Punditry

A very thoughtful letter from David Meyer that he writes to the members of the Presbysterian church he had attended and the reasons he is in the process of converting to the Catholic Church. I read the letter this weekend and the points he made have been in the back of my mind since then.  I encourage you to read it first since it is well worth your time.

He notices that families have been leaving this church for reasons others than ones central to the Reformed faith and the reasons they left do to some aspect of authority.  The problem with Sola Scriptura especially in regards to authority is an important one.  What it always comes down to is to whose interpretation of scripture do you hold to and ultimately you become that interpreter since you pick the interpret that agrees with you.

The problem with this doctrine is that when a believer disagrees with the leaders he is supposed to submit to, he then finds other leaders that agree with his interpretation to submit to. This is not submitting to church authority, it is submitting to self. Submitting to yourself is just another way of saying you don’t submit at all! There is a helpful way to remember this concept:

“If I only submit when I agree, the one to whom I submit is me.”

Amen to that. Submitting only to what you want is the very pick and choose that defines heresy in the first place.

The exact same thing can be said about obedience.  A subject I have written about in the past that if you are only obedient on subjects you agree with then you are not really obedient at all.  I think of the lives of the saints which have shown us holy obedience.  That even when they were unjustly persecuted or given what might have been an task by a superior  that was not prudential that the saint would be obedient without griping about it.  Submitting ourselves to one outside of us is difficult — especially in the climate of radical individualism we have grown up in.  Ultimately it is Christ we must submit ourselves to and we learn to do this also through submitting to those God has placed over us.  Submission seems to have become a dirty word it seems — getting your way is where it is at.

So much if not all of the dissent within the Church comes down to disobedience and people submitting only to themselves or those who agree with them.  Which is why so much of the dissent within the Church is akin to Protestantism in that where you disagree with the magisterium you find other like-minded dissenters to band with.  This is true of progressives or radical traditionalists.

Those that disagree with the Church are not willing to be patient and to pray for the Church in regards to whatever they think the Church is wrong on.  If they really believed the Holy Spirit was behind the changes they sought they would pray for this instead of taking the vain “I am right, and the Church has to catch up with me.”  The vanities of the Martin Luther types against the Church thinking how brave and good they are.  They have submitted to an authority that does not extend beyond their grasp.

He determines that his options are:

A. Remain with Reformed Christianity and continue the cycle of “self submission”, knowing in my heart it is wrong.

B. Some form of non-theism,

C.“Choose-your-own-adventure” Christianity that I self consciously make up for myself and do not worry about submitting to church authority.

D. Submit to a form of Christianity that does not subscribe to Sola Scriptura and which has a interpretive authority which can plausibly claim to be led by the Holy Spirit, so as to remove myself as the authority. Christianity that I self consciously make up for myself and do not worry about submitting to church authority.

“Choose-your-own-adventure” Christianity – talk about an accurate term. This describes so much. I have also called it “Mirror Christianity” as a pun on C.S. Lewis’ book and the fact that people are really affirming themselves in what they believe.

Mr. Meyer describes his reasons for choosing “D” and specifically the Catholic Church.

The Catholic Church is the only option left. In many ways it is a bitter pill to swallow for me. I have been very critical of Catholic doctrine as a Protestant. Much that they believe I am not inclined to believe. But I will have to submit to the mind of what I must believe is the church Christ founded.

In my own conversion I came to believe in the Church before I believed in each of her doctrines. As an atheist I had less prejudices to deal with compared to Protestants coming into the Church – but still I had to work through each doctrine. The beauty of the Church is how accessible her doctrines are to reason once you are able to explore them and see the orchestra of truth that is the Catholic faith.

I pray that David Meyer and his family come to fully see that truth.

Hat tip to Francis Beckwith

I think we need a new screening program at Catholic Schools and CCD classes. This one directed towards students. This screening test would actually be targeted towards Catholic girls. I propose a Future Pop Star (FPS) screening quiz should be implemented immediately. The reason the FPS is needed immediately and really should have been implemented years ago is because of the antics of Catholic girls like Madonna, Christina Aguilera, Gwen Stefani, Lady Gaga, etc. Somehow Catholic girls make for the biggest pop stars and those like Madonna and Lady Gaga go beyond just the immodest strutting into using the Catholic faith as something to mock while symbols associated with the Church are used as part of their shows. On Lady Gaga’s latest video:

The pop princess, real name Stefani Germanotta, recently released the music video for her single “Alejandro” and has sparked quite the outcry given its saturation of controversial imagery, including her swallowing rosary beads in a latex-version of a nun’s habit, holding the crucifix in front of her crotch and simulating group sex with a bunch of beefed-up men, who are nearly naked save for underwear and high heels.

