Punditry

Charlotte Mayor Anthony Foxx, who President Barack Obama tapped Tuesday to be the next transportation secretary, just declared Thursday “A Day of Reason” in his home city, and asked Charlotte’s citizens to observe the day.

May 2 is traditionally the National Day of Prayer, a government-designated religious event intended to encourage people to “turn to God in prayer and meditation.” Foxx separately issued a “National Day of Prayer” proclamation for the city of Charlotte.

Foxx said in his proclamation that May 2 should be A Day of Reason because “the application of reason, more than any other means, has proven to offer hope for human survival on Earth.” (source)

Well this type of idiocy gives me another reason to pray.

Besides as Blessed John Paul II wrote so wonderfully in Fides et Ratio

Faith and reason are like two wings on which the human spirit rises to the contemplation of truth; and God has placed in the human heart a desire to know the truth—in a word, to know himself—so that, by knowing and loving God, men and women may also come to the fullness of truth about themselves

As for the new transportation secretary, President Obama sure can pick them. The Constitution might have a “No Religious Test Clause”, but Obama is smarter than that since his nominees always seem to match an “irreligious test.”

Not from the Onion.

An anarchist group has targeted prominent Roman Catholics in Spain using bombs hidden in boxes of sex toys.

Two devices were sent by the anti-clerical Pro Sex Toys group, according to Spain’s EFE News One agency, concealed amidst vibrators.

They targeted the archbishop of Pamplona, Francisco Perez, and the headteacher of a private school belonging to the ultra-conservative Legionnaires of Christ movement in Madrid.

One bomb exploded in a postal sorting office, leaving a member of staff with slight injuries.

“Please accept our apologies,” the group said in an email sent to an anarchist website at the beginning of last month. “Next time we won’t fail.”

The archbishop told EFE that he vaguely recalled receiving a package that contained powder that police removed. “We didn’t give it much importance, but later it was said to be a bomb,” he said.

The same group is believed to be behind a number of other attempted bombings.

Recently a bomb inside a pressure cooker left outside a public prosecutor’s office was detonated by bomb squad officers.

Another bomb containing a gas canister, shrapnel and explosive powder planted in Madrid’s Almudena Cathedral also failed to explode.

The anarchists, who use other names such as the Artisans Club for New Uses for Coffee, claimed to have made a bomb out of an espresso coffee machine packed with gunpowder and shrapnel that was planted at a bank branch, though they did not reveal where.

Police in Spain believe the group probably only has five members, but authorities have expressed concern that extremist groups could take advantage of widespread disillusionment as unemployment in the country hits 26 percent. (source)

Thankfully they are rather inept bombing anarchists.

Another story from last week.

BRUSSELS, April 23, 2013 (LifeSiteNews.com) – In an astonshing display of gentleness in the face of a vile attack, the head of the Catholic Church in Belgium, Archbishop Andre-Joseph Leonard, remained calmly seated with eyes closed in prayer Tuesday as four topless women attacked him with shouts and curses and doused him with water.

It’s not the first time the bishop has been attacked for standing up for the Church’s teachings on homosexuality and expressing his concern for those who live the homosexual lifestyle.

The incident took place at the ULB University in Brussels where the archbishop was participating in a debate on blasphemy laws.

The four women, representing the pro-abortion and homosexual group FEMEN, took to the stage where they disrobed to reveal black-painted slogans on their bare chests and backs, such as ‘my body my rules,’ and ‘anus dei is coming.’ They also held signs reading ‘stop homophobia’. The women doused the archbishop with water from bottles formed in the image of the Virgin Mary.

For most of the attack, which lasted a number of minutes before the women could be forced off s>tage, Archbishop Leonard sat drenched with water with eyes closed in prayer. After the ordeal, the archbishop kissed the image of the Virgin Mary on one of the water bottles that was used in the attack. Le Soir reports that one of the interveners said of the archbishop: “He was very calm and maintained a position of prayer. I have to believe he was praying for us.” Story and censored photos

And to round out the other stories, one from today.

A female student at Carnegie Mellon dressed up as the Pope from the waist up and naked from the waist down passed out condoms to other students at an annual art school parade.

To make it even slightly more offensive, she shaved her hair down there in the shape of a cross. Now clearly, this was meant to be offensive and in your face.

