The USCCB is still ignoring the problem. In a usual pattern of deception, they seem bent on ignoring reality and their own canon law. By all appearances, they will most likely continue to ordain homosexuals in large numbers despite the danger they pose to the purity of boy chilren.
A preliminary report commissioned by the nation’s Roman Catholic bishops on the roots of the clergy sex-abuse scandal found no evidence that gay priests were more likely than heterosexual clergy to molest children, the study’s lead authors said yesterday.
First their title dishonestly implies that the USCCB states that "Homosexuality is not linked to sex-abuse, rather it's the other way around. Then another journalist steps in and sights a spurious study with some poorly reasoned arguments.
The full $2 million study by researchers at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice won’t be completed until the end of 2010. But the authors said their evidence to date found no data indicating that homosexuality was a predictor of abuse.
It's still amazing that the USCCB spent all that money to tell us that sodomites and criminality were at the heart of the problem.
UPDATE: Longer analysis by David Gibson over at Politics Daily.
“What we are suggesting is that the idea of sexual identity be separated from the problem of sexual abuse,” said Margaret Smith, a researcher from the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York, which is conducting an independent study of sexual abuse in the priesthood from 1950 up to 2002. “At this point, we do not find a connection between homosexual identity and an increased likelihood of sexual abuse.” [The Soviet Union made all kinds of "scientific" studies like this]
A second researcher, Karen Terry, also cautioned the bishops against making a correlation between homosexuality in the priesthood and the high incidence of abuse by priests against boys rather than girls — a ratio found to be about 80-20. [It's actually more than that]
“It’s important to separate the sexual identity and the behavior,” [But why?] Terry said. “Someone can commit sexual acts that might be of a homosexual nature but not have a homosexual identity.” [This is a false distinction and we don't in any case know what Terry means. Based on her special pleading, I doubt that it's very well defined.] Terry said factors such as greater access to boys is one reason for the skewed ratio. [Not really, priests have more freedom, and less accountability than average workers and can go anywhere they want. Fact of the matter is that they don't go after girls because most of them are homosexuals] Smith also raised the analogy of prison populations where homosexual behavior is common even though the prisoners are not necessarily homosexuals, or cultures where men are rigidly segregated from women until adulthood, and homosexual activity is accepted and then ceases after marriage. [Still reaching for an excuse. She's like he guardian of an alcoholic child who refuses to acknowledge reality.]
(…)
When asked by a bishop at Tuesday’s meeting whether homosexuality should be a factor in excluding men from the seminary, Smith responded, “If that exclusion were based on the fact that that person would be more probable than any other candidate to abuse, we do not find that at this time.”
Read at ... Commonweal.
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
Cardinal Schönborn’s visit to Medjugorje 'not a statement,' spokesman says
Cardinal Schönborn's masonic sympathies were well explained and demonstrated by Kreuz.net earlier this year when wrote about how he had attended his masonic father's masonic funeral and enjoys the good opinion of Masonic leaders in Austria today, leaders who are not quite so fond of some of his less correct brother Bishops. So, with these strong sympathies, it seems safe tocall them so, the Cardinal is attending another Masonic locale, Medjugorje.
However, his communications director, Father J. Fürnkranz indicates that this was not to be a public visitatio.
Cardinal Schönborn’s visit to Medjugorje 'not a statement,' spokesman says
Medjugorje, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Nov 16, 2009 / 02:55 pm (CNA).- Cardinal Christoph Schönborn will visit Medjugorje, the small town in Bosnia-Herzegovina where six young people have allegedly been witnesses of apparitions from the Virgin Mary. But according to the Archdiocese of Vienna, the trip is “completely private” and does not imply a statement from the cardinal on the veracity of the apparitions.
“It was supposed to be a completely private visit, it was not supposed to go out to the internet,” Fr. Johannes Fürnkranz, personal secretary to the Archbishop of Vienna, explained to CNA.
The cardinal’s visit will take place between December 8th and January 4th.
“The cardinal's visit was supposed to be absolutely personal and not public, but since it has been leaked, I can only confirm that it will take place. There is no statement whatsoever involved (in the visit),” Fr. Fürnkranz told CNA.
The local Church authorities, including Bishop Ratko Peric, whose diocese encompasses Medjugorje, have declared that the alleged apparitions are not to be published or promoted.
Story here...
However, his communications director, Father J. Fürnkranz indicates that this was not to be a public visitatio.
Cardinal Schönborn’s visit to Medjugorje 'not a statement,' spokesman says
Medjugorje, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Nov 16, 2009 / 02:55 pm (CNA).- Cardinal Christoph Schönborn will visit Medjugorje, the small town in Bosnia-Herzegovina where six young people have allegedly been witnesses of apparitions from the Virgin Mary. But according to the Archdiocese of Vienna, the trip is “completely private” and does not imply a statement from the cardinal on the veracity of the apparitions.
“It was supposed to be a completely private visit, it was not supposed to go out to the internet,” Fr. Johannes Fürnkranz, personal secretary to the Archbishop of Vienna, explained to CNA.
The cardinal’s visit will take place between December 8th and January 4th.
“The cardinal's visit was supposed to be absolutely personal and not public, but since it has been leaked, I can only confirm that it will take place. There is no statement whatsoever involved (in the visit),” Fr. Fürnkranz told CNA.
The local Church authorities, including Bishop Ratko Peric, whose diocese encompasses Medjugorje, have declared that the alleged apparitions are not to be published or promoted.
Story here...
Cloudy, USCCB Study on Clerical Sex Abuse
An impressionistic but very extensive and expensive study indicates that the abuse of [homosexual] clergy dropped off after 1985 and that it was most prevalent beginning with the Age of the Big Baby Boomer. It indirectly points the finger at that popular post-war generation, but shouldn't it also include "homosexuals"?
It's unclear why the Bishops had to spend all of this money to determine what the problem was. Referring to the historical nature of the problem, they would have disclosed that it was not foreign to the Middle Ages or the Ancient World and was often seated, along with homosexuality, in the actual practice of Witchcraft and the consequent diabolism or insanity, if you wish. The methods for dealing with these individuals, who in some cases murdered and raped children, as what the case with the a friend and companion of Joan of Arc, Baron Gilles de Rais and his friends, was burning at the stake.
Would that the Bishops would spend more time being environmentally as well as economically conscious and spare us the time of moving such individuals from parish to parish to escape the long arm of the law by simply handing them over to the secular arm for due punishment after an admissible ecclesiastical trial.
Strangely, the report also offers a solution, in terms of formation, related to a mysterious "human formation preparation". It sounds like something that might have caused the problem in the first place.
We don't know, but perhaps if they spent as much time affirming the truths of the Catholic Faith as they did avoiding it out of what, embarrassment (?), they might have an easier time helping people understand whether or not they're useful in the first place.
Link to spero article...
It's unclear why the Bishops had to spend all of this money to determine what the problem was. Referring to the historical nature of the problem, they would have disclosed that it was not foreign to the Middle Ages or the Ancient World and was often seated, along with homosexuality, in the actual practice of Witchcraft and the consequent diabolism or insanity, if you wish. The methods for dealing with these individuals, who in some cases murdered and raped children, as what the case with the a friend and companion of Joan of Arc, Baron Gilles de Rais and his friends, was burning at the stake.
Would that the Bishops would spend more time being environmentally as well as economically conscious and spare us the time of moving such individuals from parish to parish to escape the long arm of the law by simply handing them over to the secular arm for due punishment after an admissible ecclesiastical trial.
Strangely, the report also offers a solution, in terms of formation, related to a mysterious "human formation preparation". It sounds like something that might have caused the problem in the first place.
We don't know, but perhaps if they spent as much time affirming the truths of the Catholic Faith as they did avoiding it out of what, embarrassment (?), they might have an easier time helping people understand whether or not they're useful in the first place.
Link to spero article...
USCCB promises to set a new Course for Catholic Education
There was no mention of Land O'Lakes or the veritable wasteland that Catholic Education has become, but perhaps, putting an unimposing silk folding dividing screen with cranes and pastoral scenes from Chinese romances, between the laity and the public, the USCCB intends to "handle" the situation by waiting for the legion tenured heterodox to die and replacing them by enthusiastic orthodoxesque like Christopher West. Meanwhile, we perhaps can try to imagine ourselves in a kind of Gothic, ivy covered paradise where Dominicans sit with their students in gardens, explaining St. Thomas Aquinas without the usual attempts to bring things up to date with the latest in philosophical, post-post modernism.
Cardinal Newman Society
At a subsequent press conference, Cardinal George declined to name specific universities that the bishops have in mind, although he added “if any institution… calls itself Catholic,” it is the moral responsibility of a bishop to assure that it is Catholic, according to the National Catholic Reporter. Cardinal George said this offers the bishops “a chance to clarify the relationship” and see if the entity in question is operating within the bonds of Catholic communion. He said that it is the bishops’ responsibility, when institutions or organizations call themselves Catholic, to sort out what that means in each case.
Also highlighting their support for a university that became a model for reform, the bishops gave a standing ovation to Very Rev. David O’Connell, C.M., president of The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. Delivering a farewell report as he prepares to retire next year, Father O’Connell said that “the greatest progress the university has made in the past 12 years is in its Catholic identity.” He contrasted that to the “antagonism and cynicism that was present on the campus the day I arrived.”
Link to article...
Cardinal Newman Society
At a subsequent press conference, Cardinal George declined to name specific universities that the bishops have in mind, although he added “if any institution… calls itself Catholic,” it is the moral responsibility of a bishop to assure that it is Catholic, according to the National Catholic Reporter. Cardinal George said this offers the bishops “a chance to clarify the relationship” and see if the entity in question is operating within the bonds of Catholic communion. He said that it is the bishops’ responsibility, when institutions or organizations call themselves Catholic, to sort out what that means in each case.
Also highlighting their support for a university that became a model for reform, the bishops gave a standing ovation to Very Rev. David O’Connell, C.M., president of The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. Delivering a farewell report as he prepares to retire next year, Father O’Connell said that “the greatest progress the university has made in the past 12 years is in its Catholic identity.” He contrasted that to the “antagonism and cynicism that was present on the campus the day I arrived.”
Link to article...
Syrian Archbishop Al-Jamil addresses Christian Persecution in Iraq
In a talk sponsored by "Save the Monasteries" foundation, Archbishop Archbishop Al-Jamil, procurator of the Syrian-Catholic Patriarchate in Rome has given a talk about the perils and plights facing Catholics in Iraq who, despite having made significant contributions to Iraqi society in the past are now in danger of disappearing from the country entirely if the situation of current Muslim hostility is not addressed. Before the war, Christians were highly respected and considered an integral part of Iraq, but things have changed.
Link to article in Zenit...
Earlier discussion where Archbishop Al-Jamil addresses the question in 2007, link...
An independent Kurdistan...article.
Link to article in Zenit...
Earlier discussion where Archbishop Al-Jamil addresses the question in 2007, link...
An independent Kurdistan...article.
Hugo Chavez wants a War against the Church and USA
Amid talks of a coup and doubts about Chavez's mental stabillity alongside the failed economic Marxist economic policies in an oil rich Venezuela, General Chavez is intent on sabre rattling, confiscating Venezuelan Coffee productio and has also set his greedy eyes on the property of the Venezuelan Church.
Link here...
He has also looked outside of Venezuela for a source of these problems and has found a handy scapegoat in the "gringo" as he seems poised for war, although like many drug addled and confused people, he will look for convenient excuses to explain away his mania.
Link here...
Link here...
He has also looked outside of Venezuela for a source of these problems and has found a handy scapegoat in the "gringo" as he seems poised for war, although like many drug addled and confused people, he will look for convenient excuses to explain away his mania.
Link here...
Don't support the Catholic Campaign for Human Development
California Daily
Editor: The following announcement comes from the website www.reformcchdnow.com.
Every year on the Sunday before Thanksgiving, many Catholic parishes take up a second collection for the Catholic Campaign for Human Development.
Recognize that organization? If you don’t, you should. Here’s why:
Until 2008, the campaign had been funding ACORN for several years, giving over $7 million to the corrupt organization. The same organization that is being investigated for voter fraud, embezzlement, and other wrongdoing was recently caught in undercover videos in recent months helping a pimp and prostitute set up a business and traffic underage girls for prostitution.
Read further...
Editor: The following announcement comes from the website www.reformcchdnow.com.
Every year on the Sunday before Thanksgiving, many Catholic parishes take up a second collection for the Catholic Campaign for Human Development.
Recognize that organization? If you don’t, you should. Here’s why:
Until 2008, the campaign had been funding ACORN for several years, giving over $7 million to the corrupt organization. The same organization that is being investigated for voter fraud, embezzlement, and other wrongdoing was recently caught in undercover videos in recent months helping a pimp and prostitute set up a business and traffic underage girls for prostitution.
Read further...
Jesuit law Professors condemn Stupak Amendment
What's interesting about the Stupak amendment is that it would prohibit abortion coverage even by private insurance companies, but Brietta Clark and Karl Manheim professors of law at Loyola Law School, Los Angeles, think this is a bad thing.
Read more:
Read more:
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Divisive Liberals over Celibate Priests
In what could be a scene from a Lasse Hallstrom film, a 50 year old Irish priest in an romantic locale, falls in love and tells his congregation who respond with a heartfelt standing-o. He breaks with tradition, like a man who turns his back on the tumult and chaos of a tired but loyal wife and riotous children for another woman, he's turned his back on the priesthood to which he was commited for 20 years.
It would be easy to spit on him in print. Could those who've met his departure with the cheers in the closing scene of an adolescent feel-good coming of age film really understand what this man has done? Do they understand the priesthood?
What is greater in scope in the treatment of this story is that there are others, mostly comfortable elitist journalists and liberal priests, who want to make this issue and others like it, with its subjective emotional mental states, self-realization and betrayals, into something else. These men, many of whom aren't actually Catholic, want to determine how the Church is run. Their spite is palpable and it's what has always given us an inkling of the truth of the Catholic Church's claims to be what She is, "One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic".
They say that celibacy is a ridiculous rule and that the new incoming Anglicans will call all of this into question. The only thing that's certain is that any avenue of attack will do. Like the crowd that mocked our Lord at Calvary, a diabolical tumult will sound from the electronic media whose malice and desire to corrupt can reach unto every hearth and twist men's minds and make them unwhole; make them unwholesome.
