News

Fr. Lombardi’s Statement on Questions Regarding Pope’s Daily Homilies

by Jeffrey Miller
written by Jeffrey Miller

By Fr. Federico Lombardi

VATICAN CITY, May 29, 2013 (Zenit.org) – The very great interest aroused by the Pope’s brief homilies in the course of the Masses celebrated every morning in the chapel of the Casa Santa Marta, poses and continues to pose often the question from different parts on the possibility to access such celebrations or such homilies fully and not through the syntheses published every day by Vatican Radio and L’Osservatore Romano.

The question is understandable and has been taken several times into consideration and made the object of profound reflection, and merits a clear answer. First of all, it is necessary to keep in mind the character that the Holy Father himself attributes to the morning celebration of the Mass at Saint Martha’s.

It is a Mass with the presence of not a small group of faithful (generally more than 50 people) but whose character of familiarity the Pope intends to preserve. Because of this, despite the requests received, he has asked explicitly that it not be transmitted live on video or audio.

… After careful reflection, therefore, it was decided that the best way to make the richness of the Pope’s homilies accessible to a wider public, without altering their nature, is to publish an ample synthesis, rich also in original quoted phrases that reflect the genuine flavor of the Pope’s expressions. It is what L’Osservatore Romano is committed to doing every day, whereas Vatican Radio, on the basis of its characteristic nature, offers a briefer synthesis, but accompanied also with some passages of the original recorded audio, as well as CTV which offers a video-clip corresponding to one of the inserted audios published by Vatican Radio.

I can understand the reasoning, but am a bit disappointed. I really would have liked to see the full texts of these daily homilies for my own edification. I’ve seen more stories generated around these than his Sunday homilies.

There is a tension between the public aspect of the papacy and the more loose off-the-cuff daily homilies. Trying to make somewhat private what is not private I think will only lead to more difficulties. For example stories like last weeks “Atheists who do good works go straight to Heaven’ media-created flap will continue to be generated.

Yet like I said last week, most religion reporting never requires the context given by the full text. Just the juicy-bits that could generate a headline regardless of the facts.

(ZENIT)

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The Weekly Francis

The Weekly Francis eBook – Volume 11

by Jeffrey Miller
written by Jeffrey Miller

This is the 11th volume of The Weekly Francis ebook which is a compilation of the Holy Father’s writings, speeches, etc which I post at Jimmy Akin’s The Weekly Francis. The post at Jimmy Akin’s site contains a link to each document on the Vatican’s site and does not require an e-reader to use.

This volume covers material released during the last week from 15 May 2013 – 27 May 2013.

The ebook contains a table of contents and the material is arranged in sections such as Angelus, Speeches, etc in date order. The full index is listed on Jimmy’s site.

There is an archive for all of The Weekly Francis eBook volumes.  This page is available via the header of this blog or from here.

Omnibus Edition: In addition to The Weekly Francis I am also maintaining an Omnibus edition that contains all of Pope Francis writings, speeches, etc. At the end of the year an annual edition will be released along with maintaining the full omnibus.

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Punditry

So how do I get a badge for political correctness

by Jeffrey Miller
written by Jeffrey Miller

It is quite easy to complain about something, quite another to respond in a positive way.

So props to Taylor Marshall Why I’m Starting a New Boy Scouts: My Catholic Scouting Manifesto.

It is sad that the Boy Scouts of America caved to political correctness.

Still I find it odd my own reaction since I quit the scouts as a kid. Even in grade school I was a fervent atheist. The boy scout oath started to annoy me with the “To do my duty to God” part. I had enjoyed the outdoor scouting aspects and was almost willing to subsume my atheism to take part. Thankfully what I said when I resigned has gone down the memory hold, although I do remember having worn my Boy Scout nekerchief that was threaded together with a peace sign at that last meeting.

Now I am mad at the scouts for a totally different reason. Funny how things change.

So how long until “Being prepared” for the Scouts means carrying a condom?

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News

When you want to know what the Pope didn’t say

by Jeffrey Miller
written by Jeffrey Miller

There is one thing the media is quite useful for regarding coverage of the Catholic Church. If I want to know what the Pope hasn’t said then they are my go to source.

The latest media coverage led to outrage from Protestants and Catholics suspicious of this pope along with more liberal elements being delighted. The media meme of the week is that Pope Francis said that atheists could be saved purely by good works.

