Punditry

THE NEW Superior General of the Jesuits, Fr Adolfo Nicolás Pachón, has spoken out in defence of liberation theology, writes Jon Stibbs.

In an interview with the Spanish national El Periódico, the Spaniard described liberation theology as “a courageous and creative response to an unbearable situation of injustice in Latin America”. Fr Nicolás regretted that the South American based movement had not been given a “vote of confidence” from other church leaders. “It needs more time,” he said.

While liberation theology was becoming established in South America Fr Nicolás was working in Asia where he developed a reputation as a liberal. He defines the Jesuits’ work as helping “the poor, the marginalised and the excluded”, and has said he is more interested in missionaries’ “cultural dialogue with local people” than imposing doctrinal orthodoxy. [reference]

I guess that he then also regrets the smackdown on Liberation Theology written by then-Cardinal Josef Ratzinger.

I guess he didn’t get the hint from Pope Benedict XVI when he spoke to the Jesuits shortly after the election of the new Jesuit General when he said “that harmony with the magisterium that avoids causing confusion and uncertainty among the People of God.” Nd referring to all members of the Society of Jesus said they should “adhere completely to the Word of God as well as to the magisterium’s charge of conserving the truth and unity of Catholic doctrine in its entirety.” I guess the new fourth vow is to undermine the magisterium on theology.

I prefer “Libation Theology.” Take a drink every time a Jesuit dissents from the Pope.

Fr. John Malloy, SDB reports that Mr. Carrizosa who is an acolyte and lector at San Francisco’s infamous Most Holy Redeemer parish has “married” his male partner. He also reports that by his count this makes five people serving liturgical roles in the parish as having gotten “married.”

Father than quotes from “Redemptionis Sacramentum” #46

“The lay Christian faithful called to give assistance at liturgical celebrations should be well instructed and must be those whose Christian life, morals and fidelity to the Church’s Magisterium recommend them.”

Archbishop George H. Niederauer has written a letter in response to the aftermath of the passage of Proposition 8 in California which ends saying.

…Tolerance, respect, and trust are always two-way streets, and tolerance respect and trust often do not include agreement, or even approval. We need to be able to disagree without being disagreeable. We need to stop talking as if we are experts on the real motives of people with whom we have never even spoken. We need to stop hurling names like “bigot” and “pervert” at each other. And we need to stop it now.

For our part, we churchgoers need to speak and act out of the truth that all people are God’s children and are unconditionally loved by God. While we argue among ourselves, the people who need our help with hunger, unemployment, homelessness and other problems wait for us to turn together toward them. More particularly, we Catholics in the Archdiocese of San Francisco need to minister to the needs of all Catholics in this local Church. Whoever they are, and whatever their circumstances, their spiritual and pastoral rights should be respected, together with their membership in the Church. In that spirit, with God’s grace and much prayer, perhaps we can all move forward together.

The aftermath has been rather ugly including the keeping of blacklists on people who supported it. I guess in Hollywood blacklists are now okay and pretty soon we will have a House Committee on Un-Homosexual Activities

I like the basic thrust of the Bishop’s letter which as a pastoral letter is aimed at those with same-sex attraction. I do wish it was beefier on what the Church teaches.

The fact remains that, under California law, after the passage of Proposition 8, same sex couples who register as domestic partners will continue to have “the same rights, protections and benefits” as married couples. Proposition 8 simply recognizes that there is a difference between traditional marriage and a same sex partnership.

Though the truth is that Church also condemns so-called civil unions.

It is highly ironic that homosexual activists want to force people who believe that homosexual activity is sinful and are concerned for their souls should not have their opinion in public and should be forced into the closet. One video of a group of homosexuals following and shouting down a Christian group was also highly ironic. At one point one of them says “How dare they come into our neighborhood.” Tolerance has been turned into a blunt instrument forcing unanimity of opinion. A one way street is Tolerance Ave. Unfortunately any disapproval of homosexual acts is branded as homophobia and hatred and no other possible motive is allowed.

As then Cardinal Ratzinger wrote.

…There are absolutely no grounds for considering homosexual unions to be in any way similar or even remotely analogous to God’s plan for marriage and family. Marriage is holy, while homosexual acts go against the natural moral law. Homosexual acts “close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved”

…Nonetheless, according to the teaching of the Church, men and women with homosexual tendencies “must be accepted with respect, compassion and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided”. They are called, like other Christians, to live the virtue of chastity. The homosexual inclination is however “objectively disordered” and homosexual practices are “sins gravely contrary to chastity”

Though praying for those who suffer with the heavy cross of same-sex attraction is now considered hatred.

Cherie Blair has been invited to speak at a major Pontifical University in Rome. Auntie Joanna write about it.