The decision of Londonde cleric Fr Sean McKenna to leave the priesthood because he is in a relationship with a woman has raised again the issue of celibacy within the Catholic Church. It is obvious from the reception given to Fr McKenna by his congregation when he broke the news to them on Sunday that he was much admired as a priest and that that admiration follows him into his life as a lay person. The sadness that many people feel is that he had to choose between his vocation and his new relationship.
The Catholic Church has for centuries held the view that priests must be celibate. That, like its strict views on issues such as abortion and divorce and the ordination of women, is one of the attractions of the Church to those seeking certainties in their lives. However, others see celibacy as an outmoded restriction on the lives of priests.
Read more:
Diogenes comments here...
"Who is a Neo-Conservative" an Interview with Michael Novak
Insidecatholic
Prominent writer, thinker, and Crisis Magazine co-founder Michael Novak sat down with Italian scholar Alia K. Nardini to discuss neoconservatism, Catholicism, and the future of the West.
♦ ♦ ♦
Alia K. Nardini: Professor Novak, generally people in Italy and the rest of Europe want to know how much American neoconservatives share with the Republican Party. However, I find that the most interesting question really concerns the relationship between neoconservatives and the Democratic Party, especially in terms of conceptual differences that developed during the 1960s and 1970s. What is your view on this?
Michael Novak: In the first generation, virtually all neo-conservatives -- Daniel Patrick Moynihan, Irving Kristol, Daniel Bell, Norman Podhoretz, Midge Decter, Richard John Neuhaus, George Weigel, and Paul Johnson in England -- were not only Democrats; we were on the left wing of the Democratic Party. We were Kennedy Democrats. But from about 1972, the Democratic Party, drawing the wrong lessons from the war in Vietnam, chose as its campaign slogan, "Come home, America!" and began retreating from the world and its international burdens. Then, after 1973, the Democratic Party increasingly became the party of abortion. It is still the party of abortion. From our point of view, we did not leave the Democratic Party, the party left us.
AKN: Is it true that the American public did not vote in favor of abortion, but that the Supreme Court, in effect, decreed it?
MN: Actually, prior to 1973, any time abortion had been put to a vote in the United States, it was overwhelmingly defeated. The American people prefer pro-life [legislation] by a good majority. But the Supreme Court stepped in, and in 1973 made a ruling that permitted abortion for almost any reason (in practice) and during all nine months of pregnancy. This was an illegitimate exercise of judicial power. It is not the business of the Court to make legislation. Legislation should be made only with the consent of the governed, through the Congress. The American people have never consented to this ruling, [which] has caused turmoil in our politics and culture for 34 years now, as nothing else has. Together with other factors, it brought a long series of defeats to the Democratic Party.
AKN: What other major issues made you move away from what was becoming the official position of the Democratic Party in the 1970s?
MN: Economics. Many of us once thought that socialism was basically a good idea, but socialists had not found a practical way to implement it successfully. Then we actually started to examine the many different national experiments in socialism -- almost 70. None of them worked. So socialism cannot be a good idea. Now, if you are on the Left and you cease being a socialist, what are you? If you do not take the state as the main engine of progress, where do you turn?
In these circumstances, and independently, several writers started re-examining the American founding. Irving Kristol in particular wrote a beautiful book about that, and discovered a new way of thinking about the future.
Like socialists, neoconservatives try to imagine, and to work toward, a better future. Unlike socialists, neoconservatives saw in a dynamic free economy a better way of breaking the chains of poverty than socialism ever discovered.
Again, at the time of the American founding, the term "republican" was much preferred to "democratic." The latter meant rule by the majority, but that has often proven dangerous and tyrannical. A "republic" places checks and balances on the majority through representative government and stresses the rule of law and the protection of the rights of the free.
Then there was this second discovery: not just that the American founding held a superior economic idea (which is why socialism never took root in the United States), but also that the American people, when given a free choice, would usually come down on the conservative side of most issues. Polls reveal that even in Europe the vast majority of people believe in capital punishment. It is the political class -- the elites -- that does not. The Left thinks it speaks for the people, but rarely does so.
Link to article...
Prominent writer, thinker, and Crisis Magazine co-founder Michael Novak sat down with Italian scholar Alia K. Nardini to discuss neoconservatism, Catholicism, and the future of the West.
♦ ♦ ♦
Alia K. Nardini: Professor Novak, generally people in Italy and the rest of Europe want to know how much American neoconservatives share with the Republican Party. However, I find that the most interesting question really concerns the relationship between neoconservatives and the Democratic Party, especially in terms of conceptual differences that developed during the 1960s and 1970s. What is your view on this?
Michael Novak: In the first generation, virtually all neo-conservatives -- Daniel Patrick Moynihan, Irving Kristol, Daniel Bell, Norman Podhoretz, Midge Decter, Richard John Neuhaus, George Weigel, and Paul Johnson in England -- were not only Democrats; we were on the left wing of the Democratic Party. We were Kennedy Democrats. But from about 1972, the Democratic Party, drawing the wrong lessons from the war in Vietnam, chose as its campaign slogan, "Come home, America!" and began retreating from the world and its international burdens. Then, after 1973, the Democratic Party increasingly became the party of abortion. It is still the party of abortion. From our point of view, we did not leave the Democratic Party, the party left us.
AKN: Is it true that the American public did not vote in favor of abortion, but that the Supreme Court, in effect, decreed it?
MN: Actually, prior to 1973, any time abortion had been put to a vote in the United States, it was overwhelmingly defeated. The American people prefer pro-life [legislation] by a good majority. But the Supreme Court stepped in, and in 1973 made a ruling that permitted abortion for almost any reason (in practice) and during all nine months of pregnancy. This was an illegitimate exercise of judicial power. It is not the business of the Court to make legislation. Legislation should be made only with the consent of the governed, through the Congress. The American people have never consented to this ruling, [which] has caused turmoil in our politics and culture for 34 years now, as nothing else has. Together with other factors, it brought a long series of defeats to the Democratic Party.
AKN: What other major issues made you move away from what was becoming the official position of the Democratic Party in the 1970s?
MN: Economics. Many of us once thought that socialism was basically a good idea, but socialists had not found a practical way to implement it successfully. Then we actually started to examine the many different national experiments in socialism -- almost 70. None of them worked. So socialism cannot be a good idea. Now, if you are on the Left and you cease being a socialist, what are you? If you do not take the state as the main engine of progress, where do you turn?
In these circumstances, and independently, several writers started re-examining the American founding. Irving Kristol in particular wrote a beautiful book about that, and discovered a new way of thinking about the future.
Like socialists, neoconservatives try to imagine, and to work toward, a better future. Unlike socialists, neoconservatives saw in a dynamic free economy a better way of breaking the chains of poverty than socialism ever discovered.
Again, at the time of the American founding, the term "republican" was much preferred to "democratic." The latter meant rule by the majority, but that has often proven dangerous and tyrannical. A "republic" places checks and balances on the majority through representative government and stresses the rule of law and the protection of the rights of the free.
Then there was this second discovery: not just that the American founding held a superior economic idea (which is why socialism never took root in the United States), but also that the American people, when given a free choice, would usually come down on the conservative side of most issues. Polls reveal that even in Europe the vast majority of people believe in capital punishment. It is the political class -- the elites -- that does not. The Left thinks it speaks for the people, but rarely does so.
Link to article...
Official and underground priests in China ponder Card. Bertone’s letter
The document of the Vatican Secretary of State is "encouraging." Underground priests and nuns have begun to study the letter in groups. Others hope that the Vatican will give more precise information. A young bishop: We too need to be trained". Among the problems: priests too distracted by the Internet and a lack of educators in seminaries.
Beijing (AsiaNews) - The Letter of the card. Bertone to Chinese priests, published yesterday, was received and read carefully. Bishops and priests in China are convinced that the formation and spiritual growth of priests should be the first concern of the Church.
Marking the Year for the priesthood, the Vatican secretary of state, yesterday issued a letter to all priests in China, official and underground, calling for reconciliation and exhorting them to live out their vocation.
Read More...
Beijing (AsiaNews) - The Letter of the card. Bertone to Chinese priests, published yesterday, was received and read carefully. Bishops and priests in China are convinced that the formation and spiritual growth of priests should be the first concern of the Church.
Marking the Year for the priesthood, the Vatican secretary of state, yesterday issued a letter to all priests in China, official and underground, calling for reconciliation and exhorting them to live out their vocation.
Read More...
Congressman Cao explains his Vote refers to Jesuit Training
America Magazine
National Jesuit News: As a Jesuit scholastic, you experienced the Spiritual Exercises, a foundational piece of Ignatian spirituality from Jesuit founder Ignatius Loyola. Now, as a congressman, do you find that you use the Ignatian principals of discernment as you reach your political decisions? Has a grounding in Ignatian spirituality helped shape your political decision making process?
Cao: I still use the Ignatian methods almost every day, from examination of conscience back to the methods of the 30 day retreat. I do that very often. Using the whole process of discernment to see where the Sprit is moving me has been extremely important, especially in my recent decision to support the health care reform plan. The Jesuit emphasis on social justice, the fact that we have to advocate for the poor, for the widow, for those who cannot help themselves, plays a very significant part. But at the end of the day, I believe that it’s up to, at least from my perspective, understanding what does my conscious say, how is the Spirit moving me. I use that almost every day in my decision making process. The issues that we contend with in Congress affect every single person here in the United States, so I want to make sure that my decisions are based on good principals and good morals.
For example, right before the [health care] vote, I actually went to Mass and I prayed. And the theme of the day was one of the readings from Isaiah. The priest gave the homily about be not afraid, so I really felt a personal touch during this homily, that this homily was meant for me. I was going through a lot of turmoil, debating on what was the right decision, knowing the fact that if I were to vote ‘yes’, I would be the most hated Republican in the country. [laughs]. So, it was a tough discernment process but I felt during the Mass that it was speaking directly to me. It gave me the strength to say ‘yes, you have to make the right decision’ and 'be not afraid’ to do it because ‘I will go before you’ so that is why I supported the bill knowing the fact that I would be the only one.
Read entire article...
National Jesuit News: As a Jesuit scholastic, you experienced the Spiritual Exercises, a foundational piece of Ignatian spirituality from Jesuit founder Ignatius Loyola. Now, as a congressman, do you find that you use the Ignatian principals of discernment as you reach your political decisions? Has a grounding in Ignatian spirituality helped shape your political decision making process?
Cao: I still use the Ignatian methods almost every day, from examination of conscience back to the methods of the 30 day retreat. I do that very often. Using the whole process of discernment to see where the Sprit is moving me has been extremely important, especially in my recent decision to support the health care reform plan. The Jesuit emphasis on social justice, the fact that we have to advocate for the poor, for the widow, for those who cannot help themselves, plays a very significant part. But at the end of the day, I believe that it’s up to, at least from my perspective, understanding what does my conscious say, how is the Spirit moving me. I use that almost every day in my decision making process. The issues that we contend with in Congress affect every single person here in the United States, so I want to make sure that my decisions are based on good principals and good morals.
For example, right before the [health care] vote, I actually went to Mass and I prayed. And the theme of the day was one of the readings from Isaiah. The priest gave the homily about be not afraid, so I really felt a personal touch during this homily, that this homily was meant for me. I was going through a lot of turmoil, debating on what was the right decision, knowing the fact that if I were to vote ‘yes’, I would be the most hated Republican in the country. [laughs]. So, it was a tough discernment process but I felt during the Mass that it was speaking directly to me. It gave me the strength to say ‘yes, you have to make the right decision’ and 'be not afraid’ to do it because ‘I will go before you’ so that is why I supported the bill knowing the fact that I would be the only one.
Read entire article...
The Queen a Parasite? No, a penny pinching paragon.
This morning, we will see the great, unwritten British constitution on display in all its glory — the Sovereign in her Crown and on her Throne, opening her democratically -elected Parliament.
At the same time, a promising political career lies in ruins for mocking it.
Until yesterday, Peter White was a young Labour activist seeking the first rung on the political ladder.
A former chairman of London Young Labour and former aide to a Labour Minister, he is a prospective candidate for Havering Council in East London.
Today, though, at 26, he finds himself sitting somewhere between Sir Fred Goodwin and swine flu in the court of public opinion.
Over the weekend, Mr White launched a vituperative personal broadside at the most popular and respected figure in British public life.
The cause of Mr White’s foam-flecked fury was a suggestion that there should be a public holiday for the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee in 2012.
Read more...
At the same time, a promising political career lies in ruins for mocking it.
Until yesterday, Peter White was a young Labour activist seeking the first rung on the political ladder.
A former chairman of London Young Labour and former aide to a Labour Minister, he is a prospective candidate for Havering Council in East London.
Today, though, at 26, he finds himself sitting somewhere between Sir Fred Goodwin and swine flu in the court of public opinion.
Over the weekend, Mr White launched a vituperative personal broadside at the most popular and respected figure in British public life.
The cause of Mr White’s foam-flecked fury was a suggestion that there should be a public holiday for the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee in 2012.
Read more...
Bishop of Blackburn says he will not convert to Rome
Religious Intelligence
Tuesday, 17th November 2009. 12:51pm
By: George Conger.
The Bishop of Blackburn will not be taking the Pope up on his offer of a home for disaffected Anglicans in the Roman Catholic Church.
In an interview given to the Lancashire Telegraph, the Rt Rev Nicholas Reade said “I am Bishop of Blackburn, and I will continue to be until the good Lord releases me from it.”
At a joint press conference in London held by the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Archbishop of Westminster plans for a “personal ordinariate” for Anglicans who sought to enter into full communion with the Roman Catholic Church, while maintaining some aspects of their Anglican identity were announced.
Bishop Reade said the Pope’s offer was “very generous” but “I would have to say I don’t expect many to go” over to Rome.
“The Church of England is a big tent and while there are boundaries to what Anglicans believe, we are a Church that makes room for everyone,” he said. The point of friction in the Church of England for Anglo-Catholics today was the issue of “whether we have women bishops. It’s not quite as simple as saying ‘we have women judges and a woman Prime Minister’. I would hope we could come up with a stance that’s able to appeal to both sides.”
Bishop Reade said he would not be going over to Rome. “I would want to see my time out as Bishop of Blackburn. In other words, I could only cease to be Bishop of Blackburn if ill health, death or retirement intervened.”
