- Your dream is to one day compete on the Catholic Answers quarterly game
show "So you want to be an apologist" so that you can receive that
$100 gift certificate. - You have a picture of your favorite apologist in your wallet.
- Yours cats are named after Church Fathers.
- You sold everything, bought a van and go from town to town following Fr.
Benedict Groeschel’s speaking engagements. - You have lost sleep trying to determine if Just War theory includes allowing
preemptive attacks. - You bought a satellite dish just to receive EWTN.
- Your mail man got a hernia carrying Crisis, Envoy, This Rock, Lay Witness,
Our Sunday Visitor, First Things, Catholic Dossier, Catholic World Report,
Homiletic and Pastoral Review, Gilbert!, L’Osservatore Romano, National Catholic
Register, Magnificat, and Touchstone to your door each month. - Not only do you have a card in your wallet for emergencies that says "I
am a Catholic, contact a priest", the same wording is also tattooed on
your chest.
<ANDY ROONEY VOICE>
Why is it that churches that have pews with the most padding also have kneelers
with little or no padding at all? And why is it that churches with ascetic wooden
pews have kneelers padded so that you could kneel for hours?
Now the Principle of Law of the Conservation of Energy states: “The total energy
of any body or system of bodies is a quantity which can neither be increased
nor diminished by any mutual action of these bodies, though it may be transformed
into any other forms of which energy is susceptible”
Is there some kind of similar ecclesial "Law of the Conservation of Padding"
which would state "If padding is used on the pews then less padding must
be used on the kneelers and vice versa. The sum total of padding used in the
system can not be increased or diminished."
</ANDY ROONEY VOICE>
Amy Welborn has commented that "it was Kathy Shaidle of Relapsed
Catholic who coined the term “St. Blog’s” and was the first Catholic blogger.
Give credit where credit is due!" The starting year for her blog was also
in error and was changed from 1991 to 2001. We here at The Curt Jester are in
the pursuit of the truth and are not afraid to let you know when we are mistaken.
Fr. Fr. Shawn O’Neal has also commented that:
Blog is a nickname of the Serbian name “Blagoje”.
Saint Blagoje lived during the 15th century in Serbia, but there is not much
known about him. He is the patron saint of high-maintenance personality types.
His feast day is 18 October, but those who have a deep devotion to him know
that he really wanted 26 December and that darn St. Stephen just had to be there
and be a high-enough ranking saint that there’s no way that anyone trade days
with him.
Also Gregory Popcak has confirmed
"I am NOT a nice man" and has even bragged about making nuns cry."
This investigation into the dark underbelly of St. Blogs will continue. Kathy
Shaidle is from Canada and the possible real St. Blog was Serbian. There is
a definite foreign connection here, what do they think that the word Catholic
means universal or something.
What is St. Blogs parish? According to this page
"St. Blog’s Parish is home to a varied congregation of Catholic webloggers
located around the world. The webring serves to link together the many weblogs
maintained by Catholics."
Now the obvious question is who was St. Blog. I went through the classic Butler’s
Lives of Saints and found no mention. Google searches also showed no hits. I
looked at the Congregation
for the Causes of Saints and List
of Blesseds proclaimed during the Pontificate of John Paul II and could
find no mention of a St. Blog. A look through the Vatican
Secret Archives also availed no information. I filed freedom of information
requests forms with the United States Conference
of Catholic Bishops and still received no information on this saint. This
person is not someone removed when the new calendar came into being and there
has never been any city practicing the cult of St. Blog anywhere in the world.
The obvious shocking conclusion is that there has never been a St. Blog. This
is an urban myth perpetuated by bloggers with no basis in fact or even pious
tradition.
This startling discovery has led me into further investigations into this so
called cyber-parish. The Catholic Encyclopedia defines parish as:
A parish is a portion of a diocese under the authority of a priest legitimately
appointed to secure in virtue of his office for the faithful dwelling therein,
the helps of religion. The faithful are called parishioners, the priest parochus,
curate, parish priest, pastor (q.v.). To form a parish there must be (1) a certain
body of the faithful over whom pastoral authority is exercised; the ordinary
manner of determining them is by assigning a territory subject to the exclusive
jurisdiction of the parish priest. Uncertainty of parish boundaries may work
harm and the Council of Trent (Sess. XXIV, c. xiii, de ref.) orders the boundaries
of parishes to be defined.
What are the boundaries of this cyber-parish? "Around the world"
is too tenuous, so this definition directly violates the Council of Trent. The
Council of Trent (Sess. XXIV, c. xiii, de ref.) commands bishops to assign
to each parish its own individual rector. What priest was assigned to minister
to this parish. This is where an even more shocking fact was uncovered. St.
