Orwell and Islam
...from a Norwegian blogger!

Interesting observations

Got this from a reader (thanks to you guys for writing half my blog. Makes my life easier!):

Lately I have been reflecting about the parallels between Islamism and Socialism. Perhaps the best way of approaching this subject is by way of illustration. First, let me quote a section from an article by the inestimable Bat Ye'or on the ideology of Jihad (which is a central tenet of Islamism):

Jihad ideology separates humanity into two hostile blocs: the community of Muslims (Dar ul-Islam), and the
infidel non-Muslims (Dar ul-Harb). Allah commands the Muslims to conquer the entire world in order to rule it according to Koranic law. Hence Muslims must wage a perpetual war against those infidels who refuse to submit. This is the motivation for jihad. It is based on the inequality between the community of Allah and the infidels, as was re-emphasized in the Cairo Declaration. The first is a superior group, which must rule the world; the second must submit.

Compare this to Lenin's ideology of war, as written in "Socialism and War" (July 1915):

Our [socialists'] attitude towards war, however, is fundamentally different from that of the bourgeois pacifists (supporters and advocates of peace) and of the anarchists. We differ from the former in that we understand the inevitable connection between wars and the class struggle within a country; we understand that wars cannot be abolished unless classes are abolished and socialism is created; we also differ in that we regard civil wars, i.e., wars waged by an oppressed class against the oppressor class, by slaves against slaveholders, by serfs against landowners, and by wage-workers against the bourgeoisie, as fully legitimate, progressive and necessary.

Notice the parallels:

the division of the world into two classes, the enlightened and the unredeemable,
the apotheosis of the former and the dehumanization of the latter,
the disordered drive to conquer (libido dominandi) by the superior class,
the enlightened's sense of entitlement to rule over those who persist in their heretical beliefs,
the view that the peace will only reign once the unredeemable are completely subjugated or eliminated, and
the latent antinomianism of the true believers.

What's especially interesting is this: these attitudes are most certainly a consequence of original sin (a desire to be as gods), which is a reality that both Socialism and Islam deny.

This is why I pray that the light of the gospel reach the world: it notes that we are all sinners who are in need of redemption, that true peace is something that the world cannot give, and that the whole sum of the law is to love God and our neighbor.

PS. I know I am not the only one making this parallel, but I can't help but point out that the most interesting twist on this is that which Chesterton made in his book "The Flying Inn" in which the progressives and islamists are allied.

Alert the Media! Shea and the Reformed Guys at Credenda/Agenda See Eye to Eye on Something

From the "Not Swift on the Uptake" Department
Thanks to Whoever Paid the Man to get rid of the ad on my blog--whenever you did it. Somebody pointed it out to me today. I'm not what you'd call "vividly aware of sensory details". But anyway, thanks!

Irresponsible Bishops to Caesar
"Please take over management of the Church. We just can't be bothered. What? No! We didn't think you'd start trying to arrogate powers to yourself that aren't yours! Oh dear! Do we have to actually govern the Church? But we don't know how! We can't be bothered! Oh, what do we do?"

Frank Keating does exactly what you would expect a not-terribly-theologically-literate Catholic layman and politico to do in the situation the bishops have handed him. It's hard not to cheer for him, and yet the precedents he will set can only prove to be fatal for the Church in the US. When the bishops abandon governing their churches, Caesar is happy to take over. And Caesar, in the long run, will have no gods before him. Wake up, bishops.

Doug asks a reasonable question
I'm aware of no doctrine concerning the wisdom of the hierarchy. The only thing approaching it is the extremely left-handed compliment of infallibility (which encompasses the laity too insofar as it addresses the sensus fidelium). And all Infallibility means is that the Holy Spirit will not let the Church define error as doctrine, no matter how stupid and/or wicked we are. This is hardly an endorsement of Catholic greatness or wisdom, just as a strong leash is not a testimony to the friendliness of the Doberman. There is no wisdom in the Church except for the Holy Spirit, and he's enough.

Milwaukee, of course.

More Zero Tolerance Stupidity
By defining so narrowly what constitutes "abuse", a jerk like Fr. Cliff Garner, who treats his flock with contempt and shouldn't be a priest, gets the kid glove treatment while his betrayed and rightly outraged flock gets scoldings from some monsignor for daring to vent the fact that they feel betrayed and outraged. Choicest quote from Fr. Cliff Garner to his flock: "[A]t the end of the meeting, Cliff had the final opportunity to speak and gave a very arrogant speech in which he told all the parents, 'And I'll be watching you." Oh, but he's not abusive or anything. Abuse only means "sex with minors."

The Council is failure and a mistake! We have to repeal it!
The Council of Nicaea, I mean. Look, it's the year 362. The Council was in 325. It's been over 35 years since modernists rammed through their Trinitarian agenda which relied on terms like "homoousious" that were actually condemned by earlier synods in order to compel the Church down the road toward compromise with Greek philosophy and paganism. We Traditionalists warned you neo-Catholics that this would simply mean abandoning the Tradition of the Apostles for a mess of pottage. But would you listen? No. You said this would purify the Faith and make it stronger. But instead, all we've seen is one Arian after another (or sometimes semi-Arian) in the imperial court, pointing the way to the future. Will Rome listen? No. Meanwhile, failures like Athanasius, who simply cannot face reality, go from defeat to defeat and exile to exile. Wake up, will you, Athanasius? The Council was a failure and a mistake! Sheesh! The current emperor--Julian--has abandoned all pretense of Christianity whatever and is trying to reinstitute paganism and rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem to show Jesus was wrong! How much clearer do things have to be to show that the Council of Nicaea was a tragic blunder? I say we acknowledge Nicaea has failed and go back to the Golden Age before the Council when everything was perfect and there was no trouble in the Church! Nicaea has no future.

It turns out Science has none of religion's vices, according to Remarkably Simple-Minded Atheist Richard Dawkins
None. No. Really.

Psst: the editor position for http://catholicism.about.com/ is currently vacant.
If you know anybody who wants another unpaid editing/writing outlet, pass it on. Of course, you could always just start a blog too.

What's going on in Israel?

Richard Chonak indulges in shameless self-promotion

He writes:

An article in this week's "Our Sunday Visitor" tells about a group of Catholic artists in the Washington area
and mentions their web site http://www.catholicartists.org/

Some of the members' art works are very impressive, and the web site design is -- well, it's at least as good as anything I've
ever done.

More "tempt and accuse" agitations from the devil, starring The Laity!
Last month, everybody was screaming for a "Zero Tolerance" policy. The bishops complied (stupidly, I think). This month, everybody is screaming because the Zero Tolerance policy they demanded is being enforced. Life would be so simple if we Laity were really as full of the Gee-Whiz Capraesque Wisdom of the Common Feller as we think we are. My questions about this case are the same as the Jaeger one. What, exactly, did this priest do a quarter of a century ago? If it was as trivial as a backrub, and nothing has happened since, does he really merit crucifixion? On the other hand, if he really committed a sexual assault and should be jailed for it (though the statute has doubtless run out) then are the laypeople serious or not? Unfortunately, Zero Tolerance does not brook such subtleties--as laypeople and the bishops are belatedly figuring out.

Actually, I've been saying this since December: Osama is dead
But it's nice to see somebody in Arab News acknowledging this--and calling Muslims away from the pathologies of Radical Islam.

Jefferson is Overrated. The Smart Money is on Madison

Thanks to Garver
for your intelligent conversation with David. As I say, I'm not from a Reformed background and one of my principal impressions of Reformed theology is that it seems to have inherited the Catholic knack for coining jargon that baffles ordinary linguistics. So, for instance, when David says that "Limited atonement is actually infinite" my first thought is, "Then why call it 'limited' and not 'infinite'?" Likewise, slogans like "faith alone" (followed by complex explanations about how James, in condemning the notion of "faith alone" (James 2:24) was not really condemning the notion of "faith alone") leave me in the dust. My principal impression of the Truly Reformed is that semantics are being using to keep alive a quarrel that is definitely past its prime. So, for instance, I've been told by some Reformed folk that the propositions condemned by Trent are ridiculous caricatures of what the Reformers actually believed and that if the Church were serious it would address the actual arguments of the Reformers and not these silly cartoons she condemned at Trent. But then David tells me the propositions condemned by Trent are absolutely perfect descriptions of what the Reformers believed and that the Church was wrong to condemn them.

What's a confused guy like me to do? I begin to get the impression that Reformed theology, for all its precision, is rather a moving target. And since the Catholic theology it exists to criticize seems to me to be very sensible, I've never been able to muster the energy to try mastering it, because I'd rather understand the Catholic tradition and feed on it. There's only so many hours in a day. So I'm glad you're here Garver and can deal with the intricacies of the argument. I'm much obliged. For all you blog readers, check out Garver's site!

So an Egyptian guy...
with ID claiming July 4 as his birthday show up, armed to the teeth, approaches an El Al counter at LAX and blows people away. And, of course, the FBI says "Probably has nothing to do with terrorism." I'm thinkin', "Yeah. Right." Now we find out somebody did the same thing in Russia?

Sorry, but the moment a Muslim attacks anything remotely connected with Israel, assume "terrorism". This is a no-brainer.

Whoever you are, whatever you did, you did not have as much fun as me yesterday

I'm at my brother's house in Olympia. By day, he's a mild-mannered computer geek working for the Insurance Commissioner. But when cry goes out for truth, justice and big band music, he is transformed into Saxophone Man and plays in the Johnny Lewis band (Johnny's the guy that wrote "Night Train"). They do lots of cool big band music. It's a 20 piece band. Anyway, yesterday my brother (who lives on a lake) had the whole band to his house, they set up on the back yard looking over the lake, and wailed! Plus, there was a ton of food, lotsa guests, and a huge fireworks display to crown it all. I swam in the lake, goofed off with my guys, ate too much, and had a grand time. We stayed here last night, crashed in sleeping bags. Today, we bid reluctant farewell.

Einsatzgruppenphilosopher Peter Singer Loves his German Shepherd

A New Contest
The inimitable Kathy Shaidle notes: "Ever notice how video tapes are forever "surfacing", like legendary sea monsters?" It put me in mind of other bits of media shorthand from people with spellcheckers who laugh because Dan Quayle can't spell "potato" but who are too unimaginative to stop borrowing the same terminology from each other endlessly. Thus, Bush "lacked gravitas" they all said, with all the originality of a herd of independent minds. Likewise, have you ever noticed that buses always "plunge" in accidents? And sources always "reveal". And, of course, Rush Limbaugh has three names ("Conservative Rush Limbaugh") but Dan Rather is just "Dan Rather" not "Liberal Dan Rather". So: my contest. Name as many other journalistic cliches and unthinking bits of jargon as you can. Use the comments box and have fun. Let it amuse you over the weekend while I'm out eating ribs and blowing things up at my brother's house.

Mark Byron thinks I threw a gauntlet
I thought it was something more like a kiss, myself. My basic point is that it is not the case the "Catholics believe in Sacred Tradition and Protestants don't." Rather it is the case that Catholics believe in Sacred Tradition and know they do, while most Protestants believe in Sacred Tradition, but don't know they do." I argue this here, which is a chapter out of my oh-so-vitally-needed-by-all-of-you book, By What Authority?.

A bit more for David, on "anathema"

One of the basic bits of misunderstanding that some people have is what the point of an anathema is and who is subject to it. Trent, like other councils, anathematized various things and basically said, "If you think this, you are not in the Church". Paul did something similar. He declared to the Galatians that anybody who was circumcised was "cut off from Christ".

Now here's a pretty problem, since I (like most of my generation's males) am circumcised. So am I cut off from Christ?

No. Paul's proscription had in mind a particular situation (the notion that you had to keep the ceremonial Law in order to be saved). My circumcision (which, in any event, I did not choose) has nothing to do with that. It was just standard medical procedure in the late 50s and had no religious significance. It was not ordered toward the Catholic faith at all. For similar reasons, the Church does not (and indeed cannot) "anathematize" people who were born outside the Catholic communion. Anathema was an extreme disciplinary measure which said to the Catholic who was rejecting communion with the Catholic Church "You have rejected communion with the Catholic Church". It does not "damn you to hell". Only God can damn people.

People who are hung up on Trent need to read the Decree on Ecumenism from Vatican II. And if they are tempted to think Trent and V2 are contradicting each other, they need to read... my next article in This Rock. :)

Arsebishop has a powerful point, but not about the people I was discussing

He writes concerning my observations about Protestants who talk a good game about "faith alone" but then live in ways explicable only by Catholic theology:

Mark Shea has it backwards I am afraid.

No sound thinker takes salvation by faith alone literally. However, I think that the American de facto religion is antinomianism for me, but not for thee. The great wonderful me is saved by faith alone without respect to works for me, but no salvation, no forgiveness for "those evil awful people over there" otherwise known as TEAPOTS whoever they are.

