Aufer A Nobis

"Justice" According to Obama Democrats

2012-01-25T08:04:00.003-05:00

"Justice" means different things for an Obama Democrat. If you support Obama, "justice" means not only that your civil rights are defended, but that you can violate the civil rights of others who are not in favor of Obama's detrimental regime.

Hence, we see this picture of the "Occupy" rabble with their Marxist red flags invading the steps of the Supreme Court steps less than a week ago. These scoundrels are, of course, the less than 1% of the population who have invaded public spaces and completely prevented access to them by the 99% of American citizens in the name of some vague agenda which ultimately supports Obama's re-election.
(How can he not defend them!)

Notice that no barriers prevent them from being there, despite slightly veiled threats from the group of violence if they were prevented. Other members threw smoke bomb onto White House grounds. Of course, Obama Democrat "justice" required that no one be arrested. There is only one police officer visible. In the end only 4 were arrested, but only for blocking traffic.

Fast forward a couple of days to January 23 and the March for Life.

Every year, several hundred thousand peaceful protestors come to Washington to petition their representatives to defend innocent human life. They walk by the Supreme Court where the offensive decision of 7 of 9 men was issued that invented the right of mothers to murder their unborn babies.

Yet, Obama Democrat "justice" being a flexible concept hardly cares about the first amendment rights of pro-lifers whose views are diametrically opposed to the infanticidal Obama Democrat agenda.

Hence, we see barriers up and 4 police officers (there were many more!) to prevent pro-lifers from entry onto the Supreme Court steps.

Apparently, Obama Democrats not only show favoritism to their own partisans, but they fear the "disorderly" conduct of praying women and parents with a baby in a stroller.

Obama Democrats have chosen the side of partisanship and injustice. They redefine the reality of human life, or marriage, and now justice.

BEWARE AMERICA!

Perfidy at Convent of the Sacred Heart, Manhattan, NY

2011-11-10T16:25:00.001-05:00

Katie Couric and Lady Gaga tape prime time special "A Very Gaga Thanksgiving" at the Convent of theSacred Heart Catholic School in New York.

The Convent of the Sacred Heart is where Lady Gaga received her malformation. Now after countless blasphemous songs and public rejection of the Church teaching, she wants to go back to her alma mater.And the wealthy wretch will get what she wants thanks to those who run the school.

The Dames of the Sacred Heart once had also Manhattanville College in Purchase, NY. However, apostate Mother Elizabeth McCormick, a true child of Judas Isacariot, cunning enough to secularize the school and get herself on the Board of Trustees before publicly rejecting her vows and God.

Even the College website avoids all mention of her being a nun and her self-serving abuse of her authority.

The Convent of the Sacred Heart remained under the sisters' control. However, as McCormack's perfidy was not an isolated phenomenon, vocatiosn naturally declined. (Even today, there is not even a link for girls who feel called to religious life, although prominently there are links for environmental advocacy and social justice programs.) Whether faith of Catholic girls was intentionally undermined is left to divine judgment. And their success is almost complete with Lady Gaga. The fact that they are willing to have her back despite her hate of Chirstian morality is a testament to their own hate.

Meanwhile, it is well-known that Lady Gaga has a fierce agenda to make homosexual behavior seem normal. If you ever wondered where she may have learned this, look no further than the Convent Sacred Heart website:

It is expected that all members of the Sacred Heart community value differences that include, but are not limited to, ability, age, beliefs, ethnicity, family structure, gender, learning style, race, religion, sexual orientation and socioeconomic status

Check it again! It does not say to value human beings who suffer from a confused sexual orientation. Girls are taught and expected to "value" differences in "sexual orientation." This means valuing a disorder which causes many interior hardships and results in sin when acted upon. We can only wonder if "included" in the things to "value" are a proclivity to alcoholism or an addiction to gambling.

It should be clear by now that it is a scandal that the administrators of the school would whore themselves to allow this anti-Catholic and blasphemous alumna to use the school for a show.

We can only hope that the Archbishop of New York will make it a priority to make inquiries and allow the school a choice: to reaffirm its Catholic identity or throw away the slightest connection it has left with Catholicism.

St. Madeleine Sophie Barat, pray for them!

Occupy DC Criminals - Out of Control!

2011-11-08T18:52:00.001-05:00

But, the corrupt administration will likely do nothing to bring order for regular citizens.

The video below is disturbing.

In it you will see the mob mentality that prevails among the mindless foul-mouthed members of Occupy DC.Like nascent Nazis they respect no law, because they are the law and can do no wrong.They have a code of silence to hide the nefarious motives of their agenda.They show no respect to those who are not part of their cabal.
When the brave police officer facing the angry mob warns them they crossing the line, one among them mocks his authority, "You lock me up, you gotta lock us all up."
Without respect they block cars of citizens trying to go home.With no fear of reprisals from the city's mayor, they menace families with children. Filled with rage, their only glory is to terrorize and cause anarchy.
And why? Who knows! Likely these dregs of society feel powerful as a anonymous members of a group, and know that corrupt government officials will permit them to cause havoc to their hearts delight.
And the worst of all, the worst President of the United States in history supports these criminals. But, we can't blame him. Although he is a member of the 1%, they are perhaps the only fools left who think he is doing a good job and will vote for him.Perhaps they will even go after those who disagree.
Our leaders won't, so we it looks like we Americans must stand up to these villans.

Pray Tell: Blasphemous Post on a Monk's Website

2011-08-07T10:13:00.009-04:00

Recently, a friend notified me of a website Pray Tell. Since I have not been too attentive to this blog I asked him to guest write a post which I now post below.

By Bruce Tereski:

On August 2, 2011, Richard Giles posted a story titled: "Food from the Cupboard"
on Fr. Anthony Ruff's blog called Pray Tell:
http://www.praytellblog.com/index.php/2011/08/02/food-from-the-cupboard/#comment-61381

The title of the post itself is utter blasphemy because the author, Richard Giles, is referring to the Blessed Sacrament.
Apparently, he attended Mass somewhere in Germany. Everything was to his liking until Communion time when the priest went to the tabernacle to retrieve the the Blessed Sacrament for distribution.

The author states:

"Could it even have been a residual desire to proclaim that the Blessed Sacrament, as objective reality, is always in itself more significant than the liturgical event which gives it birth, and in which that group of people had been called to participate that evening?

It seemed as if the assembly that night were like a group of people invited to a friend’s house for a meal, only to find that their host, after treating himself to the newly prepared food, went to the cupboard to find some leftovers for his guests.

Of course analogies will take us only so far, and yet I came away from that church feeling something was not quite right, that in this small but significant act the spirit of the reforms flowing from Vatican II had somehow been lost. When it came to the moment of sharing the great gift of God, priest and people had withdrawn to their respective domains, and were both impoverished thereby."

This man, obviously supported by Pray Tell which hosts his post, elevates subjective feelings of unity over the objective fact that Christ is really and truly present in the most Holy Eucharist. He and others received Jesus Christ, Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity and yet he claims they were "impoverished!"

I, Bruce Tereski, posted a response. I did not point out the blasphemy of the comparison as if Christ in the tabernacle is some kind of "leftover" inferior to or somehow distinct from Christ present upon the altar.

I merely asked why sentimental subjectivism and symbolism were being raised above reality. However, Pray Tell, with its dissenter agenda did not like my comment. So, as typical leftist tyrants they defined it out of existence as Stalin did to Trotsky.

However, because the blog like some mushy comment by another responding to me, part of my comment was perserved thanks to #119 (on Sunday, Aug. 7) by Julie Heath Elliott on August 5, 2011 - 11:50 pm. She wrote:

This is a reply to Bruce Tereski at #105.

He states: “Why would any Catholic elevate subjective sentimentality of ‘feeling’ united and symbolism of Host consecrated at ‘this’ Mass over the reality of Christ’s presence?”

Even a later commentator #122 by Tom Poelker on August 6, 2011 - 4:29 pm noticed the erased post. Noting Julie Heath Elliott's response, he wrote:

What is happening here? Both of these #105?
I can find no Bruce Tereski comment above this “reply” to him.

In fact, in #124 Tom Poelker on August 7, 2011 - 1:51 pm asks again:

But where is the Bruce Tereski post?

I grant that a blogger has a right to erase comments.
But, a blogger who pretends to be Catholic should neither promote blasphemy nor dissent.
My comment was erased because it challenged the blog's warped theology.

Sadly, Pray Tell has an agenda, and its agenda is not the Church's.
It continually pushes the envelope in the name of Vatican II. In the blasphemous post named above, it dares to make the analogy of the Blessed Sacrament as old food in a cupboard and the disappointment in eating leftovers. Such an analogy betrays faithlessness in Christ's Real Presence.

Jesus Christ is really and truly present in the Blessed Sacrament. The Mass is a sacrifice and act of thanksgiving only because Christ is present in the Eucharist. Moreover, it is Christ who is received as Holy Communion because only He can effect effect Communion.

I do not deny the symbolism of receiving Hosts consecrated at the same Mass. I do not deny the GIRM encourages (but does not mandate) consecrating new breads at each Mass for the faithful. However, when a so-called Catholic blog, run by a monk with an animosity against ICEL (in any case shouldn't monks be praying rather than blogging???), downplays the significance of the real presence of Christ in the Most Holy Eucharist in favor of liturgical action, then there is a serious problem.

Cuomo Demands to Be Excommunicated!

2011-07-24T14:38:00.003-04:00

...well, if power hungry leftwingers were logical that would be the case.

After backroom deals and lobbyist bribes won the governor of New York the votes needed to redefine the reality of marriage in New York in the name of "rights," the agenda driven governor wants to deny rights of conscience to the majority of New York citizens, but especially public officials.

Thus, when asked about Barker, NY's town clerk Laura Fotusky’s resignation because of her inability to cooperate with the abomination of the redefinition of marriage, Cuomo demonstrated his radical intolerance: “The law is the law; when you enforce the laws of the state, you don’t get to pick and choose….If you can’t enforce the law, then you shouldn’t be in that position.”

One shudders to think what Cuomo would have done if he was a public official in Nazi Germany! How many Jews would he have rounded up to enforce the racial laws?

Cuomo made his statement about man-made civil "law." This law, in fact, is no true law since it contradicts the natural law. But, totalitarian Cuomo thinks most of the state of New York's citizens who oppose the unnatural law redefining the reality of marriage should not have a voice or a right to avoid contaminating themselves with his agenda.

But, Cuomo's statement would have merit if the state decree actually met the standards of true law.

This brings me to my post's title.

If Cuomo truly believes what he says, then he is literally demanding that bishops and priests do their job and deny him Holy Communion as a public sinner to be reprobated. It's not exactly excommunication, but there are similarities.

It is well-known that Cuomo picks and chooses what teachings of Christ and His Church wants to uphold, for example, arguing against the the execution of violent and dangerous criminals, but protecting the murder of helpless and innocent babies in the womb. Divine law forbids murder of the innocent. Divine law forbids concubinage and adultery. Divine law forbids taking the place of God and redefining a core institution of society such as marriage. But, for Cuomo these are an integral part of his self-definition.

So, Bishop Hubbard of Albany where Cuomo works, and Archbishop Dolan of New York where Cuomo lives (Mt. Kisco), please, mutatis mutandi, heed the governors words:

“The law is the law;
when you enforce the laws of the God and the Church,
you don’t get to pick and choose….
If you can’t enforce the law, then you shouldn’t be in that position.”

STOP CODDLING CATHOLIC POLITICIANS WHO SPIT ON THE TEACHINGS OF CHRIST AND CONTINUE TO PRETEND THEY ARE CATHOLIC!

Liturgical Jim Crow Laws at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, DC

2011-07-18T11:01:00.005-04:00

The facts:

Recently, a priest friend was visiting Washington, DC. He had recently learned to offer the Traditional Latin Mass in his home archdiocese (in the Northeast) and had even offered it publicly a few times there.

I asked him to offer one at the National Basilica.

Alas, whoever has made the policy for the Shrine is a liturgical bigot.

You see, my priest friend was denied permission to offer the Traditional Latin Mass.
Although he had a celebret, the notification from his archdiocese that he is a priest in good standing, it was denied to him to use a chapel with the liturgical equipment needed for the traditional Mass, UNLESS he produced another letter from his archdiocese saying he had permission to do so. He was dumfounded since his archdiocese does not see a need for this letter.

Meanwhile, those present themselves to offer in the ordinary form are granted free access to the sacristy. Priest friends have told me that THEY HAVE NEVER BEEN ASKED TO PRODUCE ANY CREDENTIALS. This is very disturbing! It means that anyone with a clerical shirt and a friendly disposition may granted an altar and access to the sacred vessels.

My thoughts:

It is good that a priest be required to prove he is a priest in order to have access to an altar. But, the Basilica has no right to require more than an archdiocese requires, especially when there is such a discrepancy as noted above.

Moreover, if this directive comes from Cardinal Wuerl, it is the height of hypocrisy! Remember this is a man who will give Holy Communion to anyone unless - so he says - the person's diocesan bishop has another policy.

Also, let's not forget that pressure forced Archbishop DiNoia to rescind in late February his acceptance to offer the Pontifical High Mass back in April, even though he had previously said he would do so, since he was already going to be in town that weekend. But, he had agreed to offer the Mass before Wuerl was made a cardinal! Coincidence? You decide.

In any case, liturgical Jim Crow laws are unjust. It is incredible that they are enforced at the National Basilica in the Archdiocese of Washington.

Obama Out of Touch with Americans

2011-05-11T22:47:00.000-04:00

If not for the killing of Osama Bin Laden, Obama's ratings would probably be in the 30's by now.
The country continues its decline. And yet, Obama has nothing better to do than waste time with Planned Parenthood president and lobbyist Cecile Richards and racist rapper Common.

As is well known, Obama supports the murder of babies through abortion. His pet is Planned Parenthood, and Planned Parenthood loves him for his support. here and here.

Then, in an insult to our nation's police officers, especially as Washington, D.C. gets ready for "Police Week," Obama invites a racist rapper to the White House who raps approvingly of a cop-killer. here and here.

Gray Breaks Law for Abortion and Drug Needles

2011-04-12T08:41:00.006-04:00

Mayor Vincent Gray, a self-proclaimed Catholic, is a well-know supporter of redefining marriage.

He encourages drug addiction by distributing needles to addicts, with the claim that it will reduce HIV infection. (One wonders if he will distribute rubber bullets to gang members with illegal guns to prevent murders.)

Now, Mayor Gray has taken a very public and illegal stand for abortion. Accused of this, Gray would likely whine that his support for abortion is about rights and money. But, if he were to do so, it would only prove he rejects Catholic teaching rooted in Scripture that one may not do evil, even that good may come from it. For even if he were correct that this is a matter where the right to use money is unjustly and illegally denied (and he is not), then his own morally illicit protest and morally illicit support of abortion are evil means to an wrongly perceived good end.

So, Gray is wrong on two counts: using civil disobedience to protest a just law and supporting abortion (and drug usage) to achieve his ultimate goal. Gray has chosen an evil means to seek money for abortion. He chose "civil disobedience."

Civil disobedience, of course, has its place in a Democracy. However, it is not always just. Similar to the just war doctrine, civil disobedience, because it harms the community's welfare (often by causing concrete disturbance to public order; by showing disdain for the legislative process, and by inducing a mob mentality opposed to dialogue), must only be a last resort when all legal means have been exhausted to oppose an UNJUST LAW. When a civil law is not opposed to justice and has been justly issued, civil disobedience is an act of injustice and even rebellion.

Now the currently proposed law would prevent the tax payers of the District of Columbia from paying for the butchery of babies and fostering illegal drug usage. Such a law is in no way unjust. The proposed law also provides for true "choice" whereby parents can use their tax dollars to choose how to educate their own children, something Gray is vehemently opposed to. Finally, the proposed law is to be passed by those who have the legitimate authority to do so, the Congress of the United States.

Gray shows no sense of responsibility for his office by his act. He shows an inability to make a nuanced distinction between his own personal pet projects and legitimate laws issued by legitimate authority. Ultimately, Gray is setting himself up as a thug in office.

In the first place, abortion is a heinous crime against humanity. Innocent human lives as slaughtered at will for a fee. Nothing can justify the murder of the innocent.

Secondly, the Mayor Gray of the District of Columbia may not like it, but the District has the honor of being the capital district. It is not and intentionally not a state. It is BY LAW subject to Congress. That law is not unjust, but is a matter of legitimate political decision. If the Mayor dislikes ANY law, he should take LEGAL and not ILLEGAL means to challenge it.

So, (prescinding even from recent revelations of backroom deals and nepotism), Mayor Gray proves himself an incompetent Mayor by his rash decision to break the law in order to oppose a just law. He has set a bad example for law abiding citizens, especially young people.

Finally, Vincent Gray because of his public scandal and well-know support of abortion must be denied Holy Communion if he should present himself until he publicly repents of his support for abortion a sin that cries to heaven.

Some Recent Headlines on Gray:

DC Mayor Vincent Gray released from custody

A Tough Day for DC Mayor

DC mayor arrested protesting budget restrictions

What's Wrong With D.C. Mayor Vince Gray? - Loose Lips - Washington

D.C. Mayor Vincent Gray Denies Allegations of Illicit Payments

Do Reprobate Legislators Still support Planned Parenthood?

2011-04-06T10:00:00.002-04:00

Former Planned Parenthood director asks Congress to do the math Source

Abby Johnson quit Planned Parenthood in disgust over their emphasis on abortion as industrial production. The former director of a Texas clinic, Johnson has now become a fierce critic of her former employer and of government funding of its operations. Today, Johnson explains the deceptions behind Planned Parenthood claims that their mission is focused on women’s health, and that government money doesn’t fund abortions: Though 98 percent of Planned Parenthood’s services to pregnant women are abortion, Planned Parenthood and its political allies have sworn up and down that taxpayer dollars do not to pay for abortion. But of course they do. Planned Parenthood gets one-third of its entire budget from taxpayer funding and performed more than 650,000 abortions between 2008 and 2009. An abortion is expensive. Its cost includes pay for the doctor, supporting medical staff, their health benefits packages and malpractice insurance. As clinic director, I saw how money affiliate clinics receive from several sources is combined into one pot, not set aside for specific services. Planned Parenthood’s claim that abortions make up just 3 percent of its services is also a gimmick. That number is actually closer to 12 percent, but strategically skewed by unbundling family planning services so that each patient shows anywhere from five to 20 “visits” per appointment (i.e., 12 packs of birth control equals 12 visits) and doing the opposite with abortion visits, bundling them together so that each appointment equals one visit. The resulting difference between family planning and abortion “visits” is striking. But that’s not the only deception Planned Parenthood is spreading. It also claims to help reduce the number of abortions. Not only is this not what Planned Parenthood actually accomplishes, but its goal couldn’t be more opposite. As a Planned Parenthood clinic manager, I was directed to double the number of abortions our clinic performed in order to drive up revenue. In keeping, Planned Parenthood headquarters recently issued a directive mandating that all of its affiliates provide abortions by 2013. The deceptions don’t end there, either. While claiming to be defending the health of women, Johnson accuses Planned Parenthood of engaging in risky medical practices. For instance, instead of allowing potential abortion clients to consult with a doctor on site, they now offer “telemedicine,” in which a doctor apparently consults via remote video hookup. PP has also begun lobbying for repeals of laws (and suing to overturn them) requiring abortion clinics to report cases of sexual abuse of minors, especially for girls under the age of 14. Anyone who has watched the Live Action Films exposés understand why Planned Parenthood would like to see those laws disappear, and it has nothing to do with improving the health of girls and young women. All of this would be bad enough even without taxpayers subsidizing Planned Parenthood operations. The federal government needs to get out of the industrial-abortion business, except to enforce existing regulations with which PP seems unwilling to comply. Be sure to read all of Johnson’s essay.

Schumer the Extremist and His Verbal Manipulations

2011-03-30T08:00:00.002-04:00

Schumer coordinates Dem budget attack on GOP By: Susan Ferrechio 03/29/11 1:42 PM Washington Examiner Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., a member of the Democratic Senate leadership, got on a conference call with reporters Tuesday morning without realizing the reporters were already listening in. Schumer thought he was on a private line with four Democratic senators who were to talk with reporters about the current budget stalemate. Schumer instructed the group, made up of Sens. Barbara Boxer of California, Tom Carper of Delaware, Ben Cardin of Maryland and Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, to tell reporters that the GOP is refusing to negotiate. He told the group to make sure they label the GOP spending cuts as "extreme." "I always use extreme, Schumer said. "That is what the caucus instructed me to use." Someone must have finally told Schumer that the media were listening and he stopped talking midsentence. Here's a bit more of what he said about House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, according to my notes. "The main thrust is basically that we want to negotiate and we want to come up with a compromise but the Tea Party is pulling Boehner too far over to the right and so far over that there is no more fruitful negotiations," Schumer said on the call. "The only way we can avoid a shutdown is for Boehner to come up with a reasonable compromise and not just listen to what the Tea Party wants. " Schumer described Boehner as "in a box," over the budget negotiations. The four senators came on the call after Schumer abruptly went silent and followed Schumer's script closely. Coordinating the message is common in both parties, but it's uncommon for reporters to actually hear them rehearsing.

Anti-Bush Leftists No Longer Care About Anti-War Protests

2011-03-18T23:33:00.004-04:00

It had become sort of a tradition for an anti-war protesters to gather in Washington, D.C.
However, ever since Obama was elected president, the Marxists and Socialists organizers of the event have shown their true colors. Anti-War slogans were useful in their opposition to Bush.
Under Obama's regime, America is still at War in the Middle East. So, it seems the conclusion we must draw is that the the protesters were not anti-War but anti-Bush. Since they eat up the leftist policies of Obama, they also like his wars.
Last year there was a token anti-war rally in Washington. This year it seems to have fizzled to nothing.

However, there are some people true to the cause. Perhaps they unlike the hoards of others from years past truly want an end to the war and not just a war under the leadership of a far left president.

This here is the rally information.
(But, don't expect too many people!)

Here's the report from last year:

Posted 03/20/2010
Thousands march in D.C. war protest
By Washington Post Editors

Thousands are protesting in the nation's capital on the seventh anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, carrying signs reading “Indict Bush Now” and flag-draped cardboard coffins.
Protesters gathered at Lafayette Square across from the White House and planned to march through downtown. Stops on the route include military contractor Halliburton, the Mortgage Bankers Association and The Washington Post offices.
The protest, organized by military veterans and activists Ralph Nader and Cindy Sheehan, was expected to draw smaller crowds than the tens of thousands who marched in 2006 and 2007. But organizers say momentum is building as peace protesters have become disenchanted with President Obama's decision to send more troops into Afghanistan.--Associated Press

Liberals Support Free Speech...But Only When They Like The Message

2011-02-25T20:58:00.003-05:00

Source

What happened in New York City was an exercise in urban fascism: calls for censoring the free speech of a private company were issued by agents of the state (e.g., New York City Public Advocate Bill de Blasio called for the billboard to be removed [N.B. Will the ACLU step in to defend free speech?]); waiters and waitresses who work in a restaurant in the building where the billboard was posted were harassed [By tolerant liberals...who think it is ok to murder a defenseless innocent baby in the womb. Here we see the pent up hatred and violence that festers in the hearts of those who support abortion.]; and concerns that violence might ensue—as admitted by an official for the ad company—forced the decision to take down the billboard.

Just a few months ago, the Catholic League protested a vile video that was part of an art exhibition at the Smithsonian that showed large ants running all over Jesus on the Cross. Because the Smithsonian receives 70 percent of its funding from the public, and Christians comprise 80 percent of the population, we asked Congress to reconsider the propriety of underwriting this institution. We never called for censoring the video, we never sponsored harassment of Smithsonian employees (there was none anyway), and we never threatened violence. Yet we were the subject of endless condemnation by the liberal-left.

Now, when real calls for censorship take place, along with real acts of harassment, and real concerns over violence, no one is castigated by our critics. I think we know who the real fascists are.

Defective Executive: Obama Should Be Impeached for Failing to Uphold the Law

2011-02-24T21:24:00.004-05:00

If Obama gets away with this, he is sowing the seeds for the destruction of the U.S.A. His precedent may be used by any future Chief Executive to usurp the role of the Judicial Branch with regard to judging laws unconstitutional and allow violations of laws based on personal preference.

Source

Washington, D.C. - In a statement today, Attorney General Eric Holder said the Department of Justice (DOJ) will not defend the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which protects the traditional definition of marriage for federal purposes, in two lawsuits (Pedersen v. OPM and Windsor v. United States) and in the future, saying President Obama has concluded it is unconstitutional.
Concerned Women for America (CWA) Chief Executive Officer Penny Nance had this to say:

This tyrannical decision by President Obama is perhaps his most shameful move yet. DOMA is the law of the land, whether he personally likes it or not. For him to circumvent the will of the American people, once again, to impose his latest personal fad into federal law is simply disgraceful.
Remember, just a few months ago he tried to sell the American public the idea that he supported the traditional definition of marriage, then a few weeks ago he said he "struggled" with the idea, and now the mask finally comes off. He believes DOMA is unconstitutional and we are all supposed to go along with it.
President Obama insults the majority of Americans who believe marriage is the union between one man and one woman. Americans should not stand for this. Congress should step in and demand that DOJ do its job and defend federal law.
We simply cannot allow the Executive Branch in the person of the
President or Attorney General to circumvent federal law purely on the basis of a president's personal preference.

Concerned Women for America is the nation's largest public policy women's organization.