Link to original...
Tuesday, 17th November 2009. 12:51pm
By: George Conger.
The Bishop of Blackburn will not be taking the Pope up on his offer of a home for disaffected Anglicans in the Roman Catholic Church.
In an interview given to the Lancashire Telegraph, the Rt Rev Nicholas Reade said “I am Bishop of Blackburn, and I will continue to be until the good Lord releases me from it.”
At a joint press conference in London held by the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Archbishop of Westminster plans for a “personal ordinariate” for Anglicans who sought to enter into full communion with the Roman Catholic Church, while maintaining some aspects of their Anglican identity were announced.
Bishop Reade said the Pope’s offer was “very generous” but “I would have to say I don’t expect many to go” over to Rome.
“The Church of England is a big tent and while there are boundaries to what Anglicans believe, we are a Church that makes room for everyone,” he said. The point of friction in the Church of England for Anglo-Catholics today was the issue of “whether we have women bishops. It’s not quite as simple as saying ‘we have women judges and a woman Prime Minister’. I would hope we could come up with a stance that’s able to appeal to both sides.”
Bishop Reade said he would not be going over to Rome. “I would want to see my time out as Bishop of Blackburn. In other words, I could only cease to be Bishop of Blackburn if ill health, death or retirement intervened.”
Link to original...
Lottery System to choose next Serbian Patriarch
Faith World
If U.S. voters elected their president in the same way the Serbian Orthodox Church chooses it patriarch, they could have seen Ralph Nader, Ross Perot or other third place finishers taking up residence in the White House. That’s because the Church, in a move originally aimed at thwarting Communist authorities, uses a system that incorporates a lottery within the election by church elders to choose a leader.
The Holy Synod of Bishops, the Church’s top executive body, will use that system within the next three months to elect a successor to Patriarch Pavle, who died on Sunday. Pavle headed the Serbian Orthodox Church during the breakup of Yugoslavia in the 1990s as Serbs warred with neighbours of other faiths.
Pavle, 95, died at Belgrade’s Military Hospital where he had been treated since 2007 for various ailments. As his health deteriorated, although nominally still head of the church until death, Pavle had given up its day-to-day running in 2008 to Bishop Amfilohije, who is seen as a Serb nationalist on issues such as Kosovo.
Read further...
If U.S. voters elected their president in the same way the Serbian Orthodox Church chooses it patriarch, they could have seen Ralph Nader, Ross Perot or other third place finishers taking up residence in the White House. That’s because the Church, in a move originally aimed at thwarting Communist authorities, uses a system that incorporates a lottery within the election by church elders to choose a leader.
The Holy Synod of Bishops, the Church’s top executive body, will use that system within the next three months to elect a successor to Patriarch Pavle, who died on Sunday. Pavle headed the Serbian Orthodox Church during the breakup of Yugoslavia in the 1990s as Serbs warred with neighbours of other faiths.
Pavle, 95, died at Belgrade’s Military Hospital where he had been treated since 2007 for various ailments. As his health deteriorated, although nominally still head of the church until death, Pavle had given up its day-to-day running in 2008 to Bishop Amfilohije, who is seen as a Serb nationalist on issues such as Kosovo.
Read further...
Iraqi Bishop Holds Catholic Mass at COB Adder
By: Sgt. Matthew E. Jones on: Sun Nov. 15, 2009
@WDTPRS
CONTINGENCY OPERATING BASE ADDER, Iraq – The acting bishop of Basra held Catholic Mass here Nov. 7 in honor of the service members and civilians working toward a safer, more secure Iraq.
Read further...
@WDTPRS
CONTINGENCY OPERATING BASE ADDER, Iraq – The acting bishop of Basra held Catholic Mass here Nov. 7 in honor of the service members and civilians working toward a safer, more secure Iraq.
Read further...
Christmas could be killed off by Harman's Equality Bill, bishops warn
Mail Online
By Kirsty Walker
Harriet Harman's Equality Bill strengthens protection for minority groups by placing new equality duty on public bodies
Christmas celebrations could be banned under Harriet Harman's controversial Equality Bill, Catholic bishops warned yesterday.
The bishops said they feared that the complex legislation could have the 'chilling effect' of town halls and other organisations clamping down on Christian festivities.
Monsignor Andrew Summersgill, the general secretary of the Catholic Bishops' Conference, has written to MPs expressing his concerns about the new legislation.
His submission warns that the Equality Bill will fuel Britain's 'risk averse' culture.
The bishops pointed to bizarre decisions made in recent years to ban Christmas decorations for fear of offending other cultures.
Oxford city council last year provoked outrage by renaming the city's Christmas festival as the 'Winter Light Festival' to make it more inclusive.
Read further...
By Kirsty Walker
Harriet Harman's Equality Bill strengthens protection for minority groups by placing new equality duty on public bodies
Christmas celebrations could be banned under Harriet Harman's controversial Equality Bill, Catholic bishops warned yesterday.
The bishops said they feared that the complex legislation could have the 'chilling effect' of town halls and other organisations clamping down on Christian festivities.
Monsignor Andrew Summersgill, the general secretary of the Catholic Bishops' Conference, has written to MPs expressing his concerns about the new legislation.
His submission warns that the Equality Bill will fuel Britain's 'risk averse' culture.
The bishops pointed to bizarre decisions made in recent years to ban Christmas decorations for fear of offending other cultures.
Oxford city council last year provoked outrage by renaming the city's Christmas festival as the 'Winter Light Festival' to make it more inclusive.
Read further...
Cardinal George advocates strong Leadership
"Your submission to your bishop, who is in the place of Jesus Christ, shows me that you are not living as men usually do but in the manner of Jesus himself," Antioch wrote in a citation noted by Cardinal George.
That elevated view of the bishop's authority guided George's remarks. For example, he made it clear that even the recent years of crisis would not cow the bishops in their effort to reassert their authority and relevance.
This is good news that he wishes to affirm the role of Bishop quoting St. Ignatius of Antioch, but what does it mean? He makes it clear that he will not only attempt to quell the progressive voices, but also those that are more Ultramontane and Traditionalist. How often has anyone heard the familiar cliche about turning back the clock?
"There are some who would like to trap the church in historical events of ages long past, and there are others who would keep the bishops permanently imprisoned in the clerical sexual abuse scandal of recent years," George said. "The proper response to a crisis of governance, however, is not no governance but effective governance."
If Bishops were more about teaching the Catholic Faith rather than engaging in Inter-faith and social justice, they would have an easier time asserting their authority when it comes to those dissident liberal groups who undermine the Bishop's authority not infrequently and seem to feed at the trough of social justice and religious indifferentism. If Catholics are ignorant of their Faith, they are so because American Bishops have worked so hard in the past to minimize those things, like the authority of Bishops, in favor of liberal ideas like false ecumenism, religious liberty and indifferentism.
As it is, they are "prisoners of the sexual abuse scandal" because they recruited wicked men and women to run their schools, parishes and poor relief programs. Cardinal George still seems to have a problem with this himself. Despite talking tough about dealing with the problem, the Cardinal didn't follow through as this NPR report will indicate.
He also housed a priest from Delaware who had these problems and denied knowing anything about the man's problems and is accused of dishonesty by Justice Anne M. Burke of Illinois at NPR.
San Francisco Archbishop George Niederauer, chairman of the committee on Catholic media, told reporters after Monday's opening session that in recent years the political and media landscape has sprouted so many organizations and websites and lobbies using the Catholic label -- and advocating competing agendas -- that churchgoers are confused.
"Catholics will approach us, and approach their pastors in their church, and ask us, 'Well, I hear this outfit is called Catholic and it says this and another says this and another one something else. Can they all be Catholic and disagree so vehemently with each other?' That does challenge us to makes sense of it and to speak as bishops," said Niederauer, who is widely regarded as a media-savvy prelate with a moderate temperament.
This confusion is in no small part the responsibility of Bishops like Niederauer whose glowing admiration for the film "Brokeback Mountain" was evident, but he did after all, apologize for giving Holy Communion to the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence at Mass. All of this wouldn't have been possible without all of those "outfits" that reported the event on the internet. One wonders if anything would have been done at all if the story had only been aired in the centenarian publication, The Wanderer.
Link to article...
Catholic Church pushes Bill in House, Chapels.
Abortion rights supporters say that Bishops don't speak for the majority of Catholics, but this article says that 68% of Catholic actually support the Stupak Amendment. The author of the following article says that the US Bishops have reached out in a very definitive way on the issue of abortion, more than would have been possible for various pro-life groups.
Boston Herald
WASHINGTON — For weeks, the Catholic Church has asked its parishioners to work toward ensuring tough language restricting federal funding of abortion is included in the federal health care overhaul.
The church has gone so far as to insert a prayer into the weekly bulletins in the pews of its dioceses across the country, one that implores Congress to "act to ensure that needed health care reform will truly protect the life, dignity and health care of all."
But while the church is trying to rally its forces outside of Congress, it is also using its leverage within.
Read further...
Boston Herald
WASHINGTON — For weeks, the Catholic Church has asked its parishioners to work toward ensuring tough language restricting federal funding of abortion is included in the federal health care overhaul.
The church has gone so far as to insert a prayer into the weekly bulletins in the pews of its dioceses across the country, one that implores Congress to "act to ensure that needed health care reform will truly protect the life, dignity and health care of all."
But while the church is trying to rally its forces outside of Congress, it is also using its leverage within.
Read further...
Monday, November 16, 2009
Pope: Church exists to evangelize the whole World
VATICAN CITY, (VIS) - World Mission Day, which falls on the
third Sunday of October, provided the theme for the Pope's remarks before praying the Angelus on Sunday.
The Holy Father told the thousands of faithful gathered at noon in St. Peter's Square that World Mission Sunday represented, "for all ecclesial communities and for each Christian, a powerful call to commit themselves to announcing and bearing witness to the Gospel to everyone, especially to people who do not yet know it".
"It is the light of the Gospel that guides peoples on their journey and leads them towards the realisation of the one great family, in justice and peace, under the paternity of the one good and merciful God", he said. "The Church exists to announce this message of hope to all humankind which in our time 'has experienced marvelous achievements but which seems to have lost its sense of ultimate realities and of existence itself'".
On World Mission Sunday "the Universal Church places the spotlight on her own missionary vocation. Guided by the Holy Spirit she knows she is called to continue the work of Jesus Himself, announcing the Gospel of the Kingdom of God, which is 'righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit".
"This Kingdom is already present in the world as a force for love, freedom,solidarity, and respect for the dignity of all mankind; and the ecclesial community feels in its heart the urgent need to work so the sovereignty of Christ may be fully achieved".
Benedict XVI then went on to mention "the missionaries - priests,religious and lay volunteers - who consecrate their lives to taking the Gospel into the world, facing discomforts and difficulties, sometimes even full-on persecutions.
"My thoughts go out to, among others, Fr. Ruggero Ruvoletto, a 'fidei donum' priest killed recently in Brazil, and to Fr. Michael Sinnot, a religious kidnapped a few days ago in the Philippines. And how can we not think of what is emerging from the Synod of Bishops for Africa in terms of extreme sacrifice and love for Christ and for His Church?"
The Pope then thanked the Pontifical Missionary Works for their service "in encouraging and educating missionaries". And he concluded: "I invite all Christians to make a gesture of material and spiritual support to help the young Churches in the poorest countries".
- - -
Deacon Keith Fournier asks that you join with us and help in this vital mission by sending this article to your family, friends, and neighbors and adding our link (www.catholic.org) to your own website, blog or social network. Let us broadcast, we are PROUD TO BE CATHOLIC!
Link here...
third Sunday of October, provided the theme for the Pope's remarks before praying the Angelus on Sunday.
The Holy Father told the thousands of faithful gathered at noon in St. Peter's Square that World Mission Sunday represented, "for all ecclesial communities and for each Christian, a powerful call to commit themselves to announcing and bearing witness to the Gospel to everyone, especially to people who do not yet know it".
"It is the light of the Gospel that guides peoples on their journey and leads them towards the realisation of the one great family, in justice and peace, under the paternity of the one good and merciful God", he said. "The Church exists to announce this message of hope to all humankind which in our time 'has experienced marvelous achievements but which seems to have lost its sense of ultimate realities and of existence itself'".
On World Mission Sunday "the Universal Church places the spotlight on her own missionary vocation. Guided by the Holy Spirit she knows she is called to continue the work of Jesus Himself, announcing the Gospel of the Kingdom of God, which is 'righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit".
"This Kingdom is already present in the world as a force for love, freedom,solidarity, and respect for the dignity of all mankind; and the ecclesial community feels in its heart the urgent need to work so the sovereignty of Christ may be fully achieved".
Benedict XVI then went on to mention "the missionaries - priests,religious and lay volunteers - who consecrate their lives to taking the Gospel into the world, facing discomforts and difficulties, sometimes even full-on persecutions.
"My thoughts go out to, among others, Fr. Ruggero Ruvoletto, a 'fidei donum' priest killed recently in Brazil, and to Fr. Michael Sinnot, a religious kidnapped a few days ago in the Philippines. And how can we not think of what is emerging from the Synod of Bishops for Africa in terms of extreme sacrifice and love for Christ and for His Church?"
The Pope then thanked the Pontifical Missionary Works for their service "in encouraging and educating missionaries". And he concluded: "I invite all Christians to make a gesture of material and spiritual support to help the young Churches in the poorest countries".
- - -
Deacon Keith Fournier asks that you join with us and help in this vital mission by sending this article to your family, friends, and neighbors and adding our link (www.catholic.org) to your own website, blog or social network. Let us broadcast, we are PROUD TO BE CATHOLIC!
Link here...
Cardinal George advocates Medical Wealth confiscation
Cardinal George at CNS is quoted here describing the priest's role as a conduit for Democratic Party talking points and Socialist wealth redistribution programs. It's well nigh impossible to imagine what expertise this Cardinal has in the health care field, but he has a large captive audience and is good at uttering soothing words of encouragement. It would be understandable if not a few people are more confused than ever about the role of a priest.
Read entire article...
Recently, he noted, "we have tried to be such a leaven in the debate about health care. It is not for us to speak to a particular means of delivering health care; it is our responsibility, however, to insist, as a moral voice concerned with human solidarity, that everyone should be cared for and that no one should be deliberately killed."
