Today, the 27th Sunday in Ordinary Time, is, in the United States, Respect Life Sunday.
Now it's time for me to alienate many readers. Because I have to speak the truth, however distasteful it may be to speak, or to hear.
In the "Catholic" parishes that are entrenched in dissent, Modernism and Americanism, there will be much sorrowful condemnation of capital punishment, and perhaps even candle lit vigils for some poor soul or other who is about to be executed for crimes they committed that violate human life. I am not a fan of capital punishment, but if one takes the time to actually look at the teachings of the Church, and these are clearly stated in the Catechism, the right to decide when capital punishment is appropriate lies with the civil authorities. But these parishes--and I have belonged to them--don't bother to say that. Instead, they use their opposition to it to "prove" their pro life chops. But they will not speak out on abortion, and most especially on contraception. Especially will they not speak out on contraception!
In more orthodox Catholic Parishes, there will be homilies on the evils of abortion, perhaps with reference to the sociological and psychological research that establishes links between the practice of murdering people before they're born and depression and social disturbances among both the mothers and the practitioners of abortion. There may even be references to the increase in abortion and the epidemic of breast cancer among women under 50.
I will digress here to say that, without a doubt, the link has been established. In cases of breast cancer in women under 50 the history of abortion is much more frequent than the prevalence of abortion in the female population at large--and in women with breast cancer under 35, it's nearly universal. But this isn't disseminated, and the studies that show the link are either ignored, or vigorously contested on specious grounds.
But even in more orthodox Catholic circles, one thing will not be discussed: contraception. They will not speak out about contraception. Contraception is the "third rail" of Catholic preaching. I have only heard one sermon that mentioned it, in my entire life. That sermon was preached by a deacon, who heard about it from the pastor--a priest I otherwise respect and admire--because of it's potential to impact the collection basket and attendance. In an otherwise fine priest, one of the finest I have ever met, this failing does affect my respect for him. it also gives me cause for concern about the state of his immortal soul. It does so for the same reason I'm writing this post; we have a responsibility to God, to speak the truth as we have received it. In Ezekiel 33, the Lord speaks to Ezekiel, and tells him that if a watchman blows his trumpet when the enemy comes, and one ignores it and is killed, it's ones own fault. But in verses 7-9, the Lord explains very clearly that if an evil doer courts destruction, and Ezekiel, who is "appointed watchman' for the people doesn't speak out to him, that mans destruction lays upon Ezekiel. If however, Ezekiel does speak out, and the evil doer persists, the destruction of that man is upon himself. it's very clear to anyone who reads scripture, and does not seek to explain it away, that not to speak out is to take the blame upon ones self. If I do not speak out about this, the evil practice of contraception, especially now when I have such a providential opportunity, then I too, must bear the guilt for it's consequences. But even more, I fear for our Priests, Deacons and Bishops.
Many people seem to think that the prohibition on birth control is a recent thing, something that came up in the 1960s, or as some sort of reaction by puritanical old Italian men. This is not so. Humanae Vitae wasn't the first document to condemn the practice. The first condemnation of it came in the book of Genesis. It's often said now that the problem with the story of Onan is that he failed to honor the law concerning providing heirs to his brother--not that he practiced coitus interruptus. That is an innovation, for no commentator before the 20th century ever said such a thing. In fact, the traditional interpretation, that Onan's sin was using a form of birth control, isn't even an exclusively Catholic one, it was held by both Luther and Calvin. It's also held, along with the prohibition of abortion, by Orthodox Jews.
If you would do a little looking, you would find an interesting thing--many early Christian epitaphs bear names relating to exposure, and attempted abortion. These infants were rescued by Christians, and raised as part of their families. The names cited often originated as insults, yet were retained by the Christians who bore them, as a witness to the murderous culture that had tried to reject them, and to the Christian ethic that saved their lives. From the earliest days, you find the councils and synods of the Church, even the pre Nicene synods, condemning contraception, as well as abortion. And they were unafraid to link the practice with a growth in promiscuity and licentiousness. (An effect that today is celebrated, with the claim that contraception , especially hormonal contraception, enabled the "sexual revolution".) Moreover, these synods and councils not only condemned surgical abortions, "binding" and induced miscarriage, they condemned the use of "philtres" and other medicaments meant to prevent conception in the strongest terms. In fact several of them, including, I believe, the council of Elvira, decreed that those who engaged in these practices not be admitted to Holy Communion "even at the point of death".
All Christian groups prohibited contraception until 1930, when the Lambeth Conference of Anglican Bishops approved contraception on the 14th of August. But even the Lambethpled that if the resolution passed soon birth control would be accepted for any reason, and would open the door to selfish rationalization. he was correct, and personally I feel that Our lord has rewarded him for his moral courage.) Other Christian groups have followed suit over the years, until only a few Protestant Fundamentalists and the Catholic Church hold the line on this moral teaching.
On December 31, 1930, Pope Pius XI released Casti Connubii, denouncing contraception. in it he described the Church as standing erect amide moral ruin on this teaching. So people who think that the problem started with Humanae Vitae are either deliberately ignoring almost two thousand years of Christian Tradition, or are ignorant of it.
We should take note of the fact that every distortion that Paul VI warned us of in Humanae Vitae has come to pass, or is on the table. With a contraceptive mentality has come abortion, and upswing in infanticide, euthanasia and other ills disguised as euthanasia, including in Holland the murder of children with easily treated birth defects and a move to suspend treatment for the elderly when they become seriously ill. We have become a society that throws people away for convenience.
Also, do not forget the history of the modern contraceptive movement. It was not born of desperation among women, (actually during the early years of the movement, in the 20th century, women were among it's most vocal opponents!). It was actually born of the comfortable middle class, who were concerned at the number of poor people. It was seen as way to reduce their numbers by preventing them from reproducing. In it's early days the technologies of contraception were crude, and surgery to provide permanent sterilization was favored. And it was not only used on the poor, and minorities, but forced upon them under the name of eugenics. To this day, the descendant of Margaret Sanger's first group, Planned Parenthood concentrates its efforts in poor neighborhoods, especially those of ethnic minorities, (whom Ms. Sanger referred to as "human weeds").
Well, the technologies have been refined considerably, but the moral issue hasn't changed. And the technologies are still violent. if you don't think so consider this: in 1960, one woman in 20 could expect to develop breast cancer, almost always in her 50s. now the number is one in 5, and it is no longer unusual to see the disease in women in their 20s. no one in the contraception industry wants to admit the link, but the fact remains that hormonal birth control is considered a carcinogen more potent than smoking. So between abortion and the pill, women are being killed for this practice. And when one considers that planned parenthood concentrates its efforts in minority areas, it almost seems like an attempt at genocide.
When even Martin Luther, who advised people to "sin boldly" recognized that contraception was a sin and crime against nature, I can no longer understand how otherwise good Christians can support the practice in light of history and Tradition. My brothers and sisters in Christ--because most of my readers have been Baptized, and that makes them my brothers and sisters, and those who haven't been I wish were, and I desire it for them--Scripture makes it clear that God does chastise society when it becomes unjust, and the first injustice is murder. Considering the results of hormonal birth control, its effect at times as an abortificient, and the popularity of RU486 and newer after the fact "contraceptives", is it any wonder that the world is in the mess it is? It's my opinion that many things that befall us, from social disorder and war, to the effects of environmental degradation are the result of our sins against human life. Some, like the decline in aquatic life because of reproductive harm suffered by wildlife as a result of estrogen contamination of water are direct and obvious. But others are more insidious. When we turn our backs on the Fifth Commandment, we make nearly impossible to live and behave justly. We impair the action of actual grace, and provide ground for other injustices to arise within us. As Anglican Bishop Brent so prophetically said, we have opened the door to selfish rationalization, and that practice spills over into every other type of relationship we have. We have made ourselves a shallow and selfish people.
And, there it is--i have written about contraception, and I will conclude with two points. First, even if you say that you do not believe in the teaching that contraception is unnatural, and a violation of the Fifth Commandment, it doesn't matter. if you don't believe in neutrons, they can still kill you. You are simply in the position of the man in biblical times, who ignored the watchman's trumpet. Second, and this is going to get me in lots of trouble: You cannot call yourself a good Christian, and most especially not a good Catholic, if you practice or condone contraception. And if you are, or do, you need to repent, and to go to confession. your eternal Salvation may depend on it.
TRIUMPHALIST--YOU GOT A PROBLEM WITH THAT?
Saturday, October 2, 2010
Rain...kinda
It's frighteningly dry here. About as dry as I've seen it. It's dry enough to worry about wild fires.
So I was at first delighted to hear rain falling on the porch roof. I looked out and it was coming down, a gentle, soaking rain. Then it stopped.
I went into the back yard and checked the soil in the garden. The top 1/16th to 1/8th inch was slightly moistened. Nothing below that. We need rain bad. Not just to lower the fire risk, but because I 'm a cheap person, and am worried about the inevitable increase in food prices because of this. I've already noticed that some things that are seasonal treats here, locally grown types, are not very plentiful, and of lower than usual quality.
We should bring back the Rogation and Ember days, we really should. Especially the Rogation Days.