For Information Contact:Peter Robbio703-683-5004 ext 116PRobbio@CRCPublicRelations.com media.cwfa.org

February 28th, National Day of Mourning

2011-02-22T11:25:00.000-05:00

From Washington, DC Catholic:

From the National Black Pro-Life Coalition:

On February 28, in response to the continued epidemic of abortion in the black community and the recent revelations of Philadelphia abortionist Kermit Gosnell’s house of abortion horrors, a National Day of Mourning has been called into being. Across the country, Americans are invited to mourn the loss of over 55 million babies killed (disproportionately over 16 million of which are black babies) by the Supremely wrong constitutional decision of legalized abortion, known as Roe v. Wade. We will gather to mourn the loss of life and the wounding of women by the violent act of “choice”.

In New York City, more black children are aborted than are born alive! Fifty three percent (53.2%) of all black pregnancies end in abortion.

This is not freedom. This is genocidal oppression.

Tears stream from our eyes because of the destruction of our people! (Lamentations 3:48)

For more information, go here.

Obama's Hypocrisy

2011-02-21T11:04:00.004-05:00

While supporting the right of foreigners to excercise their basic freedoms, Obama and his iniquitous administration is denying freedom and rights of conscience to Americans.

Obama Administration Rewrites Conscience Protections for Health Workers
Source
Sat, Feb. 19, 2011

According to a new rule released by the Obama administration Friday, health care workers can still refuse to take part in abortions if they find it morally objectionable but they cannot refuse to give contraception.
After years of debate, the Department of Health and Human Services rewrote the Bush-era Conscience Clause, essentially rescinding most of the rules that protected the conscience of medical workers.
"The Department supports clear and strong conscience protections for health care providers who are opposed to performing abortions," said the HHS.
But it added that the 2008 conscience rule that went into effect on the last day of the Bush administration was too broad and caused confusion. It was interpreted to allow medical workers to object to providing contraception, particularly emergency contraceptives that pro-lifers say cause abortion, [because they do cause abortions if conception has occurred] and to refuse performing in-vitro fertilization for lesbians or single women, among other things. [It doesn't get at the heart of the matter if the woman is a lesbian, single, or not. Catholics and many others object to the procedure itself as immoral. Besides treating human life as a product to be created and manipulated in a glass dish, the procedure involves introducing many in-vitro conceived human beings into the woman. It is expected that some will die. If more than one implants, some are selectively aborted. Obama and his flunkies are either crassly ignorant or prefers to spit on our consciences. You decide.]
The Obama administration weighed whether to change the conscience protection rules or rescind it altogether. Though the HHS said the new rule maintains and builds upon provisions of the Bush administration rule, [Double-speak - Obama's propaganda ministers have learned well how to implement duplicitous and authoritarian tactics.] it limited the protections to just let workers refuse to perform abortion.
"The federal provider conscience statutes were intended to protect health care providers from being forced to participate in medical procedures that violated their moral and religious beliefs," said the HHS.
"They were never intended to allow providers to refuse to provide medical care [How is contraceptives used as contraception or even abortifacients and IVF "medical care?" They answer: They are not except to agenda driven Obamaites who despise those who live in reality and see things as they are!] to an individual because the individual engaged in behavior the health care provider found objectionable."
Protesting the new rule, Dr. J Scott Ries, a family physician and part of the Christian Medical Association, said the changes were made without any evidence or justification.
"The administration, for example, contends that a rule change is necessary to protect access to contraception, but absolutely no evidence is presented to justify any such concern," he said Friday."In the process, the administration blatantly ignores the scientific evidence that certain controversial prescriptions that abortion advocates promote as contraception are actually potential abortifacients, ending the life of a living, developing human embryo. This is a critical concern for pro-life patients, healthcare professionals and institutions."
He went on to contend that the Obama administration's new rule "diminishes the civil rights that protect conscientious physicians and other healthcare professionals against discrimination."
"Losing conscientious healthcare professionals and faith-based institutions to discrimination and job loss especially imperils the poor and patients in medically underserved areas," Ries argued. "We are already facing critical shortages of primary care physicians, and the Obama administration's decision now threatens to make the situation far worse for patients across the country who depend on faith-based health care."
The new rule goes into effect in 30 days.

Nathan BlackChristian Post Reporter

Sheen's Resting Place

2011-02-01T14:01:00.003-05:00

Archbishop Sheen's Cause Goes on Despite Irresolution Over Tomb
Source

PRETORIA [sic], Illinois, JAN. 31, 2011 (Zenit.org).- The Vatican will have to decide about the fate of Archbishop Fulton Sheen's crypt, but support for the cause of his canonization is going forward. [It is strange that the cause of his canonization began in Peoria and not New York, the archdiocese where he lived much of his life and where he died.]

This was the announcement made last Thursday by the Sheen Foundation, reporting that a 12-week "pause" in efforts to promote the process has ended, and work is again under way.

Promotion was put on hold last November over debate about where Archbishop Sheen's mortal remains will be kept.

His remains currently rest under the sanctuary of St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York. But those who are promoting the cause of the archbishop's canonization are based out of the Diocese of Peoria, where Fulton Sheen was born and ordained, and they are hoping the tomb will be moved to the cathedral there. [It is understandable that Peoria is proud of its native son. However, Peoria must now humbly acknowledge it has no right to have his remains.]

The cause was officially opened in 2002 and centralized its operations in Peoria in 2007. The diocesan phase has concluded and the dossier regarding Archbishop Sheen is under review at the Congregation for Saints' Causes. [It seems that the place where he became a saint, and especially died as a saint, should have his remains. Moreover, it is usually the place where a man dies as a bishop that his remains stay. Thus, if New York does not keep him, Sheen should be moved to Rochester, but not Peoria.]

That same congregation has been asked to resolve the issue over the resting place for the archbishop's remains. [Should Rome send St. Peter's bones back to Bethsaida? Should Philadelphia sent St. John Neumann back to his birthplace in Bohemia? Should Emmitsburg send St. Elizabeth Anne Seton back to New York?]

Archbishop Sheen (1895-1979) was an internationally known radio and TV personality, well-known for his television series, "Life is Worth Living," which had a viewing audience of more than 30 million people. [He became an auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of New York in 1951 and remained until his death, except for a brief period from 1966 to 1969 when he was ordinary of Rochester.]

UPDATE: from Archbishop Dolan's blog - click here.

To Wuerl and Niederauer: Lest They Remain Confused

2011-01-27T17:03:00.005-05:00

Rep. Nancy Pelosi Statement on the 38th Anniversary of Roe v. Wade
Source
Sunday, January 23, 2011

Leader Nancy Pelosi released the following statement today in recognition of the 38th Anniversary of Roe v. Wade:

“On Saturday, as we commemorate the 38th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, we reaffirm our commitment to protecting a woman’s right to make her own reproductive health care decisions.

“As I have throughout my time in Congress, I will fight in the 112th Congress to ensure a woman’s right to choose and oppose threats to Roe v. Wade that would depart from the status quo of no taxpayer funding for abortions, and threaten women’s reproductive rights. That is because decisions about whether to have a child do not and should not rest with the government. We believe a woman — in consultation with her family, her physician, and her faith — is best qualified to make that decision.

“I will continue to work to preserve the right to privacy while promoting a comprehensive approach to reproductive health care, including planning for healthy families, reducing the number of abortions and unintended pregnancies, and providing full and medically-accurate sexuality education.”

A Grand Old Name on the Decline in the U.S.

2011-01-20T21:38:00.002-05:00

Sadly, it's our Blessed Mother's name.

Source of the following information here:

Something about the Name Mary?

Pope Benedict XVI recently encouraged Catholic parents to consider a Christian name (e.g., biblical or saint name) for their children. The Social Security Administration maintains a website that tracks the names given to children in America. The most recent listings for the top boy and girl names show that Americans still tend to give children biblical or saint names. However, there are exceptions in the top ten such as Jayden for boys (#8) and Madison (#7) for girls. The top name for boys in 2009 was Jacob and for girls it was Isabella.
Where is Mary? Not in the top ten. From 1910 to 1965 Mary was either the #1 or #2 name for girls in the U.S. In 2009, this name dropped out of the top 100 for the first time (currently #102). By comparison, Joseph has remained consistently popular. Although at #16 in 2009 this is the lowest rank for Joseph since 1910.

The names of Gospel authors have historically been popular boy names but there is considerable variation over time. The most consistently popular name has been John which was in the top ten from 1910 to 1972. Currently John is ranked #26. At the same time John exited the top ten Matthew entered the most popular group. Currently Matthew is just outside the top 10 at #13.

Just as Mary has become harder to find, Mark has also fallen out of favor. Mark was a top ten name from 1955 to 1970 but fell out of the top 100 in 2003 (currently #154). Luke has had the biggest rise in popularity since 1910 and it's not just a "Star Wars" effect. In 1950 Luke was the #511 boys name. It rose to #222 in 1976 (a year before the release of Star Wars). Luke entered the top 100 in 1993 and has remained there since (#48 in 2009).

For more on names, and specifically names given by Catholic parents, see "Don't Call Me Ishmael" by CARA researchers Paul Perl and Jon Wiggins in the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion. Here they found, "worship attendance does increase Catholics' likelihood of choosing specific names that are disproportionately common within their tradition. This suggests that committed Catholics perceive certain names as 'Catholic' and represents one instance in which names do retain religious connotations for believers. We are aware of no previous research that has established such a link between parental religious commitment and naming" (p. 209). They estimate that 50% of females named Mary (or Marie, Marion, Maria, Maryann, etc.) in the United States were raised Catholic (p.221). Females with the following names were least likely to have been raised Catholic: Tamara or Tammy (14%), Shirley or Shirlene (15%), Bonnie (16%), Brenda (16%), and Joyce (18%) (p.222).

Obama's National Abortion Deception Revealed by his Former Right-hand Man

2011-01-20T09:58:00.004-05:00

From: Life News

Boehner, Pro-Life Group Use Emanuel Admission on Abortion, Obamacare
by Steven Ertelt | Washington, DC | LifeNews.com | 1/18/11 7:16 PM

The office of Speaker John Boehner and pro-life groups have noticed comments from former Obama chief of staff Rahm Emanuel on the issue of abortion and health care.

During an interview with the Chicago Tribune editorial board, Emanuel said the executive order President Barack Obama signed to supposedly stop the abortion funding the health care reform measure would allow is not a federal law. He also essentially admitted it must not have been too bad because former Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other top abortion advocates endorsed it.

The Speaker’s office sent out this afternoon a fact check on the bill to repeal Obamacare that seized on the comments.

“In a recent interview with the Chicago Tribune editorial board, facing questions about his commitment to the pro-abortion cause, former White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel emphasized that the Executive Order on abortion signed by President Obama in March 2010 – ostensibly to eliminate the need for the pro-life Stupak Amendment to be attached to ObamaCare – does not carry the force of law, and as such, has the seal of approval of former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and others who oppose a ban on taxpayer funding of abortion,” the document said.

“Emanuel also seemed to acknowledge that the EO was a maneuver by the Obama Administration to circumvent a bipartisan majority in the House – and the will of the American people – which supported the pro-life Stupak amendment,” Boehner’s office added.

Meanwhile, saying that the interview would engender more opposition to Obamacare, Family research Council president Tony Perkins said this week’s interview with Obama’s former chief-of-staff is very telling.

“In a discussion with Carol Moseley Braun and the Chicago Tribune, Rahm Emanuel confirmed what FRC has said all along–that nothing is stopping the health care law from funding women’s abortions. Not the current language, and definitely not the phony executive order agreed to by Rep. Bart Stupak,” he said of Emanuel’s comments.

The exchange between Emanuel and pro-abortion former Senator Carol Moseley Braun follows:

Moseley Braun: “You wound up being the person tagged with making that, quote, ‘compromise’ happen…”

Emanuel: “That’s a fair question, and I’ll explain it. President Obama was determined to get his health care bill passed. There were 14 votes that were holding [it] up, and my job as chief-of-staff was to help the President get… that legislation.”

Moseley Braun: “And so you threw women under the bus?”

Emanuel: “I came up with an idea for an executive order to allow the Stupak-Amendment not to exist by law but by executive order, and it was good enough for Nancy Pelosi…who [is] held up in honors by people like NARAL and Planned Parenthood who supported that bill and supported the way to make progress.”

Perkins responded, “Notice the words ‘not to exist by law.’”

“Back when Congressman Stupak struck this deal, pro-lifers were shocked that his coalition would trade away their votes for a meaningless piece of paper. Executive orders can do a lot of things–but impacting the health care law isn’t one of them,” Perkins explains. “This was a symbolic gesture by a shrewd White House. It may have gotten the better of Stupak, but it won’t fool Americans.”

“If anything, Emanuel has just done Republicans a huge favor. By admitting that taxpayer-funded abortion not only exists–but thrives–in the health care law, he’s turned the country’s attention back to the biggest travesty of all,” he added.

The Silence of Donald Wuerl

2011-01-12T17:35:00.008-05:00

Archdiocese of Washington's Donald Cardinal Wuerl is seen here greeting the new mayor of Washington, D.C., former Council Chairman Vincent Gray, at the latter's inauguration ceremony on January 2, 2011. Wuerl was present to offer the invocation and a prayer at the request of Gray who claims to be a member of St. Francis Xavier Parish and regular attendee at St. Mary Mother of God Parish, both in Washington. , earlier served as the founding executive director of Covenant House Washington, a Catholic outreach program that serves at-risk youth.

But, as reported in a previous post, (here), Gray actively supports agendas directly opposed to his remaining a Catholic in good standing.

According to American Papist, the above picture was taken in Gray's office.
The round glass award from Planned Parenthood stands defiantly amidst two pictures of the Pope. To have such an award prominently placed is a declaration that Gray respects the judgment and activities of Planned Parenthood who granted the award. And it is well-known that Planned Parenthood is a foremost provider and promoter of unborn baby-murder for a fee.

Despite Gray's public proclaiming to be Catholic and public positions gravely inconsistent with the teachings of Catholicism, Wuerl's propoganda paper, a.k.a., The Catholic Standard, was silent. Whether intentionally or not, it misleads people into believing Gray is a Catholic in good standing whose agenda has the support of the Archdiocese.

Meanwhile, the following according to the same paper is Wuerl's prayer:

"Make our nation's capital an example of how a complex, pluralistic, democratic society can come together and that we can be that light that shines in the darkness, the city on the mountaintop that says we are everything that our nation's founding documents call us to be."

"Grant that Mayor Gray's vision and pledge to make us one city will manifest its truth in all of us so that we work together for that unity of purpose."

"Finally, gracious Lord, we ask that you let the brightness, gentleness and mercy of your countenance shine upon this wonderful city and all of us who see here our home, the dwelling place of our children and, therefore, our future, and the place where our aspirations and dreams can be realized."

"May the goodwill voiced here today, echo throughout the rest of the year ... so that everywhere we might see the wonderful power of your grace at work."

Notice anything about this prayer? A self-proclaimed "Catholic" mayor asked a Cardinal Archbishop to offer a prayer, and not one mention is made of Jesus Christ! Perhaps Wuerl judged the mention of Christ too divisive? Perhaps it would interfere with Gray's "vision." So, Wuerl shuts his mouth on two accounts.

While Catholic Standard proclaimed and self-proclaimed "Catholic" Gray publicly supports redefining marriage and the anti-human agenda of Planned Parenthood, Wuerl is silent. And when praying as a self-proclaimed Catholic's Archbishop, the same Wuerl is silent.

Sad to say, but Wuerl makes even McCarrick look good.

The Date of Christmas

2010-12-21T09:10:00.002-05:00

I'm so sick of hearing that Christmas was chosen to replace the pagan feast of Sol Invictus.
That is the canard of 19th c. Protestants, modern pagan, and misotheists who think thereby to discredit the feast of the Church. In fact, the coincidence of dates would mean little since the Church worships Christ alone, and the events of Christmas are a fact. But, we shouldn't be so quick to concede the argument to those who assert that Christians celebrated Christmas on December 25th to compete with a Roman cult.

Here's why:

1. The cult of Sol Invictus was supposedly created by Aurelian in 274. We only know that the were games to honor Sol held every four years from 274 onwards. The actual day is disputed, but likely in the summer or autumn.

2. The cult was supposedly set for December 25, but the only explicit reference to a celebration of Sol in late December is made by Julian the Apostate in his hymn to King Helios written immediately afterwards in early 363. Julian explicitly differentiates between the one-day, annual celebration of late December 362 and the multi-day quadrennial games of Sol in October .
3. Scholars don't know who was actually worshipped on the pagan feast. It may have been Latin Sol, a revival of the cult of Elagabalus (beloved by Aurelian), or a completely new god.

4. The imperial cult would have begun in Rome by the Emperors who came from Syria. Now, it is unclear how popular the cult had been. First, if introduced in the latter quarter of the 3rd century it is unlikely it would have been popular in conservative Rome where foreign cults were looked down upon. If it were popular in the East, then it must be explained why January 6th, Epiphany, was the preferred fast to recollect Christ's birth. December 25th only grew in importance in the East through the influence of St. John Chrysostom.

6. The Christian Philocalian calendar of 354 AD gives a festival of "Natalis Invicti" on 25 December. But, here it is clear that "invictus" refers to Christ. If anything, it should be assumed that pagans renamed Sol invictus and his feast moved to December 25th to compete with Christ.

7. The birth of Christ was celebrated at least in the early 200's, but at different times.
Around AD 200, Clement of Alexandria wrote that a group in Egypt celebrated the nativity on 25 Pashons (May 20). De Pascha Computus, a calendar of feasts produced in 243, gives March 28 as the date of Christ's birth.

8. Chronographai, a reference work published in 221 by Sextus Julius Africanus noted that Jesus was conceived on the spring equinox which was March 25 according to the Roman calendar. Moreover, Christians believed that Christ died on March 25. (For Jews, it was also the day of creation and many ancient calendars began the year at that time.) Thus, the two great moments in man's salvation could be recalled on the same day. His birth, meanwhile, was 9 months thence.

9. Hugo Rahner pointed out that Christmas was being celebrated in North Africa even by the Donatists. The Donatists were the schismatic Church of significant size which began in 311 when they rejected the bishops and priests who had repented of cooperating with the Roman authorities during persecution of Diocletian. Donatists did not accept any "innovation" introduced by those traditores, especially not anything that would seem to be part of a pagan cult. Yet, ST. Augustine noted that Donatists celebrated Christmas on December 25. Thus, one must conclude, based on the Donatists' celebration of the feast of Christmas, that the feast had already been established before the living memory of the Donatists alive in 311. It is unlikely a feast of Christmas introduced in 274 to compete with a Roman pagan feast would have been accepted by these purists.

Suggestion:We should rather conclude that the moving of Sol Invictus to December 25 (a day which is not even the solistice!) was an attempt by PAGANS to try to stem the tide of the feast celebrated by growing numbers of Christians.

NYC's Teachers' Union's Culture of Secrecy

2010-12-18T22:20:00.002-05:00

A couple of years ago some NYC lawmakers began a witch hunt against the Church and tried to eliminate statutes of limitations. Doing so would have meant anyone could make an accusation against a long dead clergy man who, naturally, would have been unable to defend his reputations or the Church from monetary lawsuits. The bill, however, failed when other lawmakers thought it should extend to public entities such as schools. The threat to the schools was the bills death knell.

NYC Teachers Union vs. the Children
December 10, 2010 5:43 P.M.
By Katrina Trinko

Does the public have a right to know how effective public school teachers are?
Not according to the New York City teachers’ union, which is fighting in court to forbid the New York City school district from releasing data on individual teachers’ performance. Five New York news organizations, including the New York Times, have requested the ratings for the 12,000 (out of 80,000 total) teachers whose effectiveness has been graded. The news organizations say that the Freedom of Information law gives them the right to see any government statistics; the United Federation of Teachers, which includes the New York City teachers union, is protesting that the ratings (based on how well a teacher’s students do on standardized tests and controlling for socioeconomic factors) are flawed and releasing them would embarrass teachers.

Note that this battle isn’t about whether teachers’ pay or tenure should be impacted by those ratings; it’s just about whether the public can see those ratings. That the unions view doing so as worth fighting in court is discouraging — and a sign of what school reformers are up against.

In August, the Los Angeles Times, using information from test scores released by the Los Angeles school district, ranked 6,000 individual teachers, controlling for different economic and family backgrounds. It wasn’t an uncontroversial move: the LA teachers union expressed outrage, and urged LA denizens to boycott the Times. When a teacher committed suicide weeks later, the union blamed it on the database — although no evidence has been found that suggests that was what caused the suicide.

Privacy aside, the unions’ biggest argument is that test scores are a lousy way to judge a teacher’s effectiveness. But the preliminary results of study commissioned by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation released today suggest that test scores are a good indicator of a teacher’s effectiveness.

“In every grade and subject we studied, a teacher’s past success in raising student achievement on state tests was one of the strongest predictors of his or her ability to do it again,” said Vicki Phillips, an education director for the Gates Foundation, according to the Washington Post.

Teachers should be embarrassed if year after year, they fail to teach their students what they need to know. The public deserves to know – and if the release of this data encourages a swelling of support for merit pay, so much the better.

Pius XII on Man's Last End and Art

2010-12-15T09:42:00.002-05:00

From Musicae Sacrae (25 December 1955)

24. The ordination and direction of man to his ultimate end - which is God - by absolute and necessary law based on the nature and the infinite perfection of God Himself is so solid that not even God could exempt anyone from it. This eternal and unchangeable law commands that man himself and all his actions should manifest and imitate, so far as possible, God's infinite perfection for the praise and glory of the Creator. Since man is born to attain this supreme end, he ought to conform himself and through his actions direct all powers of his body and his soul, rightly ordered among themselves and duly subjected to the end they are meant to attain, to the divine Model. Therefore even art and works of art must be judged in the light of their conformity and concord with man's last end.

25. Art certainly must be listed among the noblest manifestations of human genius. Its purpose is to express in human works the infinite divine beauty of which it is, as it were, the reflection. Hence that outworn dictum "art for art's sake" entirely neglects the end for which every creature is made. Some people wrongly assert that art should be exempted entirely from every rule which does not spring from art itself. Thus this dictum either has no worth at all or is gravely offensive to God Himself, the Creator and Ultimate End.

26. Since the freedom of the artist is not a blind instinct to act in accordance with his own whim or some desire for novelty, it is in no way restricted or destroyed, but actually ennobled and perfected, when it is made subject to the divine law.

Fr. Francis J. Connell, CSSR on the Perfidy of "Interfaith"

2010-12-14T19:40:00.003-05:00

The use by Catholics of such expressions as "interfaith meetings" and "persons of different faiths," whereby non-Catholics are said or implied to have a different faith from Catholics is very unfortunate.

The word faith as traditionally used in the Catholic Church, signifies exclusively the one true faith, which is found only in the Catholic Church.

Objectively, the faith is the body of truths that are proposed by the infallible magisterium of the Church as divinely revealed; subjectively faith is the infused virtue whereby one accepts the truths of divine revelation on account of God's authority.

The virtue of faith can can reside in persons of good will separated from Catholic unity; [but in them it impels them to full unity of belief in so far as they believe in some things true. ] it does not extend to doctrines which they themselves may sincerely believe but which are actually false.

When Catholics wish to speak of those outside the true fold, they could refer to them as persons of different denominations, different beliefs, different creeds - but the word faith should be retained in its traditional Catholic sense.

My Conclusion:
We must stop using the term "interfaith" since it can lead to relativism wherein the theological virtue of Faith is confused with a natural persuasion towards as false religion. Catholics, by baptism, have the gift of faith, subjectively, and by assent to the Church's teach, also objectively. It seems that validly baptized Protestants can have faith subjectively, but not objectively. Muslims, however, do not have faith, properly speaking, at all.
Catholics ought to replace the word "interfaith" with "interreligious."

Uno iam anno...R.I.P. Msgr. Tullio Andreatta

2010-12-11T01:23:00.001-05:00

From Rorate Caeli

Rt. Rev. Tullio Andreatta
Born: Crespano del Grappa, Veneto, Italy - 1904
Ordained a Priest: June 29, 1938

Died: San Diego, California, USA - December 11, 2009

Pastoral Work

Emigrating to USA in March 1939, he for ten years served Italians in various parishes. He arrived in the Diocese of San Diego on December 3, 1949 and was assigned to serve as the Assistant Pastor at Our Lady of Guadalupe Church in San Bernardino. In 1951, at the direction of Bishop Buddy, he established a new parish in San Bernardino which he named Our Lady of Fatima. Other pastoral assignments included Blessed Sacrament Church (now Our Lady of Light) in Descanso, Our Lady of Mount Carmel, and Our Lady of the Lake Church in Lake Arrowhead.

Honors

In 1978, he was invested as a Prelate of Honor of the Pope on the occasion of the 40th Anniversary of his ordination. On October 30, 1983, he was invested in the Knights of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem as a Knight Commander in recognition of his devoted service to Holy Mother Church.

Traditional Latin Mass

Following Pope John Paul II's 1984 authorization allowing the public celebration of the Tridentine Lain Mass, Monsignor Andreatta was the first priest in the United States to obtain permission from a diocesan bishop to do so. Following his appointment as chaplain, beginning on February 24, 1985, the Tridentine Latin Mass was offered by Monsignor Andreatta at St. Vincent de Paul Church in central San Diego.