This is the religiosity of Bill Keller of the New York Times who believes that God wanted him and his wife to murder his defective unborn child, but waxes indignantly against John Geoghan who would have shown his flaccid wee-wee to a child and Cardinal Law who allowed such a thing to happen. Obviously those two will not escape hellfire for that, no sir!, unlike the warm compassionate me who blessedly took that child out of its misery from a life not worth living.

I agree with Arsebishop that there is something spectacularly... displaced... about a fanatically pro-choice media and culture waxing indignant about the abuse of children while struggling with might and main to see to it that every last parent who wishes to can order a child's brains sucked out. My sense has long been that the more fanatically devoted American chattering class culture becomes to the "right" to murder children for any and all reasons, the more it tends to compensate for its flaming, bloody guilt by heaping bitter and unforgiving contempt on those who happen to commit sins against children that are still socially unacceptable. "See! I care about children. I'm not like that horrible Geoghan. I'm a good person." It is also struggling to alleviate the tension by other means: such as making these other crimes against children socially acceptable (see "Levine, Dr. Judith").

This is not to say that Geoghan's sins aren't heinous. But it is to say that the sins of a man like Keller go a long way toward explaining why his faith "collapsed". It's very... convenient to be able to hate the Church for hurting children while congratulating yourself on your compassion for killing your "boy-like" son.

That said, however, I was not speaking of non-Christians or apostate Catholics in my blog. I was speaking of serious, committed Protestants. Among this group, I've met many who say they believe in salvation by faith alone. I've never met any who, once they are done trotting out the phrase in some sort of "glories of Protestantism" polemic, actually go back to their ordinary lives and live as though they really believe it. They all live as though faith unincarnate in works of love is just a fiction. In short, they live in a way better explained by Catholic theology than by their own. I think that's a good thing, since it shows we're not all that far apart really (despite David Heddle's desperate hopes to the contrary).

"Everybody loved Father Brian" or "Why VOTF is Overlooking Some Important Problems with the Laity"

Excellent. A blow struck for subsidiarity
Theological Buzzword Significant Learning Opportunity Moment: Catholic doctrine, as we should all know by now, has an amazing genius for taking really nifty, common sense insights and wrapping them up in forbidding, Latinate terminology that confuses people for centuries. "Merit" is one such term (see my discussion of it here). The one thing everybody thinks it means ("Extra stuff you have to do to make up for Jesus' inadequate efforts on the cross") is what it does not mean. Same with "sacred Tradition" (which doesn't mean "stuff we dreamed up over the centuries and arbitrarily decided to make everybody believe.") Similiarly, "subsidiarity" is one those baffling terms that Protestants figure Catholics coin just to sound impressive. Actually, it's quite sensible and something most people believe: namely, don't centralize everything in some giant, lumbering, inefficient, uber-bureaucracy. Let the people closest to the problem, handle the problem. Everybody (except the Department of Education) agrees with this. So, though a World Court sounds really cool to some people, (the sort who think that centralization is Where It's At and who were enthused by Stalin's willingness to break eggs to make omelettes), the Catholic (and human) instinct is to de-centralize and let local people handle local problems locally. It's not perfect, but it's much better than centralization.

This is, by the way, what informs Catholic ecclesiology too, which is why Rome is not (contrary to popular belief) the Vast All-Controlling Octopus Treating Bishops Around the World as Puppets while the Pope Micromanages All Behind the Scenes. Some Popes have, to be sure, been more micromanaging than others. But this Pope, in particular, takes seriously the reality that the local bishop is, in fact, the head of the Church in his diocese. The disadvantages of that, we have seen. Freedom abused is a nasty thing. All of a sudden, everybody who was complaining that the Pope is trying to get into our bedroom before starts demanding that the Pope post a Helvetian guard in every rectory bedroom in the world.

But that's not how it works. The local bishop is supposed to govern his diocese, not act as Papal puppet while the Pope decides what color the drapes should be in the parish coffee room. What is to be done when the local bishop fails in this task is a matter for much debate. But massively centralizing the Church is just not going to happen. Neither, I hope, will massively centralizing World Government anytime soon. Happily, Europeans are behind the push for a World Court, and their reputation for efficiency that can only be described as, well, "european" fills me with hope that the World Court will soon achieve the sort of power and prestige that the League of Nations wielded.

To recap: Subsidiarity means (surprise!) that the hierarchical, medieval, monarchical Catholic faith is actually quite amenable to democracy. It means, as Chesterton said, that "the democratic contention is that government (helping to rule the tribe) is a thing like falling in love, and not a thing like dropping into poetry. It is not something analogous to playing the church organ, painting on vellum, discovering the North Pole (that insidious habit), looping the loop, being Astronomer Royal, and so on. For these things we do not wish a man to do at all unless he does them well. It is, on the contrary, a thing analogous to writing one's own love-letters or blowing one's own nose. These things we want a man to do for himself, even if he does them badly." There are, of course, paradoxes here I don't have time to explore. But I thought you'd like to know about this.

Jonah Goldberg is always funny. But he's really funny when he writes about Al Gore

Kairos' interesting prescription for the Situation

Boy! Those Saudis look better and better every day.
A fetching combination of the worst in First and Third World cultures.

Victims of Stockholm Syndrome Don't Merely Identify with their Kidnappers
they also fight against their rescuers.
And funniest of all, they think they are being "open-minded". VOTF: Voice of the Fuddled

I'm not from a Reformed background
And so many things that seem immensely compelling to Reformed people as arguments for or against the Catholic faith simply have no impact on me or else strike me as gigantically inconsequential. Perhaps pre-eminent among these arguments is the issue which a certain species of Protestant seems to think "the article upon which the Faith stands or falls": salvation by "faith alone". I've never met a living soul who really believes in salvation by faith alone. It's a phrase that get hauled out of mothballs for arguments with Catholics, but as soon as the Catholics are gone, normal Protestants go right back to saying things like "Work out your salvation with fear and trembling", "Faith is a muscle. You have to exercise it" and "Faith without works is dead" and all the normal stuff that both Catholics and Protestants believe. I wrote a piece about this once. I think most "faith alone" jargon is a fine example of eupocrisy in that most Protestants really believe pretty much what Catholics do: that we are saved by the Father through the Son, in the power of the Holy Spirit, by faith expressing itself in concrete works of love. Take anything out of that formula and you have less than the biblical picture. Most Protestants know and live this. So I don't worry about the "faith alone" sloganeering so long as they don't take it seriously. For an interesting take on how Reformed theology can be reconciled with Catholic thought, see my friend James Akin's Tiptoe through TULIP.

Some advice for the liturgical musician in your life

Cheeky Brits

A good piece on the Narcotic of Secrecy

A jolting surprise for Fortress Catholics
Over at HMS Blog I'm holding forth on the weirdness of monotheists claiming that Muslims or whoever worship "another god" when the reality is, there is no other God. There's just the One God. He's it. He's all. We can have wrong or incomplete ideas about him as Muslims do. We can worship figments of our imagination or trees and penguins (as pagans do). We can worship the Universe or sex or power (as atheists typically do, since atheism is simply the name people put to worshipping some created good instead of the Creator). But there are no other gods, just the One God and various creatures. If you worship a creature, you are an idolator. If you worship the One God, but have inadequate or wrong ideas about him, you are still, in some sense, worshipping the One God. The Church has always acknowledged this. It does not thereby pretend "We're all saying the same thing." But neither does it pretend we have nothing in common with other forms of monotheism. This irritates the Lidless Eye of Reactionaries who insist that the Council was wrong to say Muslims also worship the God of Abraham and that this was a novelty unheard of before the Council.

Now Pete Vere weighs in with this startling bit of info showing that the doctrines informing the Second Vatican Council's views of non-Christian religions are, shazam, not new. Pete notes: "Among Dom Basile's interesting discoveries is a letter from a Mideival Roman Pontiff to a Muslim Cailiff expressing the notition that Christians and Muslims worship the same God."

The historic pattern
One of the periodic patterns of the Church is that decapitation tends to bring out lay gifts. In the early Church, decapitation tended to be furnished by the pagan authorities, who knew perfectly well that the Faith is inherently hierarchical and so tended to go after bishops and priests. Then, lay people had to muddle through and use the gifts they had. Early Christians, being sensible, did not view this as a good thing or as "liberating". They viewed it as a form of martyrdom. Just as a blind man's other senses may become more keen to compensate for the loss, so the hobbled Body of Christ did what it could with what it had till the ordained office was restored and life could get back to sacramental normality. At other times, the Church has been decapitated by corruption (it was, for instance, a bishop who put St. Joan of Arc to death) and again, reform has sometimes come from non-ordained people (like St. Catherine of Siena). But again, the sensible Catholic saw this, not as a chance to grab power and remake the Church in his own image, but as a cross to bear till the Church was healed.

This is one of the reasons Voice of the Faithful strikes me as, well, extremely ill-informed. They primarily conceive of the Church in just the way their betrayers do: as a nexus of power to be scrabbled over and fought for in order to achieve domination. They do not conceive of the pastoral office as one of service but of domination. So the goal of course is to seize it, the better to dominate the Church in the service of their particular agenda.

I can certainly understand the anger at priests who have failed to grasp that their office is about sacrificial self-donation. What I can't grasp is laypeople, betrayed by such priests, concluding from their betrayal that what we need is for laity to be just as a Darwinian in their approach to life as our worst priests have been. Real reform movements have to learn from the early Church and see that the goal is sacrificial self-donation (and use of all gifts toward that end) and not yet another warmed-over Marxist class warfare dialectic.

Thanks for the cc's, but no thanks
People are cc'ing me on their correspondence to bishops, priests, whoever. I appreciate the thought, but your correspondence is none of my business and I have lots of correspondence of my own to read. Please leave me off the cc list. Thanks!

New Blog!

Catholics Continue to Lead the Way in Good Works and Social Justice
HMS Blog has launched a new initiative for the public welfare: St. Blog's Institute for the Criminally Insane. For news on this and the results of Pete Vere's psychological surgery, go there.

David Alexander is having a lot of fun
over at the VOTF message board. Stuck a link to this blog's reflections on VOTF and the Stockholm Syndrome many VOTF members are suffering from. Much excitement. I hope we get a large contingent of David Alexanders joining VOTF and using their wit, understanding of the faith, and persuasiveness to wrench control of VOTF from the those suffering from Stockholm Syndrome. More of him and faithful Catholics like him could actually make the group something that was about real reform and not merely another daffy group wishing to transform the Faith into the image and likeness of a unitarian committee on spelling reform. Why his nemesis in my comments box wants to cede leadership of VOTF to radicals and keep the David Alexanders from steering it back to sanity is beyond me.

Oh goody. I was hoping somebody would chronicle the history of the Cheney Presidency.

Poetry written by an Englishman

Gerard Manley Hopkins, SJ, to be precise:

As king fishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame;
As tumbled over rim in roundy wells
Stones ring; like each tucked string tells, each hung bell's
Bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name;
Each mortal thing does one thing and the same:
Deals out that being indoors each one dwells;
Selves -- goes itself; myself it speaks and spells,
Crying What I do is me: for that I came.

I say more: the just man justices;
Keeps grace: that keeps all his goings graces;
Acts in God's eye what in God's eye he is --
Christ. For Christ plays in ten thousand places,
Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his
To the Father through the features of men's faces.

Just wanted to post this, just because. Praise to God is what we're made for. Righting wrongs and fighting evil, corruption, wickedness and stupidity is just part time work. Most of eternity is going to be spent praising God.

I once wrote a piece about England vs. the UK
England is a place that intimidates Americans. We feel like manure-stomping yahoos in cowboy boots next to the manicured, Shakespearean refinement of the English. But I gotta tell ya, Americans feel like Nobel-prize-winning geniuses next to the Benny-Hill-educated, tabloid-informed, soccer-hooligans-are-our-rising-generation stupidity of UK denizens like George Michael. Nobody is born that stupid. It takes years of training, enculturation and sheer will power.

Wanna help finally stop partial birth abortion after a decade of wussiness from politicos?

Here's a way to strike a blow.

Modern art is crap
Artist: "In a letter to a friend, he explained that his motivation for tinning his faeces was to expose the gullible nature of the art-buying public."
Art-buying fools: "The Manzoni was a very important purchase for an extremely small amount of money (£22,300 or more than the cost of gold per ounce): nobody can deny that," said a spokesman for the gallery. He was an incredibly important international artist."
Artist: "I hope these cans explode in the vitrines of the collectors."

The interplay between pride and contempt in this whole exchange breathes something of the atmosphere of hell, methinks. Screwtape would love it. A "love" between artist and art snob that is indistinguishable from the loathing and carnivorous relationship between the damned.