So I was at first delighted to hear rain falling on the porch roof. I looked out and it was coming down, a gentle, soaking rain. Then it stopped.
I went into the back yard and checked the soil in the garden. The top 1/16th to 1/8th inch was slightly moistened. Nothing below that. We need rain bad. Not just to lower the fire risk, but because I 'm a cheap person, and am worried about the inevitable increase in food prices because of this. I've already noticed that some things that are seasonal treats here, locally grown types, are not very plentiful, and of lower than usual quality.
We should bring back the Rogation and Ember days, we really should. Especially the Rogation Days.
Friday, October 1, 2010
Oh Shi.....I mean, Gosh, this looks bad.
So I see in the news that Cecilia Chang was arrested again. She's a former Dean of St. Johns University. She was arrested the first time for embezzling about $1,000,000. This time, it turns out that she was using scholarship students as "forced labor". In other words, slaves. She was forcing exchange students to serve her and her son as domestics.
St. Johns is a "catholic" school. I just went to their site. It has a whole paragraph--a long one--on how it's founded on the teachings of St. Vincent de Paul. On the Faith and Service page it has pictures of a whole bunch of priests concelebrating Mass--improperly vested. It doesn't really mention Catholicism. It does have a link to the "mission" page, which says it's a Catholic university. It also says it want to pattern itself on the life and Teaching of Jesus, as embodied by the traditions and practices of the Catholic Church. Not a word about it's mission as a Catholic university vis a vis Church teaching and furthering them. And a whole lot about diversity of faith and the community. Actually, not a word about being faithful to Catholic teachings or the magisterium.
By and large, this looks like a sick institution to me. One, it's doing the absolute minimum it can to be a Catholic School. Two, it's obviously not watching out for the money donated to it--or it wouldn't have been possible to steal it so easily. Three, it sure as heck isn't watching out for it's students, and it's office that looks after scholarship and exchange students was surely not on the ball.
Maybe, if you have a kid headed to college, you might direct their interest elsewhere.
St. Johns is a "catholic" school. I just went to their site. It has a whole paragraph--a long one--on how it's founded on the teachings of St. Vincent de Paul. On the Faith and Service page it has pictures of a whole bunch of priests concelebrating Mass--improperly vested. It doesn't really mention Catholicism. It does have a link to the "mission" page, which says it's a Catholic university. It also says it want to pattern itself on the life and Teaching of Jesus, as embodied by the traditions and practices of the Catholic Church. Not a word about it's mission as a Catholic university vis a vis Church teaching and furthering them. And a whole lot about diversity of faith and the community. Actually, not a word about being faithful to Catholic teachings or the magisterium.
By and large, this looks like a sick institution to me. One, it's doing the absolute minimum it can to be a Catholic School. Two, it's obviously not watching out for the money donated to it--or it wouldn't have been possible to steal it so easily. Three, it sure as heck isn't watching out for it's students, and it's office that looks after scholarship and exchange students was surely not on the ball.
Maybe, if you have a kid headed to college, you might direct their interest elsewhere.
Yeah, There's Another Poll---
---and if you haven't voted yet, feel free.
However, you should know that this poll has raised a question I can't answer:
Exactly, how are platypi to Sherman tanks?
I have no idea, really. if you do, feel free to comment. I look forward to finding out.
However, you should know that this poll has raised a question I can't answer:
Exactly, how are platypi to Sherman tanks?
I have no idea, really. if you do, feel free to comment. I look forward to finding out.
I Worked Really Hard Yesterday...
...I read a lot. I thought a lot. I typed a lot.
I don't want to do that today, so I thought, "why not try something different'. so today you get a glimpse into my mind. Or what I have that passes for a mind. These are just snippets of things as they occur to me today.
Feel free to comment on them, or on me, just be sure not to spill the beans if you have knowledge of any crimes I may have committed, and then forgotten about. (I got alibis for the ones I remember!).
Fridays always suk-- Really. I get home between two and three, and I'm hungry. But I have a problem finding something to snack on, because most snacks I find suitable are meat based. I'm not imaginative enough to come up with a practical penance besides not meat, and I'm not theological enough to be sure of what makes an 'extra' act of charity. So there I am, hungry as heck because I don't eat breakfast, trying to find something easy to eat, and usually having to boil eggs or something because I don't really like peanut butter sandwiches.
I might be schizophrenic or something-- Because when asked to name the three sexiest actresses yesterday, I named Mary Luise Parker, Michelle Rodriguez and Elizabeth Mitchell.
I've always been a Grumpy Old Man-- and I thought being in my 50s would be a very enabling thing. I looked foreword to standing on the porch shouting "Hey you kids! Get off of my lawn!" and growling at high school boys "Pull your damned pants up! What the hell's the matter with you?". But the grand babies came, and now I find myself doing things like playing "Beep..gootchie gootchie..wobble, wobble...HUG!" and "The Four Count Game" and "The Five Count Game", and playing with Bay Chocolate the bear, and Cecilia the Giraffe, and 'walkin' dumb' and singing stupid songs. I've even found myself having conversations with My Little Pony. These little girls seem to have the ability to turn me into a little kid...at will.
Doggone it!-- Robert Manry sailed a 13' 6' boat named Tinkerbell across the Atlantic Ocean in 1965. it was the smallest boat to make the crossing to that date, And the only tiny boat to do so that wasn't specially designed for it. it was an Old Town Canoe Company "whitecap" day sailor, that he put a cabin on. The boat is long out of production, and the design isn't available for home builders, plus, it's clinker built on steamed frames, not amateur friendly. But someone else has designed an updated version, in modern composite construction, suitable for home builders. It retains the leading measurements of the original, but is easier to build and cheaper too! I stumbled across this while web surfing. I thought I had bookmarked it, but alas, I seem to have failed to successfully do so.
Unfortunately, when I try to search for it, all I get are links about that annoying little backstabbing, jealous pixie in a mini skirt who seems mainly to serve as a poor role model for girls and fantasy fodder for ephebeophiles who are into animation.
I discovered a new-to-me Band--named Bond. I really like their music. And, I had never heard them or heard of them. Imagine my surprise when I went today into my favorite 'watering hole', Steinert's. I mentioned that I had found this band on the Internet. The bartender--Courtney--went over to their high tech juke box and found that it could play songs by Bond. At lest she hadn't heard of them either. I am so out of the pop Culture loop!
I get annoyed-- When people assume that I'm a Republican. I am not. I cannot reconcile the platforms of the Republican Party to the teachings of my faith. I merely consider them to be less poisonous than the other major party. They pay not attention to Subsidiarity, they pay no attention to Distributism, and they haven't done sh*t for pro life concerns. Nobody who has known me can say that I was ever a supporter of the Republican Party. I simply find them a trifle less destructive of freedom than the Dems. Sorry.
I am not sexually active-- I haven't been for several years. The thing that's really cool about this is that i find myself freer now than I have ever been. I am especially free to enjoy women. I find that now that I am out of the game,that i can enjoy women's personalities, their way of being, their beauty--their femininity--more than I ever could before. I also find that I am more immune to being manipulated by women. It's quite the revelation to an old libertine. And a blessing on an order that I can't even calculate.
I used to weigh 183 pounds-- I did, and it was all muscle, bone and gristle. I could bench press 250 lbs, I could leg press around 700 lbs, I could run for hours, or run 2 miles in 9.5 minutes. I had almost no body fat and was cut fer. Well, I weigh 183 pounds now. And I have lots of body fat. I probably couldn't run around the block. I have a gut. I also am missing enough teeth that it's not polite to talk about it. And my hairline is receding. Well, all this is true, but I have never been so comfortable in my body, or with who I am than I am now. I don't mind being a middle aged guy with a gut--I enjoy it. And, if the improvement in my life since forty is any indication, old age is gonna rock! In fact, this is the first era of my life when anything more than the fear of hell would make me sad to lose it. God is Good.
And in the Providence of God-- I have been reconciled and reunited with my Family. I have not right to the life I have now. I was a terrible father and husband. I have two ex-wives, for pity's sake!. But God has blessed me abundantly in spite of my foolishness and sinfulness. I am on good terms with both my ex-wives,and love them both. I am able to see me kids daily, and play with my grand kids. The Queen of the house will never marry me, no. I technically rent a room--in her attic--but I am able to help her and love her, and she helps and loves me. I have learned more, in the last few years, about love, and Grace than in the whole of my life before. By being with my family, I am able to see such wonderful things. I can never make amends for who I was, or what I did. And that knowledge is one of my chief penances. But my family has enabled me to see who I can become. They help the lord to bless me, as I am able to go to Mass with them, (In a beautiful Church that celebrates the Liturgy to a high standard.
Living here, with all it's noise and confusion, and yes, even the drama, has allowed the Lord to teach me how much he loves us, and why even a scum bucket like me has hope of heaven.
I don't want to do that today, so I thought, "why not try something different'. so today you get a glimpse into my mind. Or what I have that passes for a mind. These are just snippets of things as they occur to me today.
Feel free to comment on them, or on me, just be sure not to spill the beans if you have knowledge of any crimes I may have committed, and then forgotten about. (I got alibis for the ones I remember!).