Due to the objections of several of the clergy the Tridentine Latin Mass was soon moved to Holy Cross Cemetery Mausoleum Chapel where it was offered every Sunday and Holyday without exception by Monsignor Andreatta until his retirement in 1991.
It was Monsignor Andreatta's hope and prayer that a parish church be provided where his beloved Mass could be offered and the other sacraments provided. Thanks be to God, he lived to see the day when, on October 7, 2008, the Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary, a personal parish was erected for the Traditional Latin Mass apostolate at St. Anne Catholic Church.

Latest Japanese Translation of the "Hail Mary"

2010-12-10T20:42:00.003-05:00

Japanese unveil new Hail Mary translation
Published Date: December 9, 2010
By ucanews.com special correspondent, Tokyo

The Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Japan (CBCJ) yesterday published a new, colloquial translation of the Hail Mary for trial use throughout Japan.
The provisional translation, known as the “Ave Maria prayer” for its inclusion of the Latin phrase at the beginning, was approved during the CBCJ extraordinary plenary assembly this October.

The prayer is offered for general use through March 25, 2011 – the Solemnity of the Annunciation – and the feedback collected will be considered until the conference makes a final decision on the prayer’s adoption during its ordinary plenary assembly in June.

The bishops first published a prayer book with colloquial translations of the Lord’s Prayer and the Hail Mary in September, 1993.

Those versions supplanted prayers written in a classical literary style which had been used previously. Then, in February, 2000, a further-revised Lord’s Prayer was issued in common with the Anglican Episcopal Church in Japan (Nippon Sei Ko Kai), and it is this version that is used officially today.

In the 1993 colloquial translation of the Hail Mary, a number of passages from the original Latin were either omitted from the Japanese entirely or else liberally paraphrased. For that reason, some said, “We want a translation more faithful to the words of scripture,” the CBCJ explained.

Translation issues have been a recurring point of discussion in Japan for centuries. In the past 10 years there are a number of vociferous debates on Japanese translations of everything from prayers to the catechism, to the Mass. This debate has also found its way into the pages of ucanews.com.
A version of this article was first published in the Katorikku Shimbun (The Catholic Weekly) in Tokyo, which was translated for ucanews.com by Dominic Pease.

The main points of revision of the Ave Maria prayer are as follows:

1. Original Latin: Ave Maria (“Hail Mary”)
1993 Japanese: Sei Maria (“Holy Mary”)
2010 Japanese: Ave Maria (the Latin phrase is used)

The word “ave” (“hail”) in “Ave Maria” was omitted entirely from the Japanese in the 1993 prayer book. In the provisional translation, the Latin phrase is retained as-is and rendered phonetically in katakana, the script used to write words that come from foreign languages.

2. Original Latin: gratia plena (“full of grace”)
1993 Japanese: megumi afureru (“brimming over with grace”)
2010 Japanese: megumi ni michita kata (“[a person] full of grace”)

The 1993 version rendered the Latin “gratia plena” in a Japanese phrase meaning, “brimming over with grace.” The revised translation, “megumi ni michita kata,” is more faithful to the meaning and word order [*1] of the source text.

3. Original Latin: Benedicta tu in mulieribus (“Blessed art thou amongst women”)
1993 Japanese: Shu wa anata wo erabi, shukufuku shi (“the Lord chose you and blessed you”)
2010 Japanese: Anata wa onna no uchi de shukufuku sare (“You are blessed among women.”)

The 1993 version included the phrase, “the Lord chose you,” not present in the Latin, but neglected to translate the Latin “in mulieribus” (English: “among women”).

4. Original Latin: fructus ventris tui (“fruit of your womb”)
1993 Japanese: anata no ko (“your son”)
2010 Japanese: go-tainai no on-ko (“your Son, within your womb”)

The 1993 version replaced the Latin phrase “fructus ventris tui” with the simple phrase “your son.”
The new translation addresses the original words more directly, but rejected any direct equivalent of the word “fructus” (“fruit”) as irreconcilable with acceptable Japanese idiom. Instead, the provisional text uses the phrase, “your Son, within your womb.” Here, “your Son” is an honorific phrase used previously in the older, literary translation from before 1993.

Translator’s Note

The new phrase mimics the meaning and word order of the Latin, but not the structure, technically. The new Japanese uses an appositive modifying “Maria” instead of the adjectival phrase of the 1993 version, which was grammatically more similar to the Latin. However, there is no way to have a post-positional adjective in Japanese, as there is in English and Latin, so it’s an unavoidable trade-off. Additionally, with the change of “Sei Maria” to “Ave Maria,” I think their hands were basically forced on this point due to the internal structure of the Latin.

Related reportsSmall word, big problem Japanese get to work on new Bible translation A word to say about liturgy

The Leftist Elite

2010-12-10T10:23:00.002-05:00

Clever and funny, but sadly true.

Clueless Anti-clerical Pseudo-Catholics

2010-12-09T17:46:00.003-05:00

The following article first annoyed me until I realized how pathetic the anti-clerical pseudo-Catholics of this country are. If they were not harming their souls the following would be almost funny.

Sadly, these people are steeped in fuzzy thinking and divisive subjectivism. There is no sense of mystery or grandeur when it comes to the Church in their view. The Church exists for their own liberal agenda and when its members, especially those called by God as shepherds don't push a liberal agenda, they cry and scream foul without ever examining their own obstinant and defiled consciences.

Two Churches?
December 9, 2010, 12:44 pm
http://www.commonwealmagazine.org/blog/?p=11303
By Lisa Fullam

Phyllis Zagano’s NCR column begins with an assessment of Rome’s apparent retreat on the investigation of US women religious, but concludes with a broader assessment of the state of the Church:

The world is beginning to see two Catholic Churches: one for bishops and priests and another for the rest of us. The one for clerics collects the money and controls the sacraments. [And the world also hated and still hates Jesus Christ. Christ warned the Church that the world would hate her as it hated Him. So we might ask which Church is the true Church: the Church which is hated because she believes in unchanging truths in matters or faith and morals, and also holds that Christ deserves the best we have spiritually and materially in our worship? Or the "Church" which is loved because it wants to update doctrine and morals so as to not offend against base and disordered desires, and makes the liturgy "relevant" by adopting the music and casualness of the world?]

Now I’d hasten to say that this is too starkly drawn–it’s not the ordained against the rest of us. Many priests, along with countless laypeople, women religious, deacons, (and even the occasional bishop!) are doing the work in the trenches that speaks Christ to people. [By saying that some priests and bishops are on her side, Fullam implicitly admits that the problem is not laity vs. clergy, but those who reject the apostolic faith and those who are faithful to it. Sadly, she is one who rejects it.] The divide happens somewhere within the clerical ranks–somewhere in their formation, it seems, clerics-to-be [i.e. laymen who have discerned God's call] pick a side. [I guess the whole matter is as simple as that in the mind of a muddle headed liberal like Fullam.] Over and over, when Rome or the local hierarchy or the pastor says or does something troubling["troubling?"], I hear people say, “they’re not my church. My church is…” and they name the parish, or the ministry, or the small group to which they belong. This split troubles me. [It should! If dissenters on matters of faith and morals were to accept the Catholic faith then there would be no split!]
[Warning! Red herring alert!!!] First, the cappa magna-clad (and their ilk) among the leadership only have their powerful and well-funded positions because the rest of the Church continues to acknowledge their leadership. [Ah, clueless Fullam! She has a picture of Bp. Slattery at the basilica in cappa magna. Do you know who bought the cappa magna and asked him to wear it? The Paulus Institute which was founded and run by .... LAY PEOPLE!!! And who filled the basilica to standing room only the day of that Mass?....LAY PEOPLE. So, the moronic thesis that priests and bishops are pushing these things is for childish heretics who need a reason to whine and feel self-righteous. But, in reality it is the laity that want their priests and bishops to preach the perennial Catholic Faith and even wear dignified clerical attire and liturgical vestiments. True, the younger priests seem to be more zealous for Tradition and traditions. But, they were post-Vatican II laymen who answered Christ's call to orders. As laymen they lived through the wasteland cultivated by pseudo-Catholic dissenters. Wanting no part of the pseudo-Church, they laid down their lives to serve Christ and His true Church as priests.] We pay them. Ignoring the leadership does nothing to stop them from speaking from [sic] us, and nothing to stop the rest of the world from thinking they represent us. Consider how influential bishops can be on matters of public policy involving, say, contraception, when by and large the people of God dissent from or ignore that teaching? [Fullam shows her true pseudo-Catholic colors. She is a dissenter who sets up a dangerous criteria: basically, people following sinful inclinations should determine doctrine, and not theological reflection on revealtion.]
Second, the disconnect of the two churches disrupts church polity. We are a universal church, not a Congregational body. [A bizarre juxtaposition of categories! Let me make it simple for her. There is one Catholic Church. It is the Church which was founded by Christ on the apostles and their successors the bishops with the pope as her visible head on earth. Those who knowing this reject the Church's "official" teaching are not Catholics but dissenters, schismatics, heretics, or apostates. But, it doesn't end there. There is an easy solution. One only needs to put aside one's own personal intransigence and pray for the grace to be able to acknowledge to voice of Christ in the successors of the apostles. Only His own hear His voice, and no one can believe unless the Father draws, so pray for Faith!!!] The disconnect fragments the people of God. To say that those not in synch with Rome or local leadership should put up or leave is tantamount to saying they’re not doing God’s work in a distinctively Catholic way, and that’s just not true. [An awesome example of how pseudo-Catholics are so confused and impelled by their own perverse inclinations that they think they can invent "truths" out of thin air. Now, the "distinctly Catholic way" is not a cultural phenomenon or method as Fullam seems to belief. The "Catholic way" can only mean in communion with the Church which includes living in the state of grace. Since willful dissent is a mortal sin it drives grace out of the soul. Thus, someone may outwardly claim to be Catholic and appear to act in a "Catholic way" by performing actions a Catholic would perform, but only God who knows the repentance of the human heart can know if someone is acting in a truly Catholic way. So, if no one should leave the Church. They (including Fullam) should repent! Their conscience is defiled because they know authetic Church teaching (ex. on contraception) and prefer your own private opinion to it.] New USCCB head Dolan seems to notice the flood of young people out of the Church, but seems puzzled. So…what next? [Yes, Dolan claims to be puzzled. But, the answer is clear. It is the old choice of the Kingdom of God or the world. If one thing is sure, many Catholics have lost their faith because it hasn't been preached or taught to them, especially on Sundays. The young people leaving are leaving because they want to do what they want when they want and as they want. How many actually believe, and are willing to die for the belief that Jesus is God from God become flesh? How many actually believe Jesus is present in the Blessed Sacrament? How many believe that celibacy is something good and holy? Morals are based on dogma, and if there is no dogmatic foudnation, morals will collapse. Moreover, dogmatic and moral truths are supposed to be reinforced by the liturgy. But, sadly, the liturgy has fallen on bad times in the 1970's, 1980's, and 1990's. It is only now being re-emphasized that the law of prayer is the law of belief. And ultimately, that is why pseudo-Catholic dissenters hate the old liturgy. They know it is ultimately a requiem for their dissent.]

24 Hour Pro-Life Eucharistic Vigil at CUA

2010-12-07T12:15:00.003-05:00

This is a very hopefully sign and wonderful testament to the zeal for life among the students and faculty at CUA. I speculate, but also hope that perhaps even the new president will be present.

The following was passed on to me:
...

In response to graduate student interest in Eucharistic adoration, I am pleased to forward the following information to you from Fr. Peter Tymko OFM, Conv., Associate Chaplain for Graduate Students:

You are invited to 24 hour Eucharistic Adoration for a greater respect for life in celebration of the Solemnity of The Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The schedule is as follows:

Tuesday, December 7
0 5:10pm – Vigil Mass for the Immaculate Conception of the BVM and Respect for Life
o 9pm – Praise and Worship Adoration
o 10pm – Confessions

Wednesday, December 8
o 12am – Prayer for Life
o 3am – Rosary
o 6am – Devotions
o 9am – Rosary
o 12pm – Prayer for Life
o 3pm – Chaplet of Divine Mercy
o 5:10pm – Reposition of the Blessed Sacrament and Mass for the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception of the BVM.

Please enter through the door to CALDWELL that is between the Campus Ministry Office and the Chapel (the St. Francis Garden). For more information or to volunteer to spend an hour as a group or individual, contact David Pennington, associate campus minister, at 202-319-5575 or penningd@cua.edu.
Sincerely,
Joseph Forte,
Vice President, Graduate Student Association

Does Obama Support Anti-Catholicism?

2010-12-03T13:33:00.002-05:00

The next few days will reveal whether or not Obama is an anti-Catholic bigot. As Fr. Z points out, Obama wouldn't tolerate a speechwriter who made such a comment about Muslims. But, anti-Catholicism is still a deep seeded prejudice in America, so many get away with it.
Sadly, it will not surprise me if no action is taken by this worst president ever against his speechwriter.
...

From Fr Z:
This is the sort of person Pres. Obama chooses for his speech writing staff. Now we will have to wait to see what POTUS does about this.

From The Catholic League:

OBAMA SPEECHWRITER’S IDEA OF COMEDY
The winner at last night’s “Funniest Celebrity” competition in Washington D.C. was White House speechwriter Jon Lovett. In a quip he made about the TSA’s pat downs, he said, “it’s giving a way for, you know, defrocked priests to get their lives back together, giving back to the community, lend a…Well, not lend a hand, but you know.”

Catholic League president Bill Donohue responds as follows:

Had this been some flunky entertainer appearing in an urban comedy club, no one would blink an eye. But it is at least an interesting window into the mind of one of the speechwriters for the president of the United States: Jon Lovett could have chosen a million examples to poke fun at the TSA, so it is revealing that what he settled on was a former priest guilty of sexual molestation.

This is an administration that has bent over backwards not to offend Muslims. Even in a comedic forum, it would never countenance a joke of this sort that targeted an imam. But for Catholic priests, the White House obviously has a different standard. [Does President Obama think that his staff can offend Catholics with impunity?]

At the very least, Lovett should never be given an assignment ever again that touches on matters Catholic. And quite frankly, a statement by President Obama on this issue is entirely warranted. We can’t have one standard for Muslims and another for Catholics.

At best this reveals a double-standard. At worst this reveals gross anti-Catholicism.

This requires an explanation from the White House.

What do you think? Am I wrong about this?

Albino Luciani's Vision for Vatican Council II

2010-12-03T10:17:00.003-05:00

The following is a letter written in response to a request of all bishops to give their ideas for the agenda for the Council proclaimed by Bl. John XXIII on January 25, 1959.

The English translation from the Latin taken from the 2004 Dunwoodie Review with slight modifications. The future pope's letter shows that he was no innovator in the realm of doctrine and morals, but hoped the Council would inspire Catholics to evangelical zeal in sharing the true Faith of Jesus Christ.

...

25 August 1959
Most Eminent Lord,

With all sincerity and reverence, I humbly submit to You my petitions and desires which, with a mind toward a future Ecumenical Council You ask with the highest benignness to be made manifest by me in Your Letter on the 18th day of June 1959, n. I c/59-1460.

A. Concerning Doctrine it seems to me:

1. The special nature of the ecclesiatical Magisterium, and flowing from that, the obligation of the faithful to assent with a willing spirit either to doctrinal decrees or to ordinary preaching, must again be affirmed.
2. It should be considered carefully by what effectual means Christian doctrine might be handed over to the adult faithful who are often ignorant of basic realities of the Faith.
3. The subject of Christian optimism must be emphasized against widespread pessimism and hence: against the relativists, the validity of human reason to seize upon truth and certitude; against individualists and subjectivists, free will’s capacity of commanding the inferior somewhat obscure psychological powers.
4. In a short speech concerning social realities, let it be worked in that Catholics who serve in unions and the political field may never forget that spiritual realities prevail over economic, that, in fact, the working out of charity ought to share in the very defense of social rights.
5. Let the right doctrines be handed on again concerning the primary end of matrimony, the evil of contraception, artificial fecundation, painless birth, painkillers, therapeutic psychoanalysis, reanimation, and similar questions very much discussed today.

B. Concerning discipline, I choose:

1. Let more expedient faculties be conceded to Ordinaries in conferring and taking away parishes: from this, let the norms of concursus, collatio, privatio, pensio be unchanged; let the ius patronatus - the owed compensations having been made - be taken away.
2. To the same, let there be given a bit more expedient faculties in the economic-administrative area.
3. Certain prudent norms having been handed on, let a measure be made to deal with the needs of souls by a better and more uniform distribution of the clergy
4. Let the rite of the diocesan synod be reduced to a simpler form.
5. Let religious, still exempt not only in principle but also by concrete and prudent norms, be subjected to the Ordinary of the place in those things which look toward the care of souls.
6. Let it be conceded to major superiors of religious that, for a just cause, they can extend the government of superior houses beyond a second three-year period; this especially, for the good of a hospital or school which is joined to a house.
7. Let a codification of liturgical law be prepared which would conserve and defend venerable antiquities, the Latin language, and at the same time concede something to sane modernity.
8. Let ecclesiastical censures be simplified as to kind and number, in order that they might accord with modern times and facilitate the zealous effort of confessors.

Perceiving these things on behalf of my smallness, I take the occasion to profess my devotion to You and to prostrate myself to kiss the Sacred Purple, while I sign below:

Most Obediently,
Albino Luciani
Bishop of Vittorio Veneto

St. Francis Xavier Church, NYC

2010-12-03T00:00:00.002-05:00

At St. Francis, Renovation Renews and Repurposes
Chelsea Now
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
BY BONNIE ROSENSTOCK

This high marble altar weighs roughly 24 tons, and was moved 12 feet forward to create space for a new sacristy behind it. Photo © Patrick Brewis

This holiday season will mark the first Christmas at the Church of St. Francis Xavier since the completion of its remarkable overhaul six or so months ago. “Christmas brings many visitors to our parish, and this year will provide a wonderful opportunity for those returning to see the magnificent changes,” said pastor Fr. Joe Costantino, S.J. “Those visitors seeing the church for the first time obviously won’t recognize anything other than a stunning church.

The journey began a dozen years ago when Thomas A. Fenniman attended the wedding of one of his employees at the historic church at 46 W. 16th Street. Like most, he was awed by the beauty of the church’s interior, but with an architect’s eye he was also struck by its disrepair. A few weeks later, Fenniman, whose architectural firm is headquartered at One Union Square West and 14th Street, called the then pastor, Fr. Ned Coughlin, S.J., and arranged a meeting.

The following year, in 1999, Fr. Ned hired Fenniman to do a survey and make recommendations. For starters, the lighting was broken; the oak pews, covered in varnish, were almost black; there was extensive damage to the stained glass windows — you could take your finger and peel off the lead caning; — the 14 Stations of the Cross murals, which wrap around the church, were yellowed and dark from candle smoke and incense; plaster was pulverized; the original wood floor didn’t meet together along the aisles, which was hazardous; and layers of soot and grime were everywhere and on everything. In other words, it was in dire need of salvation.

However, more pressing exterior damage had to be tackled first. In 2001, Phase I began on the restoration and preservation of the beautiful cutstone granite façade, described as Baroque, “a Parisian opera house or train station,” by Christopher Gray in the March 27, 2005 Sunday New York Times. Patrick Brewis, director of stewardship, terms the exterior design “a European-style basilica, with [interior] touches of pure Americana/Victorian period with stenciling and geometric patterns.”

The first Jesuit-founded St. Francis Xavier Church was on Elizabeth Street and the Bowery, purchased from a Protestant congregation. After it burned down, lots were purchased on W. 16th Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues but the new church, built in 185l, proved too small for the growing number of the faithful. It was gutted in 1889; the rebuilt structure now houses a Jesuit residence on an upper floor and the parish’s boys’ high school — which counts among its Xavier-educated alumni major CEOs, top Fortune 500 executives, TV newscaster Al Roker and Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia.

When the cornerstone for the current building, next door at number 46, was laid in May 1878, 5,000 people showed up. It was completed in 1882, the architect of record, Irish immigrant Patrick Charles Keely, who went on to design hundreds of churches.

With the Phase I overhaul nearing completion, Fr. Joe, then the new pastor, reinterviewed Fenniman for the interior work. Over the course of spring and summer 2008, there were a series of town hall meetings with the congregation to hear their concerns and visions. “If it was just painting, cleaning and upgrading electric, it would have been an interesting project, but it wouldn’t have had the power it has now,” noted Fenniman. “Father Joe to his credit wanted to look at the whole transept/liturgical space for renovation meaningful to the congregation.”

It came from those meetings to move the high altar to make room for the new sacristy, to put the baptismal font closer to the people and to make it more handicap accessible — three ramps now lead up to the altar. “We realized that nothing less than 100 percent parishioner participation was needed in our efforts,” said Fr. Joe.
...

The marble for the new sanctuary — Carrara (pure white), Colacata (grey) and Giallo di Siena (yellow) — was mined from the original quarry in Italy in the 1870s. The white plastic child’s pool that was used for baptisms was replaced by mosaic reflective of the church’s tri-color palette. The stained glass windows have been restored, including two by Tiffany, who had his studio at 271 Broadway at Union Square and was a parishioner. There is also a state-of-the-art mechanical room so they now have air conditioning in summer and radiators that work, “as green as we can make it,” Brewis stated.

“Every single square inch of this church was touched by human hands, whether cleaned, washed, primed, painted or restored,” said Brewis, who has made a video documentary and created a small museum detailing the transformation process.

The most dramatic move was a move — the 24-ton reredos (high altar) was moved 12 feet forward towards the congregation and to create a space for the new sacristy behind it. It’s an old-school altar harking back to when Vatican II priests had their backs to parishioners. An Amish group from Lancaster moved it. “They said very few words,” said Fenniman, “and it took them only three hours to do it. Pretty amazing.”

Many existing parts were relocated or repurposed. For example, the new altar, ambo (pulpit), cantor stand and processional cross have been crafted out of the 130-year-old oak kneelers from the original pews. The new pipe organ contains elements of the 1950 Kilgen Organ and the original Hook Organ from the 1880s. “One cannot tell where we started and the old building ended,” said Fenniman. “New sensibilities hopefully blend in a way that makes sense.”

The entire renovation and restoration cost over $11.4 million. The parish portion goal was $2.5 million, but in less than six months they had over $3 million raised and in pledges. The Catholic Church provided a loan. “People in the community love this place so much,” said Brewis. “They are here all the time, come on weekends and they put their money where their mouth is.” (In total, over 1,000 people attend the four weekend masses.)

...

Albino Luciani (John Paul I) on the Role of Moral Theologians

2010-11-29T17:26:00.003-05:00

The following is the first part of my translation of an address given by the Patriarch of Venice (and future Pope) to a convention of Moral Theologians held in Padua in 1971.

Carlo Colombo ended his relatio to the assembly of Italian bishops in 1967 in this way: “Love theologians! Be close to theologians without an inferiority complex, as teachers of the faith,… but also as fathers who understand their difficulties, who guide and help them.” (Acts of the Assembly 1967, p. 230)

If I could – I do not have any qualification, I represent myself alone here – I would say to the bishops: “Be especially close to the moral theologians who sometimes have truly serious difficulties in their work!”

Some of these difficulties were the object of our study in the days past.

1. The relationship of the Magisterium to theological research was the first difficulty.
It is a minor (difficulty), if referred to the moments in which moralists – more than researchers – function as simple messengers who bring the word of the Magisterium to the students of theology and to the people. The difficulty, then, is to “find ways always more adapted to communicate Christian doctrine to men in their epoch, because on one hand there is the deposit or the truths of the faith, and on the other there is the way with which they are enunciated even though the meaning and profound sense always remains the same.” (Gaudium et Spes 62)

Exaggerating, Pappini would say, “Every age has its language, its appetites, its dreams, its problems; you have stopped the clock of history in the 14th century and continue to dish out an eternal soup to docile students (studying) for the priesthood without caring about the Christians who are outside the doors of the cloister and who are already accustomed to a tastier and more appetizing meal…. Go out sometime into the fresh air, listen to the voices raised even by non-theologians. I have named poets first: you shall be great theologians if you do not disdain any poetic virtue. When it is a matter of going aloft, the spinning wheels of dialectic are not enough. The two Testaments that are the source and foundation of your doctrine are the height and depth of poetry. St. Augustine the theologian was a poet as Dante the poet was a theologian. But, you are horrified when faced with the daringness, beauty, and music of thought. Art and fantasy seem to you unbearable scandals. You construct very high towers with the most refined rationalist engineering, but you stop up the slits through which one could catch a glimpse of a bit of the mountain, a flower in the field, the face of a child. You debate creation without deigning to give a glance at the concreteness of creation; you discourse on mysteries without realizing the perennial divine mystery that is in the most pallid berry of the bush as well as in the giant white galaxy that flees the confines of the universe; you theorize on souls which yearn and tremble, souls which await perhaps only your word to precede them on the ladder that rises to the eternal. (G. Papini, Letters of Pope Celestine VI, Mondadori, 1960. pp. 421,415.)