Blogs is not registered with any diocese in the world. I even checked to see
if they came under the jurisdiction of any Eastern Catholic Churches, again
no. Even though there are blogging priests and deacons in this so-called parish
there is not one blogging bishop to which they answer to. This is a great scandal
that this schismatic cyber-parish dares to advertise itself as Catholic. Who
started this fraud. Why are people willing to perpetuate this deception.
To answer the previous I discovered a post previously on Kathryn Lively’s blog
requesting information on the history of the term St. Blogs. She had stated
that it was probably coined by Amy
Welborn but that she couldn’t verify it since Amy keeps no archives. Since
then Kathryn has made no mention of this. What did she find out? If she found
the answer why has she not posted it? Who got to her? Alarm bells started ringing
in my head. Why didn’t Amy keep archives anymore? Through diligent searching
I was able to find archives
on the Internet of her blog "In Between Naps" found through the
Wayback Machine – her first post.
Welcome to the latest detour on my quest to conquer, rather than be conquered
by the Internet. ..
Her first post was Sep 10, 2001; yes a day before the infamous terrorist attack.
What is the connection? The archives mysteriously end on October 13, 2001. What
was on those pages? What doesn’t she want us to know? Even stranger she has
recently cut back to posting only once a week. Did someone else discover the
dark secret of this schismatic cyber-parish and blackmail her into semi-retirement?
What are her full plans to conquer the Internet. This surprising information
has led me to investigate some of the other schismatic parishioners.
I found the following
information from the canon lawyer Pete Vere, JCL in which he says:
For instance, let us suppose one wished to found a local association of
Catholic apologists the Diocese of St. Blog. Because the right to use the title
�Catholic� is limited under canon law, one could not name this ministry �Catholic
Apologists of St. Blog�s� without first obtaining the permission of the Bishop
of St. Blog in accordance with canons 300 and 312. Again, this is because in
keeping with the second paragraph of canon 223, legitimate ecclesiastical authority,
in view of the common good, is entitled to regulate the exercise of one�s canonical
rights.
Now before we look at the implication of this, let us first look at Mr. Vere.
He is a former follower of the schismatic Archbishop Lefebvre and now a blogger
with the schismatic St. Blogs. He is formerly of Canada and now living in Florida.
One wonders what circumstances forced him to leave his homeland. Is he just
keeping one step ahead of the Canon Law?
Look at canons 300 and 312 and then the names of the following blogs:
Catholic Light, Catholic
and Enjoying It!, Catholic
Analysis, Extreme Catholic
Since there is no bishop for St. Blogs I did some checking with their home
dioceses and found that not one of them petitioned their local ordinary for
use of the word Catholic in their blog title. Again signs of disobedience.
I ponder why hasn’t this information come forth before. Domenico
Bettinelli who is an assistant editor of Catholic
World News managing editor of Catholic
World Report magazine participates in this psuedo-parish. These magazines
seem to be loyal to the church and yet Mr. Bettinelli has never run an expose
condemning this fraudulent parish. What do some unknown people have on this
man to keep him silent?
I have also found of link to one of the largest bankruptcies in US history
with St. Blogs. What did Victor Lams
a former worker of this company have to do with it? Is he the behind the scenes
financial backer behind this parish using pilfered funds.
Another clue was found looking at the names that these blogger who wrote under.
Lady of Shalot, Cacciaguida,
Old Oligarch, dylan
and even Zorak the Mantis; all
obvious aliases. At first glance I thought that Steven
Riddle might be a real name, yet on second thought employing the word riddle
was obviously meant to toy with us to see if we could determine his real name.
Some anagrams from his name are:
- DENTED SILVER – could point to him being a silversmith
- DENTED LIVERS – could point to him being a alcoholic
- DIED LENT REVS – that he is a murderer who killed Reverends during Lent
- ED DEVIL STERN – this of course has the scariest implications
I was also suspicious of the nom de plume Gregory Popcak the proprietor of
the Heart, Mind and Strength
weblog. The anagram for his name is GROK CRAPPY EGO. Grok is from the Robert
Heinlein novel "Stranger in a strange land" which means "To understand
profoundly through intuition or empathy" Since he is a psychotherapist
obviously this is a joke on his patients where he is secretly saying "I
profoundly understand that you have a crappy ego." This shows an arrogance
and contempt towards his patients and that he is not a nice man. I also wonder
about the logo at the HMS
Blog website, it appears to have an omelet frying on the head of someone.
There are also many people only going by their first names. Email addresses
usually can only be tied to Yahoo or Hotmail, accounts that anybody can get
without revealing their true name. Why this level of secrecy? What do these
people have to hide?