It seems likely that the organisers of this event do not know about the speaker’s strong association with Planned Parenthood. She is British and is simply well-known as a lawyer and the wife of a leading public figure. It is crucial, therefore, that the University is informed.

The speaker, Mrs Cherie Blair, hosted a major fund-raising event for Planned Parenthood at 10 Downing Street in 2003, promoting condoms for teenagers under the slogan “Lust for Life”. She honoured the 75th anniversary celebrations of Britain’s Family Planning Association – the leading campaigning movement for abortion in Britain – as the special celebrity guest, cutting the celebration cake and being photographed brandishing a condom. And no, it isn’t the case that the FPA or Planned Parenthood do other things than abortion and contraception – so she wasn’t helping them with other projects. They don’t make quilts or serve tea to the poor, or teach mathematics or help Auntie with the housework…they promote abortion and contraception: that’s what they were established to do, and that’s what they do, and when Mrs Blair raises funds for them she knows that what the funds are for.

Mrs Blair is a leading supporter of organisations working at the United Nations to promote abortion worldwide. Read about this here.

There is no reason whatever why Mrs Blair should speak at a Pontifical University. The Church can draw on many excellent women speakers with superb credentials to tackle issues concerning women’s rights and freedoms – it is absurd to invite instead some one who passionately supports organisations promoting abortion.

Father Powell, OP is currently at the Angelicum and has emailed Sr. Helen Alford, OP, asking for a little clarification

An astute and generous ruler, a brilliant general, and one of the most imaginative
and energetic builders of the ancient world, …

Now who could the National Geographic be talking about? Why of course it is King
Herod the Great!

Herod guided his kingdom to new prosperity and power.

He was all about hope and change.

Yet today he is best known as the sly and murderous monarch of Matthew’s Gospel,
who slaughtered every male infant in Bethlehem in an unsuccessful attempt to
kill the newborn Jesus, the prophesied King of the Jews. During the Middle
Ages he became an image of the Antichrist: Illuminated manuscripts and Gothic
gargoyles show him tearing his beard in mad fury and brandishing his sword
at the luckless infants, with Satan whispering in his ear. Herod is almost
certainly innocent of this crime, of which there is no report apart from Matthew’s
account.

Wow I guess I can forget about the Holy Innocents. Thanks National Geographic!

But children he certainly slew, including three of his own sons, along with his
wife, his mother-in-law, and numerous other members of his court. Throughout
his life, he blended creativity and cruelty, harmony and chaos, in ways that
challenge the modern imagination. [article]

Now I am confused. We know about how Herod murdered his relatives based on only
one account by Josephus written around 93 or 94. Yet the account by Matthew
written earlier and passed on by people living within living memory of King
Herod is not credible. National Geographic also calls Josephus a "hostile biographer " So I guess the one source rule can be used selectively
depending on the outcome you want. Besides somebody who murdered many family
members out of a paranoid feat of being usurped could not possibly react
like the Herod in Matthew’s account – oh wait.

Just in time for Christmas National Geographic has the television show and a
game called "Herod’s Lost Tomb" available for multiple platforms and even the iPhone/iPod Touch. Too bad according to them the slaughter of the innocents
isn’t true or they could have released a First Person Stabber where you hack at under two year old’s in Bethlehem. Surely next on the History Channel and the Discovery Channel we will soon get titles like "The Real Herod."

Ads proclaiming, “Why believe in a god? Just be good for goodness’ sake,” will appear on Washington, D.C., buses starting next week and running through December from the American Humanist Association $40,000 holiday ad campaign.

Though why believe in good? And if you are going to believe in good than was is the objective absolute you base good on, or is good just whatever you “feel” is good. If good is subjective, why not believe in a god if it makes you feel good?

Fellow ex-atheist John C. Wright also weighs in on this and makes great points.

Because, of course, rational and critical thinking is an exclusive province of the atheist camp.

In my own life, I just had a fan of secularism tell me this in all sobriety. When I produced examples and evidences to the contrary, he retreated to the posture of merely repeating himself without addressing any of the points raised. In other words, it was an dogma of faith with him, not open to dispute. Ironic, no?

Regarding the article, this is the part that gets me: “Edwords said the purpose isn’t to argue that God doesn’t exist or change minds about a deity.”

Oh, rubbish. That is exactly your purpose, and if it is not your purpose, you are a disgrace to the cause of atheism. If you are an atheist, you believe that belief in God is false, if not morally wrong, then it is your duty, your duty damn it (does that word mean nothing to you?!), to argue that God does not exist and to change minds about a deity: because all honest men must oppose what is false, and all virtuous, what is wrong.

I must say that I did not depart the atheist camp because of my disgust with my fellows, but the disgust did make the departure pleasant rather than filled with lingering regret when it came. My fellow atheists who were reasonable, not merely anti-clerical bigots, were a small and silent minority, and the choir of yammerheads was the majority.

