. "The left never brought benfits to anyone. Look at Russia, China and Cuba."

Silva's office said he had made no comment on Scheid's remarks. [Source]

Roman Chaoticism would be an apt term since there is so much disorder or confusion among those of the Catholic faith. Chaos is a disordered state and many Roman Chaotics openly endorse behavior that is objectively disordered. I nominated the National Catholic Reporter as the Catechism of the Chaotic Church.

Funny stuff going on over at Cnytr.

Hugh Hewitt notices that there is of yet, no patron saint of blogging and suggests St. Augustine as the obvious choice or possibly St. HUGH of Lincoln. While St. Augustine is a good choice, I have another saint in mind. I would nominate a contemporary of his - St. Jerome who was a prodigious letter writer. His temperament was closely suited to many bloggers and he was definitely a pundit who let loose a good rant at times He had to fight his naturally cranky temperament and is now both a saint and a Doctor of the Church. This shows that there is also hope for most of us pundit type bloggers who have been know to show similar traits at times (or everyday).

Being that he was once a hermit this would fit the media perception of bloggers to at T. They already identify us as predominantly pajama-clad white males blogging from a basement; so cave blogging would be an good metaphor for them.

"If you have trouble controlling your temper at times, being patient and staying calm interacting with others, then you are normal. Nearly everyone blows-up now and then. Grace and virtue can harness and tame you to some degree but unless you live in isolation you will most likely loose your cool occasionally. Our habits become ingrained in us. That's the most important reason why we should cultivate good habits, especially mental habits. Our thinking needs guidance because thoughts beget habits. Jerome can enlighten you. Implore him for assistance.

Perhaps because of his wide exposures to many people and travels, he developed a pugnacious and cantankerous disposition at times. His keen intellect could be contentious when his vision of truth differed from others. Jerome was a passionate lover of biblical, written expression. His ill-nature, that all creatures possess due to original sin, was forever attacking, challenging and defending his pursuit of scriptural expression." [Source]

Besides this Saint is one that many Protestants could also embrace as a patron saint since St. Jerome said "ignorance of scripture is ignorance of Christ."

St Jerome, protector of sarcastic bloggers, pray for us!

Diogenes of CWN points to and comments on this statement by Bishop Lynch. Doing some computer forensic work I was able to reconstruct the first draft of this statement. The text in blue is the reconstructed text and the rest is the posted statement.

STATEMENT FROM BISHOP ROBERT N. LYNCH ON THE DEATH OF TERESA SCHINDLER SCHIAVO

“I am deeply saddened to hear of the death of Terri Shiavo of which I did nothing to prevent or even spend the time to spell her last name right before I released this statement. I know that you join me in praying that Terri finds a warm welcome in eternity with Our Lord. I ask you, as well, to keep Terri's family in your prayers who rightly see me as personal non gratis. The many years during which Terri was incapacitated took a great toll on Terri's family and loved ones especially her husband who suffered from her staying alive. It was my sincere hope that while Terri was still in nursing care her family members would find a way to put their differences aside after all starvation and dehydration is such a small family dispute, and come together in agreement about Terri's on-going care or actually the total lack of basic care and rehabilitation. At this time, now that Terri has gone to meet our Lord, I continue to hope and pray that all of Terri's family members may seek and find healing and peace from God, our Creator.

There are a number of significant issues that have been highlighted by Terri's health problems and her death. A number of people have mentioned to me that they now see a necessity to have a formal conversation with their family members about their personal desires regarding health care in the event that they become incapacitated. And I just have no problem with people writing living wills and allowing themselves to be put to death when they are not actually at an end-of-life stage. Normally I would talk about this being a teaching moment, but I really don't want to go into the nuances between basic care and extraordinary means used to prolong life.

I have given a great deal of thought and reflection to these comments after all I had much time to think when I skipped town during Holy Week and the days leading up to Terri's death while in Jakarta, Indonesia (obviously Canon 395 does not apply when you need to dodge the media and pesky Catholics wanting me to uphold the Church's teaching). My recommendation to you is this: never miss an opportunity to spend time with your loved ones and friends; never let a day pass without telling your parents and children that you love them since you never know when a relative might get the state to help kill them; cherish each day as a gift from God, and keep your hearts fixed on that day when you will see God face to face, in fact I am looking forward to getting fitted with a millstone and being tossed into the sea. We live a very fast-paced life; it's easy to forget that life is short, especially when you are prevented from eating or drinking. The only certain formula for a happy life is to live each day in gratitude for God's goodness and being thankful for those of you who don't live in my diocese. For, at the end of a life lived in gratitude, we can be assured of Our Savior's loving embrace because while on earth you can't rely on your own Bishop to help you from being executed for the crime of being incapacitated.”