Read entire article...
Oregon Province sexual abuse claims may reach 500
Number of victims alleging abuse exceeds expectations
[Seattle University Spectator]
By Joshua Lynch
Updated: Thursday, November 12, 2009
Attorneys representing victims of sexual abuse in a case against the Oregon Province of the Society of Jesus are finding they have more clients than they expected.
As a Nov. 30 deadline for filing claims against the Oregon Province approaches, some plaintiff’s attorneys are estimating that the total between several firms will reach 500 claims alleging abuse by as many as 80 Jesuits.
Read further...
Losing's a Habit and the Jesuits are Losing...
[Seattle University Spectator]
By Joshua Lynch
Updated: Thursday, November 12, 2009
Attorneys representing victims of sexual abuse in a case against the Oregon Province of the Society of Jesus are finding they have more clients than they expected.
As a Nov. 30 deadline for filing claims against the Oregon Province approaches, some plaintiff’s attorneys are estimating that the total between several firms will reach 500 claims alleging abuse by as many as 80 Jesuits.
Read further...
Losing's a Habit and the Jesuits are Losing...
A Questionable Champion of the Soviet "martyr" Jesuits: the infamous Bishop Hubbard
Catholic News service is eager to get the full service story about the USCCB which can't get its story straight about some revolutionary Jesuits who thought they knew better how El Salvadoran citizens should spend their money than they themselves knew, and promised us, that there was severe political repression without giving us any concrete examples or even a demonstrable understanding of economics. Unfortunately, the Salvadoran Army gave the Soviet interlopers in Central America something they could really use, "martyrs". Despite years of actual oppression by the Socialist regimes for whom they worked, Cuba and the Soviet Union, these Jesuits didn't and still don't have much to say about how they'd improve the lot of the ordinary Salvadoran; nothing workable, just pie in the sky penumbras. Maybe land reform would be the ticket? That didn't work either, and the El Salvadoran government the Communist rebels and their Jesuit allies were trying to topple actually enacted those reforms too.
But the USCCB, ever eager to show how it believes in Central Command Economy, has today stepped in to remind America about a few traitorous Jesuits who supported Communist insurgency in Central America and got in the line of fire for their troubles.
BALTIMORE (CNS) -- The U.S. bishops added their collective voice to those of others in honoring the memory of the six Salvadoran Jesuit priests, their housekeeper and her daughter, all of whom were assassinated 20 years ago by a Salvadoran death squad.
Bishop Howard J. Hubbard of Albany, N.Y., chairman of the bishops' Committee on International Justice and Peace, said in a statement issued Nov. 16 -- the anniversary date of the murders -- that the bishops joined many others in "commemorating the lives and work of the six Jesuits and their collaborators."
Remaining article...
For years we've been hearing about the shenanigans of the Jesuits. The morally and financially bankrupt Oregon Province, for example. So then, we have a credibly accused and maleficent Bishop who defends causes indicative of outright Marxism. That romantic worker's struggle in Central America. Despite all of the evidence that the Jesuits so engaged were at best fools and at worst scoundrels of the worst possible kind, these clerical men of the left insist we remember them as heroes. These leftists and their sordid connections and questionable associations, who say certain things and believe certain things or at least say they believe certain things.
His fascination with "No Nukes".
Then there's the suspicious suicide of one Bishop Hubbard's detractors, the conservative Father Minkler, just three days after he signed an affidavit denying that he'd written a 1995 letter to Cardinal O'Connor accusing Bishop Hubbard of homosexuality. Suspiciously, the autopsy took months to complete and was finally ruled a "suicide". In the wake of accusations, the Diocese hired an independant investigator, Mary Jo White to clear his name. According to John Aretakis, an attorney for many of the alleged victims of Bishop Hubbard and his priests, the cost went into the millions. Bishop Hubbard and his liberal Colleague, Bishop Mathew Clark both took lie detector tests but habitual liers can defeat them.
Link to another article by Matt C. Abbott in 2004...
And from Maurice Pinay about Bishop Hubbard's rabbinical associates also involved in pederasty and giving him some public good PR in the wake of the scandal, here.
Cardinal Schönborn is coming to Medjugorje Shrine
By the turn of the year, Cardinal Schönborn is coming to Medjugorje, says kathnet. He'll be meeting with the "Seer" and the Oratory of the Cenacle Society and Schwester Elvira as well as the local ordinary who is a Medjugorje-critic.
Speaking in glowing terms about the condemned apparition, the Cardinal insists that Our Lady has revealed herself to Her children in a "special way" at Medjugorje.
Link to article...
Speaking in glowing terms about the condemned apparition, the Cardinal insists that Our Lady has revealed herself to Her children in a "special way" at Medjugorje.
Link to article...
Committee for the release of Mohammad-Reza: Iran
The International Monarchist Conference (IMC), a confederal organization regrouping 64 monarchist organization representing 29 nations, protests against the pronounced death sentence against three Iranian monarchist activists, members of the Association of the Iranian Monarchy : Mohammad-Reza Ali Zamani, 37 years old, Hamed Rouhinejad, 24, and Arash Rahmanpour, only 20. Mohammad-Reza- Ali Zamani appeared last on August 8th, together with the French citizen Clothilde REISS, before the Tehran Revolutionary Court.All three men have just been sentenced to death becauseof the part they played in the protest movement that shook the Islamic Republic after the presidential elections last June.
Together, let us formulate the demand to release the political prisoners of Iran !
Anyhow, the date of November 3, has passed and we don't know what happened to the captured Monarchists, but we'll let you know as soon as we find out. In the meantime, check out the page here for some history on Iranian history and that of the Pahlavi royal family.
Link to English Language Version...
Together, let us formulate the demand to release the political prisoners of Iran !
Anyhow, the date of November 3, has passed and we don't know what happened to the captured Monarchists, but we'll let you know as soon as we find out. In the meantime, check out the page here for some history on Iranian history and that of the Pahlavi royal family.
Link to English Language Version...
America Magazine decries Catholicism in the USCCB
While the liberal establishment in the American Episcopacy is as old as the founding of the United States, America Magazine remains as predictable as ever, as their propaganda machine for the DNC at prayer attempts to broker liberalism and modernism as sensible and exclude actual Catholicism as mere political cynicism. One gets the feeling that you just know some of them are simmering about certain Catholic Dioceses' support for Defense of Marriage plebiscites in the last election. It's high time the USCCB shows some political independence from America's ruling elites, but the Jesuits don't think that deeply any more. Their old-style opposition to the liberalising power of the State is a long ways back in the mirror. You'd think their experience in the Spanish Civil War would give them a distaste of liberalism, but here they are.
The USCCB begins its annual plenary session today in Baltimore. On the formal agenda, the bishops will consider a proposed pastoral letter on marriage (which they should scrap and start over) and the final approval of Mass translations (some are good, some not so good but it is past time to fight over them anyway). Behind the scenes, the issue that dominates all the others is the polarization within the Conference, a polarization that seems to have been imported from the political world into the USCCB. [Modern Jesuits like to create equivalence between those who espouse Catholic points of view and political righists to delegitimize their positions] The most important thing for the bishops to do this week is to heed the voice of their president, Cardinal George, to resist the political categories of left and right and return to “simply Catholicism.”
Link here...
Indeed, the Jesuit commentator makes an attempt to salvage a bit, a situation that's looking increasingly tenuous for the modernist Jesuit.
Weak, Father Journalist, just because your boys were under suspicion of heresy, doesn't mean you won't be some day too.
Yes indeed, perhaps the days of going over to Fr. X. SJ's apartment, spinning Dylan records and the like are coming to an end. Seems like the Jesuits are a little more concerned these days. As their senses become enfeebled thanks to the windy decrepitude of icy old age, they're starting to find themselves outnumbered. They've always been outgunned, at least in this century, but now they have to worry that they're a minority and what's worse is that "witch-hunters" in the Church aren't too pleased with their frequent heterodox musings and crypto-Marxism.
More certainly of what the Jesuits are unhappy about these days are the calling into question of some of their fellow-traveller initiatives like ACORN and CCHD. These organizations have a lot in common with modern Jesuits, adjetives like "irrelavent", "obsolute", "Post-Marxist" and "effeminate" come to mind. But the worst of all for them is that the modern Jesuit is subject to the same kind of exposure for their charlatranry that ACORN was. Yes, you too can be held accountable by Dominican Inquisitors some day, God willing.
NCCB reports on ACORN....
The USCCB begins its annual plenary session today in Baltimore. On the formal agenda, the bishops will consider a proposed pastoral letter on marriage (which they should scrap and start over) and the final approval of Mass translations (some are good, some not so good but it is past time to fight over them anyway). Behind the scenes, the issue that dominates all the others is the polarization within the Conference, a polarization that seems to have been imported from the political world into the USCCB. [Modern Jesuits like to create equivalence between those who espouse Catholic points of view and political righists to delegitimize their positions] The most important thing for the bishops to do this week is to heed the voice of their president, Cardinal George, to resist the political categories of left and right and return to “simply Catholicism.”
Link here...
Indeed, the Jesuit commentator makes an attempt to salvage a bit, a situation that's looking increasingly tenuous for the modernist Jesuit.
As Pope Benedict made clear in his encyclical Caritas in Veritate, life issues are social justice issues and social justice issues are life issues. The Church’s teaching must be received, understood and accepted integrally. I know that integralism is a word with a sinister history, espoused by Catholic witch-hunters during the reign of Pius X and the last years of Pius XII to brand anyone who disagreed with them as heretics. Among those caught in the web of suspicion in the reign of Piux X were Giacomo della Chiesa and Angelo Roncalli, who became Pope Benedict XV and Pope John XXIII respectively. That is not the integralism Pope Benedict XVI calls for.
Weak, Father Journalist, just because your boys were under suspicion of heresy, doesn't mean you won't be some day too.
Yes indeed, perhaps the days of going over to Fr. X. SJ's apartment, spinning Dylan records and the like are coming to an end. Seems like the Jesuits are a little more concerned these days. As their senses become enfeebled thanks to the windy decrepitude of icy old age, they're starting to find themselves outnumbered. They've always been outgunned, at least in this century, but now they have to worry that they're a minority and what's worse is that "witch-hunters" in the Church aren't too pleased with their frequent heterodox musings and crypto-Marxism.
More certainly of what the Jesuits are unhappy about these days are the calling into question of some of their fellow-traveller initiatives like ACORN and CCHD. These organizations have a lot in common with modern Jesuits, adjetives like "irrelavent", "obsolute", "Post-Marxist" and "effeminate" come to mind. But the worst of all for them is that the modern Jesuit is subject to the same kind of exposure for their charlatranry that ACORN was. Yes, you too can be held accountable by Dominican Inquisitors some day, God willing.
NCCB reports on ACORN....
Sunday, November 15, 2009
Greek Orthodox solidarity in face of crucifix ban
The Turks were a good incentive for talks of reunion at the Council of Lyon in 1276 and at Ferrara-Florence in 1438. Now we together face both Islam and Secularism at the same time. Examples like this are further encouragements for those of us who are optomistic about an end to the Great Schism.
The Greek Orthodox Church is urging Christians across Europe to oppose a ban on crucifixes in classrooms in Italy. The ban came as a result of a November 3 ruling by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) in France that the presence of crucifixes violated a child's right to freedom of religion. The European Court of Human Rights found that the compulsory display of crucifixes violated parents' rights to educate their children as they saw fit and restricted the right of children to believe or not to believe. Immediately after the ruling, Vatican spokesman Rev. Federico Lombardi said the crucifix was a fundamental sign of the importance of religious values in Italian history and culture and was a symbol of unity and welcoming for all of humanity — not one of exclusion.
Read Further...
The Greek Orthodox Church is urging Christians across Europe to oppose a ban on crucifixes in classrooms in Italy. The ban came as a result of a November 3 ruling by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) in France that the presence of crucifixes violated a child's right to freedom of religion. The European Court of Human Rights found that the compulsory display of crucifixes violated parents' rights to educate their children as they saw fit and restricted the right of children to believe or not to believe. Immediately after the ruling, Vatican spokesman Rev. Federico Lombardi said the crucifix was a fundamental sign of the importance of religious values in Italian history and culture and was a symbol of unity and welcoming for all of humanity — not one of exclusion.
Read Further...
What happened to Msgr Dale Fuschek?
Diogenes knows.
Former Diocese of Phoenix priest Dale Fushek is the founder of LifeTeen ministries. In 2005 he was charged with ten misdemeanor counts of criminal sexual mischief, which included indecent exposure, contributing to the delinquency of a minor, and assault. One of the misdemeanors is alleged to have occurred in the hot tub of Fushek's parish rectory. I couldn't find the Sacerdotal Guidelines for Hot Tub Hospitality at the USCCB's website, but it would appear that Fushek would have failed in any case to abide by them.
Link to Diogenes...
Former Diocese of Phoenix priest Dale Fushek is the founder of LifeTeen ministries. In 2005 he was charged with ten misdemeanor counts of criminal sexual mischief, which included indecent exposure, contributing to the delinquency of a minor, and assault. One of the misdemeanors is alleged to have occurred in the hot tub of Fushek's parish rectory. I couldn't find the Sacerdotal Guidelines for Hot Tub Hospitality at the USCCB's website, but it would appear that Fushek would have failed in any case to abide by them.
Link to Diogenes...
Heretical Jesuits celebrate 20th Anniversary of Soviet "Martyrs"
Despite the established fact that the Salvadoran rebel FMLN was determined as the guerrilla force backed by Soviet military intervention by the State Department as early as 1981 [El Salvadoran Civil War, Globalsecurity.org], quite a few leftists within the Jesuit order are still prepared to defend their involvement on the losing side in the war, and they get to teach your children at places like Creighton, Gonzaga, Georgetown and Loyola, at high prices, indoctrinating them, or at least trying. One wonders how these tired fellow travellers keep doing what they do.
The Jesuits engaged in armed struggle while identifying their socialist struggle with "defending the rights of the poor against the rich". Jesuit priests gave aid and support to these revolutionary agents of the Soviet Union and this is something they won't be discussing tomorrow.