I know many people will be shocked to find out about the lies that have been
put forward by people pretending to be obedient Catholics. It is time for this
deception to stop. Before posting this information I send a copy to my lawyer
and placed another in an undisclosed location. If anything happens to me in
the near future this information will be released to major newspapers across
the country. If you have information pertaining to this investigation call the
tip line at 1-800-STBLOGS.
Now you might wonder what sparked the previous. Michelle of And
Then? posted the following comment:
Hey, Jeff, I’m more interested in a sensational look into the secret goings-on
of St. Blog’s! I’m certain EWTN (or the 700 Club!) would pay top dollar to have
an inside track into the dark underbelly of a Catholic cyber-parish. Get busy,
your public is beckoning! 😉
I am sure she will never make such a foolish request again.
I ran across Nunzilla in a curio shop in Portland while I was
there. After winding it up it walks around shooting sparks out of it’s mouth.
Now at first glance this might seem to be a typical stereotypical portrayal of a ruler carrying nun but at least they show that she is on fire.
The official announcement finally was made after eight months of wondering and waiting: Ave Maria University is coming to Collier County.
Not only will a university be built, but a town to go
with it, Ave Maria officials said Wednesday at the La Playa Beach and Golf Resort
in North Naples.
The venture, first mentioned as a possibility in the
Naples area in March, is headed by Tom Monaghan, whose name became famous as
the founder of Domino’s Pizza and former owner of the Detroit Tigers baseball
franchise.
…The first Catholic university to be built in the United
States in 40 years, Ave Maria will be located about 25 miles east of Naples
and 10 miles southwest of Immokalee.
I wonder if Tom Monaghan was around this little town and conceived of putting
the University by there? If he did would it become known as "the Immokalee
Conception of Ave Maria?" In the future will people confuse the Immokalee
Conception of Ave Maria with the conception of a Jesuit University?
WASHINGTON, Feb 12 (Reuters) – U.S. Senate Minority Leader
Tom Daschle said on Wednesday the Bush administration must do more to protect
Americans against a suspected increased risk of terrorist attacks than urge
them to seal a designated room with duct tape and plastic sheets.
"This administration has to do a lot better,"
said Daschle, a South Dakota Democrat. "They have to do a lot more than
tell people that the responsibility is now on their shoulders."
With a possible war with Iraq looming and the US government
having raised the risk level of terrorist attacks based on intelligence reports,
US authorities this week recommended that every American home have at least
three days’ worth of food and water in case of a chemical, biological or radiological
strike. [Full Story]
Now we get to the real reason behind the Bush administrations policies against
Iraq. The whole war for oil thing was a red herring to cover up the real reasons.
Bush and Cheney have disinvested themselves of their oil holdings so any increase
in oil prices isn’t going to help them. But what about duct tape holdings? How
many senior administration officials have heavily invested in duct tape futures.
Follow the money and I am sure we will find the real reasons using deDUCTive
reasoning. Tom "duct tape’ Daschle please come clean to the American people
with your connections to duct tape; it is rumored that your wife is a major
duct tape lobbyist.
Check out the duct tape Wall
Taping Gallery.
By Metric Madrid
12 new and different conversion stories
The following conversion story is reprinted by permission
My name is Scott Kahn and I grew up in a very anti-metric family. My father
always taught me the great tradition of the English customary units system for
measurements. I was told that if it was good enough for my forefathers than
it was good enough for us. There would be no talk of metricism around the dinner
table. In the seventies when they first started to introduce the two Liter bottles,
my father would have none of that and would rip off that portion of the label
before allowing it in our house. The seventies were a tumultuous time with the
government threat of everyone having to convert to this system by a certain
year. I fell into drug use and my life was spiraling down, then one day I noticed
that the whole drug trade was built around the metric system. Drugs were being
weighed in grams and kilos not ounces and pounds and I then realized that my
father was right about the evilness of the metric system if even the drug lords
were using it. It was bad enough that they had lowered the speed limit to 55
mph, now they wanted to give us the false sense of speed by saying it was 88.51
kilometers per hour.
I held onto my metric faith for awhile, but in my later high school years and
then into college I started to loose faith in the English customary units system
for measurements, yet I wasn’t moving towards metricism. I started to see all
the difficulties of doing conversions from one unit to another and that there
just wasn’t a consistent system for conversion volumes. After finding out about
Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle where if you start to measure something really
small, that the act of measuring could affect the position of what you were
measuring so you could never know for certain the exact position of an electron
at any given time. I thought that if this was true in the micro world that it
was probably true in the macro world and I just fell into a very relativistic
view of measuring.