It has been a awhile since I have updated my blogroll. In fact some of the blogs I was going to add have already stopped posting. There are just so many good Catholic blogs now that it is pretty hard to keep track of them.

Interesting post on the upcoming conclave by Hugh Hewitt:

The Roman Catholic Church has many mystical traditions, traditions which this Pope embraced, from Fatima to Sister Faustina and the dedication of Divine Mercy Sunday (read here Sister Faustina' vision of Hell) in the last century back to the 16th century's St. John of the Cross (John Paul II's doctorate in theology was on the writings of this saint) and much much earlier. It is a very good bet that many of the Cardinals John Paul II appointed will share his understanding of the mysteries of Christianity and of the Church's saints.

These Cardinals will have to be wondering about, and praying about, what the Holy Spirit intends them to do in conclave and why the pope has died at precisely this moment. The anti-Christians will scoff at the idea of God's timing, but not the Cardinals, for whom God's timing is a given. They will be fully informed of the circumstances of Terri Schiavo's death, of the advance of the Groningen Protocol, the pressure under which many of the doctrines of Christianity find themselves, and of a variety of developments that are directly opposed to the Church's doctrines on the sanctity of life. They are also fully aware of the radicalization of a segment of Islam and the aggressiveness of the PRC, but the central issue in international media in the week before John Paul's death was Terri Schiavo's fate, an issue on which the leadership of the Church in America and Rome was united. Those Cardinals who shared with John Paul II an appreciation for the complexity of the world's path and of God's plan for the world can be expected to try to discern the significance of the timing of the conclave.

I bring this up as a way of reminding people that Terri Schiavo's suffering and the suffering of her family were not purposeless, and despite the crush of media surrounding the Pope's death, also far from forgotten. Her fifteen year struggle culminated on the eve of the most momentous decision the Roman Catholic Church's leadership can take, and illumens the significance of the next few weeks. If many Cardinals had the idea that a "caretaker" pope might be in order, the drama in Florida works against that desire for a period of calm transition. Would the allies have selected a caretaker general on the eve of D-Day had Ike suffered a mishap?

Is the idea of a "Schiavo effect" on the conclave just another American's preoccupation with American issues projected onto the much broader and much more indifferent world? Perhaps, but I don't think so precisely because on matters of science and ethics, on morals and sharp breaks with the past, the United States sets the tempo for much of the world. The Anglican Communion is near schism because of actions taken by its American branch. Marriage is under its heaviest assault in the United States. Embryonic stem cell research got billions from the California taxpayers last fall. Cloning isn't illegal and the announcements of the technique's march are often though not exclusively associated with American science. Assisted suicide is not just the barbaric practice of the ever more anti-humanist Dutch, but the law of Oregon. If the Cardinals want a glimpse of where the anti-humanists want to head, they need only search through the American papers. I am certain most of them do. Whether it is the death penalty debate or just war doctrine, the United States often makes the weather on issues of moral consequence.

The election of an American as pope is quite rightly ranked as the most improbable of outcomes of the conclave, but not so improbable is the selection of a new pope uniquely equipped to speak to this culture. God knows we need it. Terri Schiavo's death underscored that need in a way that cannot be understated.

It is an old story in Christianity --in fact the oldest-- that apparent disasters and outrageous injustices lead in fact to the brightest displays of grace. [Source]

Hugh also mentioned on his radio show last night that when he went to one of the emergent churches on Sunday that included over a thousand mostly young people, that the pastor their asked people to pray for the Cardinals in the selection of the next Pope.

Even if Kathy Shaidle posted nothing but her post titles, her site would still be fun reading. Cases in point:

Life in Soviet Kanuckistan
Canada: banana republic with snow
Non-crappy conclave blog

On the Laura Ingraham show yesterday they played the following quote from NPR's Juan Williams on Fox News Sunday "In the age of Aids he was very slow to respond on the issue of condoms, on what rights gays should have in society."