Bat Ye'or on the Religion of Peace
If I do say so myself, this article makes a wonderful complementary piece to my own observations about the Christian roots of the doctrine of human equality in the July issue of Crisis (which you can read here).

Josh Claybourn holds forth on the World Court

Saw Jaws This Weekend
There's that amazing scene when the mayor urges his lackey and his family to get in the water so that people will follow suit (despite the fact the shark has been munching away). So the terrified family goes out in the water or (as we say today) "the shark will have won". They take their kids. That's what I call "craven capitulation to Happy Talk".

I'm not going anywhere near the Seattle Metro area this Fourth of July. Why? Because I love my family and there are sharks in the water.

They Don't Know What's Killing Them
When a liberal starts to get hysterical, he nearly always fall back on charging an opponent with being stupid. It's all they know how to do. So, of course, here comes Rep. Diane E. Watson, California Democrat" proclaiming President Bush has a low IQ — "of 88." Never mind the abundant evidence of a Texas (and national) political landscape littered the with ruined political careers of those who underestimate the intelligence of W. He's gotta be dumb. It was the same with Reagan. I say: Keep it Rep Watson. As long as you believe your own hype you will continue to be the perfect stooge for a President who continues to be intelligent (just not the sort of intelligence you happen to value) and who will continue to run rings around you. Meanwhile, Rep Watson takes on the things that really matter, like rejecting square dancing as the official California state dance.

Gone for the Weekend
While I'm gone, think about how much you miss me and, in a weepy, impulsive fit of raw sentimentality, say to yourself, "He pours his heart out on that blog and I haven't donated a cent to him or bought a single one of his books! What's the matter with me? Don't I care about his sallow, scrawny children with the dark circles under their eyes? Oh the humanity!" Then click on the little bluish PayPal button in the left hand column and quiet your gnawing conscience by giving a tidy sum to this worthy work. Or, if you prefer, click on one of my book titles (also in the left hand column) and shop till you drop. You'll feel better. Less...guilty. And my children--the pathetic hungry little ones clutching their humble hand-made toys and smiling weakly in gratitude for the smallest favors like the Dickensian little angels they are--will thank you. [sob!]

My latest article on Catholic Exchange
or, "Why secular attempts to pit the US against the gospel are suicidal"

Happy News!
Welcome to the fold, Sen. Brownback and Mr. Morris.

More Problems for Bob Sungenis
In addition to needing a major overhaul in the science department for his advocacy of kooky geocentrism, Bob's appears to need a tune-up in the theology department as well. James Akin finds some rather glaring problems with Bob's book Not by Bread Alone. (Requires Real Audio. Discussion of Not By Bread Alone is found about seven and half minutes into the broadcast.)

Authentic Pagans miffed at Fluff-Brained Pretend Pagans

Those wacky Palestinians
"It was all a joke," says family.

Boy! Veni Sancte Spiritus really doesn't like St. Blog's proofreader
By the way, Anthony, "thin-skinned" is supposed to be hyphenated.

A man pretending to be a bishop is going to pretend to ordain women pretending to be priests
Liberal theology: in touch with reality as ever. Oh, and thanks to Veni Sancte Spiritus for the evocative term "GermChurch".

Vindication for David Alexander

Don't forget to check out his posts to the VOTF Message board. We need a lot more people like him in VOTF. We don't need Fortress Catholic Pharisees saying "He eats with tax collectors and sinners. He is ritually impure."

Gay Apologists Sound More Like Honduran Bishops all the Time

More Culture of Suspicion

A reader laments over my defense of the stupid but not criminal Fr. Jaeger:

I don't understand why Mark Shea is so hot about this priest when I do not think he knows all the facts about this priest. I used to think Cardinal Law was cleaning up Boston when I was there, not spreading the mess.

The facts are that he has done nothing criminal, judging from the public record. Arguing that somebody should have their career destroyed because "we don't know all the facts" is called "arguing from silence". Courts operate on fact, not on silence. If the only facts we have are that Jaeger once did something stupid and has never done it again, then appeals to "what might be in a file somewhere" are pointless. Produce the file, then we can talk. Till then, all we have is the facts: a stupid lack of judgment 24 years ago and no criminal behavior. Shall we start destroying people's lives because, despite the lack of any evidence to show it, they are "probably" guilty of something bad? The principle remains: innocent till proven guilty.

Just when you think you've seen everything...

there's this.

"Deception under the face of virtue" or Romanitas vs. The Culture of Fear and Suspicion

Down below, I linked to a thoroughly innocuous post by David Alexander. In response, a reader sets off a klaxon:

David Alexander is a moderator in for the D.C. Area Voice of the Faithful. Voice of the Faithful is a schismatic group of individuals whose heirarchy include Andrea Johnson of Women's Ordination Conference, Jan Leary from Women's Ordination, Leanord Zwitzer from "We are the Church - who has been invited to write the constitution for Voice of the "Faithful". He is alsoThe list goes on and on of folks who have previously been committee members of Call to Action, Massachusetts WomenChurch and Catholics for free choice.

He talks a good orthodoxy game - but is quite active in "helping" Voice of the Faithful become booming and succesful.

Mr. Paul Baeir - who I pushed to make a public statement on what that meant in terms of the issues in the Catechism, made the following statement:

"VOTF must grow before all policies are clearly established. It is of key importance that more than a few folks in Boston decide VOTF positions, so it may take a while before voting and polling is completed on all issues. The official VOTF positions are on its website. Currently, none of these positions deal explicitly with the catechism, either in fully or partially supporting it. VOTF is, however, clearly committed to representing what the middle 2/3 of mainstream Catholics want"

Posted on their main web page - you will find that it is their intention to "gain power first" than decide on the issues of women's ordination, etc, - apparently by 2/3 vote says Paul Baeir.

David recently posted on the VOTF website that he is looking for a "Seat at the Table".

A seat at the table? Of a schism?

Doesn't pass the sniff test.

All this in response to a Veggie Tales quip. Now, the fact is, I don't know David Alexander. What I can see of his site suggests he's a nice enough chap. What little he's posted says nothing about Call to Action of VOTF. Indeed, one of his few links is to some sort of Trad site. I don't know how my reader has divined all the information about his Secret Life and his Involvement in a Plot to Overthrow the Church.

But I do know this: Assuming (which I don't know) that Alexander is involved in VOTF, I have no idea how this proves him a "deceiver". While I think Voice of the Faithful has a large number of people in it suffering from Stockholm Syndrome, I also think (from what I've read of it) that it has a fair number of honest blokes in it who genuinely seek the good of the Church and who just sort of latched on to it because they want something vaguely called "reform" and VOTF seems to fit the bill. I think such folk are badly mistaken. I don't necessarily buy that they are engaged in "deception under the face of virtue". I also think it quite possible that some faithful Catholics might throw their lot in with VOTF in the hope of steering it away from radicalism and back to the Tradition. This would be an example of Romanitas: "Convert your enemies whenever possible. If you can't convert them, then render them harmless. If you can't render them harmless, destroy them only as a last resort." For all I know, Alexander might be one of these.

My point, instead of instantly writing off David Alexander (are you sure the guy at this blog is the same as the one in DC?) and declaring him an Enemy Mole, it might be a good idea to, oh, I don't know, talk to him? Find out if he's really involved in VOTF (no indication of it on his blog)? If he is, find out why? Romanitas, my friends, romanitas.

Why Palestinian culture is so frickin' sick

Okay, so today Drudge runs this piece: the "baby suicide bomber" photo. Now, I don't know if the photo is legit or not. You can do wonders with Photoshop so there's always the chance the photo was cooked up by Israeli propagandists.

But get this: "Ordinary Palestinians said if the photograph were genuine it was likely the child had been dressed up for fun."

These are people who, just the other day, had photos of children dipping their hands in blood to comemmorate the dismemberment of Israelis by a mob. Is it so very unlikely that photo is a fake when Palestinians themselves acknowledge that this is their idea of fun?

Palestinian Death Cult indeed.

Amazing. Simply Amazing

A reader sez:

The Oregonian reports today that Father Schwab's resignation was accepted by AB Vlazny. Father Schwab is quoted as saying that he "messed up" but is looking forward to going to a new parish. Another parishioner is quoted as saying that he wants Father Schwab to stay because FS was just getting started in "gently" leading them in spiritual truths!

Fr. Schwab, in case you don't know, is the knucklehead who "held a ceremony 18 months ago for a married couple and a single woman where they exchanged rings and then told others that they were married". Then it turned out the happy threesome were (shazam! what a shock) running a child sex ring. My hope is that Fr. Schwab is as mistaken in thinking he will get a new parish as he is about pastoral theology.

New Blog!

People Actually Go to These Things!
One of our liturgical musicians at Blessed S. (a very fine one) went to one of these things--once. She was astounded to hear brow-furrowed Deep Thinkers asking, "What.... [thoughtful pause to indicate 'I'm a Deep Thinker'] is the theme of Advent? What are we trying to say?"

"Theme of Advent?" she replied. "Isn't it obvious? Preparation for the coming of Christ!"

"Yes, yes. I suppose there is that. If you're into being traditional. But what are we as liturgists trying to say? What is our theme? What do we want our parishes to be about?"

She never went back.

A reading from the gospel according to AmChurch Liturgists:

When they had finished breakfast, Liturgist said to Jesus, “Jesus, child of the Heavenly Parent, do you love me more than these?” He said to him, “Yes, Liturgist; you know that I love you.” He said to him, “Feed my ego.” A second time he said to him, “Jesus, child of the Heavenly Parent, do you love me?” He said to him, “Yes, Liturgist; you know that I love you.” He said to him, “Tend to my demands.” He said to him the third time, “Jesus, child of the Heavenly Parent, do you love me?” Jesus was grieved because he said to him the third time, “Do you love me?” And he said to him, “Liturgist, you know everything; you know that I love you.” Liturgist said to him, “Feed my Pride."

The NY Times tries to reassure braying and nervous latte drinkers on the Upper West Side

"This is not a victory for the religious right."

Right. Sounds like Gorbachev assuring everybody that Communism was as strong as ever in 1989.

Memo to the Upper West Side: This was a victory for the Religious Right. It was also a victory for ordinary people who can't afford to send their kids to the schools Chelsea Clinton went to.

Peter Berger observes that if Sweden is the most secular nation in the world and India the most religious one, America is best described as a nation of Indians ruled by Swedes.

The rest of the editorial reads to me like a Swede, explaining to fellow Swedes, why they had better learn to live with this decision (and not get the vapors when the 9th Circus Court is overturned) or else face the possibility of a mob of angry and radicalized Indians who are sick of Swedish rule.

American Judicial System Diagnosed with Multiple Personality Disorder
After a week in which the American Judicial System simultaneously struck down the Pledge of Allegiance for containing the word "God" and then upheld school vouchers allowing parents to use public monies for religious education, authorities from the Institute for Mental Health diagnosed the American Judicial System as suffering from Multiple Personality disorder.

Officials from the Institute were dispatched to the System's home and found it sobbing and laughing uncontrollably. The house was in great disarray with evidence of a wild party everywhere: pizza boxes full of half-eaten pizzas, stereo blasting, furniture overturned. Individuals interviewed at the System's home expressed dismay and confusion over her erratic behavior. A Mr. ACLU complained that "One minute, she's laughing like she's the life of the party. I thought... you know... I was gonna score with her. She was all over me. Said she loved me and wanted me. Next minute, she like freezes up on me and starts jabbering like she's James Dobson's girl. Then, she bursts into hysterics and tells us, 'Court dismissed'. Creepy!"

Officials from the Institute for Mental Health have taken the American Judicial System in for observation. For the most part, she declined comment, except to say, "Feel free to send your kids to religious schools--but don't let them say 'Under God'! AND DON'T STOP CHILD PORN or I'll, I'll.... oh, I'm so happy I could just kill myself!!!"

Boy, this could sure get hairy

"Pllllllpppppppthththth!" I explained
Pete Vere continues to use a lot of words to be wrong about the merits of the Water Buffalo song vs. The Song of the Cebu. As to jurisdiction, we don't go in for four-syllable words here, which is why I am right (and let's not have a lot of logic-chopping about non sequiturs. I'm trying to tell you how I feel, people!). "Cebu" is a good two syllable word, plus, it's funny. Greg Popcak's nonsensical insertion of a non-Silly Song into the argument is condemned by all right-thinking Veggie fans everywhere. I do, however, grant that I could have been hasty in overlooking "I Love My Lips" (ousta!) in the roster of Greatness.

Bottom line: I'm right. Those who disagree with me are wrong. (Just so we're clear.)

That is all. I, Mark P. Shea, have spoken.

Veggie arguments rage throughout the blogosphere!

Tim Drake provides the Full Meal Deal roundup.