The Diocese has asked CMU to take action against this kind of hateful behavior but CMU said they’re unsure if their community standards were violated.

Excuse me?

Bishop David Zubik said he understands that “when we’re growing up we do stupid things” but he added that the behavior of this young woman crossed the line.

CMU issued a statement saying they’ll continue to review the incident. This is purely hate-filled. There’s no other explanation. Can you think of what the college would do if this type of speech were aimed at Jews, Muslims, or any other group for that matter.

If this doesn’t fall beneath their “community standards” it’s because they perhaps don’t have any. Creative Minority Report

Wow I am going to have to dig more into St. Thomas Aquinas to learn how to refute screaming water-dousing topless lesbians and a half-naked condom-dispensing women dressed as the pope. Or remember “Eight feminists flashed their breasts in the heart of Paris’s Notre Dame cathedral on Tuesday to celebrate Pope Benedict XVI’s shock resignation announcement.”

There has been some various reactions to the Diocese of Brooklyn’s ad campaign calling Jesus “The Original Hipster. I totally agree with Hector Molina from Catholic Answers post on the subject.

With all due respect, I find the ad to be tacky. What’s more, I believe it misses the mark and risks sending a mixed message.

Don’t get me wrong. I understand the intention here. The diocese wants to reach out to a younger demographic with a creative and engaging marketing campaign, one which portrays the Church as welcoming and relevant. I get that.

However, I believe that something like this must be done very carefully.

When you look at this ad, how do you interpret it? What message does it convey?

Announcing Jesus Christ as “The Original Hipster” is to me a lame attempt at making Jesus more cool and relevant by watering down his image. In other words, it reduces him into a silly caricature, something which has been en vogue for quite some time now.

What is a hipster after all?

Mirriam-Webster defines hipster as:

a person who is unusually aware of and interested in new and unconventional patterns (as in jazz or fashion).

UrbanDictionary.com defines hipsters as:

a subculture of men and women typically in their 20’s and 30’s that value independent thinking, counter-culture, progressive politics, an appreciation of art and indie-rock, creativity, intelligence, and witty banter.

Monsignor Harrington’s defines a hipster as, “someone who stands against the (mainstream) culture. Jesus stood against the culture.”

Yes, one could make the argument that Jesus was counter-cultural. He stood in sharp contrast to the elements of culture that were in opposition to the gospel he came to announce.

But do most people understand the term hipster this way? I know I don’t. And I assume that the diocese did not intend to portray our Blessed Lord as a cool, artsy, indie music lover.

I think we can do better. What do you think?

Like most attempts to be relevant I think it is doomed to failure. When Saturday Night Live parodies your ad campaign it is not because they think it is genius. Using the word hipster in this manner evokes The Princess Bride’s “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”

“For God so loved the world he sent his hipster son” – Well not really. It was not indie rock on which he built his Church.

Still it is rather difficult to distill the Church down to a diocesan-based poster ad campaign. Catholics Come Home has been very successful because it doesn’t dumb down the Church or try to be relevant. But God can bring goood even out of tack diocesan ad campaigns.

Phil Lawyer posts at CatholicCulture.org.

Writing in the Wall Street Journal, Jennifer Graham tells me something that I hadn’t heard about Boston Marathon bombing. As dozens of victims were sprawled across Boylston Street, many of them in danger of death, Catholic priests came running to the scene—and were turned away.

Doctors and nurses were welcome at the bombing scene. Firefighters and police officers were welcome. But Catholic priests, who might have offered the solace of the sacraments, were not.

”Catholics need not apply.” That slogan was familiar in Boston years ago, before Irish and Italian immigrants took over control of the city. Now, after decades of decline in Catholic influence , the attitude has returned. One priest who was barred from Boylston Street remarked that in the past a priest was admitted anywhere. “That’s changed,” he said. “Priests are no longer considered to be emergency responders.”

Unless police officers in Boston are uniquely hostile to priests (a distinct possibility), the tide has turned very quickly on this question. On September 11, 2001, there were Catholic priests at the staging areas near the World Trade Center, giving absolution to firefighters before they rushed into the doomed building: mass-producing saints!