In response to this quote she framed what Juan Williams had said and asked Fr. Rutler to respond. I transcribed the following from her show.

Laura Ingraham: "If only the pope was for birth control, if only the pope was more modern, if only the pope wanted women to be priests. Tells us about your thoughts in hearing that."

Fr. Rutler: If only the Pope had done all those things nobody would be covering his funeral now. For a man who was so out of touch with times and so irrelevant he is getting the biggest funeral in human history. That would not have been the case if he had just gone with the flow. Look at all the religious sects, the denominations which have fallen apart because they have followed exactly the prescriptions of some of these commentators. Everyone has a right to his observations on matters of religion, but sometimes when I hear people speak off the top of their heads on these matters of theology and as a theologian I sense what the dean of the John Hopkins Medical School must think if a Christian Scientist were to discuss medicine with him. These issues that people talk about very glibly have been tried and failed miserably. That is why Pope John Paul the second said that we are living in a culture of death. Some of these issues have been reduced to political terms and they cannot be. They are not political matters. A reporter the other day, a major media reporter, said was the first non-Catholic to be elected to the papacy. These are the people who are advising the Cardinals on who the next pope should be. I have been astonished though at the coverage which is unprecedented and I think in a different way and in a different scale the media was absolutely breath taken at the popular reaction to the death of Ronald Reagan. They couldn't understand it. Well this is on a universal scale, the death of this Pope. I think the people who have been quiet are sending a very clear message that what the Pope stood for, what he said and did, what his successor will do, contradicts the spirit of the age.

That an earthly agency might hold the key to the kingdom of heaven is a fond hope of mankind, such that the passing of the Vicar of Christ touches even those who long since rejected that hope. Into whose hand will the key pass? News reports suggest that the succession may fall to Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, the Vatican's chief theologian. With no way to game the odds that this might happen, I think it worth noting that Ratzinger is one of the few men alive capable of surprising the world. Ten years ago, he shocked the Catholic world with this warning:

We might have to part with the notion of a popular Church. It is possible that we are on the verge of a new era in the history of the Church, under circumstances very different from those we have faced in the past, when Christianity will resemble the mustard seed [Matthew 13:31-32], that is, will continue only in the form of small and seemingly insignificant groups, which yet will oppose evil with all their strength and bring Good into this world. [1]

He added, "Christianity might diminish into a barely discernable presence," because modern Europeans "do not want to bear the yoke of Christ". The Catholic Church, he added, might survive only in cysts resembling the kibbutzim of Israel. He compared these cysts to Jesus' mustard seed, faith of whose dimensions could move mountains. Ratzinger's grim forecast provoked a minor scandal, complete with coverage in Der Spiegel, Germany's leading newsmagazine. The offending sentences did not appear in the English translation, "Salt of the Earth", and were not discussed further in polite Catholic company.

Cardinal Ratzinger is a Prince of the Church who threatened, as it were, to abandon the capital and conduct guerrilla war from the mountains. Years before Europe's demographic death-spiral was apparent, Ratzinger had the vision to see and the courage to say that the Catholic Church stood on the brink of a catastrophic decline. This observation is now commonplace. As George Weigel, John Paul II's biographer, wrote in March, "Europe, and especially Western Europe, is in the midst of a crisis of civilizational morale ... Europe is depopulating itself at a rate unseen since the Black Death of the 14th century." [2] [Source]

The article makes some other interesting observations by George Weigel and others. The last piece by the author of the article is classic:

But Ratzinger places his hopes on the purely spiritual weapons that made Christianity a force to begin with. He has said, in effect, "I have a mustard seed, and I'm not afraid to use it."

How often we forget the power of a faith as small as a mustard seed. We are now use to the idea of splitting an atom causing a nuclear explosion and have not realized that splitting the mustard seed of faith can also cause an explosion, especially when practiced within our nuclear families.

Professor Janet Smith on the underlying power of Pope John Paul II.

Ethics and Public Policy Center has just made available the text of George Weigel's recent lecture: "The Next Pope and Why He Matters to All of Us." [Via The Corner]

George Wiegel makes some interesting points for what he considers three of the most pressing issues or our times that the Cardinal-electors will need to address in their selection of the new pope. And no they are definitely not the top three most bandied about topics. He also has some interesting commentary on both how diverse and how large this group of electors is and that this is a historical first.