So many times, leftist sympathizers ignore the reality of the Soviet role played in the El Salvadoran civil war, and on November 16th, they are going to commemorate this deception by remembering the Liberation Theology Jesuits who got caught in the middle of the fighting where they occasionally took up arms on the wrong side and paid the ultimate price as men must do. Unfortunately, the word "martyr" is applied to these men, but a look at the individuals engaged in this mad adulation reveal a pedigree of dissent from Church teachings and active if not passive engagement with Marxist causes.
Even the Democratic Congress places itself under suspicion by its recent passage of a resolution to commemorate these communists.
See Jesuit website depicting Communists as "martyrs".
Related article... portraying the commemoration taking place in all Jesuit Colleges and Universities in the United States. One wonders if anyone will show up.
The Jesuits engaged in armed struggle while identifying their socialist struggle with "defending the rights of the poor against the rich". Jesuit priests gave aid and support to these revolutionary agents of the Soviet Union and this is something they won't be discussing tomorrow.
So many times, leftist sympathizers ignore the reality of the Soviet role played in the El Salvadoran civil war, and on November 16th, they are going to commemorate this deception by remembering the Liberation Theology Jesuits who got caught in the middle of the fighting where they occasionally took up arms on the wrong side and paid the ultimate price as men must do. Unfortunately, the word "martyr" is applied to these men, but a look at the individuals engaged in this mad adulation reveal a pedigree of dissent from Church teachings and active if not passive engagement with Marxist causes.
Even the Democratic Congress places itself under suspicion by its recent passage of a resolution to commemorate these communists.
H. Res. 761, remembering and commemorating the lives and work of the six Jesuit Fathers and two women on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of their deaths at the UCA in San Salvador on November 16, 1989. The United States House of Representatives is set to pass House Resolution 761.
See Jesuit website depicting Communists as "martyrs".
Related article... portraying the commemoration taking place in all Jesuit Colleges and Universities in the United States. One wonders if anyone will show up.
The head of the Serbian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Pavle, has died in Belgrade, the Church has announced.
The patriarch, 95, became leader of the Church in 1990. He was admitted to the city's military hospital two years ago.
Though he reportedly suffered from heart and lung conditions, the Church did not specify the cause of death.
Most of Serbia's population of seven million people are Orthodox Christians. President Boris Tadic said this was "an irredeemable death" for the nation.
"There are people who bond entire nations and Pavle was such a person," Mr Tadic said in a statement.
"His death is also my personal loss," the president said.
Bishop Amfilohije, who has served as acting head of the church during most of Pavle's illness, broke into tears as he held a prayer after announcing the death.
Serbs mourn. Bells tolled from Serbian churches, as the government announced three days of mourning, beginning on Monday.
Another bishop, Lavrentije, said the patriarch's death was no reason to be sad.
"The Serbian people now have someone to represent them before God better than anyone else," Lavrentije said.
The Church's highest body, the Holy Synod, may announce as early as Monday when a new patriarch will be chosen - usually after at least 40 days.
Serb interests
Pavle was a respected theologian and linguist, known for personal humility and modesty.
After the fall of communism and rise of Serb nationalism, the Church regained a leading role during his rule.
At the beginning of the Balkan wars that followed the dissolution of Yugoslavia in the early 1990s, Pavle said - according to Serbian state television: "It is our oath not to make a single child cry or sadden a single old woman because they are of another religion or nation."
But critics accused him of failing to contain hardline bishops and priests who supported Serb paramilitaries against Catholic Croats and Bosnian Muslims.
After those wars, Pavle became more directly involved - openly criticising Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic, after he lost Kosovo following Nato's intervention.
Since then, the Serbian Orthodox Church has strongly supported the Serbian government in its efforts to stop Kosovo's independence drive.
"Kosovo is not only a question of territory, it is a question of our spiritual being," he said after Kosovo's declaration of independence.
Link to article...
Argument of the Month Club Minnesota
Like the Theology on Tap, and its various iterations, the Argument of the Month, features monthly speakers throughout the fall and winter and is gaining in popularity. It's a place where men of all ages can get together and celebrate conformity and find some hope for the future as they struggle with the moral vacuity of the world while trying to raise families and protect them from without. The Star and Tribune gives a positive article. Here, Remnant Editor Michael Matt is debating the Headmaster, Dr. Kevin Ferdinandt of Providence Academy, a local Catholic K-12 on the merits and demerits of homeschooling.
There are two aspects of the Argument of the Month Club that you'll get no argument about: It's fun, and it's exploding in popularity.
The theological debates that began with six men at a back table in a St. Paul restaurant now are monthly meetings that routinely draw 300-plus people, some from as far away as Cambridge, St. Cloud and Wabasha.
"I came last month for the first time and it just blew me away," said Lyle Bowe, a West St. Paul resident who attended his second meeting Tuesday evening. "I've been telling everyone what a great evening it is. The food is great, the company is great, the arguing is great."
It's an all-male group, which is itself something of a phenomenon, said the Rev. John Echert, rector of St. Augustine Catholic Church in South St. Paul, which hosts the meetings in its basement.
"This is a very unique success story," he said. "Getting women's groups together in a church is often very easy, but getting men's groups together is tough. And to get this many men together. ... " He shook his head as he looked around the room before adding with a tinge of awe: "It's unprecedented."
It's happening almost completely by word-of-mouth. The club has a website (www.aotmclub.com) and sweatshirts (emblazoned with "What is truth?"). "That's it in terms of getting the word out," said Josh Teske, the club's webmaster. "We don't do any advertising."
The club was started by Roman Catholics and still focuses on issues that affect Catholics, but it's often done from a big-picture perspective that reaches beyond Catholicism and draws a broader crowd.
"We have people of all faiths here," Echert said, and, sometimes, even nonfaiths, he added, pointing to a debate in January between a religious studies professor and a representative of Minnesota Atheists. "He brought several of his atheist friends along for support, and we were glad to have them."
The group's growth has forced changes in format, but the basic approach remains the same, said Kent Wuchterl, the club's director and one of its half-dozen original members 10 years ago.
"We were all apologetics," he said in a reference to early Christians who defended their faith when they were criticized by outsiders. "We were looking for a way to defend our faith. So we took over a table at the St. Clair Broiler and started arguing."
Topics were picked in advance, with three men assigned to each side of the debate. Being at a restaurant, they also felt obligated to order something. Thus was set the format: food and a fight.
As the group grew, it had to keep moving to bigger venues and different approaches. Everyone was encouraged to join in the debate until attendance topped 80, at which point it became more chaotic than insightful.
The club started bringing in two speakers to hold a formal debate, which was then followed by an open-mike session in which club members could question the speakers. Once attendance reached 200, that also started getting unmanageable. Now the members submit written questions during the debate that are passed on to a moderator.
The meal is cooked by club members in St. Augustine's kitchen. It's a "manly" meal that consists heavily of meat -- heavy enough to challenge the strength of the paper plates -- followed by dessert. Tuesday's was a chocolate layer cake served in pieces only slightly smaller than a football. Even then, many went back for seconds of both courses. The cost is $12.
"Where else are you going to eat this well for $12?" Wuchterl asked. Or, he could have added, eat this much?
The crowd is eclectic. The meetings draw people as young as 8 (sons attending with their fathers) and as old as 90. Men in business suits pull up chairs next to guys in blue jeans. Their level of interest is apparent: In three hours, not a single cell phone rang, even though there were no signs asking members to turn them off.
The topics the club considers are not light; recent ones have included debates on what is a "just" war and end-of-life issues. Tuesday's debate on home schooling pitted Kevin Ferdinandt, director of Providence Academy's upper school, against Michael Matt, an ardent home schooler and the author of several books on Catholicism.
The debates can get heated, but Echert, who also serves as the de facto sergeant of arms, is ready to step in if things get nasty. That rarely happens.
"Sometimes we'll clearly line up behind one speaker or the other, but it's respectful," said Paul Notermann of Inver Grove Heights. Seated next to him was Terry Beaudry of Roseville, who added: "We're all here for a good time."
Echert estimates that about half of the regulars are there for the camaraderie and the other half for the debate. Andrew Lynch, in his third year of driving up from Owatonna for the meetings, clearly falls in the latter category. He often brings along a group of friends, and they continue the debate all the way home.
"I like to argue," he said. "I'll take either side, sometimes just to keep the discussion going. This is the highlight of my month. I wouldn't miss it."
If there's one concern for the club, it's what to do if it keeps growing. St. Augustine can handle about 100 more before the fire codes become a concern. Club officers have offered to help launch spinoff groups; a group from Alexandria came to observe an earlier meeting. Or they might have to start taking it on the road.
"We've talked about moving it around the Twin Cities, sort of a traveling argument," Wuchterl said. "I don't know what we'll do, but we'll work something out."
They can always argue about it later.
Jeff Strickler • 612-673-7392
Read further...
There are two aspects of the Argument of the Month Club that you'll get no argument about: It's fun, and it's exploding in popularity.
The theological debates that began with six men at a back table in a St. Paul restaurant now are monthly meetings that routinely draw 300-plus people, some from as far away as Cambridge, St. Cloud and Wabasha.
"I came last month for the first time and it just blew me away," said Lyle Bowe, a West St. Paul resident who attended his second meeting Tuesday evening. "I've been telling everyone what a great evening it is. The food is great, the company is great, the arguing is great."
It's an all-male group, which is itself something of a phenomenon, said the Rev. John Echert, rector of St. Augustine Catholic Church in South St. Paul, which hosts the meetings in its basement.
"This is a very unique success story," he said. "Getting women's groups together in a church is often very easy, but getting men's groups together is tough. And to get this many men together. ... " He shook his head as he looked around the room before adding with a tinge of awe: "It's unprecedented."
It's happening almost completely by word-of-mouth. The club has a website (www.aotmclub.com) and sweatshirts (emblazoned with "What is truth?"). "That's it in terms of getting the word out," said Josh Teske, the club's webmaster. "We don't do any advertising."
The club was started by Roman Catholics and still focuses on issues that affect Catholics, but it's often done from a big-picture perspective that reaches beyond Catholicism and draws a broader crowd.
"We have people of all faiths here," Echert said, and, sometimes, even nonfaiths, he added, pointing to a debate in January between a religious studies professor and a representative of Minnesota Atheists. "He brought several of his atheist friends along for support, and we were glad to have them."
The group's growth has forced changes in format, but the basic approach remains the same, said Kent Wuchterl, the club's director and one of its half-dozen original members 10 years ago.
"We were all apologetics," he said in a reference to early Christians who defended their faith when they were criticized by outsiders. "We were looking for a way to defend our faith. So we took over a table at the St. Clair Broiler and started arguing."
Topics were picked in advance, with three men assigned to each side of the debate. Being at a restaurant, they also felt obligated to order something. Thus was set the format: food and a fight.
As the group grew, it had to keep moving to bigger venues and different approaches. Everyone was encouraged to join in the debate until attendance topped 80, at which point it became more chaotic than insightful.
The club started bringing in two speakers to hold a formal debate, which was then followed by an open-mike session in which club members could question the speakers. Once attendance reached 200, that also started getting unmanageable. Now the members submit written questions during the debate that are passed on to a moderator.
The meal is cooked by club members in St. Augustine's kitchen. It's a "manly" meal that consists heavily of meat -- heavy enough to challenge the strength of the paper plates -- followed by dessert. Tuesday's was a chocolate layer cake served in pieces only slightly smaller than a football. Even then, many went back for seconds of both courses. The cost is $12.
"Where else are you going to eat this well for $12?" Wuchterl asked. Or, he could have added, eat this much?
The crowd is eclectic. The meetings draw people as young as 8 (sons attending with their fathers) and as old as 90. Men in business suits pull up chairs next to guys in blue jeans. Their level of interest is apparent: In three hours, not a single cell phone rang, even though there were no signs asking members to turn them off.
The topics the club considers are not light; recent ones have included debates on what is a "just" war and end-of-life issues. Tuesday's debate on home schooling pitted Kevin Ferdinandt, director of Providence Academy's upper school, against Michael Matt, an ardent home schooler and the author of several books on Catholicism.
The debates can get heated, but Echert, who also serves as the de facto sergeant of arms, is ready to step in if things get nasty. That rarely happens.
"Sometimes we'll clearly line up behind one speaker or the other, but it's respectful," said Paul Notermann of Inver Grove Heights. Seated next to him was Terry Beaudry of Roseville, who added: "We're all here for a good time."
Echert estimates that about half of the regulars are there for the camaraderie and the other half for the debate. Andrew Lynch, in his third year of driving up from Owatonna for the meetings, clearly falls in the latter category. He often brings along a group of friends, and they continue the debate all the way home.
"I like to argue," he said. "I'll take either side, sometimes just to keep the discussion going. This is the highlight of my month. I wouldn't miss it."
If there's one concern for the club, it's what to do if it keeps growing. St. Augustine can handle about 100 more before the fire codes become a concern. Club officers have offered to help launch spinoff groups; a group from Alexandria came to observe an earlier meeting. Or they might have to start taking it on the road.
"We've talked about moving it around the Twin Cities, sort of a traveling argument," Wuchterl said. "I don't know what we'll do, but we'll work something out."
They can always argue about it later.
Jeff Strickler • 612-673-7392
Read further...
Should the Archdiocese of DC bend to Liberal Pressure?
The following article and poll in Washington Post asks the question: should Washington D.C. be able to force the Catholic Archdiocese there to follow a law it considers immoral?
Read more at The American Catholic.
And here...
Read more at The American Catholic.
And here...