Unable to provide spiritual help to those whose lives were endangered, the priests in Boston retreated to a nearby church, were they “set up a table with water and oranges and bananas to serve people.” Doesn’t that nicely capture what a once-Catholic, now-secular culture expects from the Church? It’s not essential for priests to administer the sacraments; in fact it’s unwelcome. But if they could just stay out of the way, and give people something to eat, that would be fine.

If true this is extremely sad but not surprising. Just another move into the “bodies without souls” direction. First responders now can not be last rite responders. I wonder how other clergy were treated? I remember that wonderful scene at the start of The Apostle with Robert Duvall involving this.

Jennifer Graham captures the problem well:

But it is a poignant irony that Martin Richard, the 8-year-old boy who died on Boylston Street, was a Catholic who had received his first Communion just last year. As Martin lay dying, priests were only yards away, beyond the police tape, unable to reach him to administer last rites…

On a related note I would wonder about the “Catholics need not apply”, there is the semi-famous “No Irish Need Apply” that might well be a historical myth in America imported from experience abroad.

The fact that Irish vividly “remember” NINA signs is a curious historical puzzle. There are no contemporary or retrospective accounts of a specific sign at a specific location. No particular business enterprise is named as a culprit. No historian, archivist, or museum curator has ever located one; no photograph or drawing exists.

Still you don’t need physical signs to harbor that attitude as the Obama administration has shown.

Remember the media storm over Bishop Vasa requesting teachers sign an agreement affirming that “modern errors” regarding “matters that gravely offend human dignity.”? Well I think this story will not get the same attention.

Christian colleges and universities have every right to maintain their denominational heritages. I teach at Houston Baptist University, and I am pleased that our school explicitly holds to its Christian mission:

Many universities call themselves Christian, but cannot bring themselves to talk about the central narrative of the Christian faith – the Incarnation, the Cross, and the Resurrection. Yet as Father Richard John Neuhaus has written, “If what Christians say about Good Friday is true, then it is, quite simply, the truth about everything.” The implications of such truths are worth studying and knowing to the fullest – truths we all must confront to have a life worthy of our Creator’s purpose.

Therefore, it is right and good for Christian institutions to ask their faculty to teach in accordance with central tenets of the Christian faith. Recently, however, a couple of Baptist colleges have dismissed theology faculty because they hold to Baptist principles. (source)

Kind of a reverse mandatum.

I wonder how often this also happens in Catholic schools and we just don’t hear about it? I certainly know students who are faithful to the Church can have a hard time of it from their professors. For example Emmy Cecilia at Journey of a Catholic Nerd Writer.

Note: A couple of years ago there was the case of Dr. Kenneth Howell who was fired by the University of Illinois for setting forth Catholic doctrine on homosexuality in a class. Although this was a secular school, but he as hired to teach a class on Catholicism. He was later rehired after the Alliance Defense Fund got involved.

I was wondering when the media honeymoon with Pope Francis would be over.

Pope Francis reaffirms crackdown on U.S. nuns

The L.A. Times uses a picture of smiling nuns/sisters wearing habits with the caption. “Nuns greet Pope Francis as he arrives in St. Peter’s Square for his inauguration Mass at the Vatican last month. The pope has reaffirmed a crackdown by his predecessor, Benedict XVI, on American nuns.”

Well I guess one man’s “reform” is another man’s “crackdown,”

Vatican City, 15 April 2013 (VIS) – “Today, the Superiors of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith met with the Presidency of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR) of the United States of America. Archbishop James Peter Sartain, archbishop of Seattle, Washington, USA, and the Holy See’s Delegate for the Doctrinal Assessment of the LCWR, also participated in the meeting,” informs a communique from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

“As this was his first opportunity to meet with the Presidency of the LCWR, the Prefect of the Congregation, Archbishop Gerhard Ludwig Muller, expressed his gratitude for the great contribution of women Religious to the Church in the United States as seen particularly in the many schools, hospitals, and institutions of support for the poor which have been founded and staffed by Religious over the years.”

“The Prefect then highlighted the teaching of the Second Vatican Council regarding the important mission of Religious to promote a vision of ecclesial communion founded on faith in Jesus Christ and the teachings of the Church as faithfully taught through the ages under the guidance of the Magisterium. He also emphasized that a Conference of Major Superiors, such as the LCWR, exists in order to promote common efforts among its member Institutes as well as cooperation with the local Conference of Bishops and with individual Bishops. For this reason, such Conferences are constituted by and remain under the direction of the Holy See.”