As usual Jimmy Akin cuts through the errors regarding this with his thoughtful analysis.

Still this episode does illustrate a problem.

Pope Francis is in the habit of saying daily Mass for the people at St. Martha’s House and invited guests, and when he does so he gives an off-the-cuff homily (rather than reading from a prepared text).

This is actually something new.

John Paul II and Benedict XVI did not do this. They did not celebrate daily Mass as publicly as Pope Francis, and they did not have daily homilies published in this way. Instead, they occasionally delivered prepared homilies at public Masses on special occasions, and only these were published. As a result, if you look at the Vatican web site, there are surprisingly few homilies listed in their sections!

As a result, the Vatican web people aren’t scaled up for this volume of homilies, and–MADDENINGLY–you can’t find complete texts of Pope Francis’s daily ones on the site.

This is a problems considering also that there has been multiple instances where part of the content of the Pope’s unpublished daily homilies have generated news stories. Not only can’t you find them on the Vatican’s site, you can only find fragments quoted by sources covering the Pope and the Vatican.

These extemporaneous homilies certainly create a difficulty for the Vatican regarding both capturing exactly what was said and providing timely translations. They seem to have a hard enough time providing timely translations of his official homilies and speeches, especially the General Audience. Although this is more of a problem for those like myself who want to read what the Pope actually said then for the media. The media in covering the Church is not interested in context anyway and even with full texts almost infallibly gets things wrong.

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Other

An atheistic aesthetic

by Jeffrey Miller
written by Jeffrey Miller

Recently having read The Church Building as a Sacred Place: Beauty, Transcendence, and the Eternal by Duncan Stroik I was thinking about how my own views towards architecture that have both changed and stayed the same.

I realize in some ways I strived for an aesthetic that was fueled by my atheism. I use to think all government buildings should be the architectural equivalent of the big box stores. Functional and without a concern for beauty or anything that would add cost for merely appearance sake. Humans really didn’t need all that to do work so why bother. I would also have seen rows and rows of cubicles as an efficient no nonsense design.

Spending many years at sea onboard various aircraft carriers I found my aesthetics pretty much satisfied by the way military ships are designed. Wiring is all visible and the bulkheads and frames of the ship are uniformly haze gray. A design based on ease of maintenance with not other concerns. It also use to annoy me that one area that was not based on practical concerns was the linoleum tiled floors. Although part of this dislike was the time spent mopping and buffing such floors and the idea of making a warship pretty.

Part of my outlook was certainly appreciation of the “Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder” relativism. Since beauty was totally subjective we should not waste time and money on something so subjective. Yet at the same time I didn’t really believe this. I was forcing this view on myself to match my philosophy. I was committed to moral relativism, but not a relativism towards beauty. When it came to art and architecture I was drawn to beauty and totally frustrated with the lack of it in so much art and architecture. So-called modern art should have appealed to my atheism, but instead it repelled me. I could find many forms of art interesting, but I didn’t equate something being distinctive as being the same as it being beautiful.

Still my more utilitarian mindset wanted to appreciate function over form. That in a universe with no ultimate meaning it was ridiculous to try to bring meaning out of art. If I had known Andy Warhol’s quote “Art is anything you can get away with” I would have appreciated it from the mindset I tried to overlay on my thoughts. Yet time and time again I was drawn to what classically was called beautiful.

It was my conversion that led me to finally drop what I didn’t really believe. I did not have pretend to myself anymore that I preferred the utilitarian or that what I found ugly or what had repulsed me was just my own subjective view. That while there are subjective reactions towards beauty this is not to say that all beauty is purely subjective. It is not that you are as likely to find a painting or photo of a mountain scene than one of a garbage dump.

I remember once my late pastor had told me that often reporters assumed that his parish was the diocesan cathedral. Surely this was because it was the most beautiful church in the diocese created along more traditional lines with a beautiful high altar. What had drawn me to this parish church was it’s beauty. I had found it accidentally when driving when I saw the sign for the book store. When I went inside I was stunned by what I saw and recognized the beauty of it. At the time I had rarely been in a Catholic church and certainly not one that couldn’t have doubled as an auditorium. Hollywood also seems to be attracted to the more traditional architecture of Catholic churches in that when you see one in the media it is never of the fan-like auditorium type that unfortunately are so prevalent. They know instinctively what a Catholic church is suppose to look like.