Friday, November 13, 2009
Pope approves Election of New Iraq Archbishop
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- More than 20 months after the body of kidnapped Chaldean Archbishop Paulos Faraj Rahho of Mosul, Iraq, was recovered, Pope Benedict XVI approved the election of a new archbishop for the city. The synod of bishops of the Chaldean Catholic Church elected Father Emil Shimoun Nona, an official of the Archdiocese of Alqosh, to succeed Archbishop Rahho. Pope Benedict gave his consent to the election, the Vatican announced Nov. 13. Archbishop Rahho was kidnapped Feb. 29, 2008, in an attack that left his driver and two bodyguards dead. Church leaders recovered the archbishop's body two weeks later after the kidnappers told them where they had buried him. Archbishop-elect Nona, who celebrated his 42nd birthday Nov. 1, was born in Alqosh, about 20 miles north of Mosul. Latest news briefs from Catholic News Service Posted: 11/13/2009
The Church reaches out to modern Art
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Once made in heaven, the marriage between art and the church has long been on the skids. "We are a bit like estranged relatives; there has been a divorce," said Archbishop Gianfranco Ravasi, president of the Pontifical Council for Culture. Much of contemporary art walked away from art's traditional vocation of representing the intangible and the mysterious, as well as pointing the way toward the greater meaning of life and what is good and beautiful, he said during a Vatican press conference Nov. 5. And the church has spent the past century "very often contenting itself with imitating models from the past," rarely asking itself whether there were religious "styles that could be an expression of modern times," he added. In an effort to "renew friendship and dialogue between the church and artists and to spark new opportunities for collaboration," he said, Pope Benedict XVI will be meeting more than 250 artists from around the world Nov. 21 inside one of the world's most stunning artistic treasures: the Sistine Chapel. Latest news briefs from Catholic News Service Posted: 11/13/2009
Thursday, November 12, 2009
John Allen uncages His Colours and opens Fire
John Allen of the liberal National Catholic Reporter usually tries to keep above the fray, often earning him the scorn of his fellows at NCR for being too conservative, but in yet another departure, he perhaps underscores the increasing desperation of the modernist editorial slant of NCR and their increasing desperation about Benedict's reforms which are increasingly showing their liturgical and doctrinal modernism in a bad light. We noted earlier the soft-ball interview he gave to Cardinal George, which didn't really ask any tough questions, venerating the seamless garment as it were.
National Catholic Reporter’s
John Allen
Makes Case for Secularism
by Edwin Faust
November 12, 2009
A wise man once remarked that logic and liberalism cannot co-exist in the same head. Illustrating this truth yet again is National Catholic Reporter’s John Allen, who chose to write Nov. 6 of Pope Benedict XVI’s supposed “lenience” for what Allen calls “cafeteria Catholicism” on the right.
The phrase has usually been applied to those who accept certain Catholic teachings and reject others, especially in the domain of marriage and sexual morality. The usual and more accurate term for such people is “heretics” or “Protestants.” Catholics come in only one flavor: traditional. There is no defined doctrine or immemorial custom that is optional for a Catholic.
Yet, Allen includes in his new category of cafeteria Catholics two disparate groups: The Society of St. Pius X and Anglicans wishing to return to the Church. His implication is that the SSPX remains outside the Church, despite magisterial pronouncements to the contrary. He equates the talks in Rome between representatives of the Pope and the SSPX with those between Rome and members of the Church of England: “...it’s not clear how many Lefebvrites or Anglicans will walk through the doors Rome has tried to open ...”
Precisely what defined doctrines the SSPX is supposed to have rejected are not specified. And, of course, such specification is impossible because the SSPX fully accepts every defined doctrine of the Catholic Faith. It is their unwavering orthodoxy that has caused their difficulties. The doctrinal talks in Rome are not about the SSPX’s dissent from articles of the faith, but about the post-Vatican II novelties of ecumenism, religious liberty and the New Mass, as the official communiqué from Rome following the initial talk has acknowledged.
Read more...
National Catholic Reporter’s
John Allen
Makes Case for Secularism
by Edwin Faust
November 12, 2009
A wise man once remarked that logic and liberalism cannot co-exist in the same head. Illustrating this truth yet again is National Catholic Reporter’s John Allen, who chose to write Nov. 6 of Pope Benedict XVI’s supposed “lenience” for what Allen calls “cafeteria Catholicism” on the right.
The phrase has usually been applied to those who accept certain Catholic teachings and reject others, especially in the domain of marriage and sexual morality. The usual and more accurate term for such people is “heretics” or “Protestants.” Catholics come in only one flavor: traditional. There is no defined doctrine or immemorial custom that is optional for a Catholic.
Yet, Allen includes in his new category of cafeteria Catholics two disparate groups: The Society of St. Pius X and Anglicans wishing to return to the Church. His implication is that the SSPX remains outside the Church, despite magisterial pronouncements to the contrary. He equates the talks in Rome between representatives of the Pope and the SSPX with those between Rome and members of the Church of England: “...it’s not clear how many Lefebvrites or Anglicans will walk through the doors Rome has tried to open ...”
Precisely what defined doctrines the SSPX is supposed to have rejected are not specified. And, of course, such specification is impossible because the SSPX fully accepts every defined doctrine of the Catholic Faith. It is their unwavering orthodoxy that has caused their difficulties. The doctrinal talks in Rome are not about the SSPX’s dissent from articles of the faith, but about the post-Vatican II novelties of ecumenism, religious liberty and the New Mass, as the official communiqué from Rome following the initial talk has acknowledged.
Read more...
Italian mayors respond to Strasbourg ruling by hanging more crucifixes in schools
No one tells the Italians what to do. Brussels sprouts bouncing all over the place on this one. Will they attempt to enforce this or their other attempt at lawmaking in Lithuania when the Brussels sprouts attempted to declare this law illegal in September?
Rome, Italy, Nov 12, 2009 / 01:49 pm (CNA).- A number of Italian officials have responded to the ruling by the European Human Rights Court that ordered schools in Italy to remove crucifixes from the classrooms by taking unprecedented measures to preserve the Christian symbol.
According to the Italian daily “Avvenire,” the mayor of Sezzadio, Pier Luigi Arnera, has leveled a fine of 500 euros against anyone who removes a crucifix from a public place.
Arnera explained that the displaying of the crucifix in “places other than churches does not affect the dignity of anyone, because it is one of our cultural references.”
Likewise in the cities of Sassuolo and Trapani, officials have acquired dozens more crucifixes to display them in public schools.
In Montegrotto Terme, digital billboards that normally are used to inform the public are now displaying the crucifix with the phrase, “We will not take it down.” The mayor of Assisi has ordered that Nativity scenes be displayed in addition to the crucifix in public offices.
In Varesotto a local contractor placed a 16-foot cross on his farm in order to express his indignation over the EU court ruling.
Article here...
Bishop Mixa of the Diocese of Augsburg and military chaplain of the Bundeswehr says the ban on the Crucifix will be easy to ignore according to kath.net. He points at the ridiculousness of the ban since many nations actually have a cross as part of their national colors.
Rome, Italy, Nov 12, 2009 / 01:49 pm (CNA).- A number of Italian officials have responded to the ruling by the European Human Rights Court that ordered schools in Italy to remove crucifixes from the classrooms by taking unprecedented measures to preserve the Christian symbol.
According to the Italian daily “Avvenire,” the mayor of Sezzadio, Pier Luigi Arnera, has leveled a fine of 500 euros against anyone who removes a crucifix from a public place.
Arnera explained that the displaying of the crucifix in “places other than churches does not affect the dignity of anyone, because it is one of our cultural references.”
Likewise in the cities of Sassuolo and Trapani, officials have acquired dozens more crucifixes to display them in public schools.
In Montegrotto Terme, digital billboards that normally are used to inform the public are now displaying the crucifix with the phrase, “We will not take it down.” The mayor of Assisi has ordered that Nativity scenes be displayed in addition to the crucifix in public offices.
In Varesotto a local contractor placed a 16-foot cross on his farm in order to express his indignation over the EU court ruling.
Article here...
Bishop Mixa of the Diocese of Augsburg and military chaplain of the Bundeswehr says the ban on the Crucifix will be easy to ignore according to kath.net. He points at the ridiculousness of the ban since many nations actually have a cross as part of their national colors.
A ‘Different Benedict is Here’: Benedict XVI and the New Missionary Age
In a subject dear to our hearts, the Holy Father is speaking about the Benedictine reform at the heart of his Papacy. Taking his cue from the great Benedictine House of Cluny, he traces its missionary importance as a great reforming movement aimed at carrying out the Great Commission.
It can and should be taken as a kind of manifesto and a call to men to consider an apostolic life in the Benedictine order energized by the great spirit of its founder at Nursia in the fifth Century.
This article by Deacon Keith Fournier understands that call and might serve to orient us prayerfully to pray for monks to lead us, as they always have, to lives of greater sanctity and Christian Hope.
The voices of those who wanted to place him in a terminological box have receded. This is a prophetic Pope with an inspired and historic mission that has only just begun.
Pope Benedict, like his namesake St. Benedict, has a vision for the Evangelization of Europe and the West. A 'different Benedict' is here and a new missionary age has begun.
CHESAPEAKE, Va. (Catholic Online) - History shows that the earliest days of a Papacy often send a signal for the watchful observer. We are told by some to pay attention to the name chosen by the new Pope and the content of their first messages. I vividly recall the first days of our current Pope’s service to the Church and the world. Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger chose the name Benedict. One of the young priests who commentated on this choice during the televised coverage of those extraordinary days noted that the new Pope had visited Subiaco before all the events even began. Subiaco is the home of the Benedictine monastic movement. It symbolizes the Christianization of Europe during the First Millennium.
Saint Benedict was born around the year 480 in Umbria, Italy. He is the father of Western Monasticism and co-patron of Europe (along with Saints Cyril and Methodius). As a young man, Benedict fled a decadent and declining Rome for further studies and deep prayer and reflection. He gave his life entirely to God as a son of the united Catholic Church. He traveled to Subiaco. That cave became his dwelling, the place where he communed deeply with God. It is now a shrine called "Sacro Speco" (The Holy Cave). It is still a sanctuary for pilgrims, including Pope Benedict XVI, who visited that very same place of prayer right before his election to the Chair of Peter.
Read further...
The new flowering of Cluny, auf Deutsch.
It can and should be taken as a kind of manifesto and a call to men to consider an apostolic life in the Benedictine order energized by the great spirit of its founder at Nursia in the fifth Century.
This article by Deacon Keith Fournier understands that call and might serve to orient us prayerfully to pray for monks to lead us, as they always have, to lives of greater sanctity and Christian Hope.
The voices of those who wanted to place him in a terminological box have receded. This is a prophetic Pope with an inspired and historic mission that has only just begun.
Pope Benedict, like his namesake St. Benedict, has a vision for the Evangelization of Europe and the West. A 'different Benedict' is here and a new missionary age has begun.
CHESAPEAKE, Va. (Catholic Online) - History shows that the earliest days of a Papacy often send a signal for the watchful observer. We are told by some to pay attention to the name chosen by the new Pope and the content of their first messages. I vividly recall the first days of our current Pope’s service to the Church and the world. Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger chose the name Benedict. One of the young priests who commentated on this choice during the televised coverage of those extraordinary days noted that the new Pope had visited Subiaco before all the events even began. Subiaco is the home of the Benedictine monastic movement. It symbolizes the Christianization of Europe during the First Millennium.
Saint Benedict was born around the year 480 in Umbria, Italy. He is the father of Western Monasticism and co-patron of Europe (along with Saints Cyril and Methodius). As a young man, Benedict fled a decadent and declining Rome for further studies and deep prayer and reflection. He gave his life entirely to God as a son of the united Catholic Church. He traveled to Subiaco. That cave became his dwelling, the place where he communed deeply with God. It is now a shrine called "Sacro Speco" (The Holy Cave). It is still a sanctuary for pilgrims, including Pope Benedict XVI, who visited that very same place of prayer right before his election to the Chair of Peter.
Read further...
The new flowering of Cluny, auf Deutsch.
George Soros is Funneling Funds to Liberal Catholic Organizations
A flock of carrion birds and packs of liberal Internet wolves, some in sheep's clothing have descended from the dark master's cavernous lair. The atheistic George Soros has been attempting to divide the American Catholic Church still further by relying on existing liberal organizations within the Church, like the USCCB, and the Catholic Campaign for Human Development to promote immorality and politically hamstring the Bishop's ability to preach the Catholic Faith.
Still more interesting in all of this is Soros' connection in this case to President Obama and the Saul Alinsky style community organizing that has been a real wet blanket at Diocesan Offices teaching the Catholic Faith. Sometimes the distinction between these charlatans and diocesan employees is completely blurred.
The critical role of the Catholic Church in passing national health care reform legislation is coming under serious media scrutiny. But the story has taken a strange turn. It has now been revealed that George Soros, the billionaire hedge fund operator and well-known atheist, has been pouring hundreds of thousands of dollars into "progressive" Catholic groups that are significant players in the national debates over health care and immigration.
On the surface, it would appear that Soros would be opposed to many positions of the Catholic Church.
A major financial backer of the ACLU, Soros supports such causes as drug legalization, the rights of "sex workers" and felons, euthanasia, radical feminism, abortion rights, and homosexual rights. He does all of this in the name of promoting an "open society."
But a review of the records of his Open Society Institute finds that a group calling itself
Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good (CACG) has received $200,000 from them over the last several years.
James Todd of Pewsitter.com, which represents traditional Catholics, calls such groups "CINOs," or Catholics In Name Only. He explains, "This group and several others have sprung up recently-I suspect purposely organized and funded-to counterbalance the growing influence of the faithful Catholics AND to try to deceive and mislead the middle of the road Catholics that have determined the last 13 Presidential elections."
Read further...
Pewsitter Blog.
Still more interesting in all of this is Soros' connection in this case to President Obama and the Saul Alinsky style community organizing that has been a real wet blanket at Diocesan Offices teaching the Catholic Faith. Sometimes the distinction between these charlatans and diocesan employees is completely blurred.
The critical role of the Catholic Church in passing national health care reform legislation is coming under serious media scrutiny. But the story has taken a strange turn. It has now been revealed that George Soros, the billionaire hedge fund operator and well-known atheist, has been pouring hundreds of thousands of dollars into "progressive" Catholic groups that are significant players in the national debates over health care and immigration.
On the surface, it would appear that Soros would be opposed to many positions of the Catholic Church.
A major financial backer of the ACLU, Soros supports such causes as drug legalization, the rights of "sex workers" and felons, euthanasia, radical feminism, abortion rights, and homosexual rights. He does all of this in the name of promoting an "open society."
But a review of the records of his Open Society Institute finds that a group calling itself
Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good (CACG) has received $200,000 from them over the last several years.
James Todd of Pewsitter.com, which represents traditional Catholics, calls such groups "CINOs," or Catholics In Name Only. He explains, "This group and several others have sprung up recently-I suspect purposely organized and funded-to counterbalance the growing influence of the faithful Catholics AND to try to deceive and mislead the middle of the road Catholics that have determined the last 13 Presidential elections."
Read further...
Pewsitter Blog.
