What about you? Do you feel the same way too?

• Are you infinitely thankful to God for having given us such a wonderful, wise and benevolent pope in Benedict XVI.?
• Do you sincerely hope that the Church will be granted a worthy successor: a rock of faith, a leader open to the Holy Spirit, a pope prayerful and holy?
• Do you as an important part of the Body of Christ wish to contribute through the power of your prayers so that the Holy Spirit may guide, protect and enlighten our Cardinals when they determine the next successor of St. Peter?

You now have the opportunity to actively be part of this providential endeavour by having a Cardinal assigned to you, who you will support through your prayer and intercession during the coming weeks before and during the conclave and for three days following the election

This is from the site http://www.adoptacardinal.org

I think this is a rather cool idea, but one aspect of it raises a quibble or two on my part.

Pray for a short moment so the Holy Spirit may choose the right Cardinal for you, and then click the button below.

While this is theologically possible, it seems to me that the odds that the Holy Spirit is going to affect whatever randomization algorithm the site uses is rather small. What in fact we will have is pseudorandom number generator based on a seed state used against an array of Cardinal names.

Although the Apostles had a simpler randomization method when they threw lots and selected Matthias. I guess both methods are based on Matth.

Edinburgh, Scotland, Feb 25, 2013 / 05:55 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Benedict XVI has accepted Cardinal Keith P. O’Brien’s resignation, and the cardinal has announced he will not attend the conclave.

“Approaching the age of seventy-five and at times in indifferent health, I tendered my resignation as Archbishop of Saint Andrews and Edinburgh to Pope Benedict XVI some months ago. I was happy to know that he accepted my resignation ‘nunc pro tunc’ – (now – but to take effect later) on 13 November 2012,” Cardinal O’Brien said in a Feb. 25 statement.

The Pope decided on Feb. 18 that he would accept his resignation effective Feb. 25.

The cardinal recently became the focus of allegations by three priests and a former clergyman who say they received inappropriate sexual advances from him during the 1980s.

The leader of the Saint Andrews and Edinburgh Archdiocese also announced that he will not be attending the conclave to elect the next Pope.

“I also ask God’s blessing on my brother Cardinals who will soon gather in Rome to elect his successor. I will not join them for this Conclave in person,” he said.

“I do not wish media attention in Rome to be focused on me – but rather on Pope Benedict XVI and on his Successor,” the Scottish cardinal added.

Pope Benedict will appoint an apostolic administrator to oversee the archdiocese until the next Pope chooses his replacement. (source)

Wow that was a compressed chain of events:

• 22 Feb – Cardinal O’Brien said he believes priests should be able to marry if they wish to do so.
• 24 Feb – Three priests and a former priest accuse Cardinal O’Brien of “inappropriate acts.”
• 25 Feb – Pope accepts Cardinal’s resignation earlier than scheduled.

This has been a test of my own charity in regard to connection of these events. Whenever somebody in the Church starts advocating for a change in discipline in regards to priestly celibacy I am usually suspicious of their motives. When charges against him rapidly came out I easily jumped to the “yeah I knew it” instead of being as skeptical against such charges as I usually am.

Regardless his decision to not attend the Conclave certainly deserves some respect. If only Cardinal Roger Mahony had the same concern for the Church.

Recently Cardinal Levada said:

“There are some victims groups for whom enough is never enough, so we have to do our jobs as best we see it,” said Levada, 76, who spoke with reporters from a Menlo Park seminary as he prepared for his trip to the Vatican for the papal conclave.

“He has apologized for errors in judgment that were made,” Levada said. “I believe he should be at the conclave.”

There is always some sensitivity whenever a Cardinal is pressured to not attend a conclave. What Cardinal Levada said about victims groups can certainly be true at times. What this dismisses is that actions have consequences that are not damped just by saying sorry. Extremely serious errors don’t go away by saying you had lapses in your judgment. You can’t just skip the “ashes and sackcloth” phase and go right to demanding that you “accept my apology.” Especially when the Cardinal has reacted like he was a martyr who is humbly enduring bad treatment. I might be totally wrong, but I get the feeling that Cardinal Mahony’s criteria is “not for the good of the Church”, but for the “good of Cardinal Mahony.”