Fridays always suk-- Really. I get home between two and three, and I'm hungry. But I have a problem finding something to snack on, because most snacks I find suitable are meat based. I'm not imaginative enough to come up with a practical penance besides not meat, and I'm not theological enough to be sure of what makes an 'extra' act of charity. So there I am, hungry as heck because I don't eat breakfast, trying to find something easy to eat, and usually having to boil eggs or something because I don't really like peanut butter sandwiches.
I might be schizophrenic or something-- Because when asked to name the three sexiest actresses yesterday, I named Mary Luise Parker, Michelle Rodriguez and Elizabeth Mitchell.
I've always been a Grumpy Old Man-- and I thought being in my 50s would be a very enabling thing. I looked foreword to standing on the porch shouting "Hey you kids! Get off of my lawn!" and growling at high school boys "Pull your damned pants up! What the hell's the matter with you?". But the grand babies came, and now I find myself doing things like playing "Beep..gootchie gootchie..wobble, wobble...HUG!" and "The Four Count Game" and "The Five Count Game", and playing with Bay Chocolate the bear, and Cecilia the Giraffe, and 'walkin' dumb' and singing stupid songs. I've even found myself having conversations with My Little Pony. These little girls seem to have the ability to turn me into a little kid...at will.
Doggone it!-- Robert Manry sailed a 13' 6' boat named Tinkerbell across the Atlantic Ocean in 1965. it was the smallest boat to make the crossing to that date, And the only tiny boat to do so that wasn't specially designed for it. it was an Old Town Canoe Company "whitecap" day sailor, that he put a cabin on. The boat is long out of production, and the design isn't available for home builders, plus, it's clinker built on steamed frames, not amateur friendly. But someone else has designed an updated version, in modern composite construction, suitable for home builders. It retains the leading measurements of the original, but is easier to build and cheaper too! I stumbled across this while web surfing. I thought I had bookmarked it, but alas, I seem to have failed to successfully do so.
Unfortunately, when I try to search for it, all I get are links about that annoying little backstabbing, jealous pixie in a mini skirt who seems mainly to serve as a poor role model for girls and fantasy fodder for ephebeophiles who are into animation.
I discovered a new-to-me Band--named Bond. I really like their music. And, I had never heard them or heard of them. Imagine my surprise when I went today into my favorite 'watering hole', Steinert's. I mentioned that I had found this band on the Internet. The bartender--Courtney--went over to their high tech juke box and found that it could play songs by Bond. At lest she hadn't heard of them either. I am so out of the pop Culture loop!
I get annoyed-- When people assume that I'm a Republican. I am not. I cannot reconcile the platforms of the Republican Party to the teachings of my faith. I merely consider them to be less poisonous than the other major party. They pay not attention to Subsidiarity, they pay no attention to Distributism, and they haven't done sh*t for pro life concerns. Nobody who has known me can say that I was ever a supporter of the Republican Party. I simply find them a trifle less destructive of freedom than the Dems. Sorry.
I am not sexually active-- I haven't been for several years. The thing that's really cool about this is that i find myself freer now than I have ever been. I am especially free to enjoy women. I find that now that I am out of the game,that i can enjoy women's personalities, their way of being, their beauty--their femininity--more than I ever could before. I also find that I am more immune to being manipulated by women. It's quite the revelation to an old libertine. And a blessing on an order that I can't even calculate.
I used to weigh 183 pounds-- I did, and it was all muscle, bone and gristle. I could bench press 250 lbs, I could leg press around 700 lbs, I could run for hours, or run 2 miles in 9.5 minutes. I had almost no body fat and was cut fer. Well, I weigh 183 pounds now. And I have lots of body fat. I probably couldn't run around the block. I have a gut. I also am missing enough teeth that it's not polite to talk about it. And my hairline is receding. Well, all this is true, but I have never been so comfortable in my body, or with who I am than I am now. I don't mind being a middle aged guy with a gut--I enjoy it. And, if the improvement in my life since forty is any indication, old age is gonna rock! In fact, this is the first era of my life when anything more than the fear of hell would make me sad to lose it. God is Good.
And in the Providence of God-- I have been reconciled and reunited with my Family. I have not right to the life I have now. I was a terrible father and husband. I have two ex-wives, for pity's sake!. But God has blessed me abundantly in spite of my foolishness and sinfulness. I am on good terms with both my ex-wives,and love them both. I am able to see me kids daily, and play with my grand kids. The Queen of the house will never marry me, no. I technically rent a room--in her attic--but I am able to help her and love her, and she helps and loves me. I have learned more, in the last few years, about love, and Grace than in the whole of my life before. By being with my family, I am able to see such wonderful things. I can never make amends for who I was, or what I did. And that knowledge is one of my chief penances. But my family has enabled me to see who I can become. They help the lord to bless me, as I am able to go to Mass with them, (In a beautiful Church that celebrates the Liturgy to a high standard.
Living here, with all it's noise and confusion, and yes, even the drama, has allowed the Lord to teach me how much he loves us, and why even a scum bucket like me has hope of heaven.
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Despite Numerous Signs of Hope, The Church Still Has Probems...
I've been writing about things that give me Hope. First, of course, is Our Lords promise that the gates of Hell would not prevail against his Church, and we gloomy neo-trads, trads and so forth need to remember this, and cleave to it. We also need to remember that the Vicar of Christ is infallible 9and that only in certain constrained circumstance!) and we are not! There are signs of Hope, signs that we cannot dismiss as mere "sunshine thinking". Signs like the efforts at reform under his Holiness Pope Benedict XVI, from Apostolic Visitations of religious communities, seminaries and associations to his writings on the Liturgy and the way he exercises his teaching authority.
At the same time, it cannot be denied that there remain serious problems in the Church, and that these problems are not restricted to any one area.
Although I am sure that it does not make me popular with my Ordinary, or with the bishops as a whole, most of the problems can be laid upon their doorstep. It is clear to me that many of them seek to cherry pick the Second Vatican Council, to skip over those parts that direct us to continuity with what went before. I see this in the actions of various National Councils of bishops.
We need to remember that these councils do not have a Magisterial function! Instead they are trusted with concrete questions of order and governance. This becomes achingly clear when one considers such things as the actions of the UK bishops. (Is there something in the air of Albion? During the reign of Henry VIII, only one of the Bishops of England remained faithful to the Catholic religion--St. John Fisher, who died a martyrs death. The pattern seems to repeat. At the same time, some of the Protestant bishops seem to always pine to be Catholic. There is something definitely strange about Albion... .)
But in the US, as well as the UK, there is something of the cowards way in the actions of the bishops. (I am not going at this point to talk of other nations bishops, because i can only read so much in a day, and I am an Anglophone--no matter how much I wish my cradle tongue was Scots Gaelic!Well, I will mention the Belgians.) The UK bishops are talking about Homosexual Unions, and the backgrounds of employees of Catholic Schools. And they are doing so in such a way as to oppose the official stance of the Vatican--that is to say the Vicar of Christ, to whom they have made promises of obedience upon elevation to the Episcopate.
The US bishops are continuing to fund groups who oppose and work against the Churches mission through the CCHD, and through those they hire, and those they do not discipline.
In the UK, the bishops rolled over for the homosexualist agenda, as it is known in Old Blighty. They have said that they are not fighting "Gay Unions"they are fighting "poverty". And this in one of the worlds comprehensive welfare states. They issued, in the early years of this decade, a document called that became the UK bishops Guidelines for Diversity and Equality. It was delivered to the Vatican Secretary of State, and return with a denunciation, as it violates Catholic moral and social teaching on numerous points. They are still using it. And just to point up their contumacy, they have issued statement concerning these things, that are in accordance with this document, immediately following the Popes visit to the UK. They are blatantly ignoring some aspect of the teachings on collegiality and over emphasising more, to conceal the fact that they are skirting close to the edge of schism. Under the tutelage of these men, and their immediate predecessors, inculturation has occurred in reverse: rather than the teachings of the Church becoming part of the culture, the attitudes of the secular culture have become entrenched in the Church. it's a sort of idolatry of attitude.
In Belgium, several Bishops have publicly stated that the Churches discipline of celibacy must be changed. The problem is, they are using this red herring argument to gt out from under a sex scandal that is even worse than the one that overtook the US Church. This particular scandal is being pursued with a vigor by the Civil Authorities. Not so much in moral outrage, but because as a secularist state, it makes a handy stick with witch to beat the Church. By blaming the Church disciplines for the scandal, the Belgians hope to divert the scandal from themselves, by allying themselves with the secularist agenda for the church in Belgium. The problem is, that in Belgium as in the US, the bulk of the abuse reported--however belatedly or ineffectually at the time (and that last clause is the true scandal!)--was perpetrated by homosexual predators taking advantage of post pubescent adolescent males: Gay Chicken Hawks, in other words. By blaming the problem on celibacy, they neatly manage to side step the fact that it wasn't the Churches teaching or discipline that caused the problem, but it's being ignored. And by blaming a Vatican policy, they seek to divert attention from the fact that it was their own cooperation in concealing these crimes that lead to the Scandal. (If one bishop had picked up the phone, called the police and sent a miscreant to jail--the scandal would have been prevented. Other predators would have realized that the priesthood was not a refuge for perverts and the widespread practice of sodomizing teen boys would not have occurred. The local scandal would have been a nine day wonder, to be sure. but the larger scandal of concealment and malfeasance would not have happened.)