At other times, moralists are instead true and proper researchers and can ask that the the following words of Paul VI be referred their own investigations. Theology advances “by means of the intelligence illuminated by faith and not without some light of the Holy Spirit to whom the theologian must be attentive and docile.” (Osservatore Romano p. 2 (Oct 1966)) Thus, even theologians can rejoice in some charism. But how does one reconcile it with the special charism in which pastors rejoice in expounding reveled doctrine? From the moment that pastors – according to the Council – have the task of “judging on the genuineness and right use of the charisms…to examine everything and retain that which is good” (AA 4) and which “among the highest gifts, is that of the apostles to whose authority the Spirit submits all bearers of gifts” (Lumen Gentium 7) I would say that the charism of the theologian should be exercised in collaboration with the charism of pastors and in a certain dependence on it. The dependence, I think, no one of us would deny. The Magisterium, in fact, not only puts in the hand of the theologian the Bible, but also provides the understanding itself of the Bible, about which scientific means of knowing alone cannot suffice. That (task) of the theologian, then, cannot be the work of Sisyphus, condemned to begin again always from scratch, but must be grafted onto that which is valid in theological work developed under the guidance of the Magisterium in past centuries. As to the collaboration, it is not only of the Magisterium to theologians, but of theologians to the Magisterium in view of a correct exercise of the Magisterium itself. The Council says, in fact, that the truth goes from the Pope and the bishops “having bee investigated and enunciated in a way adapted”, with “vigilant work, using suitable means” (LG 25). And it cites in a note the relation of Gasser at Vatican I on the infallibility of the pope (Mansi, Sacrorum Conciliorum nova et amplissima collection, 52 1213), where it is said, “Hence, the pope on behalf of his office and the gravity of the matter is held to apply apt means to investigate the truth rightly and to enunciate it aptly; and means of this kind are councils or even councils of bishops, cardinals, theologians, etc.”

But, how do we put in accord this highlighted dependence with the liberty that the Council recognizes for theologians?

“Let them seek – says the Council – to collaborate with men who excel in other sciences, putting in common their powers and opinions. Theological research, while it follows a profound knowledge of revealed truth, may not neglect the contact with its own time to be able to help competent men in various sectors of knowing to a fuller knowledge of the faith” (GS 62)… “so that they can exercise their task, let it be recognized to the faithful, both ecclesiastics and laity, the liberty to research, to think about, to manifest with humility and courage their own opinion in the area in which they are competent.” (GS 62) “In the Church, all, according to the task assigned to each,…also in theological elaboration of the revealed truth, even though keeping the unity in necessary things, let them preserve liberty.” (Unitatis Redingratio 4)

I think that the Magisterium, even though carrying out a duty of following with the greatest attention the research of theologians, can allow that the “working hypotheses” ordinarily be discussed, confronted, amplified with new contributions, and also corrected among theologians themselves, with the Magisterium reserving to itself (the right) to intervene in order to soothe (passions), to impose silence only extraordinarily when the “hypotheses” have revealed themselves inconsistent or the discussion on the scientific plane should descend or threaten to descend to the level of popularization with a danger of confusion for the unprepared faithful.

(to be continued...)

Exorcism Covered by NY Post

2010-11-28T09:14:00.002-05:00

Scare the hell out of 'em
By GINGER ADAMS OTIS
Last Updated: 9:09 AM, November 28, 2010
Posted: 1:11 AM, November 28, 2010
NY POST

The Rev. Gary Thomas knew the young lady was suffering the moment he met her.

"Lisa," a twenty-something married woman, was brought to the Catholic priest's Sacred Heart Church in Saratoga, Calif., by family members unable to explain her sudden spike in violent behavior.

"I felt a huge presence in the room," said Thomas, an ordained priest who is the chief exorcist in Northern California.

The holy man immediately said a prayer of deliverance over the young lady -- and even that small religious act got a frightening response.

"Her face started to distort, she started speaking a language not known to me that she hadn't been competent in before. She was hissing and spitting and exhibiting a serpentine look both in her body language and her face. She kept rolling her eyes," he said.

To his trained eye, it pointed to one thing: demonic possession.

"I laid my crucifix on her. She let out an incredible scream. I took my stole, which represents my authority as a member of the Catholic Church and as a priest, and I laid it on her.

"She literally slid out of the chair and onto the floor to get away from it. I said 'That's enough for today.' "

THOMAS, 57, is one of the church's small but growing army of priests trained to perform exorcisms -- a long-standing ritual that fell out of practice in the United States several decades ago, in part because of Hollywood movies like "The Exorcist" that sensationalized the rite.

Thomas, who was sent to Rome by his bishop five years ago for exorcism training, is unabashed about his belief that demonic possession is real, even though there are many doubters even within the church.

"We need to start an exorcism school here. We need a system. We don't have any training in place," Thomas said.

There are 185 Catholic dioceses in the country, and only about two dozen have a trained exorcist on staff, he estimates.

The New York Archdiocese has someone it can call if necessary but doesn't employ a full-time exorcist.

But demand for the exorcism ritual is at an all-time high -- so much so that priests can't keep pace with requests, the church admits. This month, it held a conference for exorcism in Maryland to help acquaint priests and bishops with the practice, which is far more common in Europe and Africa than in the United States.

In the five years that he's been an exorcist, Thomas has performed just five exorcisms.

But his requests for the rite number in the thousands. On average, he gets about 15 inquiries a month, he said.

"Everyone who comes to me is suffering in some way, and that is the key here," he said. "Our training is about giving a priest discernment. We need to discern the root cause of the person's issue. Is it preternatural, psychological or physical?

"People call me and think it's like ordering a tetanus shot. 'Hey, can you give me an exorcism?' And I say no way, that's not how it works."

Many weeks -- even months or years -- pass before Thomas might decide an exorcism is necessary. He works with a licensed physician and a psychiatrist -- both practicing Catholics who believe demonic possession exists -- to determine whether a client's problems are medical or psychological.

Many patients genuinely believe they're inhabited by a demon and exhibit classic signs of possession -- but it falls to Thomas to discern if a person's "manifestations" are genuine.

He looks for violent reactions from people when touched with a cross, holy water or his priestly vestments. Some people twitch, moan, can't control their faces, roll their eyes and in some cases spit, cough, drool and even foam at the mouth. Others may start to speak in a garbled language or in a foreign tongue they've never spoken before.

"Some have incredible tremors in their limbs. Sometimes they flip out of their chairs," Thomas said.

As a final stopgap against false possessions, the church requires that priests be "morally certain" that a person is demonically possessed before they can go to their bishop and request permission to perform the rite.

Only then can a priest begin the simple set of prayers and actions meant to sever a demon's hold on a human victim.

"The priests are essentially trained to be skeptics -- that's what you want, not a priest who sees a demon around every corner," said journalist Matt Baglio, whose book "The Rite" followed Thomas in Rome during his exorcism training.

A movie based on Baglio's work is due out in January starring Anthony Hopkins.

Illinois Bishop Thomas Paprocki, who organized a recent exorcism conference, says the rite itself is a simple Latin blessing.

"Priests can wear vestments or their black suits with the purple stole. They read prayers from the Scriptures, repeat songs from the Old Testament, a reading from the Bible, maybe a gospel, because there's an account there of Jesus casting a demon out," said the bishop.

Thomas said he feels no fear when he's performing the rite, as old as the church itself.

"I'm not cocky. You have to give evil a certain kind of respect because demons are much more powerful than humans, and without Christ we are dead," he said.

"But no, I'm never scared. You can't be, not when you do this."

He has been attacked by demons, he claims -- in the form of sexual temptation.

"It usually happens before or after an exorcism. I've been attacked many times, not physically but sexually," he said. "They'll send me all kinds of really strong sexual temptations to really challenge my soul. But I know how to recognize it for what it is."

Of his five exorcisms, Thomas counts Lisa's as his most successful.

After his initial skirmish with her demon, he met two more times with her family to read a prayer of deliverance over her -- a simple call for heavenly protection and not part of the actual rite.

Each time, her spitting, head rolling and speaking in a foreign tongue returned -- but the symptoms grew less extreme with every repetition of the prayer.

During the discernment phase, the priest discovered that Lisa as a child had been sexually abused by a relative.

"Many demonic victims have been sexually abused because such a trauma causes a wound to the soul, and that allows a demon a way to get through," the priest said.

He also discovered that the mother of Lisa's former boyfriend was suspected of asking a Mexican witch doctor to put a curse on her.

Lisa's family responded by going to a different witch doctor to get the hex removed, and "that really messed her up," said Thomas, who believes that dabbling with the occult, pagan practices and non-traditional religions can put a person at risk.

He finally got permission from his bishop to give her an exorcism.

"She was able to resume her normal life and could go back to church and hear Mass," he said, "and those were things she could not do before. She couldn't stand to be in a church."

gotis@nypost.com

180th Anniversary of the Apparition of Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal

2010-11-27T01:38:00.000-05:00

Salve Regina in Chinese

Cecile Richards Worried About Losing Her Blood Money

2010-11-25T10:31:00.003-05:00

Mike Pence Presses for De-Funding Planned Parenthood, Abortion LifeNews

by Steven Ertelt Washington, DC LifeNews.com 11/24/10 2:03 PM

Congressman Mike Pence is pressing for support for his bill he expected to re-introduce in the next session of Congress to de-fund Planned Parenthood — and the abortion business is not happy.
In an email to conservative and pro-life activists yesterday, Pence touted the Title X Abortion Provider Prohibition Act.

“Reports show that Planned Parenthood, America’s largest abortion provider, receives nearly one-third of its $1 billion annual budget from the federal government. And it’s about to get worse, because Obamacare is hiding even more tax dollars in handouts for abortion providers,” Pence explained.

“Nearly 3,500 abortions are performed every day in America. That’s 3,500 lives taken away, many on the government dime without the knowledge or direct approval of taxpayers! It’s reprehensible and we can’t allow it to continue,” Pence added.

Pence referred to the Pledge With America that House Republicans put forward before the elections promising to dismantle ObamaCare, which contains a full prohibition on abortion funding, and to cut off taxpayer funding for abortions in other areas.

“I’m ready to deliver that promise with legislation that will prevent abortion providers like Planned Parenthood from receiving a single dime from the federal government,” the Indiana congressman wrote. “With a new Republican majority, Planned Parenthood is running scared.”

That appears to be the case as Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards sent a desperate email to supporters of the abortion business today pleading for funds to combat the legislation.

Richards claims Pence is not telling the truth about the $650 million in federal funds a GAO report shows the abortion business getting over a seven year period. http://www.lifenews.com/nat6425.html

“He’s lying to them, telling them that tax dollars fund abortion services — but he’s deadly serious about eliminating all federal funding for Planned Parenthood’s life-saving work,” she claims. “I knew the attacks would start soon — but this is outrageous and, I fear, only the beginning. The attacks on Planned Parenthood and the people Planned Parenthood serves are bound to get worse.”

“If Rep. Pence and his anti-choice cronies are successful, the consequences for women will be dire. Federal funding helps local Planned Parenthood health centers across the country,” Richards added, claiming none of the money helps the abortion business do abortions. “After the gains anti-choice legislators made in the recent elections, we knew attacks like this would be coming.”

Richards called Pence’s bill a “vicious campaign to eliminate Planned Parenthood” and promised to “fight this and every effort to undermine” her organization’s work.

In his email, Pence said he’s not surprised Planned Parenthood has gone after him by name.

“The fear of losing their federal funding has led them to target me for my pro-life positions. They’ve even named me to their 2010 Election Hall of Shame for advocating a pro-life agenda on Capitol Hill,” he said. “But I refuse to back down.”

“Our tax dollars should not be spent on abortions. I know it. You know it. Let’s make sure every member of Congress knows it,” he concluded.

Communist Chinese Government Insults Catholic Church

2010-11-20T15:58:00.004-05:00

Long Christ the King!
Sadly, this is an appropriate story on the eve of the Novus Ordo feast of Christ the King. Yet, again, the regime that rules over the good people of China has violated human rights by interfering in the religious practice of Catholics. But, this is not a surprise. China's government is a tyranny that mandates the slaughter of it own innocent children in the name of progress. Is it a surprise it does not fear to coerce consciences?
Christus vincit, Christus regnat, Christus imperat.

China church ordains new bishop
Papal adviser describes China's decision to ordain a bishop without pope's approval as "illegitimate" and "shameful".
Last Modified: 20 Nov 2010 17:47 GMT
Source

China's government-backed Catholic church has ordained a bishop without the pope's approval, despite objections from the Vatican.Reverend Guo Jincai's ordination at Pingquan Church in Chengde city was carried out on Saturday amid strong security.A papal adviser described the ordination as "illegitimate" and "shameful".China's first ordination without papal approval in almost five years threatens to hurt the country's already tense relations with the Vatican.Eight Vatican-approved bishops are believed to have been forced to participate in the ceremony, according to AsiaNews, a Vatican-affiliated missionary news agency that closely covers the church in China.
'Controlling church'Speaking to Al Jazeera from Rome, Father Bernardo Cervellera, the editor of AsiaNews, said that the Chinese government was trying to control the church."I believe that this imprints above all the situation in China, Catholics are really upset by this move of the government which is trying to divide between those who are patriotic and those who are trying to follow the spiritual guidelines of the popes.

"I believe that China feels insecure about the situation inside because of many economic problems and because of many demonstrations against the government.

"They [Chinese government] are trying to control the church," he said.
China has forced its Roman Catholics to cut ties with the Vatican in 1951, and worship is allowed only in state-backed churches. Recent estimates by scholars and church activists put the number of Chinese Catholics loyal to the pope as high as 60 million, three times the size of the official church.

St. Thomas Aquinas on the Identification of the Apostolic Church with the Church Today

2010-11-17T16:58:00.002-05:00

Corpus Thomisticum

Quaestiones de Quolibet XII

Quaestio 13
Prooemium
[86328] Quodlibet XII, q. 13 pr.
Deinde quaesitum fuit:

[86329] Quodlibet XII, q. 13 tit. 1 Utrum sit una Ecclesia quae fuit in principio tempore apostolorum et quae est modo

[86330] Quodlibet XII, q. 13 tit. 2 Et videtur quod non.

[86331] Quodlibet XII, q. 13 arg. 1
Quia nunc non utitur eisdem regulis. Tunc enim praelati erant sine auro et argento in zonis suis. Ergo, et cetera.

[86332] Quodlibet XII, q. 13 arg. 2
Praeterea, non legitur quod Christus et apostoli habuerint castra; modo autem Ecclesia habet. Ergo, et cetera.

[86333] Quodlibet XII, q. 13 s. c.
Contra, Matth., XXVIII, 20: ecce ego vobiscum sum (...) usque ad consummationem saeculi. Hoc autem non intelligitur tantum de apostolis, quia omnes mortui sunt, et adhuc saeculum non est consummatum. Ergo, et cetera.

[86334] Quodlibet XII, q. 13 co.
Respondeo. Dicendum, quod eadem est numero Ecclesia, quae tunc erat et quae nunc est: quia eadem fides et eadem fidei sacramenta, eadem auctoritas, eadem professio; unde dicit apostolus, I Corinth., I, 13: divisus est Christus?

[86335] Quodlibet XII, q. 13 ad 1
Ad primum ergo dicendum, quod verba Matthaei tripliciter exponuntur. Hilarius et Ambrosius exponunt secundum sensum mysticum, dicentes: nolite portare aurum, etc., id est nihil in spiritualibus ministeriis auro vendatis: non duas tunicas, id est non duplicem animam habeatis. Alii exponunt ad litteram; et una expositio est Augustini, qui dicit, quod illa verba non dicuntur per modum praecepti, sed permissionis, ita quod qui non servat non peccat, et qui servat melius facit; ut sit sensus: nolite portare; id est, quando itis ad praedicandum, nolite solliciti esse de expensis, quia debentur vobis a populo: dignus est enim operarius, etc.: quasi diceret: ideo permitto quod non portetis, quia digni estis accipere ab aliis, quibus praedicatis. Paulus hoc non servavit, et tamen contra regulam hanc non fecit sed supererogavit. Alia expositio est aliorum sanctorum, qui dicunt quod haec dicta sunt praeceptive; sed hoc praeceptum datum est non ad semper servandum, sed ad primam missionem: bis enim eos misit, scilicet ante passionem Iudaeis, et post resurrectionem gentibus. In prima dixit eis: in viam gentium ne abieritis; in secunda dixit: docete omnes gentes. In prima mandavit quod praedicta servarent, non autem in secunda. Et ratio huius est, quia in prima solum mittebantur ad Iudaeos, apud quos consuetum erat quod magistri eorum ab eis sustentarentur; et ideo sine scandalo poterant accipere, et uti potestate sibi concessa. Apud vero gentiles non erat huiusmodi consuetudo, quia apud eos non erant huiusmodi praedicatores; et ideo fuisset eis scandalum, et visum fuisset eis quod pro quaestu apostoli praedicarent: et ideo Paulus hoc praeceptum non servavit in gentibus; et ideo dominus in secunda missione dixit: nunc qui habet sacculum, tollat similiter et peram.

[86336] Quodlibet XII, q. 13 ad 2
Ad secundum dicendum, quod Augustinus respondet in epistola contra Donatistas, et habetur super illud Ps. II, 1: quare fremuerunt gentes. Distinguit enim diversa tempora Ecclesiae. Fuit enim tempus quando astiterunt reges adversus Christum: et in illo tempore non solum non dabant fidelibus, sed eos occidebant. Aliud vero tempus est nunc, quo reges intelligunt et eruditi serviunt domino Iesu Christo in timore etc., et ideo in isto tempore reges sunt vassalli Ecclesiae. Et ideo est alius status Ecclesiae nunc et tunc, non tamen est alia Ecclesia.

God Bless Our Troops and Veterans.

2010-11-11T07:37:00.000-05:00

Gray's Chooses Fun Rather Than Funeral

2010-11-04T14:26:00.003-04:00

Sadly, because there is no true Democracy in one party run D.C., corrupt government is always replaced by more or less corrupt government. Up to the Democrat primary, which virtually selects the new mayor, Gray presented himself as more in touch with people than Fenty. Well, now Gray shows his true colors, choosing to wine and dine rather than show his respect for a dead police officer killed in the line of duty.

Police union supporters vexed by Gray funeral no-show
By Mike DeBonis
Washington Post

Officer Paul Dittamo, the D.C. police officer killed in a Saturday car crash, was eulogized and laid to rest today. But several prominent leaders were notably absent for the funeral -- the first for an officer killed in the line of duty since 2007. Mayor-Elect Vincent Gray, for one.

Mayor Adrian Fenty, who has been criticized for missing past funerals, did attend, albeit late.

Leaders of the police union, an early and enthusiastic endorser of Gray's, are irate. Union chairman Kristopher Baumann called the snub "unimaginable."

"The political leadership of D.C. sent a pretty serious message to the city's first responders," Baumann said. "I can't think of any city in the country when if you have had a line-of-duty death, the mayor or mayor-elect would not come to pay his respects."

The funeral, held at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Catholic Church in Prince William County, was followed by a procession into the District's 7th police district, where Dittamo served, before returning to Virginia for the interment. Baumann said that Mayor Adrian Fenty arrived near the end of the service to deliver brief remarks. No other elected official, he said, attended.

D.C. Council member Phil Mendelson (D-At Large), who chairs the public safety committee, said he was not aware that the funeral was today. Police Chief Cathy Lanier, he said, had told him Sunday that it had been tentatively scheduled for this weekend. Mendelson said he regrets not attending. "I feel bad about it," he said.

Fenty came under fire on several occasions for skipping funerals where a mayoral presence would have been expected -- including for several victims of the June 2009 Metro crash and the grand sendoff for Abe Pollin, the developer, sports team owner, and civic leader.

It's unclear where Gray, considered to be more sensitive than Fenty to this sort of thing, might have been. An inquiry with his spokeswoman as to his whereabouts was not immediately answered.

"Needless to say, there are some questions being asked of me by my members right now," said Baumann.

UPDATED, 2:10 P.M.: Earlier this afternoon, Gray was dining at the Fourth Estate, the restaurant at the National Press Club, according to a tweet from the restaurant.

Kudos to We Love D.C. for spotting the tweet -- then calling and confirming that Gray was with his replacement as council chairman, Kwame Brown.

Said Baumann: "I can't say how disappointing that is for the police officers and firefighters in the District. That's our leadership, and they failed us."

Updated: November 4, 2010; 2:00 PM ET

Obama's Abortion Deception

2010-10-26T20:48:00.002-04:00

The following short video shows how Obama knowing signed a useless executive order to deceive the majority of Americans who are pro-life.
It also reminds us to vote out of office those scoundrels who voted for Obama's abortion care bill.

Muslim Rapists

2010-10-24T12:40:00.003-04:00

When reading the story below from Jihad Watch, keep in mind the words of St. Thomas Aquinas in his Summa Contra Gentiles, bk. 1, ch. 6.4.

Discussing how assenting to revealed Truth is reasonable even though such Truth cannot be discovered by unaided human reason, he points out that aburd falsehoods are proposed by many such as Muhammad by appealing to baser instincts.

"[I]n the case of Muhammad. He seduced the people by promises of carnal pleasure to which the concupiscence of the flesh goads us. His teaching also contained precepts that were in conformity with his promises, and he gave free rein to carnal pleasure. In all this, as is not unexpected, he was obeyed by carnal men.

As for proofs of the truth of his doctrine, he brought forward only such as could be grasped by the natural ability of anyone with a very modest wisdom. Indeed, the truths that he taught he mingled with many fables and with doctrines of the greatest falsity. He did not bring forth any signs produced in a supernatural way, which alone fittingly gives witness to divine inspiration; for a visible action that can be only divine reveals an invisibly inspired teacher of truth. On the contrary, Muhammad said that he was sent in the power of his arms—which are signs not lacking even to robbers and tyrants.

What is more, no wise men, men trained in things divine and human, believed in him from the beginning, Those who believed in him were brutal men and desert wanderers, utterly ignorant of all divine teaching, through whose numbers Muhammad forced others to become his followers by the violence of his arms.

Nor do divine pronouncements on the part of preceding prophets offer him any witness. On the contrary, he perverts almost all the testimonies of the Old and New Testaments by making them into fabrications of his own, as can be seen by anyone who examines his law. It was, therefore, a shrewd decision on his part to forbid his followers to read the Old and New Testaments, lest these books convict him of falsity. It is thus clear that those who place any faith in his words believe foolishly."

Sadly, those who trust Muhammad's deadly words not only believe foolishly, but go on to perpetrate great evil deeds with Muhammad's sanction. Muhammad fabricated a religion that was easy and attractive for lustful men. And Muslim religious practice bears this out:

Abuse of temporary marriage flourishes in Iraq
by Robert of Jihad Watch

Temporary marriage is one way in which sexual immorality is cloaked with respectability in the Islamic world by those who scoff at the West's alleged immorality. Even the ridiculously anti-free speech, politically correct and thoroughly compromised NPR was able to run this story, so the abuse must be widespread. "Abuse Of Temporary Marriages Flourishes In Iraq." by Kelly McEvers for NPR, October 19:

The practice of temporary marriage has long been common in Shiite Muslim communities, especially in Iran. The idea is that rather than having an affair, a man who wants to be sexually involved with a woman should marry her -- for a few months, or even, hours -- so the relationship will be legitimate.

In Iraq, the practice was banned under Saddam Hussein but then flourished after the American invasion. Now, though, some men are using the system to take advantage of poor women, and many of Iraq's Shiites say the very religious institutions that sanction such marriages are to blame.

One mother of three, who is so ashamed about what happened to her she doesn't want to give her name, says her husband abandoned her when she found out he preferred men. She had no way to support the family.

A religious figure in her neighborhood promised to help. He brought her to his home, locked the door and had sex with her. He offered her $15.

For the man at least, it was a brief moment of muta'a, the Arabic word for pleasure -- and the Arabic word for temporary marriage.

The woman says the man who had sex with her worked with leading Shiite religious clerics in the Iraqi city of Najaf. It's one of the most revered places in Shiite Islam....

Nagham Kadhim runs a women's rights group in Najaf. She says muta'a marriage is a sensitive subject in the holy city. But she says abuse of the practice is common. "The muta'a marriage happens when there is an economic factor, like when the woman is poor and [does] not have money," she says through an interpreter. "And the religious institution would offer her those job opportunities, through working for a kindergarten, looking after children. And then she would receive like 100,000 dinars."

That's about a $100 a month. Once the women get the job, Kadhim says the institution will host seminars about temporary marriage to convince them the practice is acceptable.

The 'Right Way' To Do A Muta'a Marriage

Aqil al Shammari is a religious scholar who works with a handful of leading figures in Iraq's Shiite community. He explains that muta'a marriage goes all the way back to the Prophet Muhammad, who once told his traveling companions they could purchase a wife with a handful of dates if they were away from their regular wives.

Shammari says he has temporarily married at least five women, while traveling. Each time, he says, he paid them. He made sure they used birth control. He kept his agreement to be married for only a month. And he didn't do anything to sully their reputations afterward....

And there you have it: voila, no immorality, and he and others like him can maintain their posture of moral superiority over the West.

Margaret Sanger, Racist Founder of Planned Parenthood

2010-10-23T21:20:00.004-04:00

For more information, click here.

Heretic Priest To Give Conference in Cardinal-elect Wuerl's Archdiocese

2010-10-22T10:37:00.004-04:00

Is It Really THE END OF MEN?
A Webcast for Men and Women with Fr. Richard Rohr
[Source]
Sunday, October 24, 2010 2 pm EDT

At least Bishop Loverde of Arlington has not provided a forum for the heretic Rohr who will speak at Crossroads United Methodist Church in Ashburn, Virginia. (For evidence of his dissent and heretical activity, click here.)

However, the day before, on October 23rd, heretic Rohr will be speaking at the self-proclaimed Catholic University, Trinity in Washington, DC, at 7 pm. according to the Franciscan Monastery (click here).

Has the new cardinal designate said anything?
Has the great catechist at least demanded equal time to refute the heretic?
We shall see.

For more information click:
here
and
here.