Mark Shea has some cogent advice in his post "Ignore everything the media says about the succession" though I suspect this is preaching to the choir for most of my readers. He also has some commentary on the silliness of the media trying to break down the papal succession along racial lines. Most of what the media will have to say about the potential successors I dub Papabull (pronounced pah-PAH-bull.) Cardinal Arinze will only be a media darling as long as they don't read what this brilliant man has written or listen to what he has said in the past. It would definitely be a case of "be careful what you wish for" in relation to the Main Stream Media. Mark also has a preference for Cdl. Schoenborn, though he doubts that will be the case. MSN had a fact file the other day that listed Cardinal Cristoph Schonborn as a liberal, which I found to be rather funny. He was the general editor of the Catechism of the Catholic Church which was truly a wonderful gift to the Church.

As for me I will make no guesses as to the next pope. I do not have all that much knowledge of all the Cardinal and definitely can not fathom how the various blocks will vote and what they will see as the primary qualifications for the next pope. I mainly only have some knowledge of the American cardinals who, perhaps thankfully, will not be in the running. I am somewhat familiar though no expert on the writings of Cardinals Schönborn, Ratzinger, and Arinze and am suitably impressed with calibers of their intellects and apparent holiness.

I have also heard much mention lately of the Holy Spirit guiding the selection of the next pope. This of course assumes that the Cardinal-electors will listen to such guidance and is no guarantee that they will act on it. Only the pope enjoys the charism of infallibility when teaching to the universal Church on faith and morals. As to the outcome I will take the advice of our late papa when he started by saying "Do Not Be Afraid!" The Church withstood my entrance into it and the gates of hell will never prevail against it. So I am not going to worry myself over some theologically progressive Cardinal getting becoming the pope.

I could almost wish in fact that one of these progressive Cardinals did in fact become our next pope. It would almost be worth it to see the reaction of progressives at the end of this pontificate when there are still no women priests, or acceptance of homosexual acts, contraception or abortion. The charism of infallibility is a negative ability in that it does not guarantee that the faith is taught in the most compelling and exact way, but it would at least prevent the before mentioned nonsense from being officially taught to the universal Church. There are some interesting case studies of what happened to popes that were about to teach error and died before they could or who had changed their minds on some theological subjects once they did indeed become pope.

Now some have been speculating about the cardinal who was secretly selected, in petto, and who his identity might be. Most have guessed that it was a Chinese bishop and that he is part of the underground Church there. Well the truth is it was me, yes that is Jeffrey Cardinal Miller - thank you very much. The Holy Father considered one more clown in the college of Cardinals was appropriate. As soon as I can find my Cardinal decoder ring as proof I will be heading off to Rome.

Seriously though here is the Papabile blog that will be tracking the possible successors of our Holy Father. [Via Relapsed Catholic]

Some of the news coverage of the Pope's death has been more suited for RCIA than the material in many RCIA classes. One of the main things covered is the theological temperament of our next pope and so the standard questions are being asked. In a two hour time period watching Geraldo Rivera on Fox News last night (something I normally never do) I heard him ask those standard questions to people actually qualified to answer them. Some of the notables they had on were Professor Janet Smith, Ignatius President Mark Brumley, Canonist Ed Peters, Writer Christopher West, Apologist Marcelino D'Ambrosio, Christendom College President Timothy T. O'Donnell, EWTNews director Raymond Arroyo, and multiple Catholic clergy. It was great to hear the Theology of the Body discussed on national TV and to truly hear Catholic answers to these questions instead of the normal progressive theological mumbo-jumbo of why the Church has to change most if its doctrines. Hearing the answers given by Professor Janet Smith in regards to how the Catholic Church treats women was excellent. I am certainly glad they didn't take a Hannity and Colmes approach to this by having discussions with both the orthodox and heterodox.