David Alexander recognizes the Things That Really Matter

Rod Dreher on the simplicity of Thinking All The Media Are Out to Get the Church

Isn't blogging great? People can have arguments about stuff they never get to argue about anywhere else!

Rod Dreher writes:

I can think of several cases right now, sitting here at my computer, of newspapers and other media outlets declining to pursue priest sex abuse stories, even to this day, because clergy sex with kids is emphatically not a story most editors want to deal with. It's ugly, and it's very easy to open yourself up to charges of anti-Catholic bias. I myself was pulled off a story last summer at the New York Post, when I was finally starting to uncover some serious problems at a parish in the Bronx. I was told one day, without explanation, to find something else to write about. I have been told by two independent sources in a position to know that the Archdiocese of New York put a lot of pressure on the Post's top brass to get me to back down. Contrary to what paranoid right-wing Catholics think, media bosses are really sensitive about this kind of thing. I'm not sure what kind of decision was made at the top level to get me off the story, but I am certain the people above me thought they were doing the right thing. Look, why do you think the Los Angeles Times, with the exception of columnist Steve Lopez, has been so derelict in its coverage of Mahony? Remember the leaked Mahony e-mail, which revealed that the Times' religion reporter is in Mahony's pocket (or at least that was Mahony's impression)? When I was in Dallas, a network reporter told me she was ordered from the very top of her news division to stay away from the homosexual angle in her reporting. Last fall, an orthodox Catholic friend of mine was pleading with a friend of hers, another network reporter, to do something on this Church child-abuse scandal (the reporter had great information on a case, but was reluctant to pursue it). The reporter declined to, in the end, because in the reporter's view, it wasn't worth the hassle they would get from people calling the network anti-Catholic. It is certainly true that most secular reporters are woefully ignorant of Catholic teaching, and do have a bias against Catholicism, and Christianity in general. But in the matter of this sex scandal, the Boston Globe and other media have been a far greater friend to the faithful than the bishops, and most of the Catholic media.

New Catholic CD!

Oh, for dumb!

Apologies to Tom Hoopes. I completely misread the line I quoted from his piece. Therefore I deleted my blog on his article that was below. Here is a letter from Tom:

Yipes! "I swear ... if I didn't know that this crisis wasn't the product of media manipulation, I'd be tempted to believe that this crisis was simply the product of media smoke and mirrors" becomes, in your blog, "According to the Hoopes, it turns out the Situation is "the product of media manipulation."

That's blog manipulation.

[Shea's note: Not quite. Just reading too fast.]

Here's what I really feel about the Situation: the bishops have been allowing men with tendencies toward sexual sins to get ordained, and they need to stop it. BUT ...

The Associated Press sent out its reporters to every diocese and counted up all the charges of priests' misconduct of any kind with minors and came up with ... less than one half of 1% of priests.

I don't know of anybody who's been saying there's an epidemic of abusive priests. Certainly no blogger I know says this and I would call anybody a fool who says there is some mythical massive outbreak of abusive priests. The numbers I've heard are around 200 or so out of a pool of 47,000. So this is a red herring. The problem (which I'm afraid you are brushing past with a quick nod) is the bishops who have dealt with this small number so terribly, terribly irresponsibly and who would not, but for the press, have *ever* been called to account. That's just the facts, Tom.

A) I agree that even that is far, far too many, and, as I said, the bishops can stop more of it ...

The bishops can also do a much more credible job of taking responsibility for their sins and not, as for instance, Cardinal Mahony has, go around telling the press that they were champions of "zero tolerance" for a decade when it is a matter of public record that they were putting abusers in charge of their cathedrals and only cutting them loose when the media turned their scrutiny on them.

B) But it isn't the huge scandal that's the worst thing since the Reformation that everyone's pretending it is. Abortion by Catholics is a far bigger scandal, and the biggest scandal of all is the abandonment of the sacrament of Confession (as the Pope's letter to priests, which every one pooh-poohed, said so eloquently). One means killing kids; the other means killing souls.

C) And I, for one, am not going to play the game that pretends that these few freaky priests (the Associated Press admits that you have to count cases going back decades to get even half of 1%) are the Big Problem Today while the communion lines lengthen and the confessional lines disappear and few are they who dare say a word about contraception.

Basic rule of confession: confess our own sins, not somebody elses. Again, I don't care about "rate the magnitude" games. So what if the Scandal is not as big as the Reformation? So what if abortion is a bigger issue? I agree that it is and that the neglect of confession is very bad. But so what? The sins of a considerable number of bishops are so grave and their betrayals so shocking that they have managed to render the Church in the United States a mute moral voice in addressing these grave problems. *I* listen to what they are saying when they articulate the Tradition because I know that when they do so, they are not speaking with their own--often pathetic--moral authority, but with the voice of Christ. So do all orthodox Catholics. But yer average ill-catechized, TV-suckled, clueless Catholic (and still less you average non-Catholic) doesn't know this (partly because of the miserable catechesis they have received from the bishops). All he knows is "Why should I care what a bunch of pervert protectors think?" Sorry. But that's what life in the trenches is like for most of us lay Catholics who are trying to answer the question "why be a Catholic?" The bishops have made the task of evangelization a whole lot harder. And when we say, in their defense, "Well, at least they aren't abortionists" that is not what I would call a ringing affirmation of their moral authority. So instead of pointing to other people's sins, we in the Catholic press should lay blame where blame is due when we speak of this matter. It's the bishops who are, by Bp. Gregory's own admission, the primary engine of this Scandal. And when they ask Clinton's lawyer to keep them honest, they do not inspire confidence that they are capable of or serious about learning how to do their office properly so as to avoid future problems.

D) Also: since you said you like Tom Hoopes I should mention that I like Mark Shea. Top-notch. We need more like him.Keep up the good work.

From the Apostles at Gethsemane to the Galatian and Corinthian presbyters, from the time of Tertullian and Origen to the time of Luther, from the sacking of Constantinople to culture of death America, God help us, the Church has been ruled by sinners. And thank you, God, for helping us. As for me and my household, we defend the Church -- not a magical mystery Church, but the visible one that's endured it all.

Thanks for your kind words. The same to you too. We both wish to defend the Church and that's a huge thing that separates us from those who earnestly wish to destroy her. Thanks for being on the side of the angels. And again, apologies for misreading you.

More abuse that has nothing whatever to do with homosexuality
This time from lesbian nuns. But the homosexual subculture is the paragon of health.

No. Really.

On the other hand...

I gotta hand it to the National Catholic Register for this, yet another bit of evidence that all is not well with the book Goodbye, Good Men. Yes, I know it would be wonderful thing to just accept without question all the damning charges in the book and fling it over the transom of every bishop's office in the country with a note saying, "Read this and fix it." But you know, the more I see about the methodology this book appears to employ and the more I look at how those who question it are answered by Rose, the queasier I get about it. I freely acknowledge that I speak from ignorance (I haven't read it myself). I also haven't read Worlds in Collision by Immanuel Velikovsky. But the critiques of it still persuade me that my time might be better employed reading something else. Similarly, I am unsettled by the pattern of criticism (which seems pretty sound) and the numerous reports (and evidence from his own writing) of a remarkably thin skin on the part of Mr. Rose. I could be wrong, but I am starting to have my doubts about the wisdom of using this book as Exhibit A if you are going to be writing to your bishop or Rome. If you do, I would at least be careful and get independent verification that whatever charge you are pointing to in the book is reflective of reality. The last thing we need are half-cocked witch hunts.

Thanks 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals!

This is just the sort of stupid exasperating judgment that could get people galvanized enough to support Bush judicial nominees and unclog the blockages that guys like Daschle have tried to create while we were all paying attention to other stuff. I sincerely hope our Robed Masters find that this typical example of judicial tyranny comes back to bite them on the derrierre. (And on a happy note, remember that the 9th is the most overruled court in the nation). Josh Claybourn muses along similar lines. The US judicial system: Stamping out democracy and protecting child porn is our specialty!

And Tim Drake is all wet

Pete Vere is a heretic

From Tedious Bowdlerizers to Cash Cows to Impotent Shadows

Fr. Rob Johansen on the happy news of the downfall of ICEL (with excursuses on the translation of Latin and other nifty side notes).

Anti-Semitic Drivel Alert

Somebody comments below :

The killing of Christ by the Jews continues - every day in every way. Nothing has changed in 2000 years. Don't you get it?

No, I don't get it. My friend, Rabbi Daniel Lapin put me on his radio show several times so I can hold forth on Catholic teaching about this and that. Doesn't strike me as an act of murder. Michael Medved staunchly defends Christians, including Catholics, from cultured despisers of all stripes. Not much of a Christ-killer, if you ask me. Toward Tradition bends over backwards to forge alliances with Christians and defend them from unjust attacks by the Chattering Classes. If they are trying to murder Christ, all I can say is they sure are inept at it.

Dunno if my Jew-baiting reader is Catholic or not. If not, repent and become one, if for no other reason than whoever is teaching you now is a moron. If you are Catholic, then learn the teaching of the Church from the Catechism of the Catholic Church:

596 The religious authorities in Jerusalem were not unanimous about what stance to take towards Jesus.[380] The Pharisees threatened to excommunicate his followers.[381] To those who feared that "everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will come and destroy both our holy place and our nation", the high priest Caiaphas replied by prophesying: "It is expedient for you that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation should not perish."[382] The Sanhedrin, having declared Jesus deserving of death as a blasphemer but having lost the right to put anyone to death, hands him over to the Romans, accusing him of political revolt, a charge that puts him in the same category as Barabbas who had been accused of sedition.[383] The chief priests also threatened Pilate politically so that he would condemn Jesus to death.[384]
Jews are not collectively responsible for Jesus' death

597 The historical complexity of Jesus' trial is apparent in the Gospel accounts. The personal sin of the participants (Judas, the Sanhedrin, Pilate) is known to God alone. Hence we cannot lay responsibility for the trial on the Jews in Jerusalem as a whole, despite the outcry of a manipulated crowd and the global reproaches contained in the apostles' calls to conversion after Pentecost.[385] Jesus himself, in forgiving them on the cross, and Peter in following suit, both accept "the ignorance" of the Jews of Jerusalem and even of their leaders.[386] Still less can we extend responsibility to other Jews of different times and places, based merely on the crowd's cry: "His blood be on us and on our children!", a formula for ratifying a judicial sentence.[387] As the Church declared at the Second Vatican Council: . . . neither all Jews indiscriminately at that time, nor Jews today, can be charged with the crimes committed during his Passion. . . the Jews should not be spoken of as rejected or accursed as if this followed from holy Scripture.[388]
All sinners were the authors of Christ's Passion

598 In her Magisterial teaching of the faith and in the witness of her saints, the Church has never forgotten that "sinners were the authors and the ministers of all the sufferings that the divine Redeemer endured."[389] Taking into account the fact that our sins affect Christ himself,[390] the Church does not hesitate to impute to Christians the gravest responsibility for the torments inflicted upon Jesus, a responsibility with which they have all too often burdened the Jews alone:
We must regard as guilty all those who continue to relapse into their sins. Since our sins made the Lord Christ suffer the torment of the cross, those who plunge themselves into disorders and crimes crucify the Son of God anew in their hearts (for he is in them) and hold him up to contempt. And it can be seen that our crime in this case is greater in us than in the Jews. As for them, according to the witness of the Apostle, "None of the rulers of this age understood this; for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory." We, however, profess to know him. And when we deny him by our deeds, we in some way seem to lay violent hands on him.[391]
Nor did demons crucify him; it is you who have crucified him and crucify him still, when you delight in your vices and sins.[392]

Catholics who try to stick the blame for the Passion of our Lord on "the Jews" are saying, in effect, "It wasn't because of me Jesus died." This constitutes a denial of baptism and would be a most embarrassing thing to be found saying at the Pearly Gates. I wouldn't be surprised if you catch hell for it--literally.

In case you haven't caught my drift, anti-semitism is not welcome here. Anti-semites are, just so long as they drop their ignorant prejudices and come to learn and live what the Church teaches. Otherwise, buzz off.

A reader thinks there is a "biblical admonition"...

"separate from this sin-rent world. (By removing their children from the public schools, getting rid of their TVs, breaking off all ecumenical garbage with abortion and sodomy loving "churches", etc.)".

He also concludes that "Reagan was wrong -- America is the focus of evil in the modern world."