Before you get annoyed by this – don’t worry it is nothing negative don’t you know.

And “Alejandro” director Steven Klein told MTV that the video wasn’t meant to “denote anything negative, but represents the character’s battle between the dark forces of this world and the spiritual salvation of the Soul. She chooses to be a nun, and the reason her mouth and eyes disappear is because she is withdrawing her senses from the world of evil and going inward toward prayer and contemplation.”

I really need to work on my music video symbolism since I didn’t get any of that from it.

While all children deserve a real Catholic education where the truth is fully taught, the Future Pop Star (FPS) screening quiz could be used to identify future pop stars so that teachers and their parents could give these students some extra tutoring in scripture, Church history, theology and especially the Theology of the Body as taught by Pope John Paul II. Right now they got the Theology of the Bawdy down pat. Imagine if these talented Catholic women actually knew their faith instead instead of just being culturally attached to it? Just imagine if Sinéad O’Connor kissed a picture of the Pope instead of all the strange angry turns her relationship with the Church has taken?

Though at least the Church has given these pop stars a rich history of symbols to mock. You have to feel sorry for the pop singer raised Unitarian – where there are no real symbols to latch on and mock as part of their stage shows.

There has been a term of derision used recently to describe these women singers – Pop Tarts. While I am all for almost any pun I don’t much like this term. I do have to wonder though if the Catholic variety should be known as Pope Tarts?

At the upcoming Catholic Theological Society  of America.

Hispanic/Latin@ Consultation
Alimento para la lucha: Retrieving a Prophetic Voice from Latina AmÈrica

Convener & Moderator:
Carmen Nanko-Fernandez, Catholic Theological Union
Presenter:   Neomi DeAnda, Loyola University, Chicago

“Transgendered Images of Breast Milk: Recovering the Voice of MarÌa Anna ¡gueda de San Ignacio”

Leaders of religious orders of men and women throughout church history have used the image of breast milk. This presentation will retrieve the specific contribution of MarÌa Ana Egueda de San Ignacio’s (1695-1756), a Mexican Dominican nun. Her development of this image set in the backdrop of Latin American Catholicism expands the canon of creative and prophetic perspectives emerging from Latina America.
Respondent:  Pamela Kirk Rappaport, St. John’s University, New York

I wonder what the Catholic parallel to Jumping the shark is? Oh yeah, heresy. Via Dawn Eden

Somehow I wonder if this is connected with this story.

Rehoboth Beach in Delaware isn’t a topless beach – but a few transgender men caused a stir by treating it like one.

Police say passers-by complained after the men removed their tops and revealed their surgically enhanced breasts over Memorial Day weekend. A lifeguard asked them to put their tops back on. The men initially refused, but covered up before police arrived.

Even if they hadn’t, though, Police Chief Keith Banks notes the men were doing nothing illegal. Since they have male genitalia, they can’t be charged with indecent exposure for showing their breasts. Banks says there’s no need for a specific law to address the issue.

Via Creative Minority Report

Jimmy Akin on President Obama’s proclamation that June 2010 is Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Pride Month.

So there you have it. President Obama taking credit for all he has done to normalize the open practice of sexual deviancy in our society, as well as measures he’d like to take in the future to further normalize it, including “creat[ing] safer schools so all our children may learn in a supportive environment.”

I wonder if he’d like to require private schools to be “safer” in this way?

And I wonder where all this is going and how long it will be until gets there.

Tolerance and “safe environments” will continue to become the blunt records used against anybody who does not believe that sexual deviancy is a right that must be normalized. Not accepting this behavior will get you labeled in oh so many ways and no doubt with words that end in ‘phobe.’  How long before the travesties that have occurred in Canada and England come our way is a good question.  The real tragedy is that those who are afflicted with same-sex attraction or other disordered desires are confirmed in their sin instead of being helped.

So what month is Adultery Pride month?