Pope John Paul II at Mt Nebo near Amman, Jordan where some believe Moses first spied the promised land. (Found via The Inn at the End of the World)

For me being a convert Pope John Paul II was the only pope that I have known. Even though I am old enough to have lived through the reigns of a number of popes (I was born the day after Pope Pius XII died) they were not exactly on my radar. I was born during a interregnum and lived a virtual interregnum of not caring about a pope through most of my life. Growing up I had a vague awareness that there still was a Pope I would not have been able to say who it was. To me the idea of a pope fit into the same category as british judges wearing powder white wigs. My education for the most part was equally ambivalent about the existence of a pope other than that they worked to stifle science. The only memory I have about Paul VI was a derogatory poster I saw of him with the subtitle "No to the Pill!" I was still young enough to have no idea what this "pill" referred to (or that the picture was of Paul VI), but I assumed it was just another pope attacking science. Even though I attended a Catholic Church with my mother while in high school for about a year, judging by what I saw and heard they didn't pay much or any attention to the Pope either.

My first recollection of John Paul II was hearing that he was shot. I was at sea at the time and though it odd that this happened so shortly after Ronald Reagan had been shot. I had no use for either of them at the time and the only connection I made was that I had heard a family member call Ronald Reagan the anti-Christ and I vaguely knew that some called the Pope that. I remember when the Pope visited New York, but the only thing I took away from it was venders selling cheap plastic trinkets to what I deemed as the ignorant faithful. Over the years as I was becoming more conservative and following the news closer I was hearing more and more references to John Paul II. Talk radio frequently had mentions of what the Pope had said and was surprised to find that I mostly agreed with what he had to say in regards to morality.

Growing up during the Cold War it was hard to imagine that there would ever be a change to the status quo during my life time. Serving in the Navy during this time when the reality of a Russian attack was ever present and where the appearance of a Russian Bear Tu-95 on the horizon was immediately met with our fighters on the Alert 5 brought this reality to us almost daily. To watch what was going on in Poland with the Pope's friend Lech Walesa, the leader of Solidarity and the obvious reaction of the Polish people to the Pope's visits there was to see something historic in action. As a kid Polish jokes were all the rage, but what was happening there was no joke and changed the balance of the world. I did not understand why the Pope had this effect. I just knew that he was somehow involved in this amazing transition. Seeing the Soviet Union collapse and finally the destruction of the Berlin wall was to see something totally unexpected.

I had a growing respect for the Pope especially in regards to pro-life issues and marriage. It was just too bad he had all those archaic religious trappings and that belief in God thing. I also had the same opinions of Evangelicals like Billy Graham and others. I was finding myself agreeing with what they had to say, just not the foundation of why they believed it. Because my wife is a cradle Catholic we use to watch the Christmas and Easter Masses on television. I was amazed by the Holy Father and his force of personality. That even though he was the head of the Catholic Church and the leader of millions that there was seemingly no undue pride in the man. That even with the fancy clothes and the religious believers obvious delight in him that he appeared to me a humble man who truly loved others. That he never saw just a crowd but the individual human persons who made up the crowd. That what he treasured most was the joy of the children that he saw.

Later when I was in my read everything in the library about religion phase I came across the encyclical "The Gospel of Life." Before I read this I had considered myself to be pro-life. After reading it I saw that I was nowhere pro-life enough. This is one of his easiest to read encyclicals and so it is a good thing I pick this up first and not say for instance "Love and Responsibility." His writing to me brought into coherence the teachings of the Church in regard to sanctity of life that there was a well-founded philosophical basis for what the Church teaches as it does. I also liked how this encyclical was also addressed to "all People of Good Will." That what the Church had to teach was not limited to just Catholics and was open to all via the natural law. Shortly after this I read the new Catechism of the Catholic Church which I found to be a great gift given to us from his pontificate. I also read some of his other encyclical like Faith and Reason (FIDES ET RATIO.)

Faith and reason are like two wings on which the human spirit rises to the contemplation of truth; and God has placed in the human heart a desire to know the truth—in a word, to know himself—so that, by knowing and loving God, men and women may also come to the fullness of truth about themselves

This encyclical really helped me since so long I had seen the false dichotomy of faith and reason. Also influential to me is his encyclical Veritatis Splendor.

The splendour of truth shines forth in all the works of the Creator and, in a special way, in man, created in the image and likeness of God (cf. Gen 1:26). Truth enlightens man's intelligence and shapes his freedom, leading him to know and love the Lord. Hence the Psalmist prays: "Let the light of your face shine on us, O Lord" (Ps 4:6).

