One of my favorite priest-bloggers is Fr. Erik Richtsteig of Orthometer. Father Richtsteig is a former Mormon and was on this week’s edition of The Journey Home with Marcus Grodai.
You can watch it if you have Real Player installed here. They don’t have an MP3 version of the show up yet.
San Francisco priest Fr. Malloy reports.
Not 48 hours ago we mentioned the relationship between Most Holy Redeemer Church and the University of San Francisco, specifically the appointment of Fr. Donal Godfrey, SJ, (who wrote an approving book about MHR: see here and here) to the position of Executive Director of Campus Ministry at USF.
As if on cue, the Jesuits chime in on the scandal of Archbishop Niederauer’s giving communion to two members of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence. From this morning’s San Francisco Chronicle:
“The general sacramental principle is that you don’t deny the sacrament to someone who requests it,” said the Rev. Jim Bretzke, professor of moral theology at University of San Francisco, a Jesuit Catholic university…..”Over-accessorizing and poor taste in makeup is not an excommunicable offense.”
Fr. Bretzke is the co-chair of the Department of Theology and Religious Studies at USF. He’s also on the Advisory Board of the Lane Center for Catholic Studies and Social Thought, who sponsored the “Queer Perspectives” seminar last February at Most Holy Redeemer.
Of course withholding Communion is not excommunication anyway so the point is rather mute. I wonder if some skinhead dressed in a Nazi uniform would receive Communion from Fr. Bretzke?
In other MHR news Archbishop Niederauer ordered that a thank you from a member of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence that appeared in this Sunday’s bulletin be removed. The parish complies and did remove it from the PDF version of their bulletin from their site.
Pope Benedict XVI has completed his second encyclical, a meditation on Christian hope, Vatican sources said.
The text, tentatively titled “Spe Salvi” (“Saved by Hope”), is about 65 pages, sources said Oct. 16. No release date has been set for the document.
The working title comes from St. Paul’s letter to the Romans, in which he wrote: “For in hope we have been saved.” The encyclical is said to explore the Christian understanding of hope, with reference to modern philosophy and the challenges of disbelief.
The pope worked on the encyclical this summer, when he had time to write during his sojourns in northern Italy and at his villa outside Rome. At the same time, he was working on a third encyclical that deals with social themes, Vatican officials said.
This is really quite interesting and I am really wondering if he will be the first pope to write an encyclical trilogy. His first encyclical being on love, his second on hope, so surely the next one will be on faith. Coming to a book store near you – the theological virtues trilogy!
I wonder how many will remember the Times of London reported that the pope’s second encyclical will focus on social and economic problems facing mankind in an era of globalization. That it would condemn tax evasion and tax havens.
John Allen Jr. has some analysis on the significance of the Pope Benedict naming 23 new cardinals, with 18 under the age of 80.
The most surprising pick was Archbishop Daniel DiNardo of Glaveston-Houston. Most people expected that Archbishop Wuerl of Washington D.C would have been named. John Allen says this is because the pope is recognizing the shifting center of the Catholic population in the United States from the East Coast to the Southwest. This sounds plausible and maybe we are seeing a sea change or really a "Cardinal see" change.
Read the rest of his analysis.
Jimmy Akin believes that Pontifical Council for the Interpretation of Legislative Texts should get involved to give us an authentic interpretation of Canon 915. This would certainly help to remove the problem where different interpretations are pitted against each other.
Norwegians woke up Tuesday morning to news that a respected Oslo pre-school teacher, backed by child psychologists, thinks children should be allowed to openly express their own sexuality, not least through sex play and games in the local day care centers known as barnehager, or kindergartens.
Pia Friis, leader of the popular Bjerkealleen Barnehage in Oslo and a well-known pre-school educator, told newspaper Dagbladet on Tuesday that children should be allowed to express their own sexuality at day care centers. She doesn’t want to stifle what comes naturally.
Children, she said, should be able "to look at each other and examine each other’s bodies. They can play doctor, play mother and father, dance naked and masturbate.
"But their sexuality must also be socialized, so they are not, for example, allowed to masturbate while sitting and eating. Nor can they be allowed to pressure other children into doing things they don’t want to."
Canonist Ed Peters has a post concerning Cdl. McCarrick approach to the scandal of pro-abortion Catholic politicians compared to Archbishop Burke’s. The Cardinal recently talked about preaching the pro-life message to presidential candidates and said that while he respected Archbishop’s Burke’s position to would rather focus on persuasion.
…But in disagreeing with Burke, I think that McCarrick mischaracterized the question and Burke’s compelling answer to it.
I think this is exactly right. It is not an either/or situation of persuasion or refusing Communion. Obviously persuasion is the first step before taking further actions exactly as outlined in Matthew 18:15-17. Archbishop Burke has acted precisely in this order when addressing pro-abortion Catholic politicians within his diocese. If persuasion and catechesis fails then there must be a further step to help the individual understanding the gravity of his supporting objectively grave sin. To stop and to go no further undermines the gravity of the sin.
…To be sure, important questions such as the point at which one’s pro-abortion voting record constitutes objective grave sin, or exactly which ministers of Holy Communion are charged with assessing public conduct, must be addressed. But how can such questions even be broached when the most fundamental points of Eucharistic discipline have become so muddled?
We are living through a terrible, perhaps unprecedented, unraveling of respect for Jesus in the Eucharist. Such a crisis compels all of us, I think, to examine our consciences for how our sins might have contributed to this disaster. But in the meantime (and though he might cringe to hear such praise) let me suggest that Abp. Raymond Burke has emerged as the most articulate defender of our Eucharistic Lord among our bishops, and that his leadership is valued more widely than he can possibly imagine.
It just seems to me that the way so many bishops handle this is to just totally ignore Canon 915 and effectively say that there is no situation where this Canon would apply. Where exactly is the concern for the souls of those receiving Communion sacrilegiously? Sure denying Communion in these cases might not have the desired effect of their conversion, but it would certainly be harder for them to believe that they are in communion with the Church. These punitive measures are ordered towards repentance and it just isn’t right to not try to help them out in this manner.
Ironic Catholic has been doing a
series of interviews with Christian blog humorists. She has
my interview questions up today on her blog.
Authors of Are There Closets in Heaven? A Catholic Father and Lesbian Daughter Share Their Story will be appearing at at St. Frances Cabrini Catholic Church in Minneapolis.
A Faithful Rebel has details along with contact information for His Excellency Harry J. Flynn and others in the diocese.