This does make me wonder just how much the loss of the religious sense has contributed to so much utilitarian ugliness that pervades the world? So much art and architecture seems to exist to only glorify the architect or artist. A rebellion against beauty to force a new aesthetic into acceptance. This is understandable to some extent in the secular world, but unfortunately the same is true regarding sacred architecture and art. An attempt seems to be made to divorce themselves from the past instead of building on it. An individualism that creeps into everything yet at the same time an ugly sameness. Aesthetic relativism does not led to people arguing over what is more beautiful, but a destruction of the beautiful.

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Punditry

Bad Pentecost Math

by Jeffrey Miller
written by Jeffrey Miller

Considering that Pentecost is often mentioned as the birthday of the Church it is not surprising to hear a homily referencing the age of the Church. Today I heard the same and like I hear all to often it involves bad Pentecost math in that the Church is referred to as being 2,000 plus years old.

Now I can understand a bit of shorthand in referring to the Church as being 2,000 years old, but not 2,000 plus. The error seems to count the birth of the Church from the birth of Jesus and not Pentecost after his death. While there is some lack of precision on the year Jesus was born (theories ranging from roughly 1–7 BC) any such recalculation still does not make the Church 2000 plus years old in the year 2013. Now this is no big deal, just one of those little things that annoy me.

Still I wonder if in the years ahead if the Church will try to set some date as a 2,000 year anniversary of the Church? Jimmy Akin had an interesting piece this year exploring if we could know when Jesus died. He sets it with some precision as 3:00 p.m on Friday, April 3, A.D. 33. So in 20 years we really could be saying the Church was 2,000 years old.

The other bit of bad statistical math involved in the homily was the priest saying there were 2 Billion Catholics. The actual figure is somewhat over 1.2 Billion.

Since the priest wasn’t interested in precision of numbers I put in a donation envelope that said $20 on the outside, but contained a check for $5 inside. Well not really.

Speaking of math, here is something from post from 2006 The Mathsiah.

jesusdivision

 

“Do you think that I have come to give peace on earth? No, I tell you, but rather division;”

“Be fruitful and multiply”

“Why do you see the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log of x+1 that is in your own eye?”

“Go and sine no more.”

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The Weekly Francis

The Weekly Francis eBook – Volume 10

by Jeffrey Miller
written by Jeffrey Miller

This is the 10th volume of The Weekly Francis ebook which is a compilation of the Holy Father’s writings, speeches, etc which I post at Jimmy Akin’s The Weekly Francis. The post at Jimmy Akin’s site contains a link to each document on the Vatican’s site and does not require an e-reader to use.

This volume covers material released during the last week from 6 May 2013 – 19 May 2013.

The ebook contains a table of contents and the material is arranged in sections such as Angelus, Speeches, etc in date order. The full index is listed on Jimmy’s site.

There is an archive for all of The Weekly Francis eBook volumes.  This page is available via the header of this blog or from here.

Omnibus Edition: In addition to The Weekly Francis I am also maintaining an Omnibus edition that contains all of Pope Francis writings, speeches, etc. At the end of the year an annual edition will be released along with maintaining the full omnibus.

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Punditry

Catholic in good standing

by Jeffrey Miller
written by Jeffrey Miller

New York’s Timothy Cardinal Dolan made it clear this morning that if Gov. Cuomo proceeds with his plans to strengthen state abortion laws, he will face the wrath of the Catholic Bishops.

“I am going to hope that the better natures prevail here, but boy if you come out you can expect us to be as vociferous and rigorous as possible in our opposition to this,” Dolan said during an interview with an Albany radio station Tuesday. “I hope we don’t go there.”

Dolan went so far as to suggest that Cuomo might not be considered a Catholic in good standing if goes forward.

“I don’t mind telling you that’s one of the things the governor and I talk about,” Dolan said.

“Look, he and I have very grave differences, and this is one of them… That’s something that we talk about and that’s something that I talk turkey with him about.”

This story was later updated:

UPDATED – Dolan spokesman Joe Zwilling just emailed a note clarifying Dolan’s comments on the radio, saying “Cardinal Dolan would not and did not suggest the governor might not be a Catholic in good standing going forward. The subject he ‘talks turkey’ about was abortion.”