I like to think I have lived a life in search of and response to truth and this why my domain name is splendoroftruth.com. Now the Holy Father is with Jesus who is the way, the TRUTH, and the life. The Pope might have passed into the next world, though his legacy will not pass. He has left the Church even spiritually richer than when he became Pope. From his writing like the Theology of the Body to giving us the Mysteries of Light his memory will not soon be forgotten. Every time I hear the phrase he coined "the culture of life" and "the culture of death" I will remember him.

With the Pope's passing their is also this mixed anticipation of our next Holy Father. This process is always an exciting time in the Church and for a newbie like me it is even more exciting. Before seeing white smoke only meant I needed to buy a new muffler, now it means that we will have a new papa. Whoever the next pope is will have large shoes to fill. Though in reality all popes have large shoes (or is that large sandal) to fill because as the Vicar of Christ or as Saint Catherine of Siena called the "sweet Christ on earth." Listening to long time Catholics describing their memories of when a new pope is elected, I always had a sort of envy of that experience.

Another integral part of his pontificate was his commitment to Jesus's high priestly prayer "that they may be one" (Ut Unum Sint.) His commitment to a true ecumenism that neither downplayed religious differences or made them farther apart then they might be. His wish that the Eastern and Western Church might once again breathe with both lungs did not occur during his lifetime, but the seeds he planted might come to fruition at some future time. The schism hasn't ended but the thin theological and mainly political chasm between us is not as wide as it was. His tireless work in regards to previous mistakes in regards to the Jewish people will not soon be forgotten. His impact on believers in Protestant churches was also great. While there are still fanatical anti-Catholics you are are more likely now to run into those who saw the Pope as a brother in Christ instead of an anti-Christ.

This process is kind of bitter-sweet in mourning the passage of the Pope and at the same time awaiting the next pope. I am not looking forward to much of the coverage of this time period in fact I think it will be downright purgatorial. To hear the constant refrains of liberal and conservative in relation to the election. That the coverage will be closer to a merely political election compared to what it is. Hopefully we will not be treated to polls of who the new pope will be or any other horse race coverage. We will of course get the endless speculation of what the next pope is going to change to finally conform to the modern world. That condoms, women's ordination, and sexually theology will be constantly mentioned by those who have no idea about the nature of the Church (including unfortunately Catholics.) I have often wondered if a thousand or two thousand years from now (if Christ does not return first) what the world will make of a Catholic Church that still has not given up its beliefs to embrace whatever passes for modern beliefs? Christ was a sign of contradiction and surely his Church will also be one.

So again thank you Holy Father John Paul II for your life and witness, your intellect and humility, your love of both God and neighbor. He was both an optimist and a mystic so I guess that made him optomystic. Victor Lams said it perfectly when he recently said.

I told Fr. Paul that if we thought Pope John Paul II did a lot for the Church before, only imagine what he can do for us now.

Amen to that. I will leave you with the only Pope John Paull II joke I have written.

If Catholics started a movement where once a year at Catholic schools they gathered around a statue of Pope John Paul II and prayed would it also be called "See you at the Pole"?

* In a related note due to the impact of finding the Pope's encyclical at a local library I will highly recommend Nancy C. Brown's article in the latest This Rock magazine (April 2005) called "Evangelizing your library." (along with her blog Flying Stars)

*blog template background will be black during the Interregnum.

Dublin - Pope John Paul II was the "best front man" the Roman Catholic Church ever had, U2's own front man Bono said on Sunday.

The men, both named as nominees for this year's Nobel Peace Prize, campaigned together to end world debt.

The lead singer of the Irish rock band once famously gave the Pope his trademark wraparound sunglasses to put on during a meeting, dubbing him "the first funky Pontiff".

"A great show man, a great communicator of ideas even if you didn't agree with all of them, a great friend to the world's poor which is how I got to meet him," Bono said in a statement. [Source]

Thank you Holy Father. Today we have lost more than just a papa and a philosopher, but truly an alter Christo - another Christ. Thank you Jesus for sending this man to us for we have all been blessed by his presence.

I thought I was prepared for this moment and had felt no real sadness until the news of his passing. We have had years to prepare ourselves for this moment, but I will really miss him - especially his radiant love of young people. I am sad for myself, though truly joyful for the Pope.

At one point, according to Cardinal Pomepedda who went in to visit him, he asked those in the room with him not to cry, but to join him in joy as he prepares to stand before Jesus.

Please pray for the Holy Father and for our Cardinals that they will be moved by the Holy Spirit in the selection of our next Pope. If he is half as holy as John Paul II the Great (no longer to be called frail) we will be blessed indeed.