“Finally, Archbishop Muller informed the Presidency that he had recently discussed the Doctrinal Assessment with Pope Francis, who reaffirmed the findings of the Assessment and the program of reform for this Conference of Major Superiors.” (source)

The LCWR apologists are of course out in force trying to spin this.

Sister Simone Campbell says “The censure (of the LCWR) has always been about politics.” When you see everything via a political lens instead of the eyes of faith then of course this is how you frame it.

What has always annoyed me about the LCWR apologists is how disingenuous they are. First off they tried to redirect any criticism of the LCWR as an attack on all religious and even an attack on religious in the past. They totally got the media to buy into this lie and they cooperated with that lie by repeating it. They made it so that to critique any problematic aspect of the LCWR was to disrespect any good American religious have ever done. The fact that they never acknowledge just one problematic action regarding the LCWR makes me not trust a word they say. When a group comes under a doctrinal assessment and the group decides to have a Barbara Marx Hubbard as the keynote speaker there are serious problems. That a group of Catholic religious would sit and listen to the just-plain-whacky meanderings that refer to Jesus as a “post-human universal person” and the same person previously said that she channeled “Christ.” The LCWR apologists at America Magazine and elsewhere had nothing to say about Barbara Marx Hubbard and her Pelagian consciousness evolution.

No the LCWR apologists pretend to be the great defenders of Catholic religious life in the United States while having nothing to say about it’s decline in numbers. We constantly get stories regarding the problems with priestly religious vocations mainly as a drumbeat for women’s ordination and married priests. Yet there seems to be no concern that the very religious orders they champion are dying out.

Fr. James Martin SJ, a prominent LCWR apologist had this bit of spin regarding that fact.

“One of the most striking findings regarding new entrants is that almost equal numbers of women have been attracted to institutes in both conferences of women religious in the U.S. in recent years. As of 2009, L.C.W.R. institutes reported 73 candidates/postulants, 117 novices and 317 sisters in temporary vows/commitment. C.M.S.W.R. institutes reported 73 candidates/postulants, 158 novices and 304 sisters in temporary vows/commitment. (There are 150 nuns in formation in U.S. monasteries.)”

Wow you would think that the two institutes are roughly equal. Funny that he did not mention the 4-to–1 ratio of LCWR to CMSWR respondents and that the LCWR is a much larger group. Joanne McPortland did a good job of calling out the phoniness of this comparison. Besides what was the last new foundation any of these orders made?

The simple fact is that the leadership of the LCWR needs to be reformed and that mostly goes for the orders they represent. I realize that there are certainly members in these orders that are not happy with the LCWR or the direction religious life has taken. But the LCWR apologists are not helping since by spinning the actual problems they contribute to them. I would not be surprised to see the LCWR lose its canonically approved status rather than to cooperate with a reform. Still I have read enough history of the Church to see this as nothing new as there has always been an ebb and flow in religious orders and periods of laxity and reform.

No the pill of orthodoxy is very bitter when contrasted to the sweet itchings of the ear of heterodoxy. 2 Timothy 4:3

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Looking over a collection of links to stories I had collated over the last week I saw that the majority of them dealt with the collision between the Church’s teaching on homosexual acts/same-sex marriage and the culture. This collision is occurring more and more as the culture becomes more accepting of this and more bigoted towards Catholics. I guess closets also abhor a vacuum and as those who suffer from same-sex attraction come out of the closet, Catholics are being forced into it.

First off a story from today:

“Nicholas Coppola’s faith means everything to him. His Long Island home is full of religious books, pictures of cardinal timothy Dolan even the word, faith.

“Father Nick said I have to remove you from any public ministry, he said I have no choice,” said Coppola.
Coppola was teaching religious instruction, he was a Eucharistic minister and also a lector then in January, he got word from his church in oceanside he couldn’t do any of it anymore. He never thought marrying the love of his life a man would cost him that.

“What was pointed out, you made a very public statement getting married, I think the question was asked why, I said I got married like any other loving couple,” said Coppola.