You just might be a heretic if you get intense questioning from Stephen Colbert and then America Magazine writes:

Now it should be obvious to even the most casual Roman Catholic that Mr. Wills’s views are definitely heterodox and probably heretical.

Saying “probably heretical” is a bit of an understatement as the things Gary Wills speaks and writes on are often heretical. As Tom Piatak for Crisis Magazine notes:

By my count, Wills took positions anathematized by 14 different Canons of the Council of Trent in this brief interview

You just might be a heretic when Michael Sean Winters of the National Catholic Reporter writes Garry Wills Please Go Away.

The longer you listen to Wills the higher the heresy counter rises. As a Catholic when Wills gets done with his caveats there isn’t very much left of the faith. Although there is a consistency to his madness as he started by attacking the pope, and then the Eucharist , the priesthood, and even books in the biblical canon fell with it. Don’t like the history of the Church’s teaching then invent a Great Apostasy to suit your needs. After all this method was good enough for Mormons and Jehovah Witnesses.

Remember the kerfluffel over the late William Buckley for having supposedly written “Mater si, Magistra no”? It was actually a quip of Gary Wills that Buckley had referenced. Nothing has changed in the decades since he had first made that quip  other than the expected result that underlines it .

References: The Strange World of Garry Wills

Aliens in This World often has interesting historical tidbits regarding the Church. Case in point:

From a thing that showed up in the very late Middle Ages, called the “Letter of Lentulus,” which was presented as being a report from a Roman official (with a known historical name) to Tiberius, about the appearance and habits of Jesus. The letter was taken as eyewitness testimony by many, and the letter in some versions described Jesus’ hair and beard as “fair” and his face as “the color of wheat.” (Although other versions described His hair and beard as “the color of a ripe hazelnut”, ie, those things on the Nutella jar that are light brown and not at all fair. They also described His complexion as “reddish,” which had the symbolic meaning of someone optimistic, energetic — and honest enough to be able to blush.) So it wasn’t racism, so much as popular scholarship and Biblical fanfic (aka “pseudoepigrapha”), that led to blonde Jesuses.

The appearance of blonde or white-haired Jesuses in previous Christian art had always represented the Jesus of the Book of Revelation, Apocalyptic Jesus, Whose hair represents Him as ancient and eternal, or transfigured in light, and Who is dressed for His office as the eternal High Priest. Also, scary and impressive. Either way, His Divinity becoming as visible as His Humanity, rather than how He looked in His life normally on earth.

Most Western art follows the tradition of a bearded, dark Jesus because that’s how the Mandylion of Edessa looked. Ditto the Shroud of Turin and the byssus veil thing. Pictures and relics should generally outweigh literary descriptions; but the Lentulus letter was popular in Germany, a fur piece over the mountains from the Shroud and the byssus veil.

Now I know who to blame. I really dislike blonde Jesus’ that seem to be so prevalent. Give me a Jewish looking Jesus any day. Now I don’t mind inculturation where religious images are adapted. If Mary can appear as Our Lady of Guadalupe, who am I to complain. So maybe blonde Jesus’ would not annoy me as much if I was to visit Scandinavia. Next on the list that annoys me about Crucifixes are sanitized Jesus’ that look like they must have carried around a bottle of Purell® before being Crucified. With this style Crucifix no wonder they asked Jesus to come off the cross since obviously he was totally uninjured. I tend more to Spanish realism regarding Crucifixes, but would be fine with ones that at least pointed to the suffering Jesus underwent. At the top of my list for anathemas of this type are blonde risen Christ’s that appear to be prancing around such as one parish I sometimes attend has.

Yet somehow I have managed to own a Crucifix that I really like except for the blonde hair. I have been tempted more than once to take a black marker to the hair.