Ah the refeshment of simplistic thinking. Yes, there is a biblical admonition to "come out from them and be separate". There is also a biblical admonition to "Go out into the world". The basic balance is "be in the world but not of it". Just how that is to be accomplished is not a simple matter. And simplistic formulae which may work in one situation may not apply in another. So simply "getting rid of your TV" or "pulling your kids from public schools" may or may not be ways to be in the world and not of it. My own son is in public school for high school after a long and fruitful homeschool career. He's doing quite well thanks. And he brings kids to Mass and does youth ministry. Shall I stop him in order to conform with my reader's definition of "separation"? Likewise, we have a video player (no connection to the sewage from the networks). Are we compromised for watching old movies from the library? And shall I cease all contact with Mike Hardy (with whom I flatly disagree) in order to be pure? Indeed, shall I start screaming during Mass that all homosexuals in the communion line should get lost? How does one implement this easy recommendation of my reader's?

Puritanism worked when there were new continents to discover and you could go off by yourself and restart the Church full of confidence that, this time, you'd get it right. We're fresh out of new continents and the heirs of the Puritans turn out to be Unitarians and Bostonians, who inherited the smug conviction that they could do it better than their fathers, though not their fathers' faith in Jesus Christ. For myself, I've been Protestant, thanks. I think the way to help the Church is to stay with the Church and bear the Cross, not hive off and start something else. Yes, we have to get the world out of the Church. But no, we must not get the Church out of the world.

Nor do we have to make simplistic choices like "America or the Islamic world: which is really evil?" Both have serious problems because both are fallen: we want to clone and abort. They want to reduce the world to theocratic concentration camp. Both can, by the grace of Christ, display the glory of God. Sorry, but life's complicated.

Josh Claybourn has some End Times musings
... and asks for my commentary. None to give really. You can put my eschatological theorizing in a thimble if you are asking "What happens next?" I'm no seer and so have nothing to offer on the headlines, the future of Israel, red heifers, Temple rebuilding, One World Governments, bar codes, the EU and all the normal staple of such fanciful speculation. The Catechism tells us the basic structure of what to expect from history in the long run:

675 Before Christ's second coming the Church must pass through a final trial that will shake the faith of many believers.[573] The persecution that accompanies her pilgrimage on earth[574] will unveil the "mystery of iniquity" in the form of a religious deception offering men an apparent solution to their problems at the price of apostasy from the truth. The supreme religious deception is that of the Antichrist, a pseudo-messianism by which man glorifies himself in place of God and of his Messiah come in the flesh.[575]

676 The Antichrist's deception already begins to take shape in the world every time the claim is made to realize within history that messianic hope which can only be realized beyond history through the eschatological judgement. The Church has rejected even modified forms of this falsification of the kingdom to come under the name of millenarianism,[576] especially the "intrinsically perverse" political form of a secular messianism.[577]

677 The Church will enter the glory of the kingdom only through this final Passover, when she will follow her Lord in his death and Resurrection.[578] The kingdom will be fulfilled, then, not by a historic triumph of the Church through a progressive ascendancy, but only by God's victory over the final unleashing of evil, which will cause his Bride to come down from heaven.[579] God's triumph over the revolt of evil will take the form of the Last Judgement after the final cosmic upheaval of this passing world.[580]

So, everyday in every way, the world will not be getting better and better. History is coming to climax, but it is the climax of conflict between Christ and anti-christ, not the Great Rosy Dawn When Things All Work Out Around a UN Negotiation Table. At the same time, the coming (and present) trial through which the saints go is positively busting with hope. But it is a hope for eternal, not temporal glory. Pagans (see "St. Joan of Arc parish in the St. Paul Archdiocese") are happy about small things but sad about huge ones. They have little victories in their little power struggles, telling the Pope to stick it in his ear because they are going to include Anne Morrow Lindbergh in the readings. But in the big things, they are hopeless because don't really believe in eternal redemption, but in a sort of watery Marxism that locates all real things in this world, when this world is merely a prelude to the Real World. Christians are sad about small things but joyful about cosmic ones. And the joy even spills over onto the small sadnesses. This whole Situation, full of pain as it is, remains in the long run, an occasion of glory like every other cross the Church has carried. Because in the long run nothing can defeat the Church. It is animated by eternal life and everything that the devil flings at her just makes her stronger. Plus, she knows a huge secret:

The worst thing that can ever happen has already happened. The coming conflict with antichrist is small beer compared to what happened on Calvary 2000 years ago. Mop-up efforts.

A lot of people naturally want to get a Catholic take on the book of Revelation at times like these. For that, I would recommend a study of Revelation Scott Hahn and I did a while back on Catholic Exchange. I think Scott's take on Revelation is simply the best there is to be had anywhere. Check it out.

Another crie de coeur from the trenches

Oregonian front pages news today - Baker Archdiocese, old charges, dead priest, but everything is documented. 14 men are coming forward. Damning documentation.

If I had a blog page I'd call it "Catholic and Bearing With It...For Now."

The scandal at St. Anthony's is still swirling here...the priest who blessed a threesome. I had a long talk with my good priest, (we all think our priest is the BEST) and he remarked at how difficult things were financially. I had a call from our maintenance man at our parish, remember our parish is huge and we are in Intel-land (which means stock options are worthless today), but anyhow....our maintenance man is not getting paid. Our pastor said we can't afford it. I asked the good Father how bad things are and he said "Beddy bad". (He is from Mexico).

Something that I find as scandalous as renegade and uncelibate priests and old-boy network bishops is parishes who excuse the behavior of their errant priests and want them back. St. Anthony's is in danger of going this way...as published accounts quote parishioners as saying how much they LOVE Father Schwab and want him to stay. I am at a loss.

Eucharist, Adoration are my links to sanity.

In Christ, who will explain this whole thing to us someday

I agree Fr. Schwab should not be a pastor. What about Jaeger? Jaeger's act is highly ambiguous (chummy gesture in a campground setting conducive to chummy gestures) and isolated (it happened twice 24 years ago with nothing else on the record to suggest abuse). Fr. Schwab's stupid act was pure, premeditated pastoral cowardice. I don't know that he should be barred from ministry. But he obviously does not have what it takes to run a parish. Let him say mass in an old folks home or something. Jaeger, for that matter, should also say mass at an old folks home too. Some place where people are too deaf to hear his heterodox subversions of the Faith.

I hope I'm making it clear I don't support the subversion by men like Jaeger. I simply wish to point out that if the Policy is transformed into a tool for removing people on ideological grounds while ostensibly removing them for "abuse" then it will certainly be used to remove people for their orthodoxy and will bury them under everlasting scorn as it does so. If people are to be removed for heterodoxy and pastoral stupidity, then let us say so clearly. Let us not remove them for these reasons and say we are removing them for "abuse" or we just add another layer of mendacity to the Situation. We also lay the Church open to further persecution of the faithful on flimsy charges of "abuse".

Peter Shea is seven today!
Everything is wonderful and amazing! Swim goggles, snorkel, swim fins, Legos, and Star Wars toys are all revelations of wonder and gifts beyond deserving! Friends coming over are a miraculous blessing! Bedtime stories about Sindbad are glorious! Bibles stories are stupendous! Chasing and wrestling games are the peak of joy! Hitting a softball is a world-historical achievement worthy of celebration in verse! Cake and ice cream taste so very good!

It's great to be seven!

And while Fr. Jaeger is hung out to dry, Cardinal Mahony asks "How's my hair?" and positions himself for years more adulation as a Great Reformer
The genius of narrowly defined Zero Tolerance: it provides the comforting illusion that something is being done, while excusing principal culprits from facing the music.

A parishioner in the St. Paul Archdiocese objects

A reader writes:

I read with more than a little interest the comments of the writer who gave a defense of Archbishop Flynn. In particular, I noticed the claim that the Archbishop, in assigning priests, would attempt to reaffirm orthodoxy: "...a parish which lost a truly Catholic priest through death or retirement was provided with a replacement of the same caliber." Huh? I am a member of the largest parish in the St. Paul/ Minneapolis diocese, Epiphany parish in Coon Rapids. Our founder pastor, Fr. Rieser, was retired recently. This had been a wonderfully vibrant and orthodox parish---until now. The Archbishop sent us a new pastor whose past assignments included St. Joan of Arc's and St. William's churches, parishes not known for their orthodoxy. A "discernment" process was set into motion, wherein several liberal theologians preached to us about Community. Community is God. We are Community! Needless to say, this didn't go over very well, and heated exchanges were the result of these meetings. So our new pastor then cancelled the remaining session which was to be open to the parish. Now it's to be closed meetings by a select few, and I mean select. No orthodox need apply. Our Rosary group, which used to say the Rosary in the church before Mass, has now been banished to the chapel. The St. Michael's prayer that we used to recite at the end of Mass has been dropped, as our new pastor thinks it is "too dour". (All that silly old-fashioned stuff about Satan, I guess...) Our Teen Masses have incorporated liturgical abuses that we were told were approved by the Archbishop, though our pastor won't let us see the letter that does so. This all when we were told that no changes would be made until this "discernment" process was finished.

In short, when our priest was retired, we asked, and hoped, that the diocese would send us someone who would be holy, orthodox, and would live on site. I will not presume to question our new priest's holiness, but I will question his orthodoxy, and he doesn't live on site and has requested that our new parochial vicar ( a young and orthodox priest) not live on site either. Thanks, Archbishop!! Way to go!!

Zero Tolerance absurdities
There's been much argument against my (reluctant) defense of the irritating and evidently clueless Fr. Jaeger, but nothing that really answers the basic questions, "Since when is being stupid a crime?" and "Is it really just to destroy a man's entire career for something as trivial as his highly ambiguous offense?" Sorry, but if he's a Dignity priest that doesn't cut it. Nor does the fact that the archdiocese settled. Nor does the fact that they kept an eye on him (proving thereby that he hasn't done anything). Nor does the notion that it "suggests" something. Not one of these things would be sufficient to prove anything. So it seems to basically come down to "I dislike him because of something he did a long time ago" and "He's heterodox". And on this flimsy basis, a man's life is to be destroyed?

Orthodox Catholics had better be particularly wary of enshrining this way of enacting the Policy in practice, because it will come back to bite them on the butt. It will basically transform the policy into a tool for getting rid of priests the bishop doesn't like on the flimsiest of "He made me uncomfortable" grounds (and heaping everlasting disgrace on them to boot) when their real crime was "being orthodox" or failing to get with the bishop's program of Weaklandizing the Church in their diocese.

Fr. Rob Johansen has some sage things to say about Romanitas, Milwaukee, and Making Haste Slowly

Me, I wanna know more about Vox Clara. Is the long hegemony of ICEL (the International Commission on English in the Liturgy) finally to come to an end? It would be nice to know what the Mass actually says and not just what the bowdlerizers at ICEL would like me to think it means. I'd love a Mass that actually reflected the Latin original so that, for instance, "Ite, missa est" was translated "Go! You are sent!" (which is what it means) and not "The mass is ended. Go in peace" (a sort of Mr. Rogersization that conveys none of the missionary fire that should inform our being sent just as the Apostles were in Matthew 28.).

C'mon, Fr. Rob. Tell us more. What's Vox Clara. When do we get a good translation of the Mass? Also, if you could tell me who will win the World Series this year, that would be good.

Speaking of Huge Pop Culture Phenomena You've Never Heard of

Now that TIME has finally gotten around to hearing of the dumb Left Behind books, it could be just a matter of time before they hear about a truly worthwhile Evangelical endeavor, the magnificent work of Phil Vischer and Mike Nawrocki known as Veggie Tales! (YAY!) I love these things and they just get funnier with each new addition. And now, I have discovered that two friends of mine--professional musicians who are fellow parishioners here in Seattle--got to play in the orchestra that scored the most ambitious Veggie Tales project yet: a feature length film titled Jonah. Their advance word is "Terrific" (You get to watch the film while you are recording the score.) I tingle with anticipation.

The Peoples' Democratic Republic of Massachusetts or
"Why the Church Cannot Afford to Get Weaker"

Zero Tolerance and the Case of Fr. Jaeger

Fr. Jaeger is in the news in Seattle still. Gave a rubdown to a some kids at camp a couple of times 24 years ago and ten years later one or two of them decided this was abuse. He's been eyed by the diocese for a decade or so (after the Rudy Kos thing and some trouble here in Seattle in the late 80s resulted in Raised Consciousness for the archdiocese) and is now being yanked from ministry, apparently.

Now, it irks me to have to speak a word of defense for Fr. Jaeger because everything I know about the guy tells me he would irritate the hell out of me. I have little doubt that his life's work has involved advancing, in whatever ways possible, an agenda of dissent from the Church's teaching--particularly about matters sexual. There's a lot of these guys in Seattle. I doubt not a bit that all the frustration and exasperation my friend at Blessed Sacrament felt would have been felt by me if I'd been there to hear Fr. Jaeger speak.

But you know, I have to ask: Is it really just to sacrifice a guy on the altar of Zero Tolerance because he once gave a rubdown to a some kids at camp (the majority of whom don't seem to have regarded themselves as abused in any way)? Especially since nothing like it has ever happened again and we see no evidence of "pattern of abuse", merely an imprudent action a quarter of a century ago?