And with so many bishops not heeding their basic duties to teach, sanctify and rule the People of God, we laymen have had our religious education neglected. The typical Catholic doesn't understand their faith. in a recent poll, conducted by the Pew Forum, Catholics averages 16 out of 32 correct answers. We proved as ignorant of our own religion as we did of religious topics in general: 55% of us--only 55% of us-correctly identified the church teaching on transubstantiation. 55% is a failing grade. Whats even more disturbing, is that Atheists and agnostics averaged 20.9 questions correctly. Atheists know more about the faith, on average, than Catholics!
This leads to interesting distortions, if I can use such a benign word. Like the Irish Woman who called for Catholic Women to boycott the Mass on the 26th of September. Boycott the mass? Boycott the Mass! What kind of person, who has even the most superficial knowledge of the nature of the Mass would call for a boycott of it, in pursuit of political aims? It's more than appalling that someone who has influence in the Church could think this way. Not only is the idea of boycotting the Mass antithetical to Catholicism,the idea that the Church is subject to the same political process as an election has been formally denounced as the Heresy of Americanism. The bright ray of sunshine in this particular instance is that Catholic women in Ireland, and the pacific northwest in the US where the call was echoed, ignored it. But the very fact that the call was sent out, and echoed, is depressing.
At the same time, the Archdiocese of Boston is allowing and sponsoring a "Social Justice Conference" that has as featured speakers people like Thomas Masseo SJ, who was one of the 26 signatories of a document supporting Kathleen Sebelius as HHS Secretary, despite her being asked by her ordinary, Abp Joseph Naumann not to present herself for communion until she adhered to Catholic teachings. Also involved is Fr Bryan Hehir. Hehir presided over Catholic Charities in Boston, while they were allowing Gay Adoptions. This after it was made clear that the Catholic view did not allow for Gay adoption, and after publication of several research projects demonstrating that children raised by same sex couples do not have a favorable outcomes as those raised in traditional families.
So yes, we have reason to hope. But we have no reason, or excuse, for complacency. And we have every reason for each of us, in our own way, according to our state in life and our individual gifts and limitations, to continue to work for the reformation of the Church.
At the same time, it cannot be denied that there remain serious problems in the Church, and that these problems are not restricted to any one area.
Although I am sure that it does not make me popular with my Ordinary, or with the bishops as a whole, most of the problems can be laid upon their doorstep. It is clear to me that many of them seek to cherry pick the Second Vatican Council, to skip over those parts that direct us to continuity with what went before. I see this in the actions of various National Councils of bishops.
We need to remember that these councils do not have a Magisterial function! Instead they are trusted with concrete questions of order and governance. This becomes achingly clear when one considers such things as the actions of the UK bishops. (Is there something in the air of Albion? During the reign of Henry VIII, only one of the Bishops of England remained faithful to the Catholic religion--St. John Fisher, who died a martyrs death. The pattern seems to repeat. At the same time, some of the Protestant bishops seem to always pine to be Catholic. There is something definitely strange about Albion... .)
But in the US, as well as the UK, there is something of the cowards way in the actions of the bishops. (I am not going at this point to talk of other nations bishops, because i can only read so much in a day, and I am an Anglophone--no matter how much I wish my cradle tongue was Scots Gaelic!Well, I will mention the Belgians.) The UK bishops are talking about Homosexual Unions, and the backgrounds of employees of Catholic Schools. And they are doing so in such a way as to oppose the official stance of the Vatican--that is to say the Vicar of Christ, to whom they have made promises of obedience upon elevation to the Episcopate.
The US bishops are continuing to fund groups who oppose and work against the Churches mission through the CCHD, and through those they hire, and those they do not discipline.
In the UK, the bishops rolled over for the homosexualist agenda, as it is known in Old Blighty. They have said that they are not fighting "Gay Unions"they are fighting "poverty". And this in one of the worlds comprehensive welfare states. They issued, in the early years of this decade, a document called that became the UK bishops Guidelines for Diversity and Equality. It was delivered to the Vatican Secretary of State, and return with a denunciation, as it violates Catholic moral and social teaching on numerous points. They are still using it. And just to point up their contumacy, they have issued statement concerning these things, that are in accordance with this document, immediately following the Popes visit to the UK. They are blatantly ignoring some aspect of the teachings on collegiality and over emphasising more, to conceal the fact that they are skirting close to the edge of schism. Under the tutelage of these men, and their immediate predecessors, inculturation has occurred in reverse: rather than the teachings of the Church becoming part of the culture, the attitudes of the secular culture have become entrenched in the Church. it's a sort of idolatry of attitude.
In Belgium, several Bishops have publicly stated that the Churches discipline of celibacy must be changed. The problem is, they are using this red herring argument to gt out from under a sex scandal that is even worse than the one that overtook the US Church. This particular scandal is being pursued with a vigor by the Civil Authorities. Not so much in moral outrage, but because as a secularist state, it makes a handy stick with witch to beat the Church. By blaming the Church disciplines for the scandal, the Belgians hope to divert the scandal from themselves, by allying themselves with the secularist agenda for the church in Belgium. The problem is, that in Belgium as in the US, the bulk of the abuse reported--however belatedly or ineffectually at the time (and that last clause is the true scandal!)--was perpetrated by homosexual predators taking advantage of post pubescent adolescent males: Gay Chicken Hawks, in other words. By blaming the problem on celibacy, they neatly manage to side step the fact that it wasn't the Churches teaching or discipline that caused the problem, but it's being ignored. And by blaming a Vatican policy, they seek to divert attention from the fact that it was their own cooperation in concealing these crimes that lead to the Scandal. (If one bishop had picked up the phone, called the police and sent a miscreant to jail--the scandal would have been prevented. Other predators would have realized that the priesthood was not a refuge for perverts and the widespread practice of sodomizing teen boys would not have occurred. The local scandal would have been a nine day wonder, to be sure. but the larger scandal of concealment and malfeasance would not have happened.)
And with so many bishops not heeding their basic duties to teach, sanctify and rule the People of God, we laymen have had our religious education neglected. The typical Catholic doesn't understand their faith. in a recent poll, conducted by the Pew Forum, Catholics averages 16 out of 32 correct answers. We proved as ignorant of our own religion as we did of religious topics in general: 55% of us--only 55% of us-correctly identified the church teaching on transubstantiation. 55% is a failing grade. Whats even more disturbing, is that Atheists and agnostics averaged 20.9 questions correctly. Atheists know more about the faith, on average, than Catholics!
This leads to interesting distortions, if I can use such a benign word. Like the Irish Woman who called for Catholic Women to boycott the Mass on the 26th of September. Boycott the mass? Boycott the Mass! What kind of person, who has even the most superficial knowledge of the nature of the Mass would call for a boycott of it, in pursuit of political aims? It's more than appalling that someone who has influence in the Church could think this way. Not only is the idea of boycotting the Mass antithetical to Catholicism,the idea that the Church is subject to the same political process as an election has been formally denounced as the Heresy of Americanism. The bright ray of sunshine in this particular instance is that Catholic women in Ireland, and the pacific northwest in the US where the call was echoed, ignored it. But the very fact that the call was sent out, and echoed, is depressing.
At the same time, the Archdiocese of Boston is allowing and sponsoring a "Social Justice Conference" that has as featured speakers people like Thomas Masseo SJ, who was one of the 26 signatories of a document supporting Kathleen Sebelius as HHS Secretary, despite her being asked by her ordinary, Abp Joseph Naumann not to present herself for communion until she adhered to Catholic teachings. Also involved is Fr Bryan Hehir. Hehir presided over Catholic Charities in Boston, while they were allowing Gay Adoptions. This after it was made clear that the Catholic view did not allow for Gay adoption, and after publication of several research projects demonstrating that children raised by same sex couples do not have a favorable outcomes as those raised in traditional families.
So yes, we have reason to hope. But we have no reason, or excuse, for complacency. And we have every reason for each of us, in our own way, according to our state in life and our individual gifts and limitations, to continue to work for the reformation of the Church.
And in the World
The world keeps on turning, and it isn't stopping for our American Electoral shenanigans. While we are more or less preoccupied either the upcoming midterm elections, and fuming about attack ads and campaigns that seem to avoid the issues on one side, and are filled with a bitter anger on the other, disturbing things continue to go on around the globe. And some of these things actually bear upon the election, because they are more or less produced by the actions of our government. Of course, some of them have nothing to do with our government, and are still disturbing.