Obama the Tyrannt

2010-10-19T14:38:00.001-04:00

KUHNER: President's socialist takeover must stoppedBy Jeffrey T. Kuhner
-
The Washington Times

President Obama has engaged in numerous high crimes and misdemeanors. The Democratic majority in Congress is in peril as Americans reject his agenda. Yet more must be done: Mr. Obama should be impeached.

He is slowly - piece by painful piece - erecting a socialist dictatorship. We are not there - yet. But he is putting America on that dangerous path. He is undermining our constitutional system of checks and balances; subverting democratic procedures and the rule of law; presiding over a corrupt, gangster regime; and assaulting the very pillars of traditional capitalism. Like Venezuela's leftist strongman, Hugo Chavez, Mr. Obama is bent on imposing a revolution from above - one that is polarizing America along racial, political and ideological lines. Mr. Obama is the most divisive president since Richard Nixon. His policies are Balkanizing the country. It's time for him to go.

He has abused his office and violated his oath to uphold the Constitution. His health care overhaul was rammed through Congress. It was - and remains - opposed by a majority of the people. It could only be passed through bribery and political intimidation. The Louisiana Purchase, the Cornhusker Kickback, the $5 billion Medicaid set-aside for Florida Sen. Bill Nelson - taxpayer money was used as a virtual slush fund to buy swing votes. Moreover, the law is blatantly unconstitutional: The federal government does not have the right to coerce every citizen to purchase a good or service. This is not in the Constitution, and it represents an unprecedented expansion of power.

Yet Obamacare's most pernicious aspect is its federal funding of abortion. Pro-lifers are now compelled to have their tax dollars used to subsidize insurance plans that allow for the murder of unborn children. This is more than state-sanctioned infanticide. It violates the conscience rights of religious citizens. Traditionalists - evangelicals, Catholics, Baptists, Muslims, Orthodox Jews - have been made complicit in an abomination that goes against their deepest religious values. As the law is implemented (as in Pennsylvania) the consequences of the abortion provisions will become increasingly apparent. The result will be a cultural civil war. Pro-lifers will become deeply alienated from society; among many, a secession of the heart is taking place.

Mr. Obama is waging a frontal assault on property rights. The BP oil spill is a case in point. BP clearly is responsible for the spill and its massive economic and environmental damage to the Gulf. There is a legal process for claims to be adjudicated, but Mr. Obama has behaved more like Mr. Chavez or Russia's Vladimir Putin: He has bullied BP into setting up a $20 billion compensation fund administered by an Obama appointee. In other words, the assets of a private company are to be raided to serve a political agenda. Billions will be dispensed arbitrarily in compensation to oil-spill victims - much of it to Democratic constituents. This is cronyism and creeping authoritarianism.

Mr. Obama's multicultural socialism seeks to eradicate traditional America. He has created a command-and-control health care system. He has essentially nationalized the big banks, the financial sector, the automakers and the student loan industry. He next wants to pass "cap-and-trade," which would bring industry and manufacturing under the heel of big government. The state is intervening in every aspect of American life - beyond its constitutionally delegated bounds. Under Mr. Obama, the Constitution has become a meaningless scrap of paper.

To provide the shock troops for his socialist takeover, Mr. Obama calls for "comprehensive immigration reform" - granting amnesty to 12 million to 20 million illegal aliens. This would forge a permanent Democratic electoral majority. It would sound the death knell for our national sovereignty. Amnesty rewards lawlessness and criminal behavior; it signifies the surrender of our porous southern border to a massive illegal invasion. It means the death of American nationhood. We will no longer be a country, but the colony of a global socialist empire.

Rather than defending our homeland, Mr. Obama's Justice Department has sued Arizona for its immigration law. He is siding with criminals against his fellow Americans. His actions desecrate his constitutional oath to protect U.S. citizens from enemies foreign and domestic. He is thus encouraging more illegal immigration as Washington refuses to protect our borders. Mr. Obama's decision on this case is treasonous.

As president, he is supposed to respect the rule of law. Instead, his administration has dropped charges of voter intimidation against members of the New Black Panther Party. This was done even though their menacing behavior was caught on tape: men in military garb brandishing clubs and threatening whites at a polling site. A Justice Department lawyer intimately involved in the case, J. Christian Adams, resigned in protest. Mr. Adams says that under Mr. Obama, there is a new policy: Cases involving black defendants and white victims - no matter how much they cry for justice - are not to be prosecuted. This is more than institutionalized racism. It is an abrogation of civil rights laws. The Justice Department's behavior is illegal. It poses a direct threat to the integrity of our democracy and the sanctity of our electoral process.

Corruption in the administration is rampant. Washington no longer has a government; rather, it has a gangster regime. The Chicago way has become the Washington way. Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel is a political hit man. He is an amoral, ruthless operator. It was Mr. Emanuel who reached out to Rep. Joe Sestak, Pennsylvania Democrat, offering a high-ranking job in the hopes of persuading Mr. Sestak to pull out of the primary against Sen. Arlen Specter. It was Mr. Emanuel who offered another government position to Andrew Romanoff to do the same in the Colorado Democratic Senate primary. And it was Mr. Emanuel - as the trial of former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich has revealed - who acted as the go-between to try to have Valerie Jarrett parachuted into Mr. Obama's former Senate seat. The only question was: What did Mr. Blagojevich want in exchange?

This is not simply sleazy Chicago machine politics. It is the systematic breaking of the law - bribery, attempt to interfere (and manipulate) elections using taxpayer-funded jobs, influence peddling and abuse of power.

The common misperception on the right is that Mr. Obama is another Jimmy Carter: an incompetent liberal whose presidency is being reduced to rubble under the onslaught of repeated failures. The very opposite, however, is true. He is the most consequential president in our lifetime, transforming America into something our Founding Fathers would find not only unrecognizable, but repugnant. Like all radical revolutionaries, he is consumed by the pursuit of power - attaining it, wielding it and maximizing it. Mr. Obama's fledgling thug state must be stopped.

If Republicans win back Congress in November, they should - and likely will - launch formal investigations into this criminal, scandal-ridden administration. Rep. Darrell Issa, California Republican and ranking member of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee, has promised as much. Mr. Obama has betrayed the American people. Impeachment is the only answer. This usurper must fall.

Jeffrey T. Kuhner is a columnist at The Washington Times and president of the Edmund Burke Institute, a Washington think tank. He is the host of "The Kuhner Show" on WTNT 570-AM (www.talk570.com) from 5 to 7 p.m.

Wedding Preparation

2010-10-18T12:03:00.000-04:00

Anyone involved in the selection of music for a Catholic wedding will appreciate this:

Wuerl Can't Pass the Buck This Time

2010-10-07T09:23:00.001-04:00

[Picture Source]

When asked about giving Holy Communion to the unrepentant public dissenter, Nancy Pelosi, the great "catechist" Wuerl weaseled his way out by declaring that she is not a member of his diocese. Wuerl seemed to claim that he would treat such politicians as their local bishops had decided to treat them.

Another time, when Pelosi attended Mass very prominently at Trinity University, Wuerl had the gall to declare he had no jurisdiction over the University Mass since the University is run by a religious order.

It is such amazing passing of the buck and dereliction of duty that makes me hope he will never wear cardinal red.

But, the District of Columbia will soon be electing a new mayor. Among the primary of this one party rule district (so much for Democracy! - and there are some who want it to be a state!!!) has already determined that the mayor will be Vincent Gray. Gray claims to be a Catholic. While it is yet to be determined where he attends Mass, he certainly lives within the district, in the Hillcrest neighborhood of Ward 7 and, therefore, within Wuerl's archdiocese and under Wuerl's spiritual jurisdiction.

[Picture source]

Yet, even if he were not to be elected mayor, Gray has been serving as chairman of the city council. All the while, he has been a prominent supporter of the law to redefine marriage to include couples of the same gender (here, here, here). Has Wuerl said anything to Gray? Apparently he hasn't even said anything to the vice-president who has an official residence in the archdiocese.

In any case, let us hope that Wuerl will do his job,

To respectfully contact Archbishop Wuerl:

The Most Reverend Donald W. Wuerl

Archdiocese of Washington

P.O. Box 29260

Washington, DC 20017-0260

301-853-4500

CHANGE Fools Can Believe In

2010-10-07T08:18:00.003-04:00

"Do what I say, not what I do." That could be Obama's motto.
The Obama administration is not only turning the U.S. into a socialist nation, but making laws for you and me while considering itself above the law. Just imagine the outrage of the Left if Bush had done the following from recent headlines.
The sad thing is that the agenda of even "moderates" on the Left is so radical that liberals gladly tolerate and make excuses for Obama's injustices to push the Obama agenda.

WAKE UP, AMERICA. Do something this November!

3 Items From This Week:

Panel: President Obama downplayed Gulf oil spill destruction

White House allows big firms to dodge health reforms
(I am not for this government take over of our health decisions, but notice that high and mighty Obama forces this on the people with his puppet congress and then grants execmptions to his lobbyist buddies.)

Attorney General Eric Holder defends Justice Department performance in Black Panther case

Obama's Anti-Life Police State

2010-10-05T20:47:00.002-04:00

The following disturbing news is from http://restore-dc-catholicism.blogspot.com/.

Police State Watching 40 Days For Life Activists Already?
Monday, October 4, 2010

Remember when I posted this piece detailing how Federal officials are being "trained" (brainwashed?) to watch pro-lifers as they engage in First Amendment activities? The training, of course, was offered by "unbiased experts" such as Planned Parenthood, National Abortion Federation, et al.

The 40 Days for Life campaign is occurring now throughout the country. One is going on in Fairfax VA. Watch this report as the Fairfax group describes an apparent surveillance operation. They appear to be the targets, and Department of Homeland Security seems to be engaging in the surveillance.

Can we all say "Big Brother is snooping"?

Vincent Gray a G(r)ay Agenda

2010-10-03T21:39:00.004-04:00

When it comes to so-called "Gay Rights" there is no gray area for Vincent Gray. He has chosen to be even more radical than current Mayor Adrian Fenty.

Gray who hopes to be and almost certainly will be the next mayor because of the tyranny of one party rule in the nation's capital has been an outspoken supporter of making self-proclaimed sexual orientation something on par with race and gender. While Fenty did the same, Gray recently received the support of the Gertrude Stein Club which proclaims itself the voice of LGBT Democrats in the District of Columbia. Jeffrey Richardson, Stein Club President, gave the reasoning for picking Gray over Fenty:

"While Mayor Fenty continues to have strong support among Stein Club Members, Vincent Gray's endorsement win demonstrates the passion, organization, and coordination within his campaign to make their case to members of the LGBT community and DC voters at-large. "
[Source]

But, Gray's own words and photo show his agenda in support for redefining marriage based on the whims of a narcissitic group: here.

And by the way, despite his rejection of Christ's teaching and of natural law, Gray thinks of himself as a good Catholic. Let's hope Archbishop Wuerl will not close his eyes.

Rangel Breaks the Laws and Yet Still Makes the Laws

2010-10-01T19:23:00.003-04:00

The pathetic DemoKKKrat dominated congress still welcomes as one of its own the criminal Charles Rangel. Now in a move typical of all leftist from Nazis to Communists, Rangel is attempting to enslave the U.S. population.

http://www.remnantnewspaper.com/Archives/2010-0915-big-brother-watch.htm

The Rangler Ropes ‘Em In

(http://www.remnantnewspaper.com/) Disgraced Rep. Charles Rangel (D.) of NY introduced a bill in the House which would rope in a goodly segment of the US population if it is passed into law. H.R. 5741, the Universal National Service Act, is intended “To require all persons in the United States between the ages of 18 and 42 to perform national service, either as a member of the uniformed services or in civilian service in furtherance of the national defense and homeland security, to authorize the induction of persons in the uniformed services during wartime to meet end-strength requirements of the uniformed services, and for other purposes.”

One way to keep the unemployment numbers down.

The Rangler is looking at a herd with a twenty-four-year spread. There is nothing in the bill that determines the maximum number of “inductees,” so theoretically and at the discretion of the president, the entire cohort could be press-ganged into a kind of ill-defined “national service” that would amount to little less than indentured servitude masquerading as one’s “patriotic duty.”

Note, too, that the Congress is left out of the loop. The president (capitalized in the bill to befit the imperial dignity of the office) “shall prescribe such regulations as are necessary to carry out this title,” according to Title I, Sec. 105 (a) of this pillow-on-the-face-of-freedom piece of legislation.

Have to think about doing your bit for the homeland, don’t you know, kaff, kaff, one’s patriotic chore, bit of the old pitch in, comrade, steering a course through the waves depends upon the skill of the helmsman, making revolution depends upon the thought of Chairman Mao, ah, well, not Mao, sorry about that, slip of the tongue, just think of Lincoln or, well, some inspiring patriot or other. Charlie Rangel, for example, the example par excellence of selfless public service, and—look!—there go those Poland Chinas flying over the rooftops again!

The U.S. Congress, the E.U. Parliament, etc., are all too unwieldy and too open to corruption to continue functioning as truly representative bodies. The tried and true Traditional Catholic Social Teaching principle of subsidiarity must be reintroduced into the fundamental concept of government; government by fiat and incomprehensible bureaucratic complexity and codification must be done away with.

Do not go unheard in your opposition to this bill. Vote out any representative who supports it.

What Will Wuerl Do? - Outright Dissent at Georgetown

2010-09-28T20:27:00.005-04:00

Georgetown Professor Launches Catholics for Equality
By Alice Maglio Sep 28 2010

As Catholics across the United States continue to debate the legality of gay marriage, Fr. Joseph Palacios, S.J., adjunct professor of sociology, has taken the lead on helping to found Catholics for Equality, a new organization devoted to rallying Catholics in support of gay rights. [This priest is either stupid or a dissenter. First, people identified as "gay" already have rights. Second, what he is pushing for is a right to redefine marriage based on the whim of those who do not want to exercise the right to marry in the only sensible way.]

Palacios, who serves on the group’s board of directors, said the organization is focused on changing the political debate and civil laws by reforming the Catholic Church’s doctrine. [So, Palacios admits he is a dissenter. Now, Archbishop Wuerl styles himself as a catechist. More importantly he is the ordinary of Washington and this is a dissenter heretic priest exercising ministry in his archdiocese.]

“Catholics for Equality is an organization intended to move the moveable middle of Catholics,” he said. “We honor the separation of church and state and recognize that civil law applies to all. It is something left to society and not to religion.”

Although Catholic doctrine staunchly rejects civil marriage for gays, Palacios’ organization endorses same-sex marriage, and the Georgetown professor readily points to the progressive leanings of many American Catholics. Forty-eight percent of American Catholics support gay marriage, whereas only 46 percent of all Americans do, according to a May 2010 Gallup Poll.

“Catholicism, as a religious group, is one of the most progressive Christian groups in the [United States],” Palacios said. [Fallen away Catholics and those who prefer their own opinions to Catholicism support redefining marriage, not practicing Catholics.]

“We have a long tradition of social justice in serving the poor and unfortunate members of society. Providing [LGBT people] with equal rights is part of our responsibility as members of the Catholic community, the Eucharistic community, where no one should be excluded.”
He acknowledged dissent among many Catholics in the United States.

“[The opposition] comes from very conservative Catholics for whom gay rights is not even a debate. These are the people who think homosexuality is an illness to be cured,” he said.

For a religion consumed by debate over the issue, Palacios called for a simpler take.
“In my opinion, sexuality is a great mystery. No one has the final word on it,” he said. “The fact remains that we have gay and lesbian family, neighbors [and] co-workers … who need to live their lives and who deserve equal rights.” [The Church has spoken authoriatively on matters of sexulaity. Palacios is a heretic. Again, what will Wuerl do?]

Catholics for Equality was founded this January, and now has chapters in D.C., Minnesota, Maine, Massachusetts, Maryland and California. The organization focuses on communication through social media and grassroots organizing, with the goal of helping both Catholic and secular gay-rights organizations.

Though a member of the clergy, Palacios has encountered little direct opposition to his activism. While Georgetown’s Cardinal Newman Society, a conservative Catholic group, has written a letter to University President John J. DeGioia voicing its opposition to Catholics for Equality, the university’s official stance remains neutral. “Georgetown University does not endorse external organizations as a matter of general practice and would not institutionally support entities whose primary position is counter to church teaching,” university spokeswoman Julie Bataille said. [Nevertheless, Palacios is a priest and bound by obedience to his Jesuit superiors. Moreover, every priest in the archdiocese may only portray himself as a priest if he receives faculties from the Archbishop. If Wuerl refuses these faculties to Palacios, then Palacios may not publicly offer the liturgy nor preach, etc.]

True Then, True Today

2010-09-25T09:33:00.001-04:00

Never has the human race enjoyed such an abundance of wealth, resources and economic power, and yet a huge proportion of the worlds citizens are still tormented by hunger and poverty, while countless numbers suffer from total illiteracy. Never before has man had so keen an understanding of freedom, yet at the same time new forms of social and psychological slavery make their appearance. Although the world of today has a very vivid awareness of its unity and of how one man depends on another in needful solidarity, it is most grievously torn into opposing camps by conflicting forces. For political, social, economic, racial and ideological disputes still continue bitterly, and with them the peril of a war which would reduce everything to ashes. True, there is a growing exchange of ideas, but the very words by which key concepts are expressed take on quite different meanings in diverse ideological systems. Finally, man painstakingly searches for a better world, without a corresponding spiritual advancement.

(Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, Gaudium et Spes, 4.)

Planned Parenthood Caught Obstructing Civil Rights With Collusion of DC Government

2010-08-14T15:39:00.003-04:00

D.C. Admits Planned Parenthood 'Private Property' Sign was False
By James Tillman
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2010/aug/10081313.html

WASHINGTON, August 13, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) -- Washington city officials have admitted that the sidewalk outside of a Planned Parenthood abortuary is in fact public property, not private property as Planned Parenthood had claimed. The city has therefore retreated from its threat to arrest as a trespasser anyone who prays on the sidewalk.

“Now that Planned Parenthood’s lie has been exposed, it is time for the City to demand that the signs that falsely claim the public land as private property be removed,” said Operation Rescue’s President Troy Newman.

Pro-lifers have prayed and counseled for years on the sidewalk in front of the Planned Parenthood, but earlier this year Planned Parenthood built a fence around the yard and put up signs claiming that the area was private property.

On June 8, Rev. Patrick Mahoney, director of the Christian Defense Coalition, was arrested while praying and reading the Bible within this area.

Jim Henderson of the American Center for Law and Justice told LSN at the time that Planned Parenthood's claim was false. He said that District of Columbia owns everything within 50 feet of the curb face on the street--practically up to the front doors of the Planned Parenthood. He also said that when Planned Parenthood had attempted to put up a fence before it had even been cited for illegal construction.

"We thank God for this important victory for free speech, public prayer and the First Amendment," said Patrick Mahoney. "The City of Washington, D.C. got it right when they reversed their tragic decision to arrest American citizens for simply praying on a public sidewalk."

He also warned, however, that pro-life efforts against Planned Parenthood must continue with equal force.

"If we did not stand for our rights and go to jail; if we did not mount an aggressive legal effort and if we did not invite people do come from around the country to pray on the public sidewalk even under the threat of arrest, that sidewalk would still be closed to the First Amendment."

He continued: "This struggle reminds us all of the famous quote from Thomas Jefferson in which he said, 'Eternal Vigilance is the price of liberty.' We must recognize that our rights, freedoms and liberties must be constantly defended."

The city's admission comes on the eve of the "A Time to Stand" project, in which pro-life activists from around the country were going to challenge the city’s ban on prayer on public property and thereby risk arrest.

Advocates of unborn rights still plan to gather on Saturday, August 14, at 10:00 AM to pray and counsel on the public sidewalk.

"We encourage everyone that can to attend tomorrow’s gathering in front of the Planned Parenthood in Washington, D.C. to exercise their legal right to pray and offer help to abortion-bound women there," Newman said.

He also said that pro-lifers must continue to be vigilant so that Planned Parenthood does not turn the law against them.

"If we ignore our rights, you can bet that Planned Parenthood will be more than happy to try to take them away again so that they can continue the unabated abortion of innocent babies," he said. "We must assert our rights not for ourselves, but on behalf of the babies that would surely perish if we were not allowed to make a public stand against the killing.”

Obama and the Abortion Agenda: Undeniable

2010-07-24T07:28:00.002-04:00

FactCheck.org Confirms: Obamacare Dollars Were Set to Fund Abortions before Controversy
Friday July 23, 2010
www.lifesitenews.com
By Kathleen Gilbert

WASHINGTON, D.C., July 23, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The non-partisan fact-checking site FactCheck.org has vindicated the National Right to Life Committee's (NRLC) claim that federal monies were on the brink of funding abortions in state high-risk insurance pools before the matter was exposed by NRLC, prompting the Obama administration to retroactively enforce Hyde-amendment restrictions.

The controversy erupted a week and a half ago, when NRLC revealed that abortions would be funded under a $160 million Pennsylvania program, a fact that contradicted the repeated assurances of President Obama and pro-life Democrats that abortions would not be funded under the federal health care law. The pro-life organization also unearthed similar funding problems in New Mexico and Maryland.

The Health and Human Services Department (HHS) responded to the concerns raised by NRLC in a statement, suggesting that an abortion funding ban for the high risk pools was already implied in the health reform law. However, Planned Parenthood and NARAL both expressed shock at the HHS’s "clarification" that only abortions in cases of rape, incest, and threat to the mother's life would be federally subsidized under the high-risk plans; both groups condemned such a funding ban as a clear change in the law.

Now Brooks Jackson of FactCheck.org has agreed with both NRLC and the pro-abortion groups that nothing in the law would have prevented abortions from being funded under the high-risk pools.

He wrote that the NRLC was correct to point out that the Pennsylvania plan was flawed because, while it appeared to exclude "elective abortions" from federally-subsidized coverage, it failed to define the term "elective abortions," rendering the statement meaningless.
LifeSiteNews.com (LSN) had twice asked Pennsylvania state insurance officials to clarify the meaning of "elective abortion," but a spokesperson would not answer the question, but simply referred LSN to the HHS statement.

"The term 'elective' isn’t defined, and so isn’t very meaningful," wrote Jackson. "So — when all the verbal smoke is cleared away — the solicitation states that the program 'will' cover 'only' abortions that are legal. That doesn’t leave out much."

Shortly after the HHS announced that it would apply Hyde restrictions to the high risk pools after all, NRLC Legislative Director Douglas Johnson said that, “It is certainly clear that [HHS officials] were not imposing any abortion restrictions until now, until it became a matter of controversy.

“[HHS officials] were not applying any kind of guidance that would keep states from submitting such a plan [approving abortion coverage], and they weren’t denying approval when a state did submit such a plan,” he said.

Jackson wrote that the Pennsylvania Insurance Department’s spokeswoman Melissa Fox responded to further questions from Factcheck.org by justifying the proposal's vague language, saying that the "aggressive timeframe to submit proposals" required that the writers of the proposal “insert ‘placeholder’ language absent specific guidance from the federal government on the benefit package.”

"So the story now is that in the haste to meet a deadline, 'placeholder' language was inserted, to be adjusted later," Jackson concluded. "But whatever Pennsylvania officials intended, the stated federal policy is now clear: No abortions will be covered by the temporary risk pools except for those in cases of rape or incest, or to save the life of the mother."

The FactCheck.org article does not address in depth the New Mexico plan, whose Federal High Risk Pool initially listed “Routine Maternity/Elective Termination of Pregnancy” as a covered benefit under the section “Hospital/Facility Services.” When the Associated Press contacted the agency about that plan, a spokesperson initially claimed the coverage would remain unchanged, before calling the AP back to say that officials had begun "correcting the package so it will not have elective abortion coverage."

NRLC also discovered earlier this week that a third high-risk pool proposal in Maryland had not applied Hyde restrictions on abortion funding, and that no guidelines were given by the HHS to do so.

Martyrs of the French Revolution

2010-07-17T11:28:00.002-04:00

THE SIXTEEN BLESSED CARMELITE MARTYRS OF COMPIEGNE
Feast: July 17

The French Revolution reveals the titanic struggle between good and evil. During the terror, over 40,000 Frenchmen were executed just for holding fast to the Catholic Faith and objecting to the worst excesses of the Committee of Public Safety. The blood lost in the years of 1792-1794 staggers the imagination even in the retelling and the campaign against the Church was as diabolical as it was cruel.

Contemplative religious communities had been among the first targets of the fury of the French Revolution against the Catholic Church. Less than a year from May 1789 when the Revolution began with the meeting of the Estates-General, these communities had been required by law to disband. But many of them continued in being, in hiding. Among these were the community of the Carmelite nuns of Compiegne, in northeastern France not far from Paris - the fifty-third convent in France of the Carmelite sisters who followed the reform of St. Teresa of Avila, founded in 1641, noted throughout its history for fidelity and fervor. Their convent was raided in August 1790, all the property of the sisters was seized by the government, and they were forced to discard their habits and leave their house. They divided into four groups which found lodging in four different houses all near the same church in Compiegne, and for several years they were to a large extent able to continue their religious life in secret. But the intensified surveillance and searches of the “Great Terror” revealed their secret, and in June 1794 most of them were arrested and imprisoned.

They had expected this; indeed, they had prayed for it. At some time during the summer of 1792, very likely just after the events of August 10 of that year that marked the descent into the true deeps of the Revolution, their prioress, Madeleine Lidoine, whose name in religion was Teresa in honor of the founder of their order, by all accounts a charming perceptive, and highly intelligent woman, had foreseen much of what was to come. At Easter of 1792, she told her community that, while looking through the archives she had found the account of a dream a Carmelite had in 1693. In that dream, the Sister saw the whole Community, with the exception of 2 or 3 Sisters, in glory and called to follow the Lamb. In the mind of the Prioress, this mean martyrdom and might well be a prophetic announcement of their fate.