Russian Church is to suspend its dialogue with German Lutherans
German Lutherans must not have much of a commitment to ecumenical dialogue if they're so insensitive as to ordain a female Bishop as they've done recently. It can't bode well either that the Swedish Lutheran Church has ordained a female homosexual either. Lines are being drawn in this battle, and it looks like dying protestant denominations are doing almost as much for the Catholic cause as Benedict by making an infernal marriage with the spirit of the post-modern age.
Moscow, November 12, Interfax – The Russian Orthodox Church is ready to suspend the dialogue with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Germany after woman bishop Margot Kaessmann has become its leader.
“We planned to celebrate the 50th anniversary of our dialogue with the Lutheran Church in Germany in late November or early December. The 50th anniversary of the dialogue will become the end of it,” head of the Moscow Patriarchate Department for External Church Relations Archbishop Hilarion of Volokolamsk was quoted as saying by the Kommersant daily on Thursday.
Archbishop Hilarion reminded that Orthodoxy did not accept female priesthood.
“We can develop the dialogue, but there raise lots of simple protocol questions. How will the Patriarch address her or meet with her?” the Russian Church representative said.
Kaessmann, 51, a divorced mother of four daughters, was elected head of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Germany, which unites over twenty Lutheran and Reformed Churches, during the Synod held on October 28.
Russian Lutherans supported the Moscow Patriarchate official’s statement and agreed that female episcopate is a sign of crisis in the Western society.
“We don’t have women bishops as introducing such an institute is not a Biblical action,” general secretary of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Ingria (Russia) Fr. Alexander Prilutsky said.
Link to article...
Moscow, November 12, Interfax – The Russian Orthodox Church is ready to suspend the dialogue with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Germany after woman bishop Margot Kaessmann has become its leader.
“We planned to celebrate the 50th anniversary of our dialogue with the Lutheran Church in Germany in late November or early December. The 50th anniversary of the dialogue will become the end of it,” head of the Moscow Patriarchate Department for External Church Relations Archbishop Hilarion of Volokolamsk was quoted as saying by the Kommersant daily on Thursday.
Archbishop Hilarion reminded that Orthodoxy did not accept female priesthood.
“We can develop the dialogue, but there raise lots of simple protocol questions. How will the Patriarch address her or meet with her?” the Russian Church representative said.
Kaessmann, 51, a divorced mother of four daughters, was elected head of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Germany, which unites over twenty Lutheran and Reformed Churches, during the Synod held on October 28.
Russian Lutherans supported the Moscow Patriarchate official’s statement and agreed that female episcopate is a sign of crisis in the Western society.
“We don’t have women bishops as introducing such an institute is not a Biblical action,” general secretary of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Ingria (Russia) Fr. Alexander Prilutsky said.
Link to article...
Meeting possible between Pope, Patriarch Kirill - Archbishop Hilarion
Moscow, November 12, Interfax - Relations between the Russian Orthodox and Roman Catholic Churches are improving and a meeting between Pope Benedict XVI and the Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia, may be on the cards, a Russian Orthodox bishop said.
"Today it can be said that we are moving to a moment when it becomes possible to prepare a meeting between the Pope and the Patriarch of Moscow," Archbishop Hilarion of Volokolamsk, the head of the Department for External Church Relations, told reporters in Moscow.
"There are no specific plans for the venue or timing of such a meeting but on both sides there is a desire to prepare it," the Archbishop said.
Preparations for such a meeting must involve finding "a common platform on all remaining points of dispute," the Archbishop said.
One such issue are relations between the Uniate community and Orthodox believers in Ukraine. In the early 1990s, "the fragile interdenominational balance was upset and a serious situation took shape that still exists," Archbishop Hilarion said.
At the same time, conversion of Orthodox believers into Catholicism is less of a problem today than it was a decade ago, he said.
Benedict XVI is "a very reserved, traditional man who does not seek the expansion of the Catholic Church to traditionally Orthodox regions," the Archbishop said.
When Benedict XVI, shortly after being elected Pope, met with Metropolitan Kirill (the present Russian Patriarch, then head of the DECR, a papal visit to Russia "was taken off the agenda as now it appears to us to be impossible," the bishop said.
After Metropolitan Kirill has been elected Patriarch, "one can hope for further steps" in Orthodox-Catholic dialogue because the Patriarch "will continue the line on relations with Christians of other denominations that he pursued as part of his former activities," the Archbishop said.
Link to article...
"Today it can be said that we are moving to a moment when it becomes possible to prepare a meeting between the Pope and the Patriarch of Moscow," Archbishop Hilarion of Volokolamsk, the head of the Department for External Church Relations, told reporters in Moscow.
"There are no specific plans for the venue or timing of such a meeting but on both sides there is a desire to prepare it," the Archbishop said.
Preparations for such a meeting must involve finding "a common platform on all remaining points of dispute," the Archbishop said.
One such issue are relations between the Uniate community and Orthodox believers in Ukraine. In the early 1990s, "the fragile interdenominational balance was upset and a serious situation took shape that still exists," Archbishop Hilarion said.
At the same time, conversion of Orthodox believers into Catholicism is less of a problem today than it was a decade ago, he said.
Benedict XVI is "a very reserved, traditional man who does not seek the expansion of the Catholic Church to traditionally Orthodox regions," the Archbishop said.
When Benedict XVI, shortly after being elected Pope, met with Metropolitan Kirill (the present Russian Patriarch, then head of the DECR, a papal visit to Russia "was taken off the agenda as now it appears to us to be impossible," the bishop said.
After Metropolitan Kirill has been elected Patriarch, "one can hope for further steps" in Orthodox-Catholic dialogue because the Patriarch "will continue the line on relations with Christians of other denominations that he pursued as part of his former activities," the Archbishop said.
Link to article...
Homosexual blog forecasts violence (OneNewsNow.com)
Homosexual blog forecasts violence (OneNewsNow.com)
The FBI is investigating terrorism threats posted on a homosexual blog that appear to be aimed at Christians.
Pro-family activists have drawn attention to a disturbing exchange on a homosexual blog run by Joe Jervis of New York. The exchange takes place between individuals named Fritz and Tex in the comment section of a blog discussing the Maine homosexual marriage defeat and pro-family activists Matt Barber of Liberty Counsel and Peter LaBarbera of Americans for Truth about Homosexuality. LaBarbera says the two commentators discussed carrying out acts of terrorism against Christians.
"One guy [Fritz] sort of raises [the concept] and says, 'well, if Obama doesn't give us what we want, you are going to see a very real potential for violence' -- to quote his words...and then he says, 'well, that is not a good thing,'" LaBarbera reports. "Then another activist comes back and says, 'Well what's wrong with that?'" (See sample of blog comments below)
The FBI is investigating terrorism threats posted on a homosexual blog that appear to be aimed at Christians.
Pro-family activists have drawn attention to a disturbing exchange on a homosexual blog run by Joe Jervis of New York. The exchange takes place between individuals named Fritz and Tex in the comment section of a blog discussing the Maine homosexual marriage defeat and pro-family activists Matt Barber of Liberty Counsel and Peter LaBarbera of Americans for Truth about Homosexuality. LaBarbera says the two commentators discussed carrying out acts of terrorism against Christians.
"One guy [Fritz] sort of raises [the concept] and says, 'well, if Obama doesn't give us what we want, you are going to see a very real potential for violence' -- to quote his words...and then he says, 'well, that is not a good thing,'" LaBarbera reports. "Then another activist comes back and says, 'Well what's wrong with that?'" (See sample of blog comments below)
German diocese creates ‘Santa-free zone’
German diocese creates ‘Santa-free zone’
Speyer, Germany, Nov 11, 2009 / 05:09 pm (CNA).- In an effort to encourage people to replace the commercialization of the Christmas season with a true devotion to Advent, Christmas and the “true Santa Claus,” several groups within the German Diocese of Speyer have initiated a “Santa-free campaign.”
The Federation of German Catholic Youth (BDKJ) of Speyer has partnered with other organizations to champion the cause of St. Nicholas of Myra, a friend and helper of children and those in trouble. St. Nicholas, whose feast is celebrated on December 6, represents the good side of man: selflessness, charity and selfless service, the campaign says.
Speyer, Germany, Nov 11, 2009 / 05:09 pm (CNA).- In an effort to encourage people to replace the commercialization of the Christmas season with a true devotion to Advent, Christmas and the “true Santa Claus,” several groups within the German Diocese of Speyer have initiated a “Santa-free campaign.”
The Federation of German Catholic Youth (BDKJ) of Speyer has partnered with other organizations to champion the cause of St. Nicholas of Myra, a friend and helper of children and those in trouble. St. Nicholas, whose feast is celebrated on December 6, represents the good side of man: selflessness, charity and selfless service, the campaign says.
Minnesota Churches contributed to Maine ballot Initiative
The audience to which they play are supposed to become irritated that tax exempt organizations are lobbying against something they want to see legitimized. The same people don't complain when the Church lobbies on behalf of illegal immigrants, however.
Posted at 5:51 PM on November 11, 2009 by Tom Scheck (1 Comments)
The campaign finance report for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland, Maine shows that four Minnesota area Catholic Dioceses contributed $6250 to a campaign to reject a law legalizing gay marriage in Maine. The ballot measure asked voters "Do you want to reject the new law that lets same-sex couples marry and allows individuals and religious groups to refuse to perform these marriages?"
The measure passed 53 percent to 47 percent in the November election. The Catholic Church considers homosexuality a sin and has worked actively to define marriage as between "one man and one woman" in states across the country.
The Diocese of Crookston donated $5,000 to the effort. The Diocese of Winona and the Diocese of La Crosse, WI gave $500 each. New Ulm's Bishop John Levoir gave $250.
Rose Hammes, spokeswoman for the Diocese of Winona, said the contribution was given because Winona Archbishop John Quinn felt it was important to help his colleagues in Maine:
"He made a contribution because they're in solidarity with all of the bishops in the country and I'm assuming that Bishop Quinn decided that that was important to be in solidarity with his brother bishops."
Posted at 5:51 PM on November 11, 2009 by Tom Scheck (1 Comments)
The campaign finance report for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland, Maine shows that four Minnesota area Catholic Dioceses contributed $6250 to a campaign to reject a law legalizing gay marriage in Maine. The ballot measure asked voters "Do you want to reject the new law that lets same-sex couples marry and allows individuals and religious groups to refuse to perform these marriages?"
The measure passed 53 percent to 47 percent in the November election. The Catholic Church considers homosexuality a sin and has worked actively to define marriage as between "one man and one woman" in states across the country.
The Diocese of Crookston donated $5,000 to the effort. The Diocese of Winona and the Diocese of La Crosse, WI gave $500 each. New Ulm's Bishop John Levoir gave $250.
Rose Hammes, spokeswoman for the Diocese of Winona, said the contribution was given because Winona Archbishop John Quinn felt it was important to help his colleagues in Maine:
"He made a contribution because they're in solidarity with all of the bishops in the country and I'm assuming that Bishop Quinn decided that that was important to be in solidarity with his brother bishops."
Catholic Church in D.C. threatens to close its Services over "Same-Sex" Marriage Law.
You can't make concessions to these people.
By Tim Craig and Michelle Boorstein
Thursday, November 12, 2009
The Catholic Archdiocese of Washington said Wednesday that it will be unable to continue the social service programs it runs for the District if the city doesn't change a proposed same-sex marriage law, a threat that could affect tens of thousands of people the church helps with adoption, homelessness and health care.
Under the bill, headed for a D.C. Council vote next month, religious organizations would not be required to perform or make space available for same-sex weddings. But they would have to obey city laws prohibiting discrimination against gay men and lesbians.
Fearful that they could be forced, among other things, to extend employee benefits to same-sex married couples, church officials said they would have no choice but to abandon their contracts with the city.
Read further...
By Tim Craig and Michelle Boorstein
Thursday, November 12, 2009
The Catholic Archdiocese of Washington said Wednesday that it will be unable to continue the social service programs it runs for the District if the city doesn't change a proposed same-sex marriage law, a threat that could affect tens of thousands of people the church helps with adoption, homelessness and health care.
Under the bill, headed for a D.C. Council vote next month, religious organizations would not be required to perform or make space available for same-sex weddings. But they would have to obey city laws prohibiting discrimination against gay men and lesbians.
Fearful that they could be forced, among other things, to extend employee benefits to same-sex married couples, church officials said they would have no choice but to abandon their contracts with the city.
Read further...
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
Orthodoxy again becoming Russia's State Religion
by Christopher A. Ferrara
Two recent developments remind us of the centrality of Russia in the future of our troubled world. In the first, as reported by The New York Times in mid-August, Russian nuclear-powered submarines have been detected patrolling off the eastern seaboard of the United States, “a rare mission that has raised concerns inside the Pentagon and intelligence agencies about a more assertive stance by the Russian military… [and] has echoes of the cold war era, when the United States and the Soviet Union regularly parked submarines off each other’s coasts to steal military secrets, track the movements of their underwater fleets — and be poised for war.” (New York Times, 4 August 2009).
The Times, quoting a naval historian, notes that there had not been any Russian subs in that class off the United States coast for about fifteen years. “Anytime the Russian Navy does something so out of the ordinary it is cause for worry,” said a senior Defense Department official quoted in the piece. “We’re concerned just because they are there,” he added.
The second development, which has been underway since 2006, is that Russian pupils in the regions of Belgorod, Bryansk, Kaluga and Smolensk “will be taught the basics of Orthodox Christianity” in the classroom, and that the subject will also be included as an option “in the school curriculum in 11 other regions across the country.” (BBC, 31 August 2006). It seems that “lawmakers in the 15 regions backed the move” even though it would appear to contradict the requirement of state secularity in the Russian constitution. Russian Education Minister Andrei Fursenko is quoted as saying that “schoolchildren must know the history of religion and religious culture.”
What are we to make of these developments? On the human level, together they indicate a program already observed in this column: Putin’s harnessing of Russian Orthodoxy to nationalism in a rebirth of Russia as a dominant geopolitical player — a project that also includes the rehabilitation of Stalin as a “great leader.” The idea that Putin wants to convert Russia into a nation of pious and prayerful Orthodox is laughable. There is no sign that Russia has turned away from its binge of abortion, alcohol and divorce.