I still regard men of reason, men of the mind, to be my allies against the forces of unreason, whether the unreason issues from within the Church or from without it. A logical man respects the LOGOS, whether he calls it divine or not.

When the atheist movement turns into a secular form of religion, it has lost its soul.

Religion News Service’s Dan Burke reports that next week’s much-awaited public discussion among the bishops on political support for abortion was struck from the agenda this afternoon: [source]

Somehow I have the strange compunction to sing the Sir Robin song from Monty Python and the Holy Grail to the bishops.

Update: Still on the agenda after all.

The election of Barack Obama as the first African-American US President could pave the way for the election of the first black Pope, according to a leading black American Catholic.

…Archbishop Gregory said that the next time cardinals gathered to elect a Pope they could "in their wisdom" choose an African pontiff. "My own election as head of the US Bishops Conference was an important signal. In 2001 the American bishops elected someone they respected regardless of his race, and the same thing could happen with the election of a Pope."

I agree with everything that American Papist had to say in reaction. No doubt the article was written through a specific lens, but I still find some of the quotes to be problematic.

For one thing is he saying that his election was really an important signal. That before that time I guess we had prejudiced Catholic bishops unwilling to elect a Bishop who happened to be black? It is the newspaper that implied that "The election of Barack Obama as the first African-American US President could pave the way for the election of the first black Pope." Though if the Bishop actually implied such a thing it would be rather silly to suggest that Catholic Cardinals were prejudiced and somehow resistant to electing a black Pope even if they thought he was the right man for the times. That we have many saints who happened to be black, but we would draw the line at making one pope. Besides Cardinal Arinze was certainly one of the papabiles last time around and it certainly didn’t take an American election to guide them in such a consideration. The Catholic Church has long been on the forefront in fighting racism including excommunications of slave owners.

Besides isn’t the Jesuit General known as the Black Pope? Or is that like Bill Clinton being the first black President?

You so often hear how Catholics have “baptized” some Pagan practice to sanctify it. While no doubt this has certainly happened many times (wedding rings for example), the most famous examples of this happening is for All Saints Day and Christmas.

But the question is are these valid examples? On plenty of otherwise solid articles on Halloween I see the nebulous “scholars say” in reference to Pope Gregory III moving the celebration from May 13th to Nov 1st that he was doing so to override a pagan celebration. I have though never seen any evidence to really back this up. Father Augustine Thompson, O.P. in Catholic Parent in 2000 wrote:

It’s true that the ancient Celts of Ireland and Britain celebrated a minor festival on October 31–as they did on the last day of most other months of the year. However, Halloween falls on the last day of October because the Feast of All Saints, or “All Hallows,” falls on November 1. The feast in honor of all the saints in heaven used to be celebrated on May 13, but Pope Gregory III (d. 741) moved it to November 1, the dedication day of All Saints Chapel in St. Peter’s at Rome. Later, in the 840s, Pope Gregory IV commanded that All Saints be observed everywhere. And so the holy day spread to Ireland.

The day before was the feast’s evening vigil, “All Hallows Even,” or “Hallowe’en.” In those days Halloween didn’t have any special significance for Christians or for long-dead Celtic pagans.

In 998, St. Odilo, the abbot of the powerful monastery of Cluny in southern France, added a celebration on November 2. This was a day of prayer for the souls of all the faithful departed. This feast, called All Souls Day, spread from France to the rest of Europe.

So now the Church had feasts for all those in heaven and all those in purgatory. What about those in the other place? It seems Irish Catholic peasants wondered about the unfortunate souls in hell. After all, if the souls in hell are left out when we celebrate those in heaven and purgatory, they might be unhappy enough to cause trouble. So it became customary to bang pots and pans on All Hallows Even to let the damned know they were not forgotten. Thus, in Ireland at least, all the dead came to be remembered–even if the clergy were not terribly sympathetic to Halloween and never allowed All Damned Day into the church calendar.

So the idea of Pope Gregory III specifically choosing this day to override the Celtic holiday of Samhain seems to me to be totally lacking in evidence. Ireland was certainly no longer a Pagan country by 741 and it seems more likely that it was moved to this day simply because it is the dedication day of All Saints Chapel in St. Peter’s at Rome. Besides this feast was not raised to a universal feast by Pope Gregory IV until almost 80 years after the transference by Pope Gregory III. It would be rather odd for Gregory III to move it to Nov 1 to offset a Celtic celebration when it was only a local feast and not even celebrated in Ireland yet.

Now when it comes to Christmas I think Mark Shea aptly shows that Sol Invictus was actually created as a response by Pagans to Christians celebrating the Nativity of Christ and not the other way around as so-called popular knowledge says. Often the more we learn sometimes means the more we have to unlearn.

Now in the spirit of secular Halloween, here is something really scary.