Heading out to Bay City, Michigan Tomorrow!
March 31-April 1, I'll be speaking at a Lenten Retreat on Repentance and Conversion at St. Stanislaus Kostka in Bay City, MI.
Topics: How I Got This Way; This is My Body, Salvation: Participation in the Divine Nature; and Where Are You With God?
Contact Kambria McLean for more info.
See you Monday!
Thursday, March 30, 2006
I'm happy to report I have found another sensible Jesuit
As a former Evangelical, I learned elementary logic from people like Josh McDowell and his famous "train" analogy. Fact is the engine, Faith is the coal car, and feelings are the caboose.
Similarly, in considering what to do about the Islamosphere, the hard reality the post-Christian West must face is that Cult is the Engine, Culture is the coal car, and the view of the human person (and everything that flows from that, including political and economic structures) is the caboose.
The mistake of our current approach is that we are trying to make the caboose the engine by grafting democratic capitalism (predicated on a view of the human person that is not just foreign to Islam, but *anathema* to it) on to a culture that is founded on a vision of God and man *specifically designed* to repudiate the Christian view.
Our vague evolutionary notions then encourage us to think that with sufficient time, democracy and capitalism will somehow transmute Islam into a religion that does not view man as slave and God as Master.
Ain't gonna happen. Sooner or later we will have to do the hard work of a) returning to the gospel (or else our *own* democratic capitalist culture will likewise become a slave culture) and b) proclaim the gospel, not just the ersatz substitute of the American Way, to Muslims.
There's an interesting discussion of the article over at Amy's place.
As a former Evangelical, I learned elementary logic from people like Josh McDowell and his famous "train" analogy. Fact is the engine, Faith is the coal car, and feelings are the caboose.
Similarly, in considering what to do about the Islamosphere, the hard reality the post-Christian West must face is that Cult is the Engine, Culture is the coal car, and the view of the human person (and everything that flows from that, including political and economic structures) is the caboose.
The mistake of our current approach is that we are trying to make the caboose the engine by grafting democratic capitalism (predicated on a view of the human person that is not just foreign to Islam, but *anathema* to it) on to a culture that is founded on a vision of God and man *specifically designed* to repudiate the Christian view.
Our vague evolutionary notions then encourage us to think that with sufficient time, democracy and capitalism will somehow transmute Islam into a religion that does not view man as slave and God as Master.
Ain't gonna happen. Sooner or later we will have to do the hard work of a) returning to the gospel (or else our *own* democratic capitalist culture will likewise become a slave culture) and b) proclaim the gospel, not just the ersatz substitute of the American Way, to Muslims.
There's an interesting discussion of the article over at Amy's place.
Ed Peters on All the Complications Ensuing from TomKat's Baby and the Theology of Baptism
Stay Catholic. It makes life easier.
Stay Catholic. It makes life easier.
Weight of Glory Looks at the Phenomenon of Vigilantes for Jesus
Jesus told the parable of the wheat and the tares for a reason. Vigilante attempts to purge the church of the impure are doomed.
Jesus told the parable of the wheat and the tares for a reason. Vigilante attempts to purge the church of the impure are doomed.
St. Tom DeLay Suddenly Gets Concerned about Persecuted Christians
It's good to know that when Christians are really persecuted in this world, there'll be a conference--led by a politician eager to get back in the good graces of his constituents--to lift their spirits.
Or perhaps I should take a more Pauline attitude:
Yeah, that's probably better.
Update: I stand corrected. Apparently DeLay has long championed persecuted Christians. Bully for him!
It's good to know that when Christians are really persecuted in this world, there'll be a conference--led by a politician eager to get back in the good graces of his constituents--to lift their spirits.
Or perhaps I should take a more Pauline attitude:
What then? Only that in every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is proclaimed; and in that I rejoice. (Philippians 1:18).
Yeah, that's probably better.
Update: I stand corrected. Apparently DeLay has long championed persecuted Christians. Bully for him!
A curious peek into the mind of one Muslim attempting to make excuses for persecuting Christians
I'm thinking it's well past time for informed Catholics to begin trying to engage ordinary Muslims in the blogosphere in conversation.
I'm thinking it's well past time for informed Catholics to begin trying to engage ordinary Muslims in the blogosphere in conversation.
Another Chance for Lenten Almgiving
Norberto Sanchez lost his entire family (wife and five children) this weekend in an automobile accident. Nuff said.
God, be with your crucified servant in his hour of agony.
Norberto Sanchez lost his entire family (wife and five children) this weekend in an automobile accident. Nuff said.
God, be with your crucified servant in his hour of agony.
When it comes to how things are going in Iraq...
There are sources I trust (such as the ones Amy cites here)
and sources I don't (such the Happy Talk Psy Ops Engineers of the Bush Administration profiled here).
There are sources I trust (such as the ones Amy cites here)
and sources I don't (such the Happy Talk Psy Ops Engineers of the Bush Administration profiled here).
Who Could Not Love a Guy like Scalia?
I particularly love the gratuituous Catholic bashing in the caption:
It will be a cold day in hell before you read "Obnoxious photographer shoves cameras in faces of worshippers inside the Cathedral of the Holy Cross".
It will be even longer before the Know-Nothings at the Herald acknowledge that they are, in effect, arguing for the extirpation of Catholics from public life. For not other logic than that is behind the exchange that prompted Scalia's perfectly fitting response:
Message: Catholic should not be judges. Reading you loud and clear, Herald.
And by the way, "Vaffanculo."
I particularly love the gratuituous Catholic bashing in the caption:
Antonin Scalia gestures inside the Cathedral of the Holy Cross.
It will be a cold day in hell before you read "Obnoxious photographer shoves cameras in faces of worshippers inside the Cathedral of the Holy Cross".