While the Democratic party seems to campaigning on how stupid we are here in the common run, they can't avoid doing stupid things themselves. There is one attack ad running, where the Dems are concluding with a "What did she know and when did she know it" question, because it turns out the Republican hired an illegal immigrant--who presented all the right papers, just forged. At the same time, 60% of Americans are expressing concern and dismay at illegal immigration and the security of our southern border, this as the Democrats are pushing an amnesty for illegals as "comprehensive immigration reform". So what's happening on the border? Well aside from escalating violence, to include criminals shooting at us law enforcement across the border, the Mayors of Mexican border cities are saying it's our fault that they have a crime problem. They say this because when we deport illegal Mexican immigrants, who were found by being arrested for committing crimes, they end up back in Mexico. Think about that--it's our fault that they have a problem because we send the criminals back to Mexico. It couldn't possibly be that the Institutional Revolutionary Party that ruled Mexico for over seventy years, and still dominates it politically engendered a culture and practice of corruption that undermined the very nation they purported serve and govern. no, it's our fault. And this is coming from a Nation who has a senator elected to represent it's people in the US in their legislative body, and whose president said that wherever there were Mexican nationals, that was Mexico. It seems like the issues are not being addressed to me!
Meanwhile, there is the rest of the world to consider. Aside from horrendous flooding in Pakistan, what else i going on there? Well, the largest single contributor to relief efforts is the US, followed by the UK. Pakistan is being so grateful to us. Yes sirree Bob! They are so grateful that they have severed the NATO supply line into Afghanistan. This supposedly comes about as retaliation for drone attacks and air attacks in Pakistani territory. The problem with this is a bit complicated, but it works like this: Under the Bush administration, drones were more restricted in what they fired upon, because of a perception that it was difficult to be sure if you had non-combatants or Taliban in the sight. The current administration has stepped up drone attacks as a cheap way of waging war--with an uptick in collateral damage. The last air strike, which killed three Pakistani soldiers, was a direct response to receiving fire from the target area! In other words-the Pakistani troops fired on NATO aircraft. Further, these things are occurring in what are known as '"federally administered tribal areas". These areas are technically Pakistani territory, but are not well controlled, and are in fact Taliban Strongholds from which they attack both NATO and Pakistan. I don't see our administration doing anything constructive about this.
I saw in the BBC new this morning that China is threatening action against the US at the WTO if a bill in congress passes. The bill is the product of concern about China's artificially depressing the value of the yuan against the dollar. This is a very important issue, as the trade imbalance with China syphons lots of wealth out of the us. Currently the yuan is valued at about 75% of it's actual worth against the dollar. China is saying that if this bill passes it will hurt the US--because China is our fastest growing export market. Well, yes china is. But Canada is our largest export market, and far exceeds the worth of China's. f we were to stop importing from and exporting to China it would be a net gain for the US, especially if we replaced the imported goods with domestic manufacture--that alone could solve the unemployment debacle we are experiencing! But I see nobody--not Republicans, not Democrats--with the courage to propose this! (It could even be done in such a way as to not affect our trade with other nations-we import x number of widgets from China, so we could manufacture the same number of widgets here--and continue to import the ones we get elsewhere)
And speaking of putting people to work in the US, President Obama's love affair with big labor is working against that very goal. I have blogged before about the local Carpenters Union, and it's policy of paying street people to engage in tactics of intimidation and disruption of lawful business when they failed to organize a major contractor. I still can't figure the carpenters out. In a time when there is little work in the building trades, they cling to policies that price them out of the market, and then try to destroy the jobs in that market that others hold. But it's not just carpenters. Aside from the SEIU being virtually an action arm of Obama's political machine--they weren't this militant for the Democrats before his ascendancy--the UAW is cutting it's own throat here in Indiana. UAW Local 23, in Marion County has voted to lose their jobs. The plant in question was one of those placed in limbo when GMC took all those tax dollars, and is up for sale. The company that is interested says the plant can be viable if the workers take pay cuts, reducing wages to $15.50 an hour for unskilled workers, and $33 an hour for skilled workers. The workers would retain seniority and receive $35K bonuses for taking the cut. Instead, they have said that they will not accept the cuts. OK--650 jobs are gong to disappear from Marion County, plus the ripple effect as a $40 million a year payroll vanishes, and millions in property taxes vanish from the county budget. not to mention, that these people not only won't be receiving their former wages, they won't be receiving any wages. We paid for them to keep their jobs with the bailout--and they can't sacrifice to keep them? Something need to happen on the union front. Obviously, I believe workers have a right to organize and to collective bargaining. But this isn't collective bargaining--it's simple blackmail. The Local has decided that either they get what they want, or everyone suffers. Moreover, the suffering isn't just short term--Indiana will lose more of it's manufacturing infrastructure, which had been the heart of our economy, until unions frightened business out of the state. What's even stupider, is that the UAW national leadership supported the new contract, on the basis that at least they would have jobs.
So that's what I see happening in the world, today.
While the Democratic party seems to campaigning on how stupid we are here in the common run, they can't avoid doing stupid things themselves. There is one attack ad running, where the Dems are concluding with a "What did she know and when did she know it" question, because it turns out the Republican hired an illegal immigrant--who presented all the right papers, just forged. At the same time, 60% of Americans are expressing concern and dismay at illegal immigration and the security of our southern border, this as the Democrats are pushing an amnesty for illegals as "comprehensive immigration reform". So what's happening on the border? Well aside from escalating violence, to include criminals shooting at us law enforcement across the border, the Mayors of Mexican border cities are saying it's our fault that they have a crime problem. They say this because when we deport illegal Mexican immigrants, who were found by being arrested for committing crimes, they end up back in Mexico. Think about that--it's our fault that they have a problem because we send the criminals back to Mexico. It couldn't possibly be that the Institutional Revolutionary Party that ruled Mexico for over seventy years, and still dominates it politically engendered a culture and practice of corruption that undermined the very nation they purported serve and govern. no, it's our fault. And this is coming from a Nation who has a senator elected to represent it's people in the US in their legislative body, and whose president said that wherever there were Mexican nationals, that was Mexico. It seems like the issues are not being addressed to me!
Meanwhile, there is the rest of the world to consider. Aside from horrendous flooding in Pakistan, what else i going on there? Well, the largest single contributor to relief efforts is the US, followed by the UK. Pakistan is being so grateful to us. Yes sirree Bob! They are so grateful that they have severed the NATO supply line into Afghanistan. This supposedly comes about as retaliation for drone attacks and air attacks in Pakistani territory. The problem with this is a bit complicated, but it works like this: Under the Bush administration, drones were more restricted in what they fired upon, because of a perception that it was difficult to be sure if you had non-combatants or Taliban in the sight. The current administration has stepped up drone attacks as a cheap way of waging war--with an uptick in collateral damage. The last air strike, which killed three Pakistani soldiers, was a direct response to receiving fire from the target area! In other words-the Pakistani troops fired on NATO aircraft. Further, these things are occurring in what are known as '"federally administered tribal areas". These areas are technically Pakistani territory, but are not well controlled, and are in fact Taliban Strongholds from which they attack both NATO and Pakistan. I don't see our administration doing anything constructive about this.
I saw in the BBC new this morning that China is threatening action against the US at the WTO if a bill in congress passes. The bill is the product of concern about China's artificially depressing the value of the yuan against the dollar. This is a very important issue, as the trade imbalance with China syphons lots of wealth out of the us. Currently the yuan is valued at about 75% of it's actual worth against the dollar. China is saying that if this bill passes it will hurt the US--because China is our fastest growing export market. Well, yes china is. But Canada is our largest export market, and far exceeds the worth of China's. f we were to stop importing from and exporting to China it would be a net gain for the US, especially if we replaced the imported goods with domestic manufacture--that alone could solve the unemployment debacle we are experiencing! But I see nobody--not Republicans, not Democrats--with the courage to propose this! (It could even be done in such a way as to not affect our trade with other nations-we import x number of widgets from China, so we could manufacture the same number of widgets here--and continue to import the ones we get elsewhere)
And speaking of putting people to work in the US, President Obama's love affair with big labor is working against that very goal. I have blogged before about the local Carpenters Union, and it's policy of paying street people to engage in tactics of intimidation and disruption of lawful business when they failed to organize a major contractor. I still can't figure the carpenters out. In a time when there is little work in the building trades, they cling to policies that price them out of the market, and then try to destroy the jobs in that market that others hold. But it's not just carpenters. Aside from the SEIU being virtually an action arm of Obama's political machine--they weren't this militant for the Democrats before his ascendancy--the UAW is cutting it's own throat here in Indiana. UAW Local 23, in Marion County has voted to lose their jobs. The plant in question was one of those placed in limbo when GMC took all those tax dollars, and is up for sale. The company that is interested says the plant can be viable if the workers take pay cuts, reducing wages to $15.50 an hour for unskilled workers, and $33 an hour for skilled workers. The workers would retain seniority and receive $35K bonuses for taking the cut. Instead, they have said that they will not accept the cuts. OK--650 jobs are gong to disappear from Marion County, plus the ripple effect as a $40 million a year payroll vanishes, and millions in property taxes vanish from the county budget. not to mention, that these people not only won't be receiving their former wages, they won't be receiving any wages. We paid for them to keep their jobs with the bailout--and they can't sacrifice to keep them? Something need to happen on the union front. Obviously, I believe workers have a right to organize and to collective bargaining. But this isn't collective bargaining--it's simple blackmail. The Local has decided that either they get what they want, or everyone suffers. Moreover, the suffering isn't just short term--Indiana will lose more of it's manufacturing infrastructure, which had been the heart of our economy, until unions frightened business out of the state. What's even stupider, is that the UAW national leadership supported the new contract, on the basis that at least they would have jobs.