Nicolaus Copernicus, the 16th-century astronomer whose findings were condemned by the Roman Catholic Church as heretical, was reburied by Polish priests as a hero on Saturday, nearly 500 years after he was laid to rest in an unmarked grave. [Ref]

I saw the headline for this story on the weekend and growled in its general direction. Seeing what AP story actually said annoys me any more. Usually it is the Galileo story that gets misrepresented as “Eviiilll ignorant Catholic Church against science.” You have to wonder what a reporter workflow is?

1. Hear story about Copernicus being moved into a new tomb.
2. Make Church vs. Science connection in thought process
3. Decide it must be because Copernicus got into trouble.
4. His work being called heretical by the Church must have happened.
5. His previous tomb must not have been worthy and no doubt denied a Catholic burial.
6. Write story using this narrative.

Factchecking is obviously not part of most reporters work flow or so it also seems for editors.  After all it is so plausible from the secular point of view.

• He published De Revolutionbus at the end of his life because of the worry about what other scholars would say.
• No evidence he worried about Church reaction and De Revolutionibus was published under the auspices of a Catholic bishop and dedicated to Pope Paul III.
• At the time he died the no Church official had anything negative to say about his work, in fact it met praise. Cardinal Schonberg urged him to publish his discovery.
• He was buried in Frombork cathedral and there was a plaque saying he was buried there – but not the exact location he was buried.
• He was reburied in the exact same spot he was originally buried 500 years ago.

So I guess the accurate part of the story is that they spelled his name right.

Catholic Culture has an excellent article on this , which I liberally stole from, where they also mention:

There is a grain of truth to the notion that Church authorities were suspicious of Copernicus during his lifetime. At one point he was suspected of keeping a mistress; later he was suspected of Lutheran sympathies. But his scientific work never caused him any conflict with the Church.

Copernicus Catholic background is rather interesting in that his family was rather devout and he got his degree in Canon Law, but went on to practice medicine while serving the poor gratis. There is no documentary evidence that he ever received Holy Orders, but his name was found on a list of candidates for bishop and at one time became administrator of the diocese after the bishop died. His more accurate observations were sent to Paul III and were later used in the Gregorian Calendar reform. The opposition to Copernicus’s work first started among a Protestant pamphleteer.

Last year the new Element 112 was name Copernicium.

Update: I am not of course surprised by ignorant secular reporters and I guess I should not be surprised at the equally ignorant National Catholic Reporter.  Eventually, we get it right: burying Copernicus.  Tom Roberts uses his “Church got it wrong” narrative to advance dissident theology.  Sorry Tom, you got it wrong.

Diogenes puts it succinctly.

So the Knights of Columbus won’t go further than the bishops go. If the bishop hasn’t excommunicated Senator Mengele, the Knights won’t suspend his membership. If the bishops say it’s OK, it’s OK with the Knights.

So if the K of C had been active in England in the 1530s, following the same policies, would they have followed their bishops’ lead in accepting the title of King Henry VIII as legitimate head of the Church in England? Or would they have supported a lonely layman who rejected that claim?

Thomas More, you will recall, was a Knight– although not of Columbus. Today he’s generally known by another title, having gained membership in a still more elite fraternity

A woman who challenged a Catholic ordination ban has died. The Catholic church will not allow her to be buried at a Catholic parish.

Janine Denomme was ordained a priest in April by a group called Roman Catholic Womenpriests. She had been battling cancer and yesterday she died in her Edgewater home.

The Catholic church never recognized Denomme’s ordination. The Archdiocese of Chicago says Denomme automatically separated herself from the Church when she participated in “the simulation of the sacrament of Holy Orders.” The diocese says she knowingly and willingly participated in the simulation and brought excommunication upon herself. And because of that Denomme is denied a Catholic funeral. The Archdiocese says Denomme would only be allowed a Church burial if she gave “some sign of repentance before death.”

Denomme’s funeral mass will be held at First United Methodist Church in Evanston.

She could have avoided this problem if she had chosen to become an influential pro-abortion Senator instead. Then she could have had a televised Catholic funeral. To be fair this case is much more cut and dry compared to a case where a bishop would have some prudential decision made as to the sign of repentance of in regards to a pro-abortion Catholic politician.

This case though does make me rather sad and I pray for her and for that matter her lesbian partner Nancy.

Father Z

The results are in.