This is what bugs me about Zero Tolerance. It seems like a great idea on paper, but then you run into situations like this and every problem is dealt with on a black and white basis: a basis that appears to me to crucify people for relatively minor things while turning a blind eye to much more serious matters of neglect and betrayal (such as Fr. Cloherty's betrayal ) which don't happen to constitute "abuse" as narrowly defined by the Policy.

Happy in Milwaukee

A reader from the Land of Cheese writes concerning Abp. Timothy Dolan, the guy replacing Rembert Weakland:

Just got through listening to the press conference. Dolan is so different from Weakland. I think that there will be change, and that the Church here in Milwaukee will heal (although the medicine is not going to be pleasant for a lot of people).

So far, I'm seeing lotsa positive feedback on Abp. Dolan. May God heal his Church.

A vote of thanks for Peter Singer

A friend of mine used to be deeply grateful that Jack Kevorkian was the Face of Euthanasia since he showed so clearly what creepy sinister people are behind it. A reader now writes in the same vein to thank God for Peter Singer and the invaluable work he does in making his philosophy look ridiculous:

As much as I find Peter Singer's opinions abhorrent, I must say that I am grateful to him. He has taken one of the Zeitgeist's main axioms, i.e., "No sexual pleasure is illicit" and has taken it to its rational, if repugnant, ends. In so doing, he has exposed a number of deep flaws in contemporary moral philosophy, namely:

1) Its automatic rejection of Christian moral norms,
2) Its reflexive dismissal of natural law argumentation,
3) Its insistence that reason alone is sufficient to examine truth,
4) Its slavish conformity to intellectual fashion, in this case, moral relativism, and
5) Its insistence on a historical process that renders old arguments false and new ones true.

All of these elements are in play in Peter Singer's arguments. If you look around, though, you will see others singing from the same score, e.g., Judith Levine.

By contrast, you see the wisdom proclaimed by John Paul II, who upholds the church's teachings on sexual morality and who insists that both Faith and Reason are necessary to find the truth. For me, this is yet another proof that the Holy Father has his heart opened wide to the Holy Spirit.

New book on the way

Servant Books will be releasing a new book next month (edited by Paul Thigpen) called Shaken by Scandals. I contributed an essay. I'll let you know when it's out.

US Treasury Hires Nostradamus to design 20 Dollar bills
Favorite loony quote: "You have to wonder if the government knew about it," Sheryl Draper of Brockport, N.Y., a 30-year-old dental assistant

Somehow this makes me think of Flannery O'Connor

Why Peter Singer is a dangerous dipstick (and why the Princeton Establishment who gave him a prestigious chair are fools)

Dale the Lawyer on the "Palestinian Death Cult"

Dale sez:

The phrase isn't mine (unfortunately), but the term is the only one that fits the area anymore. What else can you say about an asylum populated by the likes of Hamas, Islamic Jihad, the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade and those who love them? BTW, at last count, "those who love them" constitutes the majority of the Palestinian people.

Think about it: what's the difference between Hamas and the Jim Jones Cult? Is it that Hamas has lasted longer, and therefore has the chance to work on an explosive kool-aid belt?

Some try to point to the much-beloved "charitable" work done by the Hamas/IJ/AAMB cultists amongst their fellow Palestinians. But the same can be said for the Branch Davidians, can't it? Folks around Waco generally liked the BDs, who kept pretty much to themselves when they weren't patronizing local businesses.

So, there really isn't much difference between the Palestinian terror cults and the Western variety, except that the latter tend to take far fewer outsiders with them when they kill. In all honesty, Islamic Jihad is just the Manson Family with Semtex. And our assiduously fair media still insists on calling the whole sack of evil lunatics "militants." Boggling.

Some scenes involving cult activity:

Including this poor brainwashed little girl:

And this walking, talking pile of pig crap that calls himself Dr. Attalah Hana, the spokesman for the Orthodox Church in Jerusalem:

Here's a break (mostly), the brilliant column by James Lileks, with the heartbreaking photograph of one of the evil bastards' victims at the end:

The Palestinians want their own state? Ha. After two years of indiscriminate butchery by Palestinians, I wouldn't trust them with a lemonade stand.

------------------------
Was on vacation for a week and a half, hence no line-dropping. No internet, and only (5) broadcast channels to choose from at the lake-front cabin. Plus, the pontoon boat didn't have a fridge. "Roughing it" at its best. :) Also, I heard the best homily ever at a Mass in the Diocese of Saginaw. Yes, there's a catch...

Close Encounters with Fr. David Jaeger
Clarification: This David Jaeger lives in Seattle and is not to be confused with the Israeli-born convert to Catholicism, who is now the spokesman for the Holy Land Franciscans.

Clinton: Catholic Abuse Scandal Reminds Him of Him
But then, so does everything else in the Universe. Oh, and he lies too. When he doesn't even need to. Something demonic about that.

Fr. Cliff Garner: "Mea mumble, mea mumble, mea maxima mumble."

Never say Never

A deeply wounded friend writes what I've been tempted to say many times:

"My rule, which I shall inscribe on my heart: NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER TRUST THE INSTITUTIONAL CATHOLIC CHURCH. "

I have an English major's congenital fear of rash vows. Too many myths and legends based on what happens to people foolish enough to make them. Plus, I have an incarnational Catholic's worries about where such a vow as this has to lead. Yes, we've got a crop of bad bishops. And yet, what do you mean by "the instititutional Catholic Church"? What do you mean by "trust"? It seems to me there are two sorts of distrust: the sort we reserve for devils, and the sort we reserve for men. We distrust devils absolutely. Everything they say is a lie for the devil is a liar and the father of lies. But the distrust we have for men is not and must not be absolute. Sometimes the worst of them speak truth. We distrust them in the sense of "put not your trust in princes". They're unreliable because they are men. But they are not devils. We should not expect any man to be utterly trustworthy, but we have to, as far as possible, go on extending trust. That's life outside the garden.

In addition, there is the reality of the Holy Spirit mucking up the formula and making our distrust even more problematic since these very unreliable men are entrusted to a) hand down the Tradition and b) to formulate doctrine. The catastrophe of the Irish Church is summed up in Joan Chittister's article "that they're not going to tell us again what's right and what's wrong anymore. From now on, we'll be figuring those things out for ourselves". It utterly fails to recognize that when the bishops (i.e. the Institutional Catholic Church) are teaching the Tradition, they are not teaching with their own (sometimes pathetic) moral authority, but with the voice of Christ. To go it alone under the burden of "never" trusting the institutional Church is to invite the mass assumption (as in Ireland) that the visible Church is unnecessary, with all the Protestant and Unitarian "invisible church" chaos that entails. More Stockholm syndrome.

Distrust the bishops as men? Fine. Be wise as a serpent and innocent as a dove. Distrust them as devils and swear rash vows to "never" trust them (even when they are teaching the Tradition)? That way madness lies. They are, like all men, to be found on a spectrum. Some are at the O'Connell and Mahony end. But not all. Wuerl went to Rome and badgered them to reverse their rejection of his laicization of an abuser. Some of these guys are good. But even the worst of them is still, by virtue of his office, capable of speaking the truth. Never was nuanced thinking more necessary than now. Anger is second only to lust in clouding the intellect. Please be careful.

Mike Hardy is a gracious guy

Steve Mattson has some interesting arguments against Anthony Marquis

Suburban Americans equate discomfort with End Times!

For the best treatment of the specious theology of the "Left Behind" books AND a really top-notch overview of the basics of Catholic teaching concerning "Last Things", see Paul Thigpen's The Rapture Trap.

Just in case you need some perspective on whatever is bothering you today.

Man with Black Hat now has fully functional links

Rod, pay it no mind

That stuff happens in Fremont, the loopiest part of Seattle, right up the hill from our Statue of Lenin. Fremont is where our hippies went to compost.

Amazing how Dallas seems so slow on the uptake

Here's a bit of news:

The Catholic Diocese of Dallas has taken action against a third Dallas priest who failed to fully implement a sexual abuse prevention plan in his parish.

But unlike the other priests, the pastor of All Saints Church in Far North Dallas will not lose his parish.

Bishop Charles V. Grahmann recently removed the Rev. Tom Cloherty from four of the bishop's key advisory committees.

Followed by a bit of commentary by a priest familiar with the scene in Dallas:

Well. well, well, well. Interesting.

Those of you who have followed the Dallas saga might remember that the three priests who were in the papers at the same time -- Rudy Kos, Billy Hughes and Robert Peebles -- had all been at All Saints at the same time. Fr Hughes was carrying on an affair with a minor girl parishioner, who was sneaking out of her house at night to be with him. Her mom noted what a zombie the poor kid was, searched her room and found love letters from Hughes. She went to a "trusted priest" to share this info, and he took the letters and promised to pass them along to officials who could address them.

The letters, of course, were never seen again, and nothing was addressed until much later.

The "trusted priest" was Cloherty, the one Bishop Grahmann doesn't remove.

Laypeople interested in contacting Bishop Grahmann about such hijinx can go here and say "I see you." Also, note that Bp. Grahmann's co-adjutor is Bp. Galante. Together, they distinguish themselves by supporting the work of fine priests like adolescent-ogling, St. Sebastian's Angels participant Fr. Cliff Garner while managing to find ways to remove two orthodox priests on minor technicalities.

Dennis Logue of The Elephant sez:

I just thought I'd point out that your friend's and Dorothy Sayer's observations about the inability of artists to articulate their visions outside of their chosen medium is one that dates back to Plato. In The Apology Socrates discusses his search for a man wiser than he. He goes to politicians, no luck. Warriors, no luck. He finally approaches artists for he is convinced that in their works they truly capture some element of truth. Sadly they can not articulate why, and they also believe that their knowledge of their particular art makes them experts at everything else. (Describe any Hollywood types you've heard of.)

This is proves two things first, that Plato thought and wrote just about everything first, and second, Germans love David Hasselhoff. (well maybe not the latter.)

Nihil Obstat: Hoist on his or her own petard

The vigilant Richard Chonak writes concerning St. Blog's self-appointed grammarian (captured here in this fine portrait):

Who shall proofread the proofreader? Well, I will.

I don't know whether to count this as one or two errors by the _soi-disant_ "official" proofreader of San Bloggio, but this time she has stuck her big toe in the light socket.

While picking lint off Betty G's weblog, Nihil not only failed to notice a misspelling, but repeated the mistake herself:

Betty G writes about Mother Theresa

I trust that Mother Teresa of blessed memory will forgive poor dear Nihil for fumbling her name. Whether the censorious young lady's reputation will recover from such an appallingly common error is yet unknown.

Since Miss Obstat has not announced an e-mail address, the only way to inform her of her mistake is to denounce -- I mean, report it publicly. How unfortunate. So: would you? Thanks.

She who lives by the sword dies by the sword!

Gone for the weekend

You kids don't put no beans up your noses. Oh, and buy my books and tapes. They're the perfect Summer Solstice gift for the St. Joan's parishioner in your life.

More problems for Michael Rose and Goodbye! Good Men

Nobody can accuse England of suffering an excess of religious energy
Euroweenies take off the oxygen mask to mumble something snide about us.

Rick Garnett has a nice take on the Supremes Death Penalty Ruling
It's amazing how the Court has a knack for doing wrong even when it does right. Bottom line: the result of the decision is a happy one (luckily), but the arrogance of the Court and its contempt for the rule of representative government is very dangerous.

Disputations...

has a nice critique of Greg Krehbiel's letter.
Okay. So it needs some nuance. The basic idea though is, Don't tithe to support corruption. Tithe to support virtue. I like that idea.

By the way, Disputations also is launching a droll reform initiative.

Bill Cork weeps over the parish built on human pride, St. Joan's
Not Catholic. Not even Christian.

The bright spot: I'm not getting many reports of other parishes as outrageously apostate as this. Hopefully, we're looking at the far end of the bellcurve.

Message of disrespect for chickens?

If the animal is suffering physically, okay fine. Don't hurt animals unnecessarily. But is a chicken really sitting there thinking, "I feel so violated! So used! I want to be appreciated for my mind! Not treated like a plaything!" No, the chicken is thinking, "mmmmm. food!" Animals are to be treated kindly. But they are not to be thought of as possessing suburban American desires for "respect" and "equality" and "dignity". Personally, the game sounds tacky and dumb and I think chickens are better employed in a barnyard eating June bugs, but I think the arguments of PETA are a dangerous conflation of human demands for "rights" where animals have none.