The pastor of Saint Anthony’s Church in Oceanside told us “He’s always welcome to come to the church and receive the sacraments as far as I’m concerned.”

Pastor Nicholas Lombardi says the decision came from the Diocese of Rockville Center.
The Diocese received an anonymous letter complaining of Coppola’s marital status and sent a letter the parish. He showed us copies.

The Diocese of Rockville Center told us in a statement:

“Gay married people cannot be on staff in the position that he held, however the church is welcoming of all persuasions.”

Coppola just wants to get back to doing what he loved so much. (Via A Long Island Catholic)

I have several reactions to this story. The first being Mr. Coppola’s total obliviousness to the consequences of his actions. Although the parish preist seemingly contributed to this atmosphere. I am also quite annoyed by the statement from the Diocese. For one I wish Catholics would totally stop using the word “gay” as an identifier. Plus using the term “Gay married people” gives too much away to cultural usage. There are people of the same sex who attempt marriage, but there are no “Gay married people.” The language we use is important and should be much more precise even in a general statement.

As for Father Lombardi, S.J. if what he said was correctly quoted that is another serious matter that I hope the Diocese does not just sweep over. Now I try not to jump to conclusions just because someone is a Jesuit, but since he is also associate director of online services for Fordham’s Curran Center for American Catholic Studies I would not be surprised if he was accurately quoted. A center named after a dissenting Jesuit who was barred from teaching theology by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith does not exactly give me confidence regarding orthodoxy. Note 1

It is bad enough that we are constantly being attacked from outside the Church. Unfortunately the same is true within the Church including the priesthood. Another recently story involved surprisingly another Jesuit, Father Edward F. Salmon who is allowing two men to attend McQuaid Jesuit High School 2013 prom as a couple. His reasoning is the typical mush to describe as love what is actually indifference to sin. He is doing these two men a great disservice that is certainly not love, the willing the good of the other. Edwards Peters has Some thoughts on Fr. Salmon’s letter re the McQuaid High prom

There are of course those priests who do defend Church teaching and a story today concerns Father Greg Shaffer a chaplain for the Newman Center at Georgetown University.

Two gay seniors who said they felt alienated by the Newman Center’s controversial priest will launch a campaign this week to force him off campus.

At least a dozen students, including seniors Damian Legacy and Blake Bergen, say they have left the Newman Center in the last several years because Father Greg Shaffer’s strong anti-gay and anti-abortion views are too polarizing. Shaffer, a Roman Catholic priest, has spent five years preaching to GW students.

Truth is polarizing as Jesus said in Luke 12:53. We have passed the stage of general acceptance of homosexuality to where it’s acceptance is forced. The attacks on religious freedom will only get worse and in this specific case one of the men involved is a priest in the “North American Old Catholic Church”.  (Thanks to Dawn Eden for the heads up)

The students lambasted Shaffer’s counseling sessions, in which he said he advises students who are attracted to members of the same sex to remain celibate for the rest of their lives.

Imagine that a confessor helping someone to avoid sin. Obviously we can’t have that. In our culture the general idea is that the best way to avoid sin is to not call something a sin at all.

“The fundamental flaw in modern thinking about human sexuality, the “Ur” (root) problem, is the (sinful) declaration that there is “no necessary connection” between human sexual activity and procreation”

The above is from Msgr. Chrles Pope’s excellent column this week Reaping the Whirlwind: A reflection on the deepening darkness that celebrates homosexual unions and activity. There is a straight line from the acceptance of contraception, divorce, and abortion to the acceptance of homosexual acts. Catholics can once again say “I told you so”, but of course nobody is listening. It is easier to call someone a homophobe and a bigot than to engage their argument.

Now if only we could evangelize as efficiently as homosexual activists and their supporters have been able to do. They have been effective in moving the culture and we haven’t. Saturating the media with their message and their using Hollywood to spread the message has worked for them quite well. Remember how Vice President Biden described how the television show “Will and Grace” helped him to “evolve”. Funny how people mocked Vice President Dan Quayle for actually critiquing (correctly) a television show plot and yet further abandoning your faith based on one is just fine.

We have our work cut out for us, but that has always been true. Evangelization like conversion is a daily thing.