Dolan’s comment’s came in a response to a question that asked how Cuomo “could be a leader on an issue that the church so fundamentally feels strongly about, opposes, abortion, and still be considered a Catholic in good standing.” (source)

One thing I have wondered about just exactly what does the term “Catholic in good standing” mean anyway? If Pelosi, Biden, and Cuomo can use those terms concerning themselves it doesn’t mean very much. Does the term have any actual definition from the Church? I’ve heard the term bandied about and while the definition of it seems common sensical. The Knights of Columbus use this term in regards to membership. The practical application of the term seems to mean someone not formally excommunicated and so ends up not meaning very much at all. Somehow I feel that after I die, telling Jesus “I was a Catholic in good standing” won’t be very helpful.

“Cardinal Dolan would not and did not suggest the governor might not be a Catholic in good standing going forward.”

If Gov. Cuomo who supports multiple intrinsic evils in his political life and commits adultery with his live-in girlfriend can be considered a “Catholic in good standing” then talk about mixed-messages.

Now I can understand pastoral sensitivities, but I don’t understand the sensitivity about this term which I believe has no canonical weight. Certainly I am frustrated by my internal feeling that “Catholic in good standing” actually means “Bishop unwilling to act.” I know that is more hyperbole than truth, but I keep waiting for a Bishop/Politician interaction where the dialogue and the dissent does not just keep going on and on. But as usual whining about Bishops is much easier than praying for them and for those “Catholics in good standing.”

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Pro-lifePunditry

An atrocity that is not an atrocity a minute earlier

by Jeffrey Miller
written by Jeffrey Miller

With the verdict finally in regarding the abortionist Kermit Gosnell we can review this horrific case and the reaction to it.

It was good to see how state legislatures and the Federal government moved to make sure nothing like this ever happens again. New legislation in regards to inspecting abortion clinics has swept the country. Oh wait that didn’t happen.

Strange how in most cases legislatures jump into action proposing new legislation before the ink is even dry regarding horrific crimes. An outcry to make sure that such a case could not happen again. To make sure that an abortion clinic could not operate for almost 20 years without an inspection. Yet the usual suspects who would regulate anything that moves are silent here. The same people who are outraged when a pro-life women’s clinic uses an ultrasound and would shut them down because of it will put up with pretty much any outrage in so many abortuaries. As I said before the reaction to Kermit Gosnell shows that for many who support abortion that they care more about keeping abortion legal than protecting women. That any threat regarding regulation of an abortion clinic must be pushed aside.

Groups that oppose legal abortion are using the horror surrounding his clinic, which garnered fresh attention during his murder trial, to push for new state and federal restrictions – even though Gosnell’s acts were already illegal. As CNN spins it.

“Justice was served to Kermit Gosnell today and he will pay the price for the atrocities he committed. We hope that the lessons of the trial do not fade with the verdict. Anti-choice politicians, and their unrelenting efforts to deny women access to safe and legal abortion care, will only drive more women to back-alley butchers like Kermit Gosnell. NARAL

Yes it is an atrocity if committed a minute after the child is born, but if chopped up in the womb any time before it is a right to be protected at all cost. The insanity of the pro-abortion position has always been there, but the emperor wears awesome clothes. NARAL talks about the lessons learned, but will not lift a finger to inspect abortion clinics. In fact they have argued that regulation drove women to use people like Kermit Gosnell. Protection of abortion is kind of like climate change in that no matter what happens it proves your point.

They call him a back-alley butcher now just to use the words back-alley to try to remind women of the fake statistics created by a founding member of NARAL Dr. Bernard Nathanson. The former abortion doctor later admitted how he had created the fake statistic of 10,000 women dying each year from back-alley abortions.

Strangely they don’t call late-term abortionist LeRoy Carhart who was caught on tape comparing unborn baby to ‘mushy meat in a Crock- Pot’ and joking about taking out fetus with ‘pickaxe and drill-bit’ a “back-alley butcher.” In fact NARAL has gone on record supporting him in the past.