I wish this article was an April Fools joke. GetReligion says "The bottom line: The Terri Schiavo case proves that John Paul II is a heretic and an idol worshipper."

People of faith routinely speak of the body and the soul as distinct entities. Paul wrote of his desire to cast off the body to enable his spirit to be closer to God.

Those who define life as any biological function that enables the body simply to exist confuse the spirit and its temple and cause extraordinary moral confusion.

The pope has for years insisted that the most elemental biological definition of the body's existence is, in fact, life. He argues to preserve a zygote as a human being at the beginning of the human process and the body, devoid of spirit, at its end.

He has chosen to combat contraception, abortion and euthanasia in such a way as to make life, as he understands it, the ultimate good. No situation, no medical condition can justify modifying his absolute interpretation. That is simplistic thinking in the face of terribly complex issues.

Notice that when anybody talks about "terribly complex issues" that they are also able to explain them correctly for us. Terribly complex for us simple minded folks, so it is a good thing they come around to 'plain fur us. Not to mention the fact that the soul animates the body and where there is no soul there is no longer biological life. A respirator might help to maintain life, but it can maintain a lifeless body.

The life of a human being is precious, unique, to be preserved and honored.

Unless of course your in the womb or a hospice. Terry Mattingly also asks "And why aren't local Roman Catholic authorities up in arms about this?" Good question.

Jonathan V. Last at Galley Slaves posts.

I'm sitting listening to a Paula Zahn-led package about the Pope on CNN. It's about how terrible and divisive John Paul II's teachings on women have been. She keeps making the point that this Pope refuses to let women be priests, but she says it like it's some crackpot idea he dreamed up on his own.

Somewhere in the distance, Roger Ailes is smiling.

Yesterday Domenico Bettinelli posted:

I’ve been watching the Fox News coverage of the Pope’s demise all day and it has been uniformly respectful and praising of the Pope, even showing long stretches of the Rosary in St. Peter’s Square. I was curious how CNN was covering it and flipped over for a second.

There was Christiane Amanpour, and I’m not kidding, she was saying, “There are millions of Catholics who disagree with the very, very conservative views of this Pope. Many women were disappointed at not being empowered to be able to join the Church [I presume she meant ordination.]”

Click.

Back to Fox News.

I wonder if CNN will get Sinéad O'Connor on so she can rip up some more pictures of the Pope?

So far Fox's coverage has been pretty good with people like Jimmy Akin, Philip Lawler, Fr. Sullivan from the Institute of Carmelite Studies (an excellent source for good translations of books by Carmelite saints and scholarly studies) and others from the Church's hierarchy. Though I could have done without Cardinal Mahoney and his boilerplate comments - can we say "Teaching moment." Though to be fair, Morton Kondracke on Fox News also bashed the Pope for being too conservative and not ordaining women. Of course it is not surprising that non-Catholics want to dictate theology on this subject when some Catholics do the same.

Yesterday Hugh Hewitt on his radio show opened up the lines to Catholics only and there were many wonderful stories of how the Pope had touched individual lives. Hugh who is an ex-Catholic is definitely not a bitter one (he says he fell away because of the actions of the Bishops) and has had many Catholics on his show (including Fr. Neuhaus this week).

Elinor at Mommentary posts:

He's worse, and not expected to last the night. I'm going to start throwing things if I hear one more vapid nitwit hope that the Holy Father's end will be "peaceful and painless". Can anyone really suppose that he would shrink from suffering?

Interesting point. It is most likely we who shrink from suffering and are really comforting ourselves when we hope someone else is dying peacefully and painlessly.

She also posts something from a review of the Pope's book Memory and Identity. Professor John Haldane writes:

Some while ago, John Paul spoke of the importance of bearing witness to the human condition in its frailty, countering the cult of invulnerability with the unavoidable image of suffering. But in these reflections he also speaks of a mystical transformation. What would otherwise be an evil, and appears such to many, is a path leading to God. Blameless suffering, willingly accepted out of love, transforms the life of the person. A peace descends of which the world has little understanding.

A nice pro-life story with a happy ending.

Jimmy Akin answers a listener in regards to the moral character of what happened to Terri as being murder. He cuts through the smoke screen of excuses of why they don't affect the moral character of the act.