To leave off, Msgr. Charles Pope responds to comments on his previous article with What does the Catholic Church offer to the Homosexual Person?. An excellent response, but again could do without using the term “gay”.

Note 1: In 1993 then-Cardinal Ratzinger said about Fr. Curran “With his theory of dissent Father Curran moved beyond individual questions to challenge the Church’s teaching office as such. He wanted to accord dissent itself an official teaching role.”

..When we eventually arrived at the Sistine Chapel on March 12, I was still pondering two or three candidates. However, when the first blank ballot was given to us, and when it was time to write down a name, something powerful–and strange–happened.

I picked up my pen to write, and I began. However, my hand was being moved by some greater spiritual force. The name on the ballot just happened. I had not yet narrowed my thinking down to one name; but it was done for me..

If something kept him from writing his own name down, it just could be a miracle.

Over the weekend Cardinal Mahony had a series of tweets regarding the new Pope while basically disparagingly the liturgical style of Pope Benedict XVI. It is also odd hearing the Cardinal speaking in praise of humulity and how the Church should be poor.

Now the inner snarker in me would say that Cardinal Mahony certainly did a lot to help his diocese to be poorer in regards to settlements and of course the so-called “Taj Mahony” Cathedral. Poor also in the number of vocations.

What facinates me the most though is the contrast of his apprarent persona which seems to bleed pride and his attraction to humility. What is so offputting about his tweets is he does not seem to get the fact that he comes off as prideful. How often though are we totally blind to our faults? Still we can be attracted to virtues that we don’t have and maybe it might even be the virtue that is the remedy to a dominant fault.

In related news Canonist Ed Peters has Some thoughts on conclave leaks and specifically in regards to Cardinals Kasper and Mahony.

One of the narratives I keep hearing repeated regarding Pope Francis’ papacy is the reform of the Curia. This keeps getting repeated like this is the highest priority and of the upmost importance.

Now of course I realize the Curia needs reform. We all are in need of reform daily and this can be said of any bureaucracy. The Curia has no dispensation from original sin and is filled with all forms of human stupidity. The Curia has generated many unforced errors especially in regard to communication with the media and lacking simple due diligence in research (sometimes even a simple Google search could have saved heartburn).

So surely the Curia needs reform and possibly even an outsider to the Curia might be able to further advance such reform. I am not sure if that statement is true or not in this case, but an outsider can be more immune to “This is the way we have always done it.”

Regardless, what if the Curia was perfectly reformed and actually became a well functioning bureaucracy (if that is not a contradiction in term)? What would it really give us? Sure it would be nice to prevent unnecessary headlines and actually have a more unitive message among the Secretary of State and various congregations and tribunals.

Still when I look at the problems the Catholic Church faces, the Roman Curia is not at the top of the list of what needs to be addressed. The problems of secularism and the fact that many believers act in their daily lives as if God did not exist is of much more concern. There has never been a perfect time in Church history when all the believers actually acted as if their faith was true. Maybe it was always a mistake to divide territories and to describe some as mission territories. Evangelization never ends with the conversion. This is the point Catholic soteriology makes in that salvation is a process. Conversion that is not continuous is no conversion at all.

This emphasis can come under the heading of the New Evangelization which can be simply described by:

“It is an old story that, while we may need somebody like Dominic to convert the heathen to Christianity, we are in even greater need of somebody like Francis, to convert the Christians to Christianity.” –G.K. Chesterton “The Dumb Ox”

Maybe one of the reasons for so much focus on the Pope and the Curia is that in many ways we have become dependent on structures. Instead of going out and evangelizing ourselves we hope for a higher organization to fix those problems for us. Just as in politics increased Federalization to solve problems is akin to this attitude. If only we had such and such dicastery with such and such prefect in charge of it everything would be better. We want a charismatic Pope to evangelize for us, so we don’t have to do it ourselves.

Now as a great believer in both/and I don’t mean to throw things into opposition. It is not a case of either the Pope doing something or ourselves. It is also not the case of whether we evangelize or instead reform some aspects of the Curia. Really I am quite thankful for the great catechists and evangelizers I have been lucky to have as popes during my lifetime (even when I didn’t appreciate it). I am just ranting at the idea of an idealized Curia and the transferring of what are also our personal responsibilities to others. Most of all I have to rant at myself for falling into this same trap.