So that's what I see happening in the world, today.
It's Called "Gettin' Lucky"
There was an apparent gas lne explosion today in the vicinity of Paoli Indiana. The region is heavily forested, and as we are in a drought--the dryest September on record--the potential for a catastrophic wildfire is high. Fortunatly, while there was the smell of smoke, the various fire departments that responed found only one tree smouldering--a hollow tree.
(If you've ever seen a hollow tree burn from the inside out, you know how lucky we were!)
For this and all the protections of Heven we enjoy, thanks be to God.
(If you've ever seen a hollow tree burn from the inside out, you know how lucky we were!)
For this and all the protections of Heven we enjoy, thanks be to God.
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
An Update to the Electric Chainsaw Massacre
Subvets suggestion of tossing some rubber snakes into the Holy Trees worked--the little birds are gone.
It worked so well, that we're going to put a couple in the cherry tree next spring.
It worked so well, that we're going to put a couple in the cherry tree next spring.
You have got to go and give this a listen!
Via Father Z's place i found a link to tutorials of chant settings of the new Translation of the Roman Missal--they are beautiful, and will also teach you what the new responses are for us Anglophone Catholics.
I'm going to give the link, unfortunately, my virus protection is pretty aggressive, and since it got turned on, none of my html links seem to work. you might have to type it in manually. (Gasp! The Horror!--quit whining, i learned to type-yeah, type, not 'keyboard" on one of those 1/2 ton Olivetti machines you see in old P.I. movies--it won't kill you!)
Here is the link:
www.chantcafe.com/2010/09/tutorial-videos-on-new-missal-chants.html
Go check it out. If you're an OF person who is still into reverent and traditional worship, you'll love it. If you're and EF person, you might see some liturgical value to the EF. If your a "progressive" Catholic, or a Modernist, you deserve the discomfort.
I'm going to give the link, unfortunately, my virus protection is pretty aggressive, and since it got turned on, none of my html links seem to work. you might have to type it in manually. (Gasp! The Horror!--quit whining, i learned to type-yeah, type, not 'keyboard" on one of those 1/2 ton Olivetti machines you see in old P.I. movies--it won't kill you!)
Here is the link:
www.chantcafe.com/2010/09/tutorial-videos-on-new-missal-chants.html
Go check it out. If you're an OF person who is still into reverent and traditional worship, you'll love it. If you're and EF person, you might see some liturgical value to the EF. If your a "progressive" Catholic, or a Modernist, you deserve the discomfort.
I wonder...
...if I put up a 'tag cloud' of all sorts of sordid yet popular search terms, would it make more people come to this thing? And if I put up a tag cloud filled with search terms likely to be used by those in need of evangelization? Would it be a service to humanity, a way to further evangelization?
But these questions are moot, because I know--and you know-that it would just be a way to sucker more people into visiting my blog, and would only start flame wars in the com box.
Besides, I have no idea of how to actually create a tag cloud.
But these questions are moot, because I know--and you know-that it would just be a way to sucker more people into visiting my blog, and would only start flame wars in the com box.
Besides, I have no idea of how to actually create a tag cloud.
I feel vaguely cheated.
One of the things I follow is a particular training Bn. of the US Army. The kids doing their basic, you know?
Imagine my surprise when I saw the bivouac pics--the old shelterhalf pup tents, whose design dates back to the civil war, have been replaced by modern castramentage. I never thought I'd see it happen!
But darn, why did I get stuck with those stupid shelter halves?
Imagine my surprise when I saw the bivouac pics--the old shelterhalf pup tents, whose design dates back to the civil war, have been replaced by modern castramentage. I never thought I'd see it happen!
But darn, why did I get stuck with those stupid shelter halves?
Bullet Remarks
And, no, I haven't given them lots of thought, this is just my gut reactions. Therefore, I reserve the right to be wrong.
Isabeli Fontana: Is a really beautiful fashion model from Brazil. She got pregnant at 19. The agency that managed her tried to coerce her into having an abortion, saying that the pregnancy and child would end her career. Well, she now has a 8 year old son, and her career. Abortion isn't for women, it's for those who want to exploit them in one way or another.
Labor vs TEA party: The SEIU wants to ship 25,000 people to DC in order to make noise about the TEA party. It's pretty much what I have come to expect from labor--if you can't win a vote down shout. I see it three days a week downtown, where the Carpenters Union is paying nonunion wages to street people to noisily demonstrate at a work site where a company they failed to to organize is working. They lost the vote,so now they are trying to intimidate the workers, the company and the employers of the company.
How would you like your crow, NBC: NBC did a poll, only to find that the line they were selling wasn't popular with the public. It turns out that 54% of Americans really like the TEA parties, and twice s many see them as a good thing as a bad thing. And this was in a self selecting sample of people who are into NBC.
European Courts are Verkakte: A European court has overruled a German Court, that upheld the dismissal of a church musician who was fired when he left his wife to live in sin with another woman. The German court held that the contract he signed to uphold Church Teaching was valid, as he freely entered into it. The European Court ruled that it wasn't because everybody has a right to commit adultery. Moral qualifiers don't apply to employment. so what happens when a priest who is dismissed for sodomizing boys appeals the same way?
Poor Pelosi: Her negative opinion rating is tied--with British Petroleum.
No Catholic Women boycotted the Mass Sunday: I didn't get around to writing about this, but there was a call by an Irish woman for Catholic Women to Boycott the Mass on the 26th. I can tell you that none did. I'm sure there were women who didn't go, but they were, as the Good Cardinal said, people who had long since left the Church, but remained physically present in it's buildings.
They keep shooting them...Two parishioners--elderly parishioners, of St. Dominic's church in Youngstown Oh have been murdered this year On the church grounds. But no body says hate crime. One is called a robbery, one is called a drive by. I say someone either hates Catholics or old people there. There have been no arrests. But it's not a hate crime, no way!
We're not as free as I thought: If anyone is paying attention, they will realize that money has no intrinsic worth, it's value is an agreed upon convention. Now gold...gold has worth. gold is a way to safeguard your wealth. Believe it or not, an ounce of gold has about the same buying power now as it did in 1933, when Roosevelt took the Us off the gold standard. n the last two years, for the first time, the bulk of gold sales has been to private investors, seeking to protect their wealth from inflation and rapacious taxation and bank fees. But never fear! Our government is here! and congress included in the "Health Care Reform" that Obama signed, new restrictions on who can buy and sell gold, and how it is bought and sold. if it was good law, why did they have to hide it in a health care bill?
Alan Grayson...Is a skunk brained poltroon, who uses anti-christian Bigotry in the worst way. He ran an ad against his opponent in a Florida congressional contest, taking a remark out of context and saying that his opponent was a "christian Taliban" who would destroy women's freedom. Part and parcel of the attack ads that I have seen the Dems running this year.
Paul Collins: A former editor for the Australian Broadcasting Company, has begun speaking out about something he call Catholicophobia. He listed instances of blatant lies and misrepresentations against Catholicism in the UK and Oz. He also asks why he is so frequently asked to speak and write about Islamophobia, but never about the bigotry against Catholics in the UK and OZ. Diogenes, we might have your man.
Vocations: Fr. Rutler is asking what wonders we behold over at the Catholic Education Resource Center. he is speaking about the surge in vocations. It is an answer to our prayers, and not only are those groups that have been getting a trickle getting significant numbers, and not only are those groups who have been very popular getting numbers, but the Dominican Sisters of St. Cecilia, who held their own throughout the vocations slump by receiving relatively consistent numbers, are startled--they admitted the largest novitiate class in 150 years! I think that is to say in their history.
Isabeli Fontana: Is a really beautiful fashion model from Brazil. She got pregnant at 19. The agency that managed her tried to coerce her into having an abortion, saying that the pregnancy and child would end her career. Well, she now has a 8 year old son, and her career. Abortion isn't for women, it's for those who want to exploit them in one way or another.
Labor vs TEA party: The SEIU wants to ship 25,000 people to DC in order to make noise about the TEA party. It's pretty much what I have come to expect from labor--if you can't win a vote down shout. I see it three days a week downtown, where the Carpenters Union is paying nonunion wages to street people to noisily demonstrate at a work site where a company they failed to to organize is working. They lost the vote,so now they are trying to intimidate the workers, the company and the employers of the company.
How would you like your crow, NBC: NBC did a poll, only to find that the line they were selling wasn't popular with the public. It turns out that 54% of Americans really like the TEA parties, and twice s many see them as a good thing as a bad thing. And this was in a self selecting sample of people who are into NBC.
European Courts are Verkakte: A European court has overruled a German Court, that upheld the dismissal of a church musician who was fired when he left his wife to live in sin with another woman. The German court held that the contract he signed to uphold Church Teaching was valid, as he freely entered into it. The European Court ruled that it wasn't because everybody has a right to commit adultery. Moral qualifiers don't apply to employment. so what happens when a priest who is dismissed for sodomizing boys appeals the same way?