Mother Teresa had said to her sisters: “Having meditated much on this subject, I have thought of making an act of consecration by which the Community would offer itself as a sacrifice to appease the anger of God, so that the divine peace of His Dear Son would be brought into the world, returned to the Church and the state.” The sisters discussed her proposal and all agreed to it but the two oldest, who were hesitant. But when the news of the September massacres came, mingling glorious martyrdom with apostasy, these two sisters made their choice, joining their commitment to that of the rest of the community. All made their offering; it was to be accepted.

After their lodgings were invaded again in June, their devotional objects shattered and their tabernacle trampled underfoot by a Revolutionary who told them that their place of worship should be transformed into a dog kennel, the Carmelite sisters were taken to the Conciergerie prison, where so many of the leading victims of the guillotine had been held during their last days on earth. There they composed a canticle for their martyrdom, to be sung to the familiar tune of the Marseillaise. The original still exists, written in pencil and given to one of their fellow prisoners, a lay woman who survived.

Give over our hearts to joy, the day of glory has arrived,
Far from us all weakness, seeing the standard come;
We prepare for the victory, we all march to the true conquest,
Under the flag of the dying God we run, we all seek the glory;
Rekindle our ardor, our bodies are the Lord’s,
We climb, we climb the scaffold and give ourselves back to the Victor.

O happiness ever desired for Catholics of France, To follow the wondrous road
Already marked out so often by the martyrs toward their suffering,
After Jesus with the King, we show our faith to Christians,
We adore a God of justice; as the fervent priest, the constant faithful,
Seal, seal with all their blood faith in the dying God....

Holy Virgin, our model, August queen of martyrs, deign to strengthen our zeal
And purify our desires, protect France even yet, help; us mount to Heaven,
Make us feel even in these places, the effects of your power. Sustain your children,
Submissive, obedient, dying, dying with Jesus and in our King believing.

On July 17 the sixteen sisters were brought before Fouquier-Tinville. All cases were now being disposed of within twenty-four hours as Robespierre had wished; theirs was no exception. They were charged with having received arms for the émigrés; their prioress, Sister Teresa, answered by holding up a crucifix. “Here are the only arms that we have ever had in our house.” They were charged with possessing an altar-cloth with designs honoring the old monarchy (perhaps the fleur-de-lis) and were asked to deny any attachment to the royal family. Sister Teresa responded: “If that is a crime, we are all guilty of it; you can never tear out of our hearts the attachment for Louis XVI and his family. Your laws cannot prohibit feeling; they cannot extend their empire to the affections of the soul; God alone has the right to judge them.” They were charged with corresponding with priests forced to leave the country because they would not take the constitutional oath; they freely admitted this. Finally they were charged with the catchall indictment by which any serious Catholic in France could be guillotined during the Terror: “fanaticism.” Sister Henriette, who had been Gabrielle de Croissy, challenged Fouguier-Tinvile to his face: “Citizen, it is your duty to respond to the request of one condemned; I call upon you to answer us and to tell us just what you mean by the word ‘fanatic.’” “I mean,” snapped the Public Prosecutor of the Terror, “your attachment to your childish beliefs and your silly religious practices.” “Let us rejoice, my dear Mother and Sisters, in the joy of the Lord,” said Sister Henriette, “that we shall die for our holy religion, our faith, our confidence in the Holy Roman Catholic Church.”

While in prison, they asked and were granted permission to wash their clothes. As they had only one set of lay clothes, they put on their religious habit and set to the task. Providentially, the revolutionaries picked that “wash day” for their transfer to Paris. As their clothes were soaking wet, the Carmelites left for Paris wearing their “outlawed” religious habit. They celebrated the feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel in prison, wondering whether they would die that day.
It was only the next day they went to the guillotine. The journey in the carts took more than an hour. All the way the Carmelite sisters sang: the “Miserere,” “Salve Regina,” and “Te Deum.” Beholding them, a total silence fell on the raucous, brutal crowd, most of them cheapened and hardened by day after day of the spectacle of public slaughter. At the foot of the towering killing machine, their eyes raised to Heaven, the sisters sang “Veni Creator Spiritus.” One by one, they renewed their religious vows. They pardoned their executioners. One observer cried out: “Look at them and see if they do not have the air of angels! By my faith, if these women did not all go straight to Paradise, then no one is there!”

Sister Teresa, their prioress, requested and obtained permission to go last under the knife. The youngest, Sister Constance, went first. She climbed the steps of the guillotine “With the air of a queen going to receive her crown,” singing Laudate Dominum omnes gentes, “all peoples praise the Lord.” She placed her head in the position for death without allowing the executioner to touch her. Each sister followed her example, those remaining singing likewise with each, until only the prioress was left, holding in her hand a small figure of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The killing of each martyr required about two minutes. It was about eight o’clock in the evening, still bright at midsummer. During the whole time the profound silence of the crowd about the guillotine endured unbroken.

Two years before when the horror began, the Carmelite community at Compiegne had offered itself as a holocaust, that peace might be restored to France and the Church. The return of full peace was still twenty-one years in the future. But the Reign of Terror had only ten days left to run. Years of war, oppression and persecution were yet to come, but the mass official killing in the public squares of Paris was about to end. The Cross had vanquished the guillotine.
These sixteen holy Carmelite nuns have all been beatified by our Holy Father, the Pope, (Pope St. Pius X, 27 May 1906) which is the last step before canonization. Blessed Carmelites of Compiegne, pray for us!

Obama Blames Republicans for His Own Stealth Appointments

2010-07-16T23:13:00.000-04:00

Mister transparency acts again. And yet, stupid people will continue to defend this autocratic reprobate who holds the presidency.
His tactic of blaming Republicans is mind boggling especially when the Congress give a more than adequate majority to Democrats.
Obama's game is smoke and mirrors, divide and conquer, whine and complain until people believe you. And sad to say, there are enough stupid people who will believe him.
These were stealth appointments for sure. Obama wants to hide his agenda from the public.

Obama issues 15 recess appointments
Scolds GOP for holding up filling of key administration vacancies
MSN

WASHINGTON — Fed up with waiting, President Barack Obama announced Saturday he would bypass a vacationing Senate and name 15 people to key administration jobs, wielding for the first time the blunt political tool known as the recess appointment.

The move immediately deepened the divide between the Democratic president and Republicans in the Senate following a long, bruising fight over health care. Obama revealed his decision by blistering Republicans, accusing them of holding up nominees for months solely to try to score a political advantage on him.

"I simply cannot allow partisan politics to stand in the way of the basic functioning of government," Obama said in a statement.

The 15 appointees to boards and agencies include the contentious choice of union lawyer Craig Becker to the National Labor Relations Board. Republicans had blocked his nomination on grounds he would bring a radical pro-union agenda to the job, and they called on Obama not to appoint Becker over the recess.

Obama went ahead anyway, while also choosing a second member for the labor board so that four of its five slots will be filled. The board, which referees labor-management disputes, has had a majority of its seats vacant for more than two years, slowing its work and raising questions about the legality of its rulings.

Republicans complain
Overall, Obama's appointments will take place through next week, allowing people to make the transition to their new jobs, White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki said. The news of Becker's appointment drew the bulk of the ire from Republicans.

"Once again the administration showed that it had little respect for the time honored constitutional roles and procedures of Congress," said Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona, Obama's foe in the 2008 presidential election. "This is clear payback by the administration to organized labor."

Both Republican and Democratic presidents have made recess appointments, which circumvents the Senate's authority to confirm nominees, when they could not overcome delays. President George W. Bush made more than 170 such appointments in his two-term presidency. President Bill Clinton made nearly 140.

Obama had been on record as warning of recess appointments if the Senate didn't act. He followed through at the end of a week in which his political standing was significantly bolstered by the party-line passage of a historic health care bill, a student loan overhaul and a hard-fought nuclear arms treaty with Russia.

The White House dropped the news in a press release on a quiet Saturday, with Obama at Camp David and lawmakers home in their districts.

The recess appointments mean the 15 people could serve in their jobs through the end of 2011, when the next Senate finishes its term. A recess appointment ends at the completion of the next Senate session or when a person is nominated and confirmed to the job, whichever comes first.

Confirmations held up
Obama filled two posts at the Treasury Department: Jeffrey Goldstein as under secretary for domestic finance and Michael Mundaca as assistant secretary for tax policy. He singled them out: "At a time of economic emergency, two top appointees to the Department of Treasury have been held up for nearly six months."

On Becker, Republicans have held up his confirmation for months, saying they fear he would circumvent Congress to make labor laws more union-friendly.

Democrats had failed to overcome Republican delaying tactics on Becker's nomination, and all 41 GOP senators wrote to Obama on Thursday urging him not to appoint Becker over the break — to no avail. Becker is a top lawyer at the Service Employees International Union and the AFL-CIO.

Labor unions were especially keen on getting Becker installed on the board that is responsible for certifying union elections and addressing unfair labor practices. Under a Democratic majority, the labor board could decide cases or make new rules that would make it easier for unions to organize workers. The board could allow speeded-up union elections that give employers less time to counter organizing drives.

The other pro-union lawyer Obama named to the board, Mark Pearce, has not faced opposition from Republicans.

The White House says its appointees have been awaiting a vote for an average of seven months.

Obama named three people to the Equal Opportunity Employment Commission, which has also been operating without a quorum.

More obstruction
The Senate's top Democrat, Harry Reid, welcomed Obama's move. "Regrettably, Senate Republicans have dedicated themselves to a failed strategy to cripple President Obama's economic initiatives by stalling key administration nominees at every turn," said Reid, the majority leader from Nevada.

Obama and Democratic leaders say he faces more obstruction, in terms of the number of pending nominees and the length of their delay in getting a vote, than Bush did. The hyper-partisan atmosphere in Washington began long before Obama's presidency but remains as entrenched as ever, if not worse, during his term.

Already in a struggle with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce over a financial overhaul, Obama now has another one over Becker. "The business community should be on red alert for radical changes that could significantly impair the ability of America's job creators to compete," the chamber said in a statement.

In February, Democrats fell far short of the 60 votes they needed to push through Becker's nomination. Two Democrats joined Republicans to halt Becker.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said Saturday that Obama's move is "another episode of choosing a partisan path despite bipartisan opposition."

St. Agnes Risen From Ashes and Flourishing

2010-07-13T08:15:00.003-04:00

This article by Austin Ruse is a bit old, i.e. from 1998. Most of the priests mentioned below are now in other parishes.
Source


Original church (1877-1992)

The first wholly traditional Catholic parish structure built since Vatican II could not be situated in a more central location, at a more opportune time. New York is enjoying an astounding 1990s rejuvenation, bulging with tourists and new business. St. Agnes Church is at the center of it all, in midtown Manhattan, near Grand Central Station.

Only at St. Agnes in New York City can an orthodox churchman be attacked from the right. Yet there they were, a dedicated band of angry young people picketing Msgr. Eugene V. Clark at Mass only one week after St. Agnes had burned nearly to the ground in late 1992. Their charge? That the good Monsignor intended to replace the old brick Gothic structure, now ruined, with what they called a "Swedish-Igloo-Modern." Monsignor Clark never gets mad, but he got mad that day - although today he looks back on the incident with amusement. He even saved one of their flyers and is considering having it framed.

Did those excitable young men and women actually live within the parish boundaries of St. Agnes? No. But then hardly anybody actually lives in the East 40s. St. Agnes has maybe 100 to 150 residential parishioners. Nobody really cares, either; and this is one of the charms of St. Agnes. It is a commuter church located next to one of the busiest ports of call in the world, Grand Central Station. St. Agnes Church is a place that is searched out, discovered, chosen. To many it seems that St. Agnes chooses them.

But there was that awful day when many thought it might close.

It was an unseasonably warm December 10, about 2:30 in the afternoon, when office workers on the 32nd floor in the nearby Pfizer Chemical building first heard the insistent scream of fire engines. The sirens didn't stop. A thick smoke poured down the big avenue, down Second and Third, down 42nd Street, all emanating from the side street where St. Agnes has stood since 1873.

At 2:30, Msgr. Clark was planning a benefit with two ladies over lunch, and they were lingering over dessert. Walking through Grand Central a few minutes later, he noticed the fire engines' incessant whine. the sound drew him to his home of many years. It was a four-alarm fire; firemen were everywhere. They allowed Msgr. Clark to dash inside to retrieve the Blessed Sacrament. There he found a most unlikely sight: Rudy Giuliani (now Mayor of New York), then working as an attorney in a nearby building, was wandering up and down the aisles looking for anyone who might have been overcome by smoke. He had already prevented two looters from stealing silver-plated candelabras.

Monsignor Clark, along with Carlos Arias, a worker at the church, then waded through two feet of water in the lower church to retrieve the Blessed Sacrament. Afterward, he stood outside with hundreds of others and watched the flames lick and then puncture the 120-year-old roof of the church. Only two days before, this church had been one of the busiest in Manhattan, perhaps the country, when, as for all feast days, she celebrated 36 Masses for the Feast of the Immaculate Conception. Some 15,000 Catholics had jammed St. Agnes that day. Now they would have to go elsewhere.

The St. Agnes fire was news all over the region. The major New York papers covered it extensively for two days. It was on all the local television stations. The commuter parishioners and much of the city grieved. Monsignor Clark told the Daily News three days after the fire that he expected to have Mass in the lower Church by Christmas Day, but his hopes were dashed when the building inspectors told him that no one would be allowed back into the dangerously weakened structure.

There was only one more Mass said at St. Agnes Church. Nearly a year after the fire, right before the final demolition, Clark, the other priests of St. Agnes and a few favored altar servers gathered in the ruins of the church one last time. It looked like a wartime scene: robed and kneeling figures gathered against a backdrop of charred and ruined walls.

With Mass attendance down, a burned Catholic church has a slim chance of being rebuilt in New York City. On the day of the fire, however, two men vowed to rebuild St. Agnes. While the fire still burned, Cardinal O'Connor hurried from a meeting in Yonkers to join Msgr. Clark. Together they stood outside the smoking church and pledged that she would rise from the ashes.

The demolition cost two million dollars; the new building cost six. The parishioners decamped to the Daily News' Patterson Auditorium. For months New Yorkers watched Fr. William Shelley, Fr. John Perricone and others in their cassocks leading parishioners down Third Avenue to the Daily News building for Sunday Mass. After several months, a chapel was built within a gymnasium in the old St. Agnes School around the corner on 44th Street. Eight Masses a day were celebrated in that cramped space, sixteen on feast days, until the new St. Agnes opened on January 17, 1998, five years after the fire.

What is so important about this relatively small church located in a commercial area of New York?

St. Agnes is not the oldest church in Manhattan, having been built in 1873 by the same European immigrants who erected Grand central Station, half a block away. These were poor men and women, who cobbled together their pennies and built St. Agnes themselves; they also built a school next door. From the very beginning, a strong and loving community sustained the church.

A visible testament to their original generosity still exists in marble: the names of those hard-pressed people who managed to give $100 in support of the school so that "no poor child would ever be turned away." Several distinguished Protestants also contributed.

The popular history of St. Agnes begins with her pastor in mid-century, Msgr. Chidwick, one-time rector of the archdiocesan seminary and a U.S. Navy chaplain assigned to the U.S.S. Maine and cited for heroism. For decades he was considered a premier speaker in the city; when he died the newspapers said his funeral was the largest ever held in New York.

A few years later, even the fame of Msgr. Chidwick was eclipsed by the arrival of the best-known Catholic in America, Msgr. Fulton Sheen. Sheen never actually lived at St. Agnes, as many believe, but he was her most famous preacher. Millions tuned in to his radio and television broadcasts. For years he even outpaced the man who came to be known as Mr. Television, Milton Berle.

Fulton Sheen was best known by New Yorkers, however, for his homilies delivered during the traditional Three Hours' Service of Good Friday. So many people jammed into St. Agnes for those sermons that the block out front was closed and giant speakers put up to accommodate the overflow. Today the block of 43rd Street between Lexington Avenue and Third Avenue is officially known as Fulton Sheen Place.

Building on the work of his predecessors, Msgr. Clark turned St. Agnes into what it is today. Clark has the bearing of a senator, a captain of industry or a professor. He never thought of any calling but to the priesthood. He grew up in New York, attended the archdiocesan seminary and was ordained in 1951. He worked in a series of New York parishes until he came to the attention of Cardinal Spellman, to whom he became private secretary and general gatekeeper. Upon the Cardinal's death, Clark served his successor, Cardinal Terence Cooke, by creating a modern, professional communications office in the chancery. He also became a very efficient fund raiser, creating at the Cardinal's request a committee to assist the Vatican Museums - for which it raised many millions.

It is not geography that brings people to St. Agnes. Parish selection is a fairly modern phenomenon. "Some people pick a parish and a great many people are almost forced to pick one," says Msgr. Clark, "mostly because they have strong feelings about certain things." Anger, he says, "is not the compelling force for most people"; they generally seek out a parish "because something has been missing for them, something they want. " Most often people are looking for a respectful liturgy and sound catechesis. "There was once a great uniformity of practice. If you left an adverb out of the Beatitudes, everybody noticed. Even the altar boys held their hands in exactly the right way. That is not the scene today."

In many parishes these correct practices will be found only in books, waiting to be brought to life by men. And this is why St. Agnes shines: the men who live here.

Through the back office of the St. Agnes rectory walks a spectacular private parade. Between 6:00 and 6:30 p.m. the march begins: the priests going down to a cocktail and dinner. Ambling through the office come Fr. George Rutler, writer and Catholic celebrity; Fr. John Perricone, fiery preacher with a great following in orthodox circles; Msgr. Florence Cohalan, resident historian of the Archdiocese; Msgr. James Reinert, the Nebraskan assigned to the Holy See's Mission to the United Nations. On a given evening ten or eleven priests walk through the back office, and any one of them can stop and lucidly answer questions of the Faith, or of Church or even secular history. Laymen are allowed almost everywhere in the St. Agnes complex, but generally not in the dining room. It is hallowed ground where visiting priests from all over the world sit agape at the fast and often uproarious dinner-time debate - always lofty, and occasionally in Latin.

All over Manhattan huge and luxurious rectories stand virtually empty, but there is often a waiting list to live in the small, cramped, dingy rooms of St. Agnes. Each man there fits into the mix of holiness, intellectual prowess, liturgical precision and orthodox belief. "The group of priests living in this house still adhere to certain basic principles, certain basic evangelical goals and a certain pastoral zeal," says Msgr. Clark.

Occassionally Msgr. Clark's guests flee the dinner table. "One fellow came here a few years ago," he says, "and at dinner someone brought up St. Francis de Sales. Monsignor Cohalan remarked that it was quite extraordinary how de Sales saw through and handled so many of the problems of his age, and how he handled the Calvinists and even converted a few of them. In a few well-executed sentences Cohalan had compassed de Sales. Then another of our priests compared de Sales to Pascal, who had mishandled some of the same problems. Two or three others then made references that advanced the conversation. And all of a sudden our guest said, 'I had no idea people like you really existed.' Now this fellow was not saying we were all bright, but that we were crazy. And you should know that very few of the men in this house are academics, just men with general habits of reading. They are truly literate men who are genuinely interested in the Church." It wasn't exactly the kind of conversation their guest was used to in his own rectory.

These are the men at the dinner table at St. Agnes, the men in the pulpit, the men in the confessional. Some of them make speeches. Some teach. Some write books. All of them are truly Catholic, and truly priests.

The number-two priest at St. Agnes, and running the day-to-day operations, is the beloved Fr. William Shelley, 73 years old. Father Shelley was once pastor of St. Malachy's, "the actors' church," across midtown in the theatre district. He tells stories about hearing regular confessions there at 3:00 a.m. so that the late-night theatre crowd could attend the 4:00 a.m. Mass. Father Shelley ministered at St. Malachy's to many Broadway luminaries. It was at St. Malachy's that he came to love Broadway theater, which remains one of the few luxuries he ever allows himself.

Father Shelley came to St. Agnes 25 years ago. He even remembers the exact date. "March 3, 1973," he says without hesitation. And he quickly became a much-beloved figure. A straightforward mix of practicality and holiness, he seems to know more about the people and the history of St. Agnes than anyone else. "Traditionally," he says, "there were four types of people who came to St. Agnes: the few people who live in the neighborhood, the many people who work here (including those who work in bars, restaurants and hotels on Sundays), visitors and then the people who just choose it. But a fifth group was added in 1989 - the Latin Mass people who come every Sunday."

Father Shelley guides the soup kitchen at St. Agnes, which has fed thousands of hungry people each Saturday for thirteen years. Dozens of volunteers arrive Friday night to prepare the Saturday meal, and by early morning a long line of guests winds down 44th Street. The kitchen has missed only two days in all the years it has run. A few years ago, when Los Angeles rioted over the Rodney King verdict, fear spread to New York that rioting would start here. All New Yorkers remember the panic that Friday afternoon as the city closed down, and people literally ran home in the middle of the afternoon. "Even on that day, the volunteers showed up to get the soup kitchen ready for the next morning," says Fr. Shelley proudly.

Father Shelley also shows up nearly every Saturday morning at the local abortion mill to lead a small band of faithful protesters in the Rosary. Whenever he arrives you can see the air go out of the clinic "escorts" who are there to keep the young women away from the pro-life witnesses at the curb.

Recently, after the new church was completed, Msgr. Clark moved into quarters in the rebuilt church area. As number two, Fr. Shelley was offered Monsignor's old rooms. They are larger and more convenient than the ones he has occupied for many years in the second rectory on 44th Street. Shelley declined, even though his current rooms require him to climb painful stairs going to and from the church. He likes those stairs, he told Monsignor, and is used to them. Typical. There is a story going around that he didn't want the larger rooms because he has so few possessions that he couldn't fill them. Father Shelley has spent his life giving things away - his money and his possessions and his love. To many parishioners, this man, sometimes hobbling, always holy, is St. Agnes.

It would be easy to write whole books about each of the priests at St. Agnes. Father Matthew Farrelly, an 84-year-old Holy Ghost Father, gave up his teaching post in Ireland in 1943 and traveled by ship through submarine-infested waters to start what would be years of ministering to the people of Nigeria and Gambia. In Nigeria he was given food and a canoe and sent alone upriver, where he stayed for over fifteen years. He came back with an enormous respect and love for the African people. He knows some Africans so well that he can recognize facial characteristics of certain tribes even in American faces. He has surprised many New York cab drivers from Africa by speaking their native language.

One day Fr. Farrelly had had quite enough with the loud and vulgar uproar that frequently went on next to the temporary chapel at the homeless shelter, called St. Agony, that used to be St. Agnes' boys' school. This elderly white-haired priest was a vision of Shakespearean righteousness as he stormed into the shelter and shouted to the men that they should be ashamed of themselves, that they had a magnificent history and traditions and that the people of Africa would be embarrassed to call them brothers. He was successful.

After Africa, where for years he had been secretary to Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, at the time a singularly effective African bishop, Fr. Farrelly was assigned to represent his order in Rome. Monsignor Clark says he is one of the most well-liked and well-connected persons who have served at the Vatican.

Father Farrelly is a quiet and holy man who spends his days instructing converts, offering Mass and praying. Each morning he can be found in the church at 6:00, kneeling over his breviary.

Monsignor Florence Cohalan lives on the third floor of the rectory; despite his wheelchair and his blindness, he appears at every meal in the rectory dining room. Cohalan spent much of his life teaching history at the archdiocesan minor seminary. It was during his tenure at Crestwood that Msgr. Clark began keeping his vow always to have a home for this man who was so important to his own intellectual and spiritual formation. In the 1960s Msgr. Cohalan, Msgr. Clark and Neil McCaffrey (Image Books; founder of Arlington House and the Conservative Book Club), served in William F. Buckley, Jr.'s brain trust. These days Msgr. Cohalan frequently forgets what he had for breakfast, but, just as easily, remembers intricate details of seventh-century Church history. And Buckley, noted Catholic author Malachi Martin, and countless judges, librarians and old friends can still be seen sprinting up the back stairs of the rectory to see the great teacher on the third floor.

Father Venant Lalonde, a Franciscan now in his seventies, spent World War II on a submarine, among the most dangerous posts in the war. After the war he became a captain in the merchant marine; to this day he attends meetings of sea captains in New York city. Five years ago he finished a thirty-year stint in the mission fields of Bolivia and came back to New York. "His submarine service is greatly appreciated at St. Agnes," says Msgr. Clark, "since it taught him how to fix just about anything. This is particularly helpful in a house where a simple videotape machine baffles everyone else."

Father Lalonde is a benevolent presence as he walks the sidewalks around St. Agnes in his brown habit and sandals. He opens the Church with Fr. Farrelly at 6:00, and prays his Office.

Father Kazimierz Kowalski was dean of the Lutherans in Brooklyn ten years ago when he perceived a call to the Catholic Church. He is a bear of a man, well-loved, a type of man's man that is too rare in the Church today. As do Frs. Shelley, Farrelly and Lalonde, Fr. Kowalski serves St. Agnes full time. He came to St. Agnes only a few years ago and is number three to Msgr. Clark.

It is a thirty-year tradition that some members of the Holy See's Mission to the nearby United Nations live at St. Agnes. Today there are two. Monsignor Carl Marucci, attachè and personal secretary to apostolic nuncio and Permanent Observer Archbishop Renato Martino, is an acomplished musician, and manages an orchestra with his wheelchair-bound brother, who is also a priest. Monsignor James Reinart, another attachè at the Holy See's Mission, is also young - not many years off the farm, in fact, serving from the Diocese of Bishop Fabian Bruskewitz of Lincoln, Nebraska.