Then again, in God’s providence what is happening in the Russian schools and her military buildup could both be a material preparation — quite unintended by their proponents — for the true conversion of Russia and her reunion with Rome to save the West in the midst of some dire scenario like the one predicted by the Russian mystic and philosopher Vladimir Soloviev at the turn of the 20th Century.
All things work together in the divine plan, whether or not God’s rebellious subjects freely cooperate in it. Thus there is reason to hope that, whatever Putin intends, Russia is being prepared for its consecration and the consequent Triumph of the Immaculate Heart — an event that, as Antonio Socci has so eloquently put it, will mean “a radical and extraordinary change in the world, an overthrow of the mentality dominating modernity, probably following dramatic events for humanity.” Clearly, those dramatic events are very near.
Link to article...
Two recent developments remind us of the centrality of Russia in the future of our troubled world. In the first, as reported by The New York Times in mid-August, Russian nuclear-powered submarines have been detected patrolling off the eastern seaboard of the United States, “a rare mission that has raised concerns inside the Pentagon and intelligence agencies about a more assertive stance by the Russian military… [and] has echoes of the cold war era, when the United States and the Soviet Union regularly parked submarines off each other’s coasts to steal military secrets, track the movements of their underwater fleets — and be poised for war.” (New York Times, 4 August 2009).
The Times, quoting a naval historian, notes that there had not been any Russian subs in that class off the United States coast for about fifteen years. “Anytime the Russian Navy does something so out of the ordinary it is cause for worry,” said a senior Defense Department official quoted in the piece. “We’re concerned just because they are there,” he added.
The second development, which has been underway since 2006, is that Russian pupils in the regions of Belgorod, Bryansk, Kaluga and Smolensk “will be taught the basics of Orthodox Christianity” in the classroom, and that the subject will also be included as an option “in the school curriculum in 11 other regions across the country.” (BBC, 31 August 2006). It seems that “lawmakers in the 15 regions backed the move” even though it would appear to contradict the requirement of state secularity in the Russian constitution. Russian Education Minister Andrei Fursenko is quoted as saying that “schoolchildren must know the history of religion and religious culture.”
What are we to make of these developments? On the human level, together they indicate a program already observed in this column: Putin’s harnessing of Russian Orthodoxy to nationalism in a rebirth of Russia as a dominant geopolitical player — a project that also includes the rehabilitation of Stalin as a “great leader.” The idea that Putin wants to convert Russia into a nation of pious and prayerful Orthodox is laughable. There is no sign that Russia has turned away from its binge of abortion, alcohol and divorce.
Then again, in God’s providence what is happening in the Russian schools and her military buildup could both be a material preparation — quite unintended by their proponents — for the true conversion of Russia and her reunion with Rome to save the West in the midst of some dire scenario like the one predicted by the Russian mystic and philosopher Vladimir Soloviev at the turn of the 20th Century.
All things work together in the divine plan, whether or not God’s rebellious subjects freely cooperate in it. Thus there is reason to hope that, whatever Putin intends, Russia is being prepared for its consecration and the consequent Triumph of the Immaculate Heart — an event that, as Antonio Socci has so eloquently put it, will mean “a radical and extraordinary change in the world, an overthrow of the mentality dominating modernity, probably following dramatic events for humanity.” Clearly, those dramatic events are very near.
Link to article...
Swedish Lutherans Ordain First Female Sodomite Bishop
In a move that's guaranteed to anger Swedish conservative clergy, the Swedish Lutheran Church gives a whole new meaning to Sola Scriptura by legitimizing perversion earlier this month and then giving the go-ahead to bemitre a woman sodomite.
Swedes! Wake up, the Lutheran Church at which you had such fond memories at Christmastide is dead, if it was ever alive. Perhaps you will now reassess the evil legacy of Martin Luther and the unwisdom of leaving behind the true Church?
STOCKHOLM, November 11, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Sweden's Lutheran church announced it had ordained its first openly homosexual bishop on Sunday, less than a month after it gave its ministers the right to "marry" same-sex couples in church.
The Church of Sweden, which was the state church until 2000, had backed the parliament's adoption of the same-sex "marriage" law, which took effect on May 1. Its synod approved homosexual church "weddings" on October 22.
Eva Brunne, 55, was consecrated as the Bishop of Stockholm in a ceremony at Uppsala cathedral, just north of the Swedish capital, the Church of Sweden said in a statement.
Brunne is in a civil union partnership with another woman, Gunilla Lindén, who is a Church of Sweden pastor. Together they are the guardians of a three-year-old child.
"It is very positive that our church is setting an example here and is choosing me as bishop based on my qualifications, when they also know that they can meet resistance elsewhere," Brunne told the Associated Press.
Anglican bishops from England and Northern Ireland in fact refused to attend the ordination.
Five bishops from various levels within the Anglican Church, including Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, decided not to attend the November 8th ceremony, the Dagen newspaper reports.
"The Anglican Church has a moratorium right now concerning the ordination of bishops who live together with someone of the same sex," Alan Harper, a bishop from Armagh in Northern Ireland, told the newspaper.
Swedish Archbishop Anders Wejryd, who conducted the ordination of Brunne, disputed the claim that the Church of England was boycotting the ceremony.
"That's not true at all," he told the Kyrkans Tidning newspaper. "We send invitations to those with the highest rank. That's why the Archbishop of Canterbury received an invitation, but no one expected him to say yes."
According to Wejryd, the international invitees who declined to take part in the ordination included "many who generally never come."
Other invitees who declined to attend, according to Swedish news service The Local, were bishops from the Lutheran churches of Iceland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, as well as the World Lutheran Federation.
See related LSN coverage:
Catholics and Orthodox Express "Sadness" over Swedish Lutheran Decision to Embrace Homosexual "Marriage"
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2009/oct/09102701.html
Article here...
Swedes! Wake up, the Lutheran Church at which you had such fond memories at Christmastide is dead, if it was ever alive. Perhaps you will now reassess the evil legacy of Martin Luther and the unwisdom of leaving behind the true Church?
STOCKHOLM, November 11, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Sweden's Lutheran church announced it had ordained its first openly homosexual bishop on Sunday, less than a month after it gave its ministers the right to "marry" same-sex couples in church.
The Church of Sweden, which was the state church until 2000, had backed the parliament's adoption of the same-sex "marriage" law, which took effect on May 1. Its synod approved homosexual church "weddings" on October 22.
Eva Brunne, 55, was consecrated as the Bishop of Stockholm in a ceremony at Uppsala cathedral, just north of the Swedish capital, the Church of Sweden said in a statement.
Brunne is in a civil union partnership with another woman, Gunilla Lindén, who is a Church of Sweden pastor. Together they are the guardians of a three-year-old child.
"It is very positive that our church is setting an example here and is choosing me as bishop based on my qualifications, when they also know that they can meet resistance elsewhere," Brunne told the Associated Press.
Anglican bishops from England and Northern Ireland in fact refused to attend the ordination.
Five bishops from various levels within the Anglican Church, including Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, decided not to attend the November 8th ceremony, the Dagen newspaper reports.
"The Anglican Church has a moratorium right now concerning the ordination of bishops who live together with someone of the same sex," Alan Harper, a bishop from Armagh in Northern Ireland, told the newspaper.
Swedish Archbishop Anders Wejryd, who conducted the ordination of Brunne, disputed the claim that the Church of England was boycotting the ceremony.
"That's not true at all," he told the Kyrkans Tidning newspaper. "We send invitations to those with the highest rank. That's why the Archbishop of Canterbury received an invitation, but no one expected him to say yes."
According to Wejryd, the international invitees who declined to take part in the ordination included "many who generally never come."
Other invitees who declined to attend, according to Swedish news service The Local, were bishops from the Lutheran churches of Iceland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, as well as the World Lutheran Federation.
See related LSN coverage:
Catholics and Orthodox Express "Sadness" over Swedish Lutheran Decision to Embrace Homosexual "Marriage"
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2009/oct/09102701.html
Article here...
Kennedy gets Huffy with Bishop Tobin
Like an adolescent with a drug problem confronted by his parents, Patrick Kennedy says, "he won't even dignifiy that with an answer", referring to Bishop Tobin's stern lecture earlier this week. Considering the Kennedy clan's support for homo-perversion in US Schools, his hostillity becomes more understandable and his claims to be Catholic in good standing very dubious indeed. The family has in the past also put its loyalty to the United States on the shelf for some political support from the Soviet Union. What a family.
Providence, RI (LifeNews.com) -- Rep. Patrick Kennedy is swinging back at his Catholic bishop, who rebuked him for comments he made saying the Catholic Church is not pro-life because it opposes the health care bills over abortion funding. Bishop Thomas Tobin also criticized Kennedy for canceling a meeting to discuss the situation.
When Kennedy canceled, Bishop Tobin decided to write a letter for the local Catholic newspaper saying Kennedy's pro-abortion stance puts him at odds with the Catholic Church.
Kennedy said he was "not going to dignify with an answer" Tobin's assessment that Kennedy could not be a good Catholic and still support abortion.
In remarks to the Providence Journal newspaper, he called those comments "unfortunate," and said, "I'm not going to engage [in] this anymore."
He also said he found it "very disconcerting" that Bishop Tobin would not meet with him to have a private discussion of his pro-abortion views and Catholic faith, even though it appears Kennedy is the one to have postponed their planned meeting.
Kennedy tells the newspaper that he canceled the meeting because Tobin would not promise to keep any discussion of his views private.
"I had initially agreed to a meeting with him [Thursday], provided we would not debate this in public in terms of my personal faith, but unfortunately, he hasn't kept to that agreement, and that's very disconcerting to me," the congressman claimed.
Michael Guilfoyle, spokesman for the diocese, told the Journal that the meeting was postponed "by mutual agreement," but said Bishop Tobin would still welcome Kennedy.
"The bishop's schedule is still free on Thursday if the congressman would like to have that personal and pastoral meeting," he said.
Read entire...
Providence, RI (LifeNews.com) -- Rep. Patrick Kennedy is swinging back at his Catholic bishop, who rebuked him for comments he made saying the Catholic Church is not pro-life because it opposes the health care bills over abortion funding. Bishop Thomas Tobin also criticized Kennedy for canceling a meeting to discuss the situation.
When Kennedy canceled, Bishop Tobin decided to write a letter for the local Catholic newspaper saying Kennedy's pro-abortion stance puts him at odds with the Catholic Church.
Kennedy said he was "not going to dignify with an answer" Tobin's assessment that Kennedy could not be a good Catholic and still support abortion.
In remarks to the Providence Journal newspaper, he called those comments "unfortunate," and said, "I'm not going to engage [in] this anymore."
He also said he found it "very disconcerting" that Bishop Tobin would not meet with him to have a private discussion of his pro-abortion views and Catholic faith, even though it appears Kennedy is the one to have postponed their planned meeting.
Kennedy tells the newspaper that he canceled the meeting because Tobin would not promise to keep any discussion of his views private.
"I had initially agreed to a meeting with him [Thursday], provided we would not debate this in public in terms of my personal faith, but unfortunately, he hasn't kept to that agreement, and that's very disconcerting to me," the congressman claimed.
Michael Guilfoyle, spokesman for the diocese, told the Journal that the meeting was postponed "by mutual agreement," but said Bishop Tobin would still welcome Kennedy.
"The bishop's schedule is still free on Thursday if the congressman would like to have that personal and pastoral meeting," he said.
Read entire...
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
US Women Religious: Dysfunctional Family Values
Congregation heads no longer required to supply ownership, asset, age information
Women religious will still have to answer other questions related to how they conduct their ministries, but like alcoholics, the mentally ill and habitual miscreants, they don't like being held accountable, and perhaps, like an overly permissive parent, Sister Millea, who is overseeing the visitation has caved into the complaints requesting asset, age and ownership information.
It's hard to understand why they would object to such requests for this information, unless, contrary to popular belief, a life of poverty is out of the question.
U.S. women religious superiors will no longer have to supply to the Vatican some of the most controversial information it had requested as part of a three-year study of religious congregations.
Word of the change in procedures came in a letter dated Nov. 5 sent to the women religious superiors by Apostolic Visitator Mother Mary Clare Millea.
It's good to see, however, that there will still be other questions, like the following, still trying to hold rebellious nuns accountable for their manifest failure to follow the rules and live lives that have more than an impressionistic resemblance to the visions of the founders of their communities.
Part B involves some 60 subjective questions regarding vocations, governance, financial, liturgical and spiritual life within the congregations. For example, questions include the following:
How often is the Eucharist celebrated in primary houses of the unit whether a mother house, formation house, retirement facility, skilled-care facility, etc.?
Do your sisters participate in the Eucharistic liturgy according to approved liturgical norms? [We know that in most cases this is, "No"].
Despite having serious disciplinary, doctrinal, honesty and emotional problems, US Women religious have some pretty serious enablers in their corner who are willing to help them on the path of destruction, like liberal family member, Fr. McBrien of Notre Dame who teaches "theology" to unsuspecting students, who's willing to step in and give a defense of the US women religious which not surprisingly attacks the Church as "sexist". Of course, he begins his article by citing another article from a Sacred Heart Sister who teaches at Berkley. She doesn't believe that many people with an opinion have the back ground to make their judgements, she says, "too many critics of religious life in the United States "have no lived experience of or academic competence" in regard to it.
But she doesn't stop there. She wants to talk about religious habits and cloisters from a feminist perspective that boarders on the pathological. Her issues with religious habits and religious discipline are almost too stupid and inaccurate to mention, especially for someone who holds others to high standards when it comes to judging her and her consorors' work in the US, like a lot of charlatans, she tries to slither behind academic degrees and hope that she won't be challenged. It has often been the case that such women and men in the Church, like Fr. McBrien, have gone unchallenged. It's time that was ended. If you don't really believe the Church is good for humanity, why bother with it? Get out. Please.
It's typical for dysfunctional family members to cover for their relatives' sins and crimes. In this case, it seems clear that misrepresentation and malfeasance is one possible accusation and the natural tendency is to defend one's self or others who are guilty of the same crimes you are.
Well, now US Women Religious have to be held accountable because their decadence and dysfunctionality has grown to such catastrophic heights that you don't need to be a person with trained proficiency to know that US Women's Religious are in trouble. All you have to do is read one of Sister Joan Chittister's columns or take time to visit a nominally "Catholic" college where you can find Female Religious Professors who will admit to you that they want to destroy the Church.
Read the article here...
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