After college I worked as a carpet installer. Routinely we had to determine
the total square yards of carpet to use and I was amazed that this system always
worked. We would always have enough carpet to carpet the house. I started to
regain my trust in my father’s faith. This is when a decisive event happened
in my life. I met Ann who would be my future wife. We got along and agreed on
everything; everything except the standards for a measuring system. Yes she
was a cradle-metric born in raised in a household that use centimeters, meters,
centigrade and the whole lot. She was taught that the The International System
of Units was infallible when speaking on units of measurement. I tried to tell
her about all of the evil that the metric system had caused. One of the mars
landers was never to be heard from again because they had mixed English measurements
with metric measurements. I tried to tell her that it was an international conspiracy
to sell us more confusing rulers, thermometers and requiring us to have two
sets of wrenches to work on cars. She wouldn’t listen so I was bound in my conviction
to prove that metricism is a false system. But she wouldn’t give in inch in
fact she would only give 2.540 centimeters. She tried to get me to read books
like "English Unit Fundamentalism and Metrication" by Kilo Keating
but I refused to read books by these metric apologists, they just didn’t measure
up. I started reading all that I could on the metric system to be able to disprove
it and I found the readings of the metric fathers. These were a group of people
in 18th century France fed up with the lack of standards and difficulties of
converting and they wanted to build a system based on the decimal system. I
was surprised at the depth and ease of the system. You could actually do conversion
just by moving a decimal point. To make a long story short instead of converting
her, she converted me and I am deeply grateful for the truth and beauty of the
metric system. I now bow my intellect and will to the metric magisterium the
International System of Units.
YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK, Wyo., Jan. 16 � Suzanne Lewis
was in for a shock when she sat down at home one recent night to watch
television.
On came a commercial for Metamucil, the laxative, that
showed what looked like a National Park Service ranger pouring a glass of it
down Old Faithful and announcing that the product keeps the famous geyser
“regular.”
…”My eyes got bigger, and my jaw dropped,” Ms. Lewis
said. That is because she is the superintendent of Yellowstone and the chief
steward of the park and its geysers.
The park responded to complaints with a letter saying
that Procter & Gamble had not filmed the real Old Faithful or an actual park
ranger and that the company was within its legal rights. But, the letter added,
“This advertisement goes against all of the National Park Service’s efforts to
encourage people not to put foreign objects into the thermal features.”
[Full
Story]
I understand what they mean, when my children were younger I constantly had
to keep telling them “stop sticking things into thermal features.” On a more
serious note the scariest thing I ever saw in my life was turning around and
seeing my three year old son sticking two nails into the kitchen electrical
socket. Luckily nothing happened and my heart returned to a more normal pulse a
month or two later. My wife and I immediately went out and bought those
electrical outlet covers for all of the empty electrical sockets, so if you have
young’uns I encourage you to do the same. My son was quite inquisitive and
industrious, one day he told us “I fixed mommies door.” Only to find out that he
had managed to remove the lower and middle pins from the hinges of our bedroom
door. And while I am relating childhood stories I will include one more. My son
was a big He-Man Master of the Universe fan and constantly carried a He-Man
sword I had made for him. I was carrying him around on my shoulders one day in a
park while he was swinging his sword and evoking He-Man lines. I offered to let
him walk around instead, reasoning to him saying “He-Man isn’t carried around
all day”, he blithely replied “How about Battle Cat?
Angels Angels
Watcha gonna do, whatcha gonna do
When our sins make you blue
Angels, Angels
Watcha gonna do, watcha gonna do
When our sins make you blue
You know Joe being a Guardian Angel isn’t all that it is cracked up to be.
Yeah Uriel, I know what you mean. We are out on the mean streets all day among those who totally ignore us and generally pay us no attention. Out of the twelve choirs of angels we are on the lowest rung with no chance of promotion. Not only that Joe, but how about those pompous Seraphim sitting around all day in the bosses office, getting face time and singing over and over again. You’re right about that Uriel, they have a real cushy job, almost as cushy as being Mary’s Guardian Angel. Gabriel will never let us live that one down, he keeps bragging how Mary always did the Lord’s will and that he only had to pop into her presence once and the rest of the time he kicked back without a worry in the world. Well Joe, that was a one time shot and the rest of us have to contend with humans of the non sinless type. What really aggravates me is that when humans do get on an Angel craze they decide to represent us as stunted chubby cheeked cherubs or as emotional fumbling double mocha latte drinking Angels.
That gets me too Uriel, sometime I would like to show myself to them, then they will quake with fear at my glory and they won’t mistake me for some Gerber baby wannabe.
Listening in on the Guardian Angel Scanner
…Subject turning on prime time TV, possible Code 10th (commandant) in
progress. Request prayers for purity.
…Subject Catholic politician about to vote against an abortion ban. We have
a Code 1st and 5th in progress, request backup.
…Subject has started a weblog, be on the lookout for a code 8th.
…Subject walking into the confessional. He has detailed his sins and
wait; check we have contrition. Subject has done his penance. Request that his record be excised with a recommendation of minor temporal punishment.