Father Gerald Murray, tall and Irish, and a chaplain in the Naval Reserves, is the most recent addition, just having completed many years of studying canon law in Rome. He got straight As from Dartmouth on. He was sent to a poor Spanish parish in tough upper Manhattan, where he served for several years before moving to St. Patrick's Cathedral. Cardinal O'Connor sent him to study canon law at Rome's Gregorian University, and he now serves on the Matrimonial Tribunal of the Archdiocese of New York.

The firebrand of St. Agnes is a young priest from New Jersey, Fr. John Perricone, whose pure orthodoxy keeps the Tridentine Mass at St. Agnes jammed to the rafters whenever he is celebrant. Father Perricone is considered one of the leaders in the promotion of the ancient Latin Mass. (Thanks to Cardinal O'Connor, who himself made the request of Msgr. Clark, St. Agnes was the first parish in the Archdiocese to offer the Tridentine Mass after papal permission was extended in 1988.)

Among a minority of priests these days, Fr. Perricone also gives spiritual direction. People going to him quickly find themselves scaling heights they never thought possible - nothing overly grim, but daily exercises, or what he calls "norms of piety."

Father Perricone is just 48, but he has much priestly gravitas. As do most of the priests at St. Agnes, he wears a cassock when on church grounds. He has made it a personal project to rescue magnificent vestments discarded after what he calls the "revolution" of thirty years ago. His Masses are examples of liturgical and rubrical precision.

Father Perricone created a personal apostolate many years ago called ChristiFideles, which prepares its members intellectually and spiritually to do battle in society and in the Church. "ChristiFideles was a constructive response to the increasing crisis in the Church," he says. "We teach Catholics about their faith from a theological and philosophical perspective, but also from a more traditional view of the spiritual life."

ChristiFideles presents frequent lectures from political, legal and academic leaders. It publishes a hard-hitting newsletter that has doubled in circulation in less than two years, and has published original work from Joseph Sobran and Malachi Martin, as well as nurturing the talent of half a dozen young writers. There are nearly 1,000 members of ChristiFideles, but the core group of twenty, mostly in their 20s and 30s, meets every other Monday evening for an intensive three hours on the Baltimore Catechism and the Summa Theologica.

An intrepid band of these traditionalists attends local lectures by liberals and modernists and, having prepared intelligent and incisive questions in advance, fire them off one after another. It never fails to jolt the other side to see polished professionals in the opposition.

Father George Rutler looks like a nineteenth-century English saint. He probably sounds like one, too, as unlikely as it seems that a boy raised in Patterson, New Jersey would have an Oxbridge accent; it's a consequence of many years of study abroad. Father Rutler is by far the best-known priest at St. Agnes, probably one of the most famous in the U.S. He is the author of half a dozen books. He has made his own program on Mother Angelica's Eternal Word Television Network. Tapes of his lectures sell as well as those of any figure in the Catholic world. He is also the chaplain of Legatus, an organization of Catholic CEOs founded by Domino's Pizza Chairman Tom Monahan.

Father Rutler used to be an Anglican priest; a distinguished career lay ahead of him in the Episcopal Church. But the Anglican's growing resemblance to the Democratic Party, in addition to theological and spiritual reasons, sent him to Rome in 1980.

Father Rutler says Catholics come to St. Agnes for several reasons. "They come because there is a solid commitment to the solid Gospel here," he says. "And the time constraints of saying so many Masses in a single day keep out the luxury of preaching frills. Also, there is the location in midtown Manhattan. But there is also the presence of regular confession, several hours each day. We preach conversion here; and the surest sign of conversion is repentance and confession." At St. Agnes confessions are heard in the morning from 7:30 to 8:45, over lunch from 12:35 to 1:45 and in the evening from 5:00 to 5:45. Although many parishes claim to need only 30 minutes of confession a week, St. Agnes seems always to have a line whenever the confessional is open.

Father Rutler sees no problem in the lack of registered parishioners. "We have parishioners like John Wesley had parishioners - the whole world is our parish," he says. "You can go all over the world and meet people who have been here. People come here for the orthodoxy, certainly, but also for the sacramental services. There is a deep level of serious supernatural worship here."

Father Rutler is known for many things. He is known for a wicked sense of humor; at an elegant Manhattan fundraising dinner that he emcees every year, he once referred to Msgr. Clark as "the Mother Teresa to the rich." He is a fine prose stylist; his column appears monthly in Crisis magazine, and his wit has often been compared to G.K. Chesterton's. He is an especially gifted homilist; many people track down his wildly fluctuating Mass schedule in order to be present at one of his three-minute sermons. His programs on EWTN are among its most popular. He is even an accomplished landscape artist.

What Father Rutler is best known for around St. Agnes and New York are his Good Friday sermons. He has inherited the mantle of orator of St. Agnes from Fulton Sheen, who presided over four Good Friday services. Father Rutler has done twelve. Before the church burned, people used to arrive at St. Agnes early in the morning to make sure they got a seat. After the fire, the service was moved to the Grand Ballroom of the Waldorf Astoria Hotel, which has been a godsend. It holds over 1,200 people, and it is standing room only. Starting at 12:00 and ending at 3:00, Fr. Rutler takes the parishioners through the death of Christ on the Cross in his own particular way. One year it was "The Seven Last Words of Christ and the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World." Another compared the seven last words with the seven deadly sins. He delivers seven sermons in those three hours without a note; and then they are published almost verbatim in book form. Hugh Carey, former governor of New York State, recalls: "I was there one year, and it was such a wonderful experience that I ran outside to a pay phone and called all my sons and told them to meet me immediately. They all came. Father Rutler is an amazing priest."

Father Rutler says St. Agnes is important for the atmosphere it creates. "When people enter St. Agnes they know immediately they are entering a sacred space," he says. "But it isn't a stuffy or exclusive place. It is like the Catholic Church as a whole. The Catholic Church leaves room for casual and anonymous curiosity. You can come in, stand around, and get comfortable with it. I am reminded of a sign that Ronald Knox spotted in a Catholic Church: 'Mind Your Umbrella.'" Father Rutler explains that Catholicism is so open that anyone can come in, but that that freedom also includes the thief, or a street person. "A bag lady came up to me one day and quoted something I'd said in a Good Friday service." That's St. Agnes, and Catholicism.

Father Rutler travels almost constantly for Legatus, and is away from St. Agnes for long stretches of time. He has a new book coming out from Ignatius Press this spring. Entitled The Confessions of an Anglican Choirboy, it is his reflections on a hundred old and favorite hymns. Webmaster note: the book is now in print but was renamed 'Brightest and Best'.

So there are the church and the men. Why do people flock to St. Agnes? For more than convenience: they come for the Faith, for the Faith delivered in a solemn, no-nonsense manner. Many Catholics the world over grit their teeth through banal sermons, silly music and profane liturgies. At St. Agnes, parishioners get the real thing. Each sermon is a real lesson about the Church, an aspect of the Faith, the life of a saint. The sermons are delivered by saintly men who would bridle at the label of saint. This church is open from 6:00 in the morning until 7:00 at night; it has Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament every afternoon until 5:00. In this church Communion is received kneeling. Above all, in this church the priests and the laity can be seen saying their prayers on their knees at all times of the day.

A Reminder to Pray for the Church in China

2010-07-08T15:27:00.001-04:00

Catholic priest, nun murdered in China
Agence France-Presse
Posted at 07/08/2010 4:14 PM
Source

BEIJING - A priest and a nun who were both members of China's underground Catholic church were murdered in the north of the country this week but the motive was not clear, police said Thursday.

AsiaNews, a Vatican-based news service, said Joseph Shulai Zhang and Sister Mary Wei Yanhui were apparently stabbed to death at the nursing home where they worked in the city of Wuhai in Inner Mongolia.

After the two failed to appear at morning mass, their bodies were discovered in a pool of blood in the home, which was housed within the local church, the report said.

The priest was apparently stabbed seven times, while the nun suffered one stab wound to the chest.

"This is a criminal matter, we are in the process of cracking this case," a city policeman, also surnamed Zhang, told AFP.

The policeman said the motive for the murders was not immediately clear and that investigators were not sure how many suspects were involved.

Zhang, 55, had been a priest since 1985. Sister Wei, 32, was the director of the nursing home, which housed about 60 elderly people, AsiaNews said.

China has about five million Catholics who worship at Communist Party-sanctioned "official" churches, while up to 11 million reportedly worship at "underground" churches not sanctioned by the government.

Sad Irony in D.C.

2010-07-07T13:40:00.007-04:00

On the E Street brdige over I-395:

Just to the south, I-395 runs under the US Department of Labor and under the reflecting pool in front of the US Capitol where socialist control the U.S. Congress.

Looking east from the bridge toward 3rd Street:

The US tax court.

Looking east toward 2nd Street:

The poor house!
Catholic Charities and another group run a homeless shelter.

Let's not forget in November and at the next presidential election that unless we get rid of the Democrats, this will be America's future - taxes and poverty.

Kagan the Deceiver

2010-07-04T12:04:00.002-04:00

The following is an excerpt from Slate. The full article is here. The only reason this twisted woman is still considered for the important life long post is because DemoKKKrats have a double standard with regard to ethical behavior, and RepubliCONS have no background. This country is in serious trouble.

Kagan didn't just "clarify" ACOG's position. She changed its emphasis. If a Bush aide had done something like this during the stem-cell debate, progressive blogs would have screamed bloody murder.

At the hearing, Kagan said ACOG had told her that intact D&X "was in some circumstances the medically best procedure." But that doesn't quite match her 1996 memo about her meeting with ACOG. In the memo, she wrote that

we went through every circumstance imaginable—post- and pre-viability, assuming malformed fetuses, assuming other medical conditions, etc., etc.—and there just aren't many where use of the partial-birth abortion is the least risky, let alone the "necessary," approach. No one should worry about being able to drive a truck through the President's proposed exception; the real issue is whether anything at all can get through it.

The language in this memo—"imaginable," "let alone," the quotes around "necessary"—depicts a conversation in which nobody could think of a real case where intact D&X was, as Kagan's revision would later put it, "the best or most appropriate procedure in a particular circumstance to save the life or preserve the health of a woman." Indeed, the participants doubted whether "anything at all" could meet Clinton's standard—namely, a case in which intact D&X would be "necessary to preserve the life of the woman or avert serious adverse consequences to her health." So Kagan's statement at her hearing—that ACOG had said intact D&X "was in some circumstances the medically best procedure"—considerably stretches the truth as she recorded it. It implies, contrary to her contemporaneous notes, that ACOG had affirmed a specific need for the procedure.

Kagan's critics see her political meddling as a violation of science. The revised ACOG statement "was a political document, intended to bolster the case for partial-birth abortion, under the false flag of scientific objectivity," says Power Line. National Review agrees: "Language purporting to be the judgment of an independent body of medical experts" was "nothing more than the political scrawling of a White House appointee." These complaints are overboard. Science and politics aren't mutually exclusive. The ACOG statement was largely scientific, and even Kagan's insertion was more than political scrawling: It reframed but obeyed the constraints of ACOG's objective beliefs.

But if conservatives are being naive about the relationship between science and politics, Kagan is being cynical about it. "There was no way in which I would have or could have intervened with ACOG, which is a respected body of physicians, to get it to change its medical views," she told senators on Wednesday. With this clever phrasing, she obscured the truth: By reframing ACOG's judgments, she altered their political effect as surely as if she had changed them.
She also altered their legal effect. And this is the scandal's real lesson: Judges should stop treating the statements of scientific organizations as apolitical. Such statements, like the statements of any other group, can be loaded with spin. This one is a telling example.

Beware of Liberals: Obama's Kagan Agenda

2010-07-02T23:23:00.003-04:00

For Liberals there is no truth, or rather truth is what is expedient to get what they want here and now. The following video is disturbing showing radical leftist Alinsky trained Jeremiah Wright heeding Obama's pick Sotomayor saying one thing when she sought to become a Justice and saying the complete opposite once she got what she wanted. There is no doubt that the crypto-socialist and radical leftist Kagan will do the same.

McCarrick's Support For Dissenter Keehan

2010-06-30T09:56:00.002-04:00

The Washington Post reports that on Wednesday June 23, the Vigil of the Birth of St. John the Baptist, priests and bishops gathered at a special Mass at St. Matthew's Cathedral in anticipation of Cardinal McCarrick's upcoming 80th birthday.

The article goes on to add:
"Wuerl and McCarrick spoke, and a reading was done by Sister Carol Keehan, president of the Catholic Health Association, who was in the news a lot earlier this year when she bucked the U.S. bishops and supported the White House's health care bill."

It is scandalous that a prince of the Church would have a high profile dissenter act as lector.

Yet, it is also sadly ironic, coming as it does in the context of his birthday celebration on the eve of the birth of the holy man who lost his head when another politically shrewd prince celebrating his own birthday gave into the wish of a woman who performed a (liturgical) dance for him.

McCarrick apparently has great respect for Keehan - a respect which apparently runs deeper than his respect for the Church's teaching on the duty to protect the most innocent of human life in the womb. Recently he appeared at the graduation and Mass of the Jesuit run highschool, St. Aloysius Gonzaga, on North Capitol where Keehan gave the commencement address to the 2010 graduating class.

Restore DC Catholicism reports:

"A few of our number, including the woman ejected from the church, stayed until the end. They saw Cardinal McCarrick and Sister Carol Keehan walk out - arm in arm! No surprise there. Cardinal McCarrick and the late Ted Kennedy were seen walking out in that fashion after some event a few years back. I understand my friend rebuked the Cardinal and Sister quite forcefully as they proceeded to the reception area."

There is good news, however. Since McCarrick turns 80 on July 7th, he will no longer have a vote in the next papal conclave!

Oldest images of Christ's apostles found in Rome

2010-06-27T17:55:00.002-04:00

Source

Art restorers in Italy have discovered what are believed to be the oldest paintings of some of Jesus Christ's apostles.

The faces of Apostles Andrew, John, Peter and Paul were uncovered using new laser technology in a catacomb in Rome.
The paintings date from the second half of the 4th Century or the early 5th Century, the restorers and Vatican officials believe.
The images may have influenced later depictions of Christ's early followers. 'Very emotional'
"These are the first images that we know of the faces of these four apostles," said Fabrizio Bisconti, head of archaeology for Rome's numerous Vatican-owned catacombs.
The frescoes in a tomb of a Roman noblewoman in the Santa Tecla catacomb were known about but their details came to light during a two-year restoration project funded by the Vatican.
The images were uncovered using new laser technology that allowed the restorers to burn off thick white calcium carbonate deposits caused by extreme humidity and lack of air.
"The laser created a sort of mini-explosion of steam when it interacted with the calcium carbonate to make it detach from the surface," said Barbara Mazzei, who was in charge of the project.
"It was very, very emotional to discover this," she added.
Andrew, Peter and John were among Jesus' original 12 apostles.
Paul was an influential early Christian who travelled widely in the Mediterranean area in the 1st Century. His letters to the early churches, found in the Bible's New Testament, are arguably some of the most influential on Christian thinking.

Update on Dolan at St. Francis Xavier Parish

2010-06-15T17:23:00.002-04:00

Except for the commentary in green, the following is from Pewsitter.com through Good Jesuit Bad Jesuit.blogspot.com:
(Note that the parish pastor is unwilling to obey the Chief Shepherd of the Archdiocese in a proper and completely legitimate request. He needs to be removed!
Hopefully, Dolan will avoid and even forbid the rededication.)

NYC Parish Defies Archbishop Dolan's Request To Not Participate in Gay Pride March Later This Month

This is the picture used on the brochure announcing St. Francis Xavier's participation in the Pride March. June 14, 2010 - St. Francis Xavier parish in New York City is defying Archbishop Dolan’s request and planning to participate in the “Pride March” scheduled for June 27.

According to informed sources, New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan, wrote Father Joe Costantino, SJ, the Pastor of St. Francis, to say he would not like to see any group participate in the Pride March under the parish banner. In spite of this directive from the Archbishop the LGBT ministries and their family and friends hand out brochures about the Church of St. Francis Xavier encouraging participation in the event. The text of this brochure appears below:

NYC’s 41st Annual LGBT Pride March
Sunday, June 27, 2010

The Church of St. Francis Xavier is the only Roman Catholic Church in New York City—maybe one of a handful in the world—to participate in the Pride March. We welcome all, as did Jesus. So we ask you to consider walking with the LGBT ministries on Pride Sunday, June 27, and represent a church that truly lives the Gospel. Many of us will attend the 9:00 am or 11:30 am Mass and then head uptown to where the group will meet [location to be determined on June 21].

Each year, through our presence and our handing out of flyers, a number of people find their way to St. Francis Xavier to return to the sacraments and to find their place in the Catholic Church. [This is totally false! People find their way to the parish but are not given the true teaching of the Church. Just check my previous post.]

We look forward to spending this day of celebration, ministry and the living out of our mission statement together as a parish. If you have any questions, please e-mail SFXWomen@aol.com or SFXGCGroup@gmail.com, or call (917) 297-6804.

St. Francis Xavier is the same Jesuit parish that last month hosted the dissenting, pro-abortion, Catholic Kerry Kennedy. The parish bulletin, available online, list among its scheduled activities meetings for Gay Catholics, Lesbian Catholics and a Zen Meditiation. Also online is an agenda from a recent parish council meeting in which one of the items to be discussed was how to promote and advertise Bishop Sullivan’s visit to the parish for the LGBT Anniversary Mass scheduled for May 14th.

One Week Away: Dolan to Rededicate Church and Altar of Dissenter Parish

2010-06-13T21:32:00.002-04:00

The Church of St. Francis Xavier Celebrates the Rededication of Church and New Altar
Archbishop Timothy Dolan, "presider"

Saturday, June 19, 2010
6 o'clock in the evening
[Doors will open at 5:15 pm]

Tickets required: No tickets will be available on the day of the rededication!
(Source)

According to the pastor, special guests will include Cardinal Egan, and Archbishop Migliore, the permanent observer of the Holy See to the United Nations.

Ordinarily, this would be good news. But, this is a parish which styles itself as gay-friendly, i.e., it supports homosexual activity.

And there is no doubt about this fact. [Just check out the evidence here, here, here, and here and even the July 4, 2007 posting at http://cclonline.org/index.php?pg=lcsw&blogfile=/2007_07_01_archive.html.] Among these, perhaps the clearest example of the pastor's not challenging, but promoting, a sinful lifestyle is here and here.

The official parish website boldly invites parishioners to march in the upcoming Gay Pride Parade.

Presumably, they plan to march, as they have in years past, with a parish banner in a parade which flaunts a lifestyle that offends God.

The parish also put together a "Pride Potluck" on June 11, at which "Catholic Lesbians and Gay Catholics will be sharing favorite entrées, desserts and beverages in celebration of the 41st anniversary of Stonewall."

Meanwhile, the parish does not only dissent on the Church's sexual teaching. Recently it hosted pro-abortion pro-women ordination dissenter Kerry Kennedy as a speaker. (Incidentally, I still can't find a pro-life page at this socially active parish. They do, however, have a page implying support for women's ordination.]

If you were thinking about attending this scandalous rededication, forget it! With Jesuitical shrewdness, the parish is requiring tickets. And as of June 6th, it's too late to get one. This means the "open and welcoming" parish will become "exclusive!"
Moreover, apparently, only the parish priests will distribute Holy Communion so that there will be no embarrasing pictures for Archbishop Dolan, like the following of Archbishop Niederauer at a dissenter parish in San Francisco. (Niederauer later apologized for giving Holy Communion to the man dressed as a clown-nun.)

I would respectfully urge Archbishop Dolan not to reconsecrate this church and altar...until the parish cleans up its act and restores the full truth of Catholic teaching. And they can start by removing the pro-dissent material from their website.

I'm sure much has gone into the preparations, but this parish has long been known to be a place of dissent. And just this past spring it has continued to flaunt it. To redidcate the church and altar only declares nothing is wrong.

Pray for the parish and contact communications@archny.org

Pro-Democratic Iran Rally

2010-06-13T16:25:00.008-04:00

Saturday, June 12, 2010 at 2:10 p.m.
Bearing the banner of Imperial Iran, this group began and continued expressing displeasure with Ahmadinejad and Khomeni.

National Asian Heritage Festival

2010-06-12T20:40:00.002-04:00

Illegal Bike Riding in DC

2010-06-12T20:08:00.003-04:00

It is illegal to ride a bicycle on the sidewalk in Washington, D.C. within the central business district. The area is roughly between Massachussests Ave and the Mall from north to south and 2nd to 23rd Sts. from east to west. (This ride is doing so out of the zone, so apparently no laws are being broken.)

A bicycle is a vehicle and should be required to stay on the road.
But, too often cyclist do whatever suits them weaving in and out between sidewalk and street.

Walking Around D.C.

2010-06-12T09:12:00.003-04:00

News Report on Priestly Celibacy

2010-06-11T11:09:00.000-04:00

I guess not all media is anti-Catholic!
The following is a surprisingly respectful and accurate presentation of the Church's teaching on priestly celibacy and chastity.

Farmers Market, Washington, DC

2010-06-11T06:14:00.000-04:00

From the US Navy Memorial, looking north up 8th Street towards the National Portrait Gallery.

The Farmer's Market comes to DC on Thursdays during the warmer months of the year. It meets on 8th Street between E and D Streets, NW.

Market Hours: 3 pm to 7 pm.

Products of the Day

Looking south from E Street toward the National Archive

China Boy Delicatessen, Washington,D.C.

2010-06-10T21:06:00.008-04:00

China Boy is an unimposing place. It is easily overlooked by visitors, but well-known to the Chinese community.

This place is hidden away on the eastern side of 6th Street, NW, between H and I Streets. [It is directly across from the Wah Luk House and the 6th and I Streets Synagogue.]

They have a table for those who wish to eat there, but mostly cater to take out customers. They are known for their noodles. And in fact, their noodles made upstairs are exported to restaurants around the region.

St. Augustine: Fonts of Morality of the Human Act

2010-06-10T06:26:00.002-04:00

Below, Augustine distinguishes what is being done (the object) from why it is being doing (the intention). [St. Thomas Aquinas would term the former the finis operis and the latter, the finis operantis.] Augustine affirms that one cannot rightly choose to perform an evil action and be good. Even a good intention while performing an evil action cannot make the person good. Thus, it is clear that Augustine would reject the proportionalism, utilitarianism, and situation ethics of modern dissenter theologians.

From De Mendacio (On Lying):

17. But yet if the option were proposed to the man who chose to burn incense to idols rather than yield his body to abominable lust, that, if he wished to avoid that, he should violate the fame of Christ by some lie; he would be most mad to do it. I say more: that he would be mad, if, to avoid another man's lust, and not to have that done upon his person which he would suffer with no lust of his own, he should falsify Christ's Gospel with false praises of Christ; more eschewing that another man should corrupt his body, than himself to corrupt the doctrine of sanctification of souls and bodies. Wherefore, from the doctrine of religion, and from those utterances universally, which are uttered on behalf of the doctrine of religion, in the teaching and learning of the same, all lies must be utterly kept aloof. Nor can any cause whatever be found, one should think, why a lie should be told in matters of this kind, when in this doctrine it is not right to tell a lie for the very purpose of bringing a person to it the more easily. For, once break or but slightly diminish the authority of truth, and all things will remain doubtful: which unless they be believed true, cannot be held as certain. It is lawful then either to him that discourses, disputes, and preaches of things eternal, or to him that narrates or speaks of things temporal pertaining to edification of religion and piety, to conceal at fitting time whatever seems fit to be concealed: but to tell a lie is never lawful, therefore neither to conceal by telling a lie.

18. This being from the very first and most firmly established, touching other lies the question proceeds more securely. But by consequence we must also see that all lies must be kept aloof which hurt any man unjustly: because no man is to have a wrong, albeit a lighter one is done to him, that another may have a heavier kept from him. Nor are those lies to be allowed, which, though they hurt not another, yet do nobody any good, and are hurtful to the persons themselves who gratuitously tell them. Indeed, these are the persons who are properly to be called liars. For there is a difference between lying and being a liar. A man may tell a lie unwillingly; but a liar loves to lie, and inhabits in his mind in the delight of lying. Next to such are those to be placed who by a lie wish to please men, not that they may do wrong or bring reproach upon any man; for we have already before put away that kind; but that they may be pleasant in conversation. These, differ from the class in which we have placed liars in this respect, that liars delight in lying, rejoicing in deceit for its own sake: but these lust to please by agreeable talk, and yet would rather please by saying things that were true, but when they do not easily find true things to say that are pleasant to the hearers, they choose rather to tell lies than to hold their tongues. Yet it is difficult for these sometimes to undertake a story which is the whole of it false; but most commonly they interweave falsehood with truth, where they are at a loss for something sweet. Now these two sorts of lies do no harm to those who believe them, because they are not deceived concerning any matter of religion and truth, or concerning any profit or advantage of their own. It suffices them, to judge the thing possible which is told, and to have faith in a man of whom they ought not rashly to think that he is telling a lie. For where is the harm of believing that such an one's father or grandfather was a good man, when he was not? Or that he has served with the army even in Persia, though he never set foot out of Rome? But to the persons who tell these lies, they do much harm: to the former sort, because they so desert truth as to rejoice in deceit: to the latter, because they want to please people better than the truth.