Minute Particulars has an interesting discussion of problems with keeping all gays out of priesthood

Judging from some of his more recent rants on the topic, I gather Mike Hardy missed my change of mind in this area a week or two ago. I now incline toward thinking those with a homosexual-orientation can sometimes become priests, but that the screening process will have to be pretty rigorous in order to ensure that the candidate is serious about the Faith and about chastity. Mike will be happy to know that the principal thing which changed my mind is a passage from that hidebound troglodyte John Paul II, who says, "Man and woman are the road the Church must walk." Statistical thinking is useful in some respects, but it cannot replace the encounter with the person in all his or her, uh, minute particularity. Apologies for my foray into zero tolerance thinking.

And to my readers: If I appear to you to still be thinking these matters through, that's because I am. Blogs are not written for the ages. They are (or at least mine is) written to process my thinking.

In justice to Abp. Flynn:

A reader writes:

I read with interest your remarks concerning St. Joan of Arc Church in Minneapolis. I certainly concur with your feelings on the subject. That is until we get to your remarks concerning Archbishop Harry Flynn.

A little background on St. Joan of Arc (hereafter SJA) is in order. SJA has long been out on the extreme modernist end of the spectrum in this Archdiocese. The decline into heterodoxy was instituted by the Rev. Harvey Egan, long time "progressive" gadfly and leading champion of the "spirit of Vatican II" This occurred in the last years of Abp. Leo Binz, and continued under the leadership of Abp. John Roach; former president of the USCCB. In short, this problem long out dates the present pastor, having started over thirty years ago.

When Abp. Flynn took the leadership of this Archdiocese, he faced a priest shortage, problems of leadership and orthodoxy in our minor and major seminaries, and a Archdiocese rife with "liturgical innovation." He chose a quiet incremental approach to these problems. The first thing he did was replace much of the seminary leadership with priests of proven orthodoxy.

Then without fanfare he changed many priests assignments, apparently to break up power bases. While doing this he was careful not to "spread the contagion." For example, if a priest was considered liturgically suspect, but had good administrative skills, he might be moved to a parish that already had liturgy and administrative problems. Thus providing a stopgap solution for a portion of the problem. At the same time, a parish which lost a truly Catholic priest through death or retirement was provided with a replacement of the same caliber. While all of this has been going on, the seminary numbers, "orthodoxy quotient", and quality and quantity of newly ordained priests has been steadily rising. As new priests become available they are being utilized to correct more and more of the problems which developed over the last thirty five years.

This is not the most satisfying solution to the problems our church is in, I know that the Celt in me often wants to "bare the blade" and have at them! On reflection however, Abp. Flynn's approach has much more to recommend it that my inclinations. We will not fix problems that have developed over thirty five years overnight. Our Abp. is far from perfect, but I do not believe that he deserves the scorn that was implied on your blog.

Finally on a slightly different note, we ARE NOT the Archdiocese of Minneapolis!!!!!! This is and has been since its' inception the Archdiocese of St. Paul / Minneapolis. The Cathedral and chancellery are located in St. Paul, which historically is the much more Catholic of the two cities. St. Paul is no more Minneapolis than Seattle is Tacoma!

Yeah. Like I said yesterday, I think I was way too swift to gripe at the Archbishop. My archbishop is in a similar position: trying to clean up a big mess left him by his predecessors. And I thing swift draconian measures usually create more problems than they fix. Mea culpa.

Sorry about the nomenclature mixup. I thought your cathedral was in Lake Wobegon.

Somebody is way ahead of me in messing with the heads of Rich Nigerians
By the way, turns out the right place to report this scam is 419.fcd@usss.treas.gov.

Different Intelligences

My pal Steve Greydanus got to talk to Steven Spielberg and the exchange between Greydanus and various actors reminds me again of Dorothy L. Sayers remarks in The Mind of the Maker about the creative process and the mysterious ways in which artistic creativity is not the same as comprehension of the things the artist creates. An artist can be a creative genius, and yet, when he or she turns to trying to articulate what they have created or to talk about its implications, they can often be amazingly dull or even dumb.

There are different kinds of intelligence. Verbal types (like me) tend to equate verbal intelligence with Intelligence. And so the Press, whose stock in trade is words, goes on talking as though Bush is stupid when there is manifold evidence that he merely possesses other forms of intelligence than verbal intelligence (and uses them to run rings around the press). In the same way, great directors (visual artists) like Spielberg often say amazingly mundane things about their own works. Meanwhile, people with enormous verbal intelligence can often be helpless in other forms of more practical intelligence. (Chesterton once wired his wife: "Am at Hampton Station. Where ought I to be?").

Interesting interview of Fr. Tom Doyle by Pete Vere

Shanley indicted
I sincerely hope he and the creep in the Brooklyn diocese who suctioned money out of the school to fund his gay affairs will carry through with their blackmail promises and finger every scuz in the Church that they know of. Let the Enema continue until this crap is gone.

The Supremes Reject Execution for Mentally Disabled...
and it appears some conservatives are disappointed. Me, I think the Pope is basically right in Evangelium Vitae: execute people if you have to in order to prevent further loss of life. Otherwise, don't kill 'em. This is not a "reversal" of Catholic teaching. The Church still says Caesar has the right to wield the sword. She merely says that this right should not be exercised if mercy can be applied without out endangering the innocent.

Lucky for us the Earth Doesn't Move
Otherwise we might have hit this thing!

Another honest voice in the gay community

Gay Radio Host: "Predatory Gay Men" Are the Problem

Story: An openly gay radio talk show host has admitted that in the Catholic priest scandals, "what you have here are not pedophiles. You have predatory gay men . . . "

Al Rantel, a talk show host for KABC radio in Los Angeles, said on CNN's "Talk Back Live" on June 14 that "these predatory gay men found their way into the Catholic priesthood in inordinately large numbers," adding that "it makes the Boy Scouts look prescient with what they did" [in banning gay Scoutmasters].

Following is a transcript of Rantel's comments:

"Well, I mean, and I don't say this happily, Arthel, because, as you may know, I happen to be gay myself. I'm openly gay here on the radio in Los Angeles, and have been for many years.

But I have to tell you that, you know, even if you are gay, two and two is still four, and there's this proverbial 3,000-pound elephant sitting in the room that no one wants to talk about. This is not a pedophile issue, although the media called it a pedophile issue, because they don't want to insult the gay community. They don't want to be politically incorrect.

But what you have here are not pedophiles. You have predatory gay men -- and there are some of us, believe me, I don't happen to be one of them but there are some and we should all admit they're there. And these predatory gay men found their way into the Catholic priesthood in inordinately large numbers, you know, it makes the boy scouts look prescient with what they did. And these gay men have gone after young males. And I think it's disgraceful, and I think the media needs to address this. The gay community needs to address this."

The more I think about this, the more I see a weird parallel between the majority of talking heads in the gay community and some of the dumb and outrageous things said by some of our clergy, and this is why I think it bugs me so much. A bishop from Honduras stands up and says "This is all a plot by Catholic bashers to attack the Church!" and everybody rightly tells the bishop to shut up, face reality and clean up his community, not blame the people who are exposing the sickness at the heart of it. And yet, how do the words of the overwhelming number of apologists for the gay community differ in any substance from the bishop's? The thing about Rantel's comments is that they are news. They are unusual for a gay person to say. They break ranks. Most gay talking heads spend their time complaining that "gays are being scapegoated" just like the bishop complained that Catholics were being scapegoated. They don't want to face the sickness at the heart of their own community and attack anybody who tries to expose that sickness as a gay-basher. I, for one, applaud Rantel for facing this problem squarely and not engaging in the sort of "shoot the messenger" rhetoric that has made some of our bishops--and most of the gay talking heads--look so silly. I hope he will be heeded by the members of his community.

Unhappy with Me

Been mulling over my posts for this week, particularly as regards the bishops and I think I'm guilty of uncharity. I'm awful damn quick to assume the worst and cast everything in the worst light. What do I know about Abp. Flynn's management of his diocese beyond one flaky parish? Several commenters remark that he's a good guy and has done some very good things. I know my own diocese has some loopy things going on which our bishop has tried to stop. But he's only one man with a resistant staff and an educational establishment arrayed against him. Same with many other bishops. So before I go spouting off about bishops full of sound and fury, signifying nothing, I think I should give them time and stop being so all-fired distrustful. Yes, I've been burned by the betrayals that we've seen and yes, I have a "right" to be distrustful. (Lotsa useful Bible passages about prudence and being "wise as a serpent" to bolster me here). And yet "charity hopeth all things". That doesn't mean going all dumb and pollyanna. But it does mean not construing every episcopal act (or apparent lack of action) in the worst possible way. My apologies to readers for participating in that culture of suspicion. I shall endeavor to do better.

Those rich Nigerians!

Just got a fabulous offer. Oddly, it's the same fabulous offer I've gotten several times (one of them was addressed "Dear Julie Andrews" because of this link on my site) Other times they've been Islamic converts to Christianity who just liked the cut of my jib. Once, it was a Nigerian general. Anyway, the offer reads:

Dear Friend,

I am a Solicitor resident and practicing in Lagos, Nigeria and I am using this correspondence to urgently seek and request your assistance and cooperation in a sensitive but highly beneficial financial arrangement. An important client of mine whose details and person I cannot release at this point has implored me to contact a reliable and trustworthy partner overseas to urgently receive and handle funds total FIFTEEN MILLION US DOLLARS(US$15.M)in CASH presently lodged in a security/finance outfit in overseas. Due to my client inability to travel out of the country presently and the fact that we continue to accumulate huge debts daily as long as this consignment remains in the security/finance company we need an associate and partner to proceed as soon as possible to receive this funds for investment purpose as shall be instructed by my client. We have agreed in principle to give twenty-percent (25%) of the total sum to whom ever shall handle this funds for us while the remaining sixty-five percent (65%)shall be for my client and ten-percent (10%) for me as the attorney. As soon as you are ready to proceed to receive this cash on our behalf we shall furnish you with the details and information you will need to accomplish this task. Please be rest assured that this arrangement is absolutely risk free And cannot implicate you in any way. However I implore you to handle this matter with urgency and utmost confidence even if you do not intend to execute the project for us. Whatever the case, please acknowledge receipt of this mail via my e-mail address If your response is positive we shall proceed immediately without any delay. Thank you in anticipation of your cooperation and hoping to hear from you soonest.

Yours sincerely,

Barrister, musa yakubu (LLB).

I forwarded it, as is my custom, to the Seattle FBI for them to investigate or round file as they will. But I couldn't resist. I also wrote the guy back, saying, "Wow! What can I do to help? Do you need my bank account number?" Let's see if the rat takes the bait. If you want to play too, his email is musa1818@lycos.com. Just don't be foolish enough to give him any actual information. And don't mention I blogged this. If he knows I reported him to the FBI he'll just kill the account before they can investigate.

I kinda thought this might happen

A source sez that "the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith will order the American bishops to halt its policy of removing abusive priests until Rome can rule on the measures. That means the Vatican is going to order an immediate halt to the removal from ministry of priests with a history of sexual abuse of minors on their records."

Pete Vere has been predicting this (me too). American bishops come up with faulty policy. Rome sez "This policy's faulty. Re-do." My fear: Instead of behaving with integrity, the American bishops go to the press and say, "We tried. Lord knows we tried. But Rome is blocking reform." Voila! Blame is shifted. I hope people aren't suckers for this. But the press did fall for Mahony's bogus claim of his ten year old "Zero Tolerance" policy, so my hope is not huge.

If you have a burning need to know about arcane issues in canon law, here's the place to go

2% of the general population is homosexual but 30% of all abusers are homosexual

"Although homosexuals constitute only about two percent of the population, they represent one-third of child molesters. "The Gay Report," the 1979 work of homosexual researchers Jay and Young revealed that 73 percent of homosexuals surveyed admitted to having had sexual relations with boys ages 16 to 19 or younger."

There's nothing amiss in the gay subculture though and it's persecuting homophobia to even suggest there might be. Kathy Shaidle is on point here.

Elephant? What Elephant?

A reader sez:

Federation of Diocesan Liturgical Commissions strikes again! A defrocked priest serves executive director of FDLC for 10 years, and they claim they "didn't know."

Some movement on the Scranton Front

More on the Higher and Lower Laws

A day or two ago, I remarked on C.S. Lewis' observation that those who do not obey the Higher Law find themselves compelled to obey lower ones.

Had a conversation with somebody recently which prompted some more thought in that department, particularly about our episcopate's relationship with the press. My friend wrote: "Conservative Catholics who get on their high-horse with media-bashing are making fools of themselves."

My reply: True. And yet remember Watergate. Journalists were, well... not exactly heroes, just morally better than Richard Nixon--for a while. They occupied an important ecological niche for a time--and then that time passed, Nixon was ousted, but they went on pressing their agenda and doing their bit to make the culture of the 70s the wasteland it was and to make life hell for sensible people and believers of any stripe. In short, once their short-term function was past, they went back to being what they often are: enemies of sanity. The press, like the Assyrians during a time of judgment on Israel, have performed an essential and salutary role in exposing the rot in the Church and may God bless them for it. But the press is not thereby interested in the holiness or spiritual prosperity of the Church or the human race, any more than Assyria was interested in Israel's welfare nor realized they were a chastising rod in the hand of the Almighty. Many of the press, like the nation of Assyria, are profound enemies of God and his people and, in their pride, they should take heed of God's warning to Assyria.

