Jeffrey Miller

John Mallon from HLI writes that it looks like Father Jonathan Morris will be on Hannity and Colmes tonight, Friday, March 30 discussing contraception. Father Morris is a Fox News contributor and analyst and previously was quite negative of Fr. Tom Euteneuer handling of an interview with Sean Hannity on this subject. Hopefully there will be more light than heat on the subject and it is pretty cool that the Church’s teaching against contraception is being defended on national TV in the first place.

The Rt. Rev. Daniel Herzog, retired bishop of Albany, has entered into full communion with the Catholic Church. In his letter to Bishop Love, Herzog writes:

My sense of duty to the diocese, its clergy and people required that I not walk away from my office and leave vulnerable this diocese which I love. I believed that it was my responsibility to provide for a transition to the future. Your subsequent election and consecration discharged that duty and has given me the liberty to follow my conscience, and now resign my orders and membership in the House of Bishops.

	Jester Hat Tip:	Pontifications

Unfortunately the rumor that in the Diocese of Albany that we swapped Bishop Hubbard for Bishop Herzog is not true.

Valencia, Mar 29, 2007 (CNA).- The Holy See is moving ahead with the cause of beatification of Father Felipe Ciscar Puig, a Spanish priest who was martyred during the persecution of 1936 for protecting the seal of confession.

In statements to the AVAN news agency, the vice postulator of the cause, Father Benjamin Agullo, said Father Puig “is considered a martyr of the sacramental seal as he was shot for refusing to reveal the confession of a Franciscan priest who was himself executed.”

Francisco Father Andres Ivars asked to go to confession when he was in prison in August of 1936, suspecting that his execution was near. “At that moment Ciscar was brought to the same prison. After the confession, they tried to get him to reveal the contents and in response to his denial to do so, the militants threatened to kill him,” Father Agullo said.

Since he remained unmoved, his captors organized a mock trial and condemned him to death. Both Father Agullo and Father Ivars were driven by car to another location and were executed on September 8, 1936, the vice postulator of the cause explained.

Father Puig studied at the Seminary of Valencia and was ordained a priest in 1888. After serving as pastor in various parishes, he served as chaplain for the Augustinian Sisters of Denia.

Fathers Ciscar and Ivars are part the cause of canonization of the Servants of God Ricardo Pelufo Esteve and 43 companions, including 36 Franciscans.

Jay Anderson of Pro Ecclesia * Pro Familia * Pro Civitate had a post he wrote featured in the Washington Times.

A Catholic priest who regularly prays outside an abortion clinic wrote of his positions in a newspaper column, to which two letter-writers responded.They dismissed the church’s teaching against abortion on the grounds of the recent sex scandals — in which church officials covered up accusations of sexual abuse, mostly by homosexual priests against teenage boys.

Catholic blogger Jay Anderson reacted by proposing a Catholic equivalent to the Internet rule known as Godwin’s Law "for invocations of ‘the Scandal’ as a rhetorical device."

"It would go something like this: ‘As a debate involving the Catholic Church (either a discussion about the Church specifically, or a discussion in which the Church is taking a position) grows longer, the probability of someone mentioning the sex scandal approaches one.’

"And then there’s its corollary: ‘Once such reference to the Scandal is made, whoever mentioned the Scandal has automatically "lost" whatever debate was in progress,’ " writes Mr. Anderson, a former mayor of Columbia, Va.

"Perhaps the Scandal is still too recent," he concludes. "But surely, at some point in time, such ad hominem argumentation against the Church and its teachings needs to be consigned to similar status as inappropriate Nazi comparisons."

The author of the article though doesn’t state Godwin’s law very well at the beginning since it as Jay previously noted is "regarding references and analogies to the 3rd Reich." Unfortunately I think we will have too many opportunities to state "Anderson’s Law" since the priestly scandal abuse analogies are all to common in many conversations regarding the Church.

You can tell the Holy Week is fast approaching since that is when a hotel will display a "6-foot tall anatomically correct sculpture of Jesus in milk chocolate." Artist Cosimo Cavallaro titles his work “My Sweet Lord.” Well I guess his mother is the Immaculate Confection.

Of course Catholic League president Bill Donohue is on the case.

An article that contains a picture of the statue calls it "Jesus, The 485,460-Calorie Messiah." If the statue was in a more fitting medium than milk chocolate it wouldn’t be that bad since showing Jesus nude has certainly been done throughout history at time in Catholic art. Though it is pretty hard to take seriously an artist who is best remembered for covering a New York City hotel room in melted cheese in 1999.

Update: Display now cancelled.