19. These sorts of lies having been without any hesitation condemned, next follows a sort, as it were by steps rising to something better, which is commonly attributed to well-meaning and good people, when the person who lies not only does no harm to another, but even benefits somebody. Now it is on this sort of lies that the whole dispute turns, whether that person does harm to himself, who benefits another in such sort as to act contrary to the truth. Or, if that alone may be called truth which illustrates the very minds of men with an intimate and incommutable light, at least he acts contrary to some true thing, because although the bodily senses are deceived, yet he acts contrary to a true thing who says that a thing is so or not so, whereof neither his mind nor senses nor his opinion or belief gives him any report. Whether therefore he does not hurt himself in so profiting another, or in that compensation not hurt himself in which he profits the other, is a great question. If it be so, it should follow that he ought to profit himself by a lie which damages no man. But these things hang together, and if you concede that point, it necessarily draws in its train some very embarrassing consequences. For should it be asked, what harm it does to a person rolling in superfluous wealth, if from countless thousands of bushels of wheat he lose one bushel, which bushel may be profitable as necessary food to the person stealing it; it will follow that theft also may be committed without blame, and false witness borne without sin. Than which, what can be mentioned more perverse? Or truly, if another had stolen the bushel, and you saw it done, and were questioned, would you tell a lie with honesty for the poor man, and if you do it for your own poverty will you be blamed? As if it were your duty to love another more than yourself. Both then are disgraceful, and must be avoided.

Trying to Redefine Marriage in NY / A Reply from DC

2010-06-09T15:01:00.002-04:00

According to Gothamist New York City Council Speaker:

Christine Quinn Pushes For Open Information on Same-Sex Marriage

Now that domestic partnerships can come with a ceremony, Council Speaker Christine Quinn [who refuses to open information on her slush funds (see here)] is pushing for same-sex couples to get another step closer to marriage. She is backing a plan that would require clerks to inform same-sex couples applying for the partnerships of the five states and countries where they could legally wed. She hopes the plan would inspire lawmakers to legalize same-sex marriage in New York, telling the Daily News, "It think it will speak volumes about the inequality in our state. And the need for our state Senate to follow the lead of other states." So far, just two same-sex couples have taken advantage of the new domestic partnership ceremonies.

A Reply from Washington, D.C.:

Meanwhile, Eve Tushnet of eve-tushnet.blogspot.com, a self-proclaimed celibate lesbian and convert to Catholicism argues very cogently from a non-religious perspective against redefining marriage to include people of the same sex.
According to the NYT:

Marriage should be reserved for heterosexuals, whose “relationships can be either uniquely dangerous or uniquely fruitful,” (Tushnet) explained in an e-mail message. “Thus it makes sense to have an institution dedicated to structuring and channeling them.”

But same-sex marriage, she wrote in The New York Post in 2007, “can bring one of three outcomes: A two-tiered marriage culture, where heterosexual couples are asked to do the hard things (sex only within marriage, marriage for life in most circumstances) and homosexual couples work out their own marriage norms; reshape marriage into an optional, individualized institution, ignoring the creative and destructive potentials of ‘straight’ sex; or encourage all couples to restrict sex to marriage and marry for life, and hope that gay couples accept norms designed to meet heterosexual needs.”

Chinese Moongate Garden at Smithsonian Castle

2010-06-09T06:02:00.001-04:00

The Moongate Garden, is based on the Temple of Heaven in Beijing, China. It is around the cardinal points of the compass and is meant to help visitors relax.

Granite and water are the main features since rock is traditionally held to symbolize the body of the earth and water, earth's spirit.

"The path leading into the Moongate Garden enters at the southwest corner and exists at the northeast corner. Carlhian call this the 'pinwheel treatment' and utilized it to align important features of the Arts and Industries Building with the Freer Gallery."

And just outside the Moongate:

The Bus Depot at 10th and H, Washington DC

2010-06-08T20:15:00.009-04:00

Not the bus you want! Actually, an exhibit of the new trolley that will have a route on H St., NE.

The trolley again.

The parking lot between 9th and 11th Sts. and H St. and New York Ave, N.W.
This is looking east toward I St. The Renaissance Hotel is on the left.

Looking west, the Megabus is about to pick up passangers on what would otherwise be 10th St.

Looking south, the Megabus and Bolt bus are ready for passengers who are waiting.

Looking south from New York Avenue at what would otherise be 10th St.

Settled Law? Not so Fast…

2010-06-08T05:16:00.000-04:00

By Fr. Frank Pavone
National Director, Priests for Life

Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan reportedly “considers abortion rights to be settled law” (USA Today, May 21, p. 5A). And we can expect during her confirmation process to hear a number of Senators echo that assertion. Yet America’s courts and legislatures have a proud history of changing “settled law.”

America has, on various occasions, recovered the recognition of the equal dignity of those who were deprived of their rights and suffered violence which was given legal cover under a different name. This legal cover was often mistakenly recognized by the Supreme Court for a while, but then such decisions were overturned.

Dred Scott v. Sandford (1856) is the most commonly cited instance. The slaveholder's right to property eclipsed and subsumed the slave's right to freedom. But the Constitution was eventually amended to correct the error.

Decisions like Lochner v. New York (1905) show us another error: employers' right to contract eclipsed and subsumed the workers' rights to humane conditions and hours. These abuses were corrected by subsequent Supreme Court decisions like Muller v. Oregon and Bunting v. Oregon.

The "Separate but equal" doctrine of Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) sanctioning segregation was overturned by Brown v. Board of Education some 58 years later.

Erroneous decisions like Hammer v. Dagenhart (1918) institutionalized child labor. But this was overturned 23 years later by United States v. Darby. A new development -- a "pedagogical moment" -- occurred here in Constitutional law. The question was whether constitutional rights applied to children too. The answer was yes.

Many reversals of Supreme Court cases came about when new evidence was brought forward that made it clear that someone's rights, not previously recognized, were being violated. Thus, Louis Brandeis brought forward the facts about how workers were being harmed.

We are now witnessing the same trend regarding the children in the womb. Evidence that has been around for quite some time demonstrating their humanity is finding its way into legislatures and courts. One of the most striking instances comes out of South Dakota.

Federal courts have upheld South Dakota’s law requiring that abortion providers tell women that the procedure destroys a “whole, separate, unique, living human being.” This came about because of the evidence presented to the court regarding the humanity of the unborn child.

With hundreds of embryological sciences, and massive evidence of the harm abortion does to women, such evidence, combined with new legal concepts, can challenge Roe vs. Wade in the same way its erroneous ancestral decisions were challenged.

The day after Roe vs. Wade was decided, the New York Times headline read, “Supreme Court Settles Abortion.” Yet it has remained the most unsettled issue on our national landscape.

The facts above should shape the way that senators, Supreme Court nominees, and all the rest of us speak about Roe vs. Wade and the so-called “right” to choose an abortion. History should shape our language, and should strengthen our hope that abortion policy can change again just as radically as it did in 1973.

This column can be found online at www.priestsforlife.org/articles/document.aspx?id=3201

Comments on this column? Go to www.AskFrFrank.com

Fr. Frank's columns are podcast. See www.PriestsForLife.org/Podcast

German American Museum, Washington, D.C.

2010-06-05T08:06:00.010-04:00

The facade of the museum

The new office space across the street on 6th (NW).

I Hate the Beatles

2010-06-03T14:36:00.000-04:00

From the Dean Martin Show in 1965 with Allan Sherman and Vic Damone:

Permanent Protest at White House

2010-06-03T06:08:00.001-04:00

If you try to get a picture of the White House from Lafayette Park, chances are that the following yellow sign will get in your way.

The 70 year old-ish lady has been camped out there protesting in the spot 24 hrs/day, every day, for about 29 years.

Ordinarily, no one is allowed to protest in the area. But, apparently, this woman began her protest (against nuclear weapons) before the law which forbade protests there. Therefore, for better or worse, she is allowed to remain.

Jews for Palestinian Protest at White House

2010-06-02T22:52:00.005-04:00

Taken on Tuesday, June 1, 2010

Apparently, there was also another protest that day by actress Qorianka Kilcher and anti-Garcia Peruvians.

St. Isaac Jogues in Manhattan

2010-05-29T01:01:00.002-04:00

There Were Only Two Catholics in the City of New Amsterdam

from Good Jesuit, Bad Jesuit

If you go over to the eastern side of Fish Island you will find an isolated and stunted pine, which is known far and wide as " Captain Kidd's Tree," and you may have to listen to all sorts of gruesome tales about how the bold buccaneer buried his treasures somewhere in the soil and left them to the care of the Prince of Darkness.

It is curious that Captain Kidd and Father Isaac Jogues, who are poles away from each other morally, should meet on this little green spot in the Hudson.

After six days the ship reached New York, and the Governor gave Joques a most honorable reception, seating him beside the Dominie at table, providing for his wants, and changing his ragged and half savage costume for a civilized dress. Naturally the presence of a priest and a Jesuit on Manhattan Island, especially with all the marks of his terrible sufferings upon him, caused a profound sensation among the colonists.

They crowded around him to ask about his captivity, and it is narrated that, on one occasion, a young man fell at his feet and, kissing the mangled hands of the priest, exclaimed: " Martyr of Jesus Christ! Martyr of Jesus Christ!" "Are you a Catholic?" asked Jogues. " No, I am a Lutheran, but I recognize you as one who has suffered for the Master."

There were only two Catholics in New York at that time —one the Portuguese wife of the Ensign, who, singularly enough, had a picture of St. Aloysius in her room; the other an Irishman who had come up from Maryland. He gave Father Jogues intelligence about the Jesuits there and profited by the occasion to perform his religious duties.

Link (here) to portion of the book entitled Isaac Joques, S.J.: Discover of Lake George

Link (here) Fr. Z's post on kissing the hand of a priest.

Painting of St. Isaac Jogues, S.J. martyrdom at the hands of the Mohawk Indians (here)

Obamanomics at "Work"

2010-05-28T01:24:00.000-04:00

Next time you here the administration claim that unemployment is decreasing, remember the following.

Two more Census workers blow the whistle
Last Updated: 1:23 AM, May 25, 2010
Posted: 12:42 AM, May 25, 2010
by John Crudele
http://www.nypost.com/

You know the old saying: "Everyone loves a charade." Well, it seems that the Census Bureau may be playing games.
Last week, one of the millions of workers hired by Census 2010 to parade around the country counting Americans blew the whistle on some statistical tricks.
The worker, Naomi Cohn, told The Post that she was hired and fired a number of times by Census. Each time she was hired back, it seems, Census was able to report the creation of a new job to the Labor Department.
Below, I have a couple more readers who worked for Census 2010 and have tales to tell.
But first, this much we know.
Each month Census gives Labor a figure on the number of workers it has hired. That figure goes into the closely followed monthly employment report Labor provides. For the past two months the hiring by Census has made up a good portion of the new jobs.
Labor doesn't check the Census hiring figure or whether the jobs are actually new or recycled. It considers a new job to have been created if someone is hired to work at least one hour a month.
One hour! A month! So, if a worker is terminated after only one hour and another is hired in her place, then a second new job can apparently be reported to Labor . (I've been unable to get Census to explain this to me.)
Here's a note from a Census worker -- this one from Manhattan:
"John: I am on my fourth rehire with the 2010 Census.
"I have been hired, trained for a week, given a few hours of work, then laid off. So my unemployed self now counts for four new jobs.
"I have been paid more to train all four times than I have been paid to actually produce results. These are my tax dollars and your tax dollars at work.
"A few months ago I was trained for three days and offered five hours of work counting the homeless. Now, I am knocking (on) doors trying to find the people that have not returned their Census forms. I worked the 2000 Census. It was a far more organized venture.
"Have to run and meet my crew leader, even though with this rain I did not work today. So I can put in a pay sheet for the hour or hour and a half this meeting will take. Sincerely, C.M."
And here's another:
"John: I worked for (Census) and I was paid $18.75 (an hour) just like Ms. Naomi Cohn from your article.
"I worked for about six weeks or so and I picked the hours I wanted to work. I was checking the work of others. While I was classifying addresses, another junior supervisor was checking my work.
"In short, we had a "checkers checking checkers" quality control. I was eventually let go and was told all the work was finished when, in fact, other people were being trained for the same assignment(s).
"I was re-hired about eight months later and was informed that I would have to go through one week of additional training.
"On the third day of training, I got sick and visited my doctor. I called my supervisor and asked how I can make up the class. She informed me that I was 'terminated.' She elaborated that she had to terminate three other people for being five minutes late to class.
"I did get two days' pay and I am sure the 'late people' got paid also. I think you would concur that this is an expensive way to attempt to control sickness plus lateness. I am totally convinced that the Census work could be very easily done by the US Postal Service.
"When I was trying to look for an address or had a question about a building, I would ask the postman on the beat. They knew the history of the route and can expand in detail who moved in or out etc. I have found it interesting that if someone works one hour, they are included in the labor statistics as a new job being full.
"I am not surprised that you can't get any answers from Census staff; I found there were very few people who knew the big picture. M.G."
When I received my Census form in the mail, I filled it out. Nobody had to knock on my door.
I answered truthfully about the number of people living in my household. But I could have just as easily dou bled the number. Why not? Didn't Census ad vertisements imply that my community would get more federal money if the popula tion were larger?
I'm glad people are finding work with the Census. For some it's the only work they have had this year and the chump change they are making for a few hours' work is a godsend.
But wasting taxpayers' money on busywork isn't going to do much for the economy. john.crudele@nypost.com
Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/business/two_more_census_workers_blow_the_OqY80N3DBTvL17VmxKKR0O#ixzz0p9Sq8MVJ

Dissent Springs Eternal in Manhattan Parish

2010-05-27T10:09:00.002-04:00

An evening with Kerry Kennedy author of Being Catholic Now.
Wednesday, June 2nd 7:00 PM
Main Church [Will they remove the Blessed Sacrament?]
Suggested Donation $15.00
http://www.sfxavier.org/

Her life has been devoted to the vindication of equal justice, to the promotion and protection of basic rights, and to the preservation of the rule of law. At a time of diminished idealism and growing cynicism about public service, her life and lectures are testaments to the commitment to the basic values of human rights.
[This is a woman who claims to be Catholic and yet believes the legalized murder of innocent human life in the womb is a basic value and human right. It's no surprise that she is allowed by Fr. Joseph Constantino, S.J. to speak at St. Francis Xavier parish. The parish has long promoted immoral lifestyles. Tom Peters recently exposed this here. ]

Pray for the parish and contact communications@archny.org

Archbishop Hannan of New Orleans

2010-05-26T20:39:00.003-04:00

Born on 20 May 1913 and ordained on 8 December 1939, Fr. Philip Matthew Hannan served as curate at St. Mary Mother of God on 5th and H Street NW in Washington, DC during the late 1940's.

He was ordained titular bishop of Hieropolis for the Archdiocese of Baltimore-Washington on 28 August 1956. Appointed to New Orleans on 29 September 1965, during the second Vatican Council, he ministered to that church as its ordinary until 6 December 1988.

Deacon Gregory Kandra shares this anecdote:

"When I was growing up in Rockville, Maryland in the 1960s, there was a a large patch of farmland nearby that was owned by a family named Hannan. Part of the land was sold off for a subdivision -- the main street through the development is now called "Hannan's Way" -- but the rest was donated to the Archdiocese of Washington with two conditions: it would be used for a church, and the church would be named for the family patriarch, Patrick.

That was how I came to grow up in a new parish, St. Patrick's, where I first served as an altar boy some 40 years ago. And that was how I also developed an unusual connection to another member of that storied family, the legendary Archbishop of New Orleans, Philip Hannan. He was in Rockville for the dedication of St. Patrick's in the late 1960s, along with another legend, (and another Patrick) Washington's Archbishop O'Boyle."

Archbishop Hannan has seen it all with the New Orleans Saints
By Peter Finney

Times-Picayune
May 23, 2010

"The Archbishop Wore Combat Boots."
It's a new book, the life story of Philip Hannan, who went from serving as the parachute-jumping chaplain of the 82nd Airborne Division in World War II, to the "say-a-prayer-for-us" chaplain of the New Orleans Saints during their journey from pro football's laughingstock to Super Bowl champions.Ellis Lucia/The Times-PicayuneArchbishop Hannan has seen the New Orleans Saints rise to the top of pro football, and is the subject of a new book.
It's the story of someone who grew up an avid baseball fan of the Washington Senators, who gave the eulogy at the funeral of his friend, President John Kennedy, before arriving here in 1965, on the winds of Hurricane Betsy, then later found himself, wearing overalls and his old combat boots, offering help and comfort to hundreds following visits by Hurricanes Camille and Katrina.
At 97, Archbishop Hannan is still with us, perhaps the only living member of a fan club that rooted for Hall of Fame pitcher Walter Johnson.
"They called him 'The Big Train' because he was so fast and overpowering," Archbishop Hannan recalled. "One sports writer wrote he could throw three strikes at a time. He was my hero. When I was 11, I wrote him a letter, praising his pitching and sportsmanship. When he sent back a quick response, I couldn't believe it. He wrote: 'Dear Philip, I'm very grateful for your kind letter and appreciate your support.'"
In the seventh game of the 1924 World Series against the New York Giants, Hannan was in the stands at Griffith Stadium, watching Johnson come in to pitch four scoreless innings in relief to close out the championship.
"It was one of the greatest days of my young life," he said. "I remember my dad say batters, hampered by nightfall, saw only his release, not delivery. They knew they struck out only after hearing the ball pop into the catcher's mitt."
It didn't take baseball fanatic Philip Hannan long to realize, when it came to sports, New Orleans was a different cup of tea.
"As a religion," he said, "I found out football ranked just behind Catholicism."
Ted Jackson/The Times-PicayuneArchbishop Philip Hannan, with New Orleans Saints owner Rita Benson LeBlanc and President George H. Bush, wish kicker Garrett Hartley well before the NFC championship game at the Superdome. On Nov. 1, 1966, All Saints Day, he was looking at the size of the headline in The Times-Picayune on page one - "N.O. GOES PRO'' - wondering if World War III had been declared.
Soon after, he was receiving a call from Gov. John McKeithen, who told him they wanted to name the team "Saints" because of the song, "When the Saints Go Marching In."
"Would that be sacrilegious?"
"I told the governor I'd have no objection. But I quickly added, from the viewpoint of the Church, most of the Saints were martyrs."
Considering what was to come, it was highly appropriate.
So was the archbishop's prayer for the expansion Saints of 1967, preparing to face the Los Angeles Rams in the opening game before a sellout crowd of 80,879 in Tulane Stadium:
"God, we ask your blessing upon all who participate in this event, and all who have supported our Saints. Our Heavenly Father, who has instructed us that the saints by faith conquered kingdoms and overcame lions, grant our Saints an increase of faith and strength so that they will not only overcome the Lions, but also the Bears, the Rams, the Giants, and even those awesome people in Green Bay.
"May they continue to tame the Redskins and fetter the Falcons as well as the Eagles. Give our owners and coaches the continued ability to be as wise as serpents and simple as doves, so that no good talent will dodge our draft. Grant to our fans perseverance in their devotion and unlimited lungpower, tempered with a sense of charity to all, including the referees.
"May our beloved Bedlam Bowl be a source of good fellowship and may the 'Saints Come Marching In' be a victory march for all, now and in eternity."
Well, as we all know, John Gilliam would return the opening kickoff 94 yards, something the archbishop compared to "Charlton Heston parting the Red Sea."
But did you know this? Because the archbishop had to meet a class later in the day, he was not around to see his Saints lose the first of many games.
Let the record show, thanks to owner Tom Benson, Archbishop Hannan would be around, 43 years later, for every moment of the closest thing to a football miracle the Big Easy ever experienced.
At a game-day Mass, as the football world prepared to witness a 31-17 victory against the Colts, Benson was reminded what the word was in Las Vegas: Never bet against the prayers of a 96-year-old archbishop.
"Archbishop Hannan," Benson said, "was heaven sent. He had more impact on our city than any individual I could name. He was front and center post-Katrina. He did so much to help lift and repair the spirits of everyone in our community."
His time as head of the archdiocese was highlighted by a 1987 visit by Pope John Paul II, no doubt the finest athlete to ever hold that position. He grew up playing soccer. He skied, jogged, hiked, played tennis, paddled a kayak.
The archbishop was awed by the pope's energy, by the way he "created an intimacy" at a youth rally that drew a crowd of 80,000 to the Superdome. "Pope John Paul," Hannan said, "drew on his strengths as an actor and communicator."
And then there was Edwin Edwards, someone the archbishop described as gifted, intelligent, flawed, with a great sense of humor. This was a governor elected to his fourth term with the bumper-sticker message, "Vote for the Crook, It's Important," in his campaign against Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard David Duke.
"We would have meetings with Edwards at the governor's mansion and he would bring up some question about Scripture to prove he knew something about it," Hannan said. "Usually, it was a complete misuse of Scripture.''
The archbishop tells a story suggesting it's a shame the pope never got to meet the governor.In preparing for the historic visit by John Paul II, security concerns were vital, the total budget for the trip estimated at close to $2 million that included pay for state police and city police.
"This was in the midst of the oil collapse and the state's massive fiscal woes," Hannan said. "But, ever the showman, Edwards insisted he wasn't worried in the least.
"If we have to," the governor promised, "we'll just rob Peter to pay for John Paul."

The Ignorance of the Current Administration

2010-05-23T15:26:00.000-04:00

National Asian Heritage Festival - Washington, D.C.

2010-05-22T09:36:00.002-04:00

www.asiaheritagefoundation.org/

Where:
Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
between 3rd & 6th Streets
Washington, DC

When:
Saturday,

May 22nd,
10:00 AM to 7:00 PM

The fesitval includes outdoor craft exhibits, live performances, food and open market vendors, interactive displays, martial arts, talent show, Pan-Asian cooking, lion dance and much more.

....

Upcoming:

Hawai’i Cultural Festival at the National Museum of the American IndianMay 29-31, 2010, 10:30 a.m.-4:30 p.m. National Mall. Explore and celebrate the richness of Hawaiian culture through hands-on activities (lei-making, kapa stamp art), dance with hula lessons, music and food demonstrations, films, lectures and much more.

Liberal Hypocrisy at Its Best

2010-05-20T12:12:00.002-04:00

The following story, below, reveals the typical hypocritical action of liberals. Wake up, America! Learn from this that a criminal must be reported to the authorities, except if an "enlightened" liberal decides the criminal does not have to be reported. So, little girls are raped, brought by their rapist to Planned Parenthood for an abortion, and Planned Parenthood officials fail to report the rapist or rape. They get a free pass. Michelle Obama, the Chief Executive's wife (!!!), learns of a crime, and as seen below, nothing will happen to her for her non-action nor to the criminal. [Incidentally, Barack Obama's aunt, illegally in this country for years, has just been given permission to stay. Talk about nepotism!)
And yet, these same liberals continually demand that bishops turn over the names of any priests who may have been merely accused of a crime, so that unscrupulous lawyers can grow rich.

Feds won't act on child's question to first lady
By the CNN Wire Staff
May 20, 2010 10:58 a.m. EDT

Washington (CNN) -- Immigration officials will not swoop in to deport a woman whose daughter asked first lady Michelle Obama about "taking people away" if they don't have proper paperwork, a Department of Homeland Security spokesman said Thursday.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement investigations are based on "solid law enforcement work and not classroom Q and As," said DHS spokesman Matt Chandler. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is a part of DHS.

The statement comes after a student concerned about her mother's legal status asked the first lady about the president's immigration policies Wednesday.

"My mom said, I think that she says that, Barack Obama is going to take away everybody that doesn't have papers," the young girl told Mrs. Obama as she visited a Washington-area school with Mexican first lady Margarita Zavala.

The unscripted moment was sandwiched between examples of Michelle Obama's signature policy initiatives -- a lesson on healthy eating and an exercise session -- and forced the first lady to walk the fine line of immigration reform policy language.

"Yeah, well, that's something that we have to work on, right? To make sure that people can be here with the right kind of papers, right? That's exactly right," she said.

The girl replied, "But my mom doesn't have any."

"[W]ell we have to work on that; we have to fix that and everybody's got to work together in Congress to make sure that happens. That's right," Obama said before moving to the next question.

Dana Tofig, a spokesman for Montgomery County, Maryland, schools, said the district would not identify the student and does "not ask about the immigration status of our students and their families."

"There was a Supreme Court decision that makes it clear that if there's proof of residency in the county, then we educate the child," Tofig said.

"And we're not going to identify the student or her parents. We protect the identity of our students."

Immigration took center stage in Washington on Wednesday as the president welcomed his Mexican counterpart, Felipe Calderon, to the White House.

Both leaders used the occasion -- the fourth time they have met for bilateral talks -- to take sharp aim at Arizona's controversial new law meant to crack down on illegal immigrants.

Calderon characterized the measure as discriminatory; Obama called it a "misdirected expression of frustration."

Obama also repeated his call for a comprehensive immigration overhaul.

Pentecost High Mass by Newly Ordained

2010-05-19T23:35:00.003-04:00

Fr. Steven Markantonis of Archdiocese of New York (above) was ordained by Archbishop Timothy Dolan on Saturday, May 15th.

His first Mass was offered in the ordinary form on Sunday, May 16th at Most Holy Trinity Church in Mamaroneck, NY.

His first Mass in the extraordinary form will be offered on Sunday, May 23rd at 3 PM at the Church of the Assumption, Peekskill, NY.

For more information, contact the parish here.

Church of the Assumption
131 Union Avenue
Peekskill, NY 10566
(P) 914-737-2071