Unfortunately regardless of the behavior of so many abortionists this is not going to shock the conscience of most Americans. Once you have bought the lie of abortion not being murder then all the other lies come as a package deal. If you can’t see the horror of dismembering a child in the womb you don’t really see the horror of Gosnell or so many who are equally twisted. If you support abortion you will accept a Gosnell just like assisted-suicide supporters supported an equally twisted Dr. Kevorkian.

Still despite the intentioned blindness of so many, some are removing those wrappings around their eyes. Last Month ex abortion clinic manager Abby Johnson wrote this:

During President Obama’s speech to a group supporting the nation’s largest abortion chain, he claimed that “Planned Parenthood is not going anywhere” now, or in the future.

Guess what, Obama? Neither are we.

Of the 97 original Planned Parenthood affiliates that once stood, only 80 remain. Just in the last few weeks, four Planned Parenthood clinics in Wisconsin are closing down because they have been stripped of taxpayer funding. Clinic workers have left and publicly outed the disgusting Planned Parenthood center in Delaware, noting its dangerous conditions and the fact that five women were hospitalized in a five-week period from botched abortions at this one location. That center has been closed. In 2009, Texas had over 90 Planned Parenthood centers in the state. There are now fewer than 60 locations.

Obama reiterated Cecile Richards’s own words describing Planned Parenthood as “the only organization that she’s ever been at where there are opponents who … ’literally get up every day trying to figure out how to keep us from doing our work.” Planned Parenthood’s work consists of killing over 330,000 preborn boys and girls every single year while raking in over half a billion taxpayer dollars annually.

Since June 2012, 51 abortion-clinic workers have come through And Then There Were None, a ministry I launched last summer to help clinic workers quit their jobs, gain new employment, and find healing from their work in the abortion industry. Our most recent initiative, Exodus2013 — Leave the Abortion Industry Day, yielded much fruit. We had five abortion workers contact us, ready to quit their jobs with our support. Many of these former employees have come from Planned Parenthood centers across the country, and several are ready to speak out about their experiences in the abortion industry.

Sometimes, Planned Parenthood employees send us e-mails they receive regarding our work. Just before Exodus2013, a Planned Parenthood affiliate sent out a mass e-mail describing ATTWN as “a group [trying] to intimidate our current employees.” The fact that they even mentioned ATTWN is a surefire sign that they are terrified of the ministry and the former workers that come to us for help. Planned Parenthood went on to tell their employees that “you will not let these sorts of intimidation techniques sway you from our mission… . We, at Planned Parenthood, are committed to the growth and advancement of our staff. We are confident you will remain with us.” But there is good reason to question that the momentum is on their side. Even former NARAL president Nancy Keenan noticed the youth presence at the Rally for Life in D.C. in 2010, “I just thought, my gosh, they are so young,” she said. ”There are so many of them, and they are so young.”

President Obama and Planned Parenthood can publicly continue to cling to their false sense of security all they like. Their days are numbered, and they know it. They are feeling the pressure of an increasingly powerful pro-life movement, and we are not slowing down.

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Software

No to Novena

by Jeffrey Miller
written by Jeffrey Miller

One of the problems I have with novenas is being able to remember to pray them during each of the nine days of if you are doing a novena of novenas during that time frame. So last Friday being a traditional day of starting a novena I remembered that I had recently seen an iOS app designed for novenas and so purchased it. Simply called Novena and priced at $2.99.

There are many ways a mobile application could help with praying a novena as far as scheduling goes. Unfortunately this app came up with none of these ideas. No push notifications. No scheduling. Nothing to track what day of a novena you might be on.

Neither was I impressed by the design of the app. Apparently not much effort went into design and it only worked in portrait mode in one orientation. Being a universal app for the iPhone and iPad it at least supported both platforms. Yet on the iPad the menu was apparently the same as for the iPhone or so just took up a small area at the top right part of the screen.

On the plus side novenas were grouped in several ways that could be useful in finding the one you want. You could also favorite one to easily come back to later. The artwork seems to have been taken from German holy cards and I did like the look of these cards and they did give the look of the app some consistency. Once selecting a novena you were presented with the individual novena and you could select or swipe to a history of the saint involved.

One nice feature was that for each image you could select Symbols to show a text overlay explaining some of the symbolic components in the image.

Overall I was disappointed by this app for missing obvious features and having a poorly designed interface and menu. So if anyone knows of an iOS novena app with push notifications and/or some form of scheduling please let me know.

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