Poor Pelosi: Her negative opinion rating is tied--with British Petroleum.
No Catholic Women boycotted the Mass Sunday: I didn't get around to writing about this, but there was a call by an Irish woman for Catholic Women to Boycott the Mass on the 26th. I can tell you that none did. I'm sure there were women who didn't go, but they were, as the Good Cardinal said, people who had long since left the Church, but remained physically present in it's buildings.
They keep shooting them...Two parishioners--elderly parishioners, of St. Dominic's church in Youngstown Oh have been murdered this year On the church grounds. But no body says hate crime. One is called a robbery, one is called a drive by. I say someone either hates Catholics or old people there. There have been no arrests. But it's not a hate crime, no way!
We're not as free as I thought: If anyone is paying attention, they will realize that money has no intrinsic worth, it's value is an agreed upon convention. Now gold...gold has worth. gold is a way to safeguard your wealth. Believe it or not, an ounce of gold has about the same buying power now as it did in 1933, when Roosevelt took the Us off the gold standard. n the last two years, for the first time, the bulk of gold sales has been to private investors, seeking to protect their wealth from inflation and rapacious taxation and bank fees. But never fear! Our government is here! and congress included in the "Health Care Reform" that Obama signed, new restrictions on who can buy and sell gold, and how it is bought and sold. if it was good law, why did they have to hide it in a health care bill?
Alan Grayson...Is a skunk brained poltroon, who uses anti-christian Bigotry in the worst way. He ran an ad against his opponent in a Florida congressional contest, taking a remark out of context and saying that his opponent was a "christian Taliban" who would destroy women's freedom. Part and parcel of the attack ads that I have seen the Dems running this year.
Paul Collins: A former editor for the Australian Broadcasting Company, has begun speaking out about something he call Catholicophobia. He listed instances of blatant lies and misrepresentations against Catholicism in the UK and Oz. He also asks why he is so frequently asked to speak and write about Islamophobia, but never about the bigotry against Catholics in the UK and OZ. Diogenes, we might have your man.
Vocations: Fr. Rutler is asking what wonders we behold over at the Catholic Education Resource Center. he is speaking about the surge in vocations. It is an answer to our prayers, and not only are those groups that have been getting a trickle getting significant numbers, and not only are those groups who have been very popular getting numbers, but the Dominican Sisters of St. Cecilia, who held their own throughout the vocations slump by receiving relatively consistent numbers, are startled--they admitted the largest novitiate class in 150 years! I think that is to say in their history.
Aliens and Zombies--the Pulse of Our Culture?
The pulse of out culture? Probably not! I just put that in the title because I'm in kind of a mischievous mood today.
In interpreting pop culture it's a given that the 1950s Flying Saucer and Alien Invasion movies were expressions of the cultural angst accompanying the Cold War. I'm not altogether sure of how this was arrived at, but it is the most repeated. Often, the movie Invasion of the Body Snatchers is cited as expressing the fear of communist spies and infiltrators.
So I began to wonder, what are Zombie movies about? If flying saucers and alien invaders are about the Cold War, then surely Zombie movies are about something too. They are getting more common, and have been increasing their following. Heck, I read in one of the alternative tabloids that "Zombies are the new Vampires", what ever that means. (Try as I might, I can't imagine a sexy seductive zombie!) Always bleak, they seem to be getting bleaker. The last one I watched, The Zombie Diaries, ended by presenting living humans being as much a threat as the undead, in much the same way, becoming predators ruled by appetite.
That became a clue for me in figuring out what Zombie movies are about, at least in an overly cerebral, cultural interpretation way.
When you look at Zombies as presented in pop culture (as opposed to Haiti, where they are apparently slaves kept in a drug induced trance) what you find is an entity, formerly human, which has lost the use of it's higher faculties and reason, yet retains it's motile abilities. Being dead, they no longer are inhabited by souls. They have become mindless, soulless entities driven by appetite. In fact, not only are they driven by appetite, fulfilling their appetite is the only imperative, the only thing, about them. they have and are nothing else.
Of course, we must remember that they are dead. And, as William James famously said, "Death is the worm that eats at us all". Death is the great leveler, that comes for all, no matter what their station in life, their situation. Each will die, and in the genre of Zombie Movies, each may become a zombie Zombies are full of appetite, but have no soul, no reason. They mindlessly and relentlessly pursue the object of their appetite--in the convention of the genre, human flesh.
The living humans are pursues without break, and if they avoid the fate of being consumed, they run the risk of being infected and themselves becoming zombies. The key to this genre is dehumanization. the zombies are undead, inhuman, and their victims are dehumanized by being consumed--turned into an object of appetite--or by being turned to zombies.
This is a new cultural metaphor, born of secularity and relativism. Just as the zombie discards all other considerations to the fulfillment of appetite, elevating the base desire to feed on human flesh, our society has erased absolutes, and morals, to write in their place an ethic of acquisition and sensate fulfillment based on possessions and the use of others. When one functions without a absolutes, without ethics or morals, the tendency is to gravitate to the exhaltation of appetite, and eventually to elevate appetite to the point of being the motivation for existence. It doesn't matter whether the appetite is for power, possessions, sex, food or what have you--the satisfaction of appetite becomes the end towards which we will move.
Our culture is grounded in the Judeo-Christian Tradition, and in that tradition, to be ruled by appetite is to lose ones ones salvation--to forfeit ones eternal life. And when ones hope of eternal life is gone, one is numbered among the dead (let the dead bury the dead--one of Jesus' less comforting statements!) . Yet in our cultures current, tortured permutation, we are dominated by an information revolution. At no other time have we been so bombarded by messages urging us to buy, to consume or to act out on our appetites.
In the universe of Zombie movies there is a convention that there is no escape--that in the end, everyone is doomed either to be consumed or to become a zombie,and the world to be ruled by the undead. Just as we have a cultural "base note" that discourages us from giving into unbridled appetite, we live in an environment that constantly drives us to the other extreme, and an economic system that we are told will falter, and fail, if we do not continue to acquire. Likewise, the very media that bring us the Zombie movie, also bombard us with messages to fulfill our other appetites, to give in to our carnal urges, whether they are for food, sex,power, display or what have you. The relentless, ruthless attacks of marketing and mass culture are seemingly inescapable. Also inescapable is the knowledge that in a world where everyone is driven by the appetites engendered by a mass market economy of consumption, and a mass media glorification of libertines, one really has only two fates-become a predator, or become prey.
So it becomes easy to see that the root of the zombie fad is this: That at a level not consciously acknowledged, we know the paucity of a relativistic and philosophically atheistic culture of consumptionist licentiousness, and we fear what it will make of us, society and the whole world. The zombie fad is a pop cultural expression of the truth that we were made to be happy, and that our happiness consists in coming to know, love and serve God. When we removed absolutes from our cultural references, we remove the possibility of an absolute God. And without that we have a resulting ontic anxiety, for we were never created to be without our creator. When we reduce our anthropology to mere biology and primatology, and our ethics to mere utilitarian expedience, we lose our uniquely human dignity, and realize, however we choose to express it or not express it--that without God, and all he implies,we are pray to our fallen nature.
In interpreting pop culture it's a given that the 1950s Flying Saucer and Alien Invasion movies were expressions of the cultural angst accompanying the Cold War. I'm not altogether sure of how this was arrived at, but it is the most repeated. Often, the movie Invasion of the Body Snatchers is cited as expressing the fear of communist spies and infiltrators.
So I began to wonder, what are Zombie movies about? If flying saucers and alien invaders are about the Cold War, then surely Zombie movies are about something too. They are getting more common, and have been increasing their following. Heck, I read in one of the alternative tabloids that "Zombies are the new Vampires", what ever that means. (Try as I might, I can't imagine a sexy seductive zombie!) Always bleak, they seem to be getting bleaker. The last one I watched, The Zombie Diaries, ended by presenting living humans being as much a threat as the undead, in much the same way, becoming predators ruled by appetite.
That became a clue for me in figuring out what Zombie movies are about, at least in an overly cerebral, cultural interpretation way.
When you look at Zombies as presented in pop culture (as opposed to Haiti, where they are apparently slaves kept in a drug induced trance) what you find is an entity, formerly human, which has lost the use of it's higher faculties and reason, yet retains it's motile abilities. Being dead, they no longer are inhabited by souls. They have become mindless, soulless entities driven by appetite. In fact, not only are they driven by appetite, fulfilling their appetite is the only imperative, the only thing, about them. they have and are nothing else.
Of course, we must remember that they are dead. And, as William James famously said, "Death is the worm that eats at us all". Death is the great leveler, that comes for all, no matter what their station in life, their situation. Each will die, and in the genre of Zombie Movies, each may become a zombie Zombies are full of appetite, but have no soul, no reason. They mindlessly and relentlessly pursue the object of their appetite--in the convention of the genre, human flesh.