The bishops have handed the enemies of the Faith the perfect cudgel to do untold damage to the Church in the future. It's media-bashing to blame the press for exposing the sins of the bishops. It's not media-bashing to note the obvious fact that many in the journalism community are overjoyed by this Scandal (in the long-faced puritanical way that all such beings rejoice) and see in it a huge opportunity to attack, not corruption, but the Faith itself. And, as we both know, many in the journalism community are carefully sculpting the facts to attack the Faith while ignoring the problem (see Sullivan, Andrew).

The bishops are going to need journalists nipping at their heels for the foreseeable future to keep them honest, much as Israel "needed" (in the divine economy) Assyria and Babylon as instruments of judgment. But it is definitely a Darwinian and temporal, not an ideal and eternal, arrangement. There's a difference between the Christian mutuality of the Body of Christ in which each member is there for the good of all and the predator/prey "balance of nature" we see in this fallen world. Its the difference between Christ and antichrist, or reality and parody. The relationship between bishops and press is of the latter and lower nature (more of that business of having to obey lower laws if you won't obey higher ones). And, God willing, it will continue to be until the bishops have embraced the Higher Law, at which point the press will not be necessary as a Darwinian check on corruption. As such, the press is good, but it's not best. And the press remains just as fallen as the rest of us. So it's done good work and is to be thanked. But it's not to be trusted any more than the bishops. The whole world lieth in the power of the evil one.

Amy has blogged this but it's worth noting the timing

This story in the NY Times about the (surprise!) gay pastor who sucked tons of money out of his parish to lavish on his 18 year old gay lover, oppressed those who tried to stop him, and got boocoo help from his bishop in trying to silence whistleblowers is notable primarily for the period of time in which it happened:

After a year or so of stonewalling and harassment, the whistleblower threatened to go to the cops in *March 2002* as the Scandal was erupting and the good padre resigned--only to be put in another parish by his equally good bishop, Thomas V. Daily of Brooklyn. He is still there, happy and safe as his bishop returns from Dallas, full of zero tolerance sound and fury, signifying nothing. Rev. John Thompson, who robbed his parish blind to lavish gifts on his 18 year old gay lover is not guilty of sexual abuse. So what's wrong with putting him in another parish without warning them of his past?

If you want to contact the Brooklyn diocese about the good bishop's Minimum Daily Adult Requirement approach to ethics, go here. Alert him to the fact that this time, we are here and we are not silent.

Anne Wilson, who agrees with me about The Matrix

...also agrees with me about The Truman Show, that it is a "fiercely incarnational movie". For my review of Truman, go here.

Networking Blogger Discovers Solution to Scandal!

A reader writes:

Interesting. Believe it or not: I also consider my parish, which happens to be called Blessed Sacrament Parish as well, to be an wonderful. The web page is terrible but other than that it is an great place to attend mass. We have instituted a perpetual adoration there and it has helped to renew the church.

Obviously, the solution to our ills is to rename every parish in the country "Blessed Sacrament". Please direct all expressions of gratitude for my genius to...

Let us now praise great priests and great parishes!

Enough kvetching. Here's Rod Dreher on a really great priest and a really great parish:

St. Joan's is the anti-Blessed Sacrament parish!

Here is the link to Blessed Sacrament's website:

This is the Dallas parish I wrote you about before, the one with the terrific pastor, Fr. Paul Weinberger. Just you look at the "schedules" section to see how much prayer and confession goes on in that parish. Check out the "Center for Virtue and Learning," which Fr. Paul conducts all on his own, at no cost to any parishioner (he has a lot of working-class folks in his parish). To my eyes, Blessed Sacrament is a miracle parish. I have never seen anything like it in all my years as a Catholic. I went there this past Saturday to the vigil mass, and it was sublime. Fr. Paul preached on the scandal, and said the problem was our bishops, and too many of our priests, see themselves as CEOs of a diocese or a parish, and not as shepherds and fathers to the flock. After mass, I took him out to dinner. I asked him how he managed to do all this great stuff in the parish. He said he doesn't have time for meetings, and to serve on "interfaith committees" and suchlike. He just prays and educates, and serves his people that way. The chancery seems willing to leave him alone, and he likes it that way. Honestly, looking at the schedule of things going on at that parish, could you imagine if that were your own? And Mark, I'm telling you, you go to mass there, you can feel the presence of the Holy Spirit in a tangible way. Did I tell you that Blessed Sacrament is in a poor part of town? That parish, and its priest, is to me a sign that God has not forgotten his people.

To Rod's remarks I would add my own in praise of another wonderful Blessed Sacrament parish--my own! I love the very stones of the place and the Dominicans are wonderful wonderful guys. Thanks, Blessed Sacrament--nestled in the University District in Seattle--for being a huge source of spiritual nourishment! The name says it all.

If you readers know of terrific parishes, by all means give the details in the comment section. You may be giving water to a thirsty soul in the desert who thought all there was in town was Fr. Flapdoodle and the pastoral assistant with Raised Consciousness giving her umpteenth homily on "Diana Worship: A Sensitive Reappraisal in Light of Eco-Feminist Paradigms"

New blog!

He just wants to help people
Rev. Schwab is, wouldnchaknowit, a Catholic pastor. The greatest terror, for a certain sort of person, is the terror of being thought "conservative" even when the person who berates you for this is mad as a March Hare. To his credit, the pastor offered to resign.

Stockholm Syndrome

Here's a parish in the thrall of the Stockholm Syndrome. See the Happy Pastor being profiled by an adoring parishioner. He's a courageous rebel ("loves the cutting edge". Quotable quote: "He talked about loving Rome and his repeated visits to Italy - I asked him, "Could you say, all roads lead to Rome? " He said, "yes, but not necessarily to the Vatican." Har har. The Old Guy in Rome is a joke, of course. He's not In Touch and Aware like padre is.) Hear the Baby Boomer "History Begins and Ends with Us" mentality ("The excitement was tangible in those days and he says he knew he "was witnessing history being made" during the years of John Kennedy and Pope John the twenty-third.") See the self-congratulation: "We are "not a parish just trying to protect ourselves and taking care of our own souls and being a holy and pious people--but a people involved and caring." (Being involved and caring, you see, is the opposite of holiness and piety.) See the Enlightened Reading List for Thoughtful People. John Dominic Crossan, who informs us the body of Jesus was eaten by wild dogs. "The ministry of Jesus was first and only a social ministry". "Eisler takes us way back to the time of Goddess worship". "With the advent of a male god and the creation of the world’s major religions we moved into a time, and continue to be in that time, of domination. This book is a must read." "O’Murchu continues his theme from his previous book about the need for a creation centered spirituality. In this book he endorses the idea of a time when there was Goddess worship, and sees that as a possible way to a healthier spirituality."

Personal favorite quack book: Quinn, Daniel. The Story of B: An Adventure of the Mind and Spirit. New York: Bantam Books, 1996.
This is a continuation of Ishmael. However, the books do stand on their own. Quinn maintains that we have been lied to, and that human development did not begin only with the dawn of “civilization.” As a matter of fact, Quinn maintains that some ancient “abandoned civilizations” were indeed abandoned because civilization is not the best way for humans to organize themselves. These books by Quinn are informative, and easy to read.

It's a beehive of activity at St. Joan's and only a churl could find fault with the fact that there is not a whiff of pro-life work, adoration, or ordinary Christian prayer being done there when there are so many other worthy projects underway such as the neo-pagan ecospirituality task force, the ingenious readings substituted for Scripture during mass, the weekly homilist, the Hatha Yoga in the Sanctuary, the staff bursting with Gay Pride, the Mission Statement indistinguishable from a Unitarian committee on Spelling Reform for Guatemala, the lectures which address the question "Is Jesus God?" with the refreshingly straightforward condescension of the apostate:

Our tradition teaches that Jesus was God come down to make up for and overcome this inaccessibility. Jesus "won back" for us that which was lost due to Original Sin. Jesus, therefore, has to be more than human...for if He is not actually God, then we are not really saved.

But the images of our childhood can no longer always work within our faith. The Roman Catholic "institutional leadership", however, continues to uphold these images.

and the confirmation class that produces graduates who boast that their faith is "a mix of Eastern Religion and Christianity. 'My beliefs and I have found a home. I am so proud that I was confirmed at SJA!'”.

Indeed, what comes through is the enormous clubby, back-slapping, "aren't we fabulous" pride of the enterprise. It hits precisely the same sort of notes as all the gushy, lionizing, "Behold the Future of the Church!" puff pieces that were done on Paul Shanley by his adorers in the 80s. (This is not to suggest that Fr. Wertin is the moral equivalent of Paul Shanley. I don't know the man. I merely know the tripe on his parish site). But when the day comes that the parishioners are betrayed by somebody who holds the Tradition in contempt as they do, they have nothing to fall back on but the clubby, backslapping, rhetoric of "community" and "The ministry of Jesus was first and only a social ministry" and "goddess worship" and all the rest of the politicized, pseudo-philosophical twaddle that passes for Catholic faith in parishes like St. Joan's. And so they go on parroting what they were taught and never even know that the people who betrayed them also robbed them and sold their Catholic birthright for a pot of message. Indeed, any suggestion that the Tradition might in fact liberate the Church from those, like Shanley, who despise the Tradition is greeted with hoots by the betrayed. After all, they aren't interested in being holy and pious people, but a people involved and caring. They've grown. And they are way smarter than the Tradition--a Tradition that has "thwarted the development of human spirituality". Thus do the hostages make war on Jesus, their rescuer. What a world.

You can write the St. Paul archdiocese here if you want to encourage Abp. Flynn with the thought that Catholics would be grateful, not offended, if he made just a bit more haste in cleaning up this mess. If outraged Unitarians at St. Joan's choose to follow their Fr. Wertin into the basement of the Unitarian Church for continued lectures on Gaia worship, I think it's their choice. They have been using Church property to attack the gospel itself for years. Time for them to choose whom they will serve.

Bitter irony note for Fr. Wertin: the gospel reading for last week begins, "At the sight of the crowds, the heart of Jesus was moved with pity. They were lying prostrate with exhaustion, like sheep without a shepherd." You are a wicked shepherd, Fr. Wertin, and I hope you will soon be cast down in your arrogance so that the meek and lowly can be lifted up into your place. May the next pastor of that parish be named Matthias.

Hmmm... could we see a rehash of the investiture controversy?

The investiture controversy was part of a long duel between the Church and the State in the Middle Ages concerning who, exactly, got to appoint bishops: the Pope or the Prince? The Situation is rife with opportunities for Caesar to grab more control of the Church. And it would be hard, in this case, to make an argument that he shouldn't. But it will not end there. "Understand, Frodo. I would use this Ring to do good. But through me it would wield a power more terrible than you can imagine."

Some hopeful news from John Mallon

My head hurts...

A reader queries:

With Padre Pio now a saint, what are we to call him? Saint Pio, San Pio, San Pio di Pietrelcina, Saint Pius of Pietrelcina? What's up with the names. We do not refer to John the Baptist as [Hebrew Saint] Jonah the Baptist. We do not call Francis of Assiss - San Francesco d'Assisi. So what's up with mixing the English and foreign? I need some straightening out.

Can't answer for the good padre, but John would have been called "Yochanan" in his day. By the way, give Jonah Goldberg a crew cut and he would look like J. Jonah Jameson, doncha think? Or doncha?

And Johansen replies to Rose and Co.

"An institute run with such knavish imbecility that if it were not the work of God it would not last a fortnight." - The Church, as described by Hilaire Belloc Thanks to Ad Orientem.

The imminent danger of discussing a problem with women is...

They will probably start doing something about it where men are content to just bitch. Amy Welborn has some excellent ideas about what can be done to strengthen the Church in this time which are worth more than all my kvetching.

Greg Popcak sez I suffer from Catholic Bipolar Disorder

and I'm so happy about it, I could just kill myself!

Here's a depressing argument

Just how depraved are our seminaries? There are two schools of thought: Michael Rose says they're really really really depraved. Fr. Rob Johansen says they're just pretty depraved. A week or so ago, Johansen took Rose to task for his view. Now Rose and Co. take Johansen to task for taking Rose to task. I suggest that we should stop taking each other to task and take our bishops to task for allowing this depravity that drives decent people to such anger that they take it out on each other in their sense of helplessness before the spectacle of such episcopal prostitution to the zeitgeist.