The living humans are pursues without break, and if they avoid the fate of being consumed, they run the risk of being infected and themselves becoming zombies. The key to this genre is dehumanization. the zombies are undead, inhuman, and their victims are dehumanized by being consumed--turned into an object of appetite--or by being turned to zombies.
This is a new cultural metaphor, born of secularity and relativism. Just as the zombie discards all other considerations to the fulfillment of appetite, elevating the base desire to feed on human flesh, our society has erased absolutes, and morals, to write in their place an ethic of acquisition and sensate fulfillment based on possessions and the use of others. When one functions without a absolutes, without ethics or morals, the tendency is to gravitate to the exhaltation of appetite, and eventually to elevate appetite to the point of being the motivation for existence. It doesn't matter whether the appetite is for power, possessions, sex, food or what have you--the satisfaction of appetite becomes the end towards which we will move.
Our culture is grounded in the Judeo-Christian Tradition, and in that tradition, to be ruled by appetite is to lose ones ones salvation--to forfeit ones eternal life. And when ones hope of eternal life is gone, one is numbered among the dead (let the dead bury the dead--one of Jesus' less comforting statements!) . Yet in our cultures current, tortured permutation, we are dominated by an information revolution. At no other time have we been so bombarded by messages urging us to buy, to consume or to act out on our appetites.
In the universe of Zombie movies there is a convention that there is no escape--that in the end, everyone is doomed either to be consumed or to become a zombie,and the world to be ruled by the undead. Just as we have a cultural "base note" that discourages us from giving into unbridled appetite, we live in an environment that constantly drives us to the other extreme, and an economic system that we are told will falter, and fail, if we do not continue to acquire. Likewise, the very media that bring us the Zombie movie, also bombard us with messages to fulfill our other appetites, to give in to our carnal urges, whether they are for food, sex,power, display or what have you. The relentless, ruthless attacks of marketing and mass culture are seemingly inescapable. Also inescapable is the knowledge that in a world where everyone is driven by the appetites engendered by a mass market economy of consumption, and a mass media glorification of libertines, one really has only two fates-become a predator, or become prey.
So it becomes easy to see that the root of the zombie fad is this: That at a level not consciously acknowledged, we know the paucity of a relativistic and philosophically atheistic culture of consumptionist licentiousness, and we fear what it will make of us, society and the whole world. The zombie fad is a pop cultural expression of the truth that we were made to be happy, and that our happiness consists in coming to know, love and serve God. When we removed absolutes from our cultural references, we remove the possibility of an absolute God. And without that we have a resulting ontic anxiety, for we were never created to be without our creator. When we reduce our anthropology to mere biology and primatology, and our ethics to mere utilitarian expedience, we lose our uniquely human dignity, and realize, however we choose to express it or not express it--that without God, and all he implies,we are pray to our fallen nature.
Stupid Poll Question
Feel free to vote. It don't cost nuthin', and it could make you a better person. (OK, I justmade that last bit up.)
New Widget
I put a stat counter on the blog. I fine it interesting that even though I get less comments now than I did at the old blog, I have lots more hits.
The score for the old blog was 1,434, whole for the new blog it's 3,712, as of this writing.
Of course, i could just spend a week or two visiting the blog every minute without signing in, and make that look better, but I 'd rather play with the grand babies and eat food. And drink beer. And stuff.
The score for the old blog was 1,434, whole for the new blog it's 3,712, as of this writing.
Of course, i could just spend a week or two visiting the blog every minute without signing in, and make that look better, but I 'd rather play with the grand babies and eat food. And drink beer. And stuff.
If you've been 'silenced"...
..why are you talking about it in the newspaper?
Lucinda Nayor was the "Artist in Residence" at the Basilica of St. Mary in Minneapolis, Mn. Recently the Bishops of Minnesota sent out DVDs explaining the Churches teaching on Gay marriage. Ms. Nayor has started an art project in protest of the teaching and the DVD mailing, using the DVDs themselves as the media for the "art".
So, she was fired--"suspended" is the word used--from her position at the Basilica. Now she's pulling the "Innocent Artists Silenced By The Oppressive Church" Card. And it doesn't wash.
here's why:
1--If she's been so effectively silenced, why has she got such a great platform to cry about it? The Minnesota Independent has written this up, with out even a nod towards the churches side.
2--No where can you find a job, where your employer will let you take their advertising materials and build a piece of "art" that says there claims are all fallacious.
Ms.Nayor seems to think that the Church --that's us Catholics in the pew, ultimately--should continue to pay her while she undermines it's teaching by subjecting them to the Modernist idea that they are open to debate and popular vote. She hasn't been silenced, in law or fact, she's been fired for bein' all ate with the dumba**, if she thinks an employer will put up with that sort of thing.
Lucinda Nayor was the "Artist in Residence" at the Basilica of St. Mary in Minneapolis, Mn. Recently the Bishops of Minnesota sent out DVDs explaining the Churches teaching on Gay marriage. Ms. Nayor has started an art project in protest of the teaching and the DVD mailing, using the DVDs themselves as the media for the "art".
So, she was fired--"suspended" is the word used--from her position at the Basilica. Now she's pulling the "Innocent Artists Silenced By The Oppressive Church" Card. And it doesn't wash.
here's why:
1--If she's been so effectively silenced, why has she got such a great platform to cry about it? The Minnesota Independent has written this up, with out even a nod towards the churches side.
2--No where can you find a job, where your employer will let you take their advertising materials and build a piece of "art" that says there claims are all fallacious.
Ms.Nayor seems to think that the Church --that's us Catholics in the pew, ultimately--should continue to pay her while she undermines it's teaching by subjecting them to the Modernist idea that they are open to debate and popular vote. She hasn't been silenced, in law or fact, she's been fired for bein' all ate with the dumba**, if she thinks an employer will put up with that sort of thing.
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
So--Do Ya Wanna Hear My Take on Zombies As Cultural Critique?
'Cause I think it''s be ready tomorrow--if the moaning undead don't eat my brain first.
Monday, September 27, 2010
I'm going to feel so guilty...
Wednesday is my name day. In order tocelebrate the feast of my patron, I thought I would make something festive and special, that we don't often have. (That's the thing about being an unimaginiative Catholic--you take the idea of feast days rather literally when you try to live the sanctoral cycle!)
Well, for months now i've had a craving for quality bratwurst, simmered in beer with onions and finished on the grill.
One of my daughters came in today and said that she had bought me some beer in which to simmer the brats. She did. She brought home Chimay! I am gong to simmer brats in Chimay!
I'm going to feel guilty about cooking with the finest beer on Earth,, rather than reverentially drinking it, but I'm going to do it. I have a question though--is cooking with Chimay something that needs brought up in confession?
Well, for months now i've had a craving for quality bratwurst, simmered in beer with onions and finished on the grill.
One of my daughters came in today and said that she had bought me some beer in which to simmer the brats. She did. She brought home Chimay! I am gong to simmer brats in Chimay!
I'm going to feel guilty about cooking with the finest beer on Earth,, rather than reverentially drinking it, but I'm going to do it. I have a question though--is cooking with Chimay something that needs brought up in confession?
My Second Favorite Breakfast
I had my second favorite breakfast this morning:
four strips of bacon, fries crispy, with an egg fried hard--with the yolk broken and distributed--served on toasted light rye bread with a slice of extra sharp cheddar and Dijon mustard.
yum.
four strips of bacon, fries crispy, with an egg fried hard--with the yolk broken and distributed--served on toasted light rye bread with a slice of extra sharp cheddar and Dijon mustard.
yum.
Finding My Son-in-Law's Darkside
After a might fine Sunday dinner of roasted pork loin with green beans and onion, seasoned with Zat-a'ar ad bacon, red rice cooked in string chicken broth, gravy and bread, i was feeling rather mellow. My Son in-Law and i went to the porch for an after dinner tobacco session. (It's odd-I generally don't enjoy my tobacco habit, i just smoke because not smoking makes me have the heebie-jeebies to the point of being unpleasant for everyone around me, but the smoke after dinner is always enjoyable.)
Well, in the glow of fellowship brought bout by a good meal,pleasant weather and a lovely twilight, he confessed to something that showed me a previously unsuspected darkness in his personality.
He wants to take a holiday to San Francisco, and while there gather up as many purse poodles as he can get his hands on. preferably by taking them from the people on the streets who are carrying them about. Then he wants to build a trebuchet, and launch the poodles at Alcatraz Island.
I found this to be rather shocking. Because, Alcatraz is a historical site, and i can't believe he would risk littering it's significant and interesting installations with dead purse poodles.
It just goes to show--everyone has unsuspected depths to them.
Well, in the glow of fellowship brought bout by a good meal,pleasant weather and a lovely twilight, he confessed to something that showed me a previously unsuspected darkness in his personality.
He wants to take a holiday to San Francisco, and while there gather up as many purse poodles as he can get his hands on. preferably by taking them from the people on the streets who are carrying them about. Then he wants to build a trebuchet, and launch the poodles at Alcatraz Island.
I found this to be rather shocking. Because, Alcatraz is a historical site, and i can't believe he would risk littering it's significant and interesting installations with dead purse poodles.
It just goes to show--everyone has unsuspected depths to them.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)