It will be even longer before the Know-Nothings at the Herald acknowledge that they are, in effect, arguing for the extirpation of Catholics from public life. For not other logic than that is behind the exchange that prompted Scalia's perfectly fitting response:
Smith was working as a freelance photographer for the Boston archdiocese’s weekly newspaper at a special Mass for lawyers Sunday when a Herald reporter asked the justice how he responds to critics who might question his impartiality as a judge given his public worship.
“The judge paused for a second, then looked directly into my lens and said, ‘To my critics, I say, ‘Vaffanculo,’ ” punctuating the comment by flicking his right hand out from under his chin, Smith said.
The Italian phrase means “(expletive) you.”
Message: Catholic should not be judges. Reading you loud and clear, Herald.
And by the way, "Vaffanculo."
Happy Birthday Pentacostals! Happy Birthday to You!
It might not be a bad idea for Catholics to inquire as to the attraction of Pentacostalism and to try to build bridges with this group. This seems to me to be much more sensible approach than the "Fear them and/or dismiss them" approach of so many evangelism-allergic Fortress Catholics I meet.
The faith is not supposed to hide in a fortress. The faith is supposed to go into the whole world.
With more than 580 million adherents (growing by 19 million per year and
54,000 per day), the Pentecostal/charismatic movement has become, in just
100 years, the fastest growing and most globally diverse expression of
worldwide Christianity. At the current rate of growth, some researchers
predict there will be 1 billion Pentecostals by 2025, most located in Asia,
Africa, and Latin America.
It might not be a bad idea for Catholics to inquire as to the attraction of Pentacostalism and to try to build bridges with this group. This seems to me to be much more sensible approach than the "Fear them and/or dismiss them" approach of so many evangelism-allergic Fortress Catholics I meet.
The faith is not supposed to hide in a fortress. The faith is supposed to go into the whole world.
Two Immutable Laws of Internet Discourse
1. When somebody begins a long diatribe about the Catholic Church with "I was raised Catholic..." you can know with absolute certainty that what is about to follow will be a farrago of ignorant nonsense about the Catholic faith.
2. When somebody concludes a moral argument with "This does not make me a bad person", you can be certain that they are a moral imbecile.
1. When somebody begins a long diatribe about the Catholic Church with "I was raised Catholic..." you can know with absolute certainty that what is about to follow will be a farrago of ignorant nonsense about the Catholic faith.
2. When somebody concludes a moral argument with "This does not make me a bad person", you can be certain that they are a moral imbecile.
More Hilarity from the "Extirpate Religion From the Public Square" crowd
The fun thing about stories like this (apart from the amusing spectacle of watching Bill O'Reilly bravely defending the Easter Bunny) is that weird cross currents in our culture that this points out. Many is the Fundie or Evangelical who has expressed a dislike of the Easter Bunny because he's, you know, *pagan* and all. The emphasis for years has been on "Jesus is the Reason for the Season" and a dislike of all the non-Christian stuff Easter (like Christmas) has acquired over the centuries.
But now, when the ultra-paranoid legions of the ACLU and their minions attack the Easter Bunny in their insane zeal to make sure that no passing non-Christian feels "oppressed" by his hippity-hoppity evangelism for a Theocratic Fascist state, conservative Protestants are forced into the weird position of having to defend this little cultural bauble because they recognize that an attack on the Easter Bunny is yet another attack on the Christian faith and part and parcel of an ongoing campaign to eradicate every last vestige of the Western Catholic tradition and culture from American life.
The fun thing about stories like this (apart from the amusing spectacle of watching Bill O'Reilly bravely defending the Easter Bunny) is that weird cross currents in our culture that this points out. Many is the Fundie or Evangelical who has expressed a dislike of the Easter Bunny because he's, you know, *pagan* and all. The emphasis for years has been on "Jesus is the Reason for the Season" and a dislike of all the non-Christian stuff Easter (like Christmas) has acquired over the centuries.
But now, when the ultra-paranoid legions of the ACLU and their minions attack the Easter Bunny in their insane zeal to make sure that no passing non-Christian feels "oppressed" by his hippity-hoppity evangelism for a Theocratic Fascist state, conservative Protestants are forced into the weird position of having to defend this little cultural bauble because they recognize that an attack on the Easter Bunny is yet another attack on the Christian faith and part and parcel of an ongoing campaign to eradicate every last vestige of the Western Catholic tradition and culture from American life.
A reader writes:
I guess I don't necessarily agree that there has to be a dichotomy between literature and pop culture. It used to be that artists created their work for the consumption of ordinary people. Shakespeare entertained the groundlings. Dickens is one of the literary greats of the 19th century and he wrote for the ordinary Joe. The Lord of the Rings is, at once, great literature and an icon of pop culture. But when the professional critics get involved, there is alwasy the temptation to pull "litritchuh" away from the unwashed herd and seal it into a mausoleum of upper crust sensibility. It think its possible (for somebody else, not me) to write fiction informed by a Catholic sensibility that is both good and popular. No telling though, how that will happen.
Here is an article from the latest National Catholic Register that I thought you might find interesting. It's a good article and raises a lot of good points, but I still can't help but think it misses the point a bit.
While I'd love to see a revival of Catholic "literature," I think we are in far more need of Catholic pop culture. What do I mean by that? I mean the next Flannery O'Connor or Evelyn Waugh coming along would indeed by a good thing, but we as a Church and as a culture are FAR more in need of the next Catholic Stephen King or Brad Bird. Who was it who once said, "You make the laws of the people. I'll make the songs, and the people's hearts will be mine."
I'd much rather a Catholic author come along who is going to be read by the masses than have a Catholic author who is only going to be discussed in the New York Review of Books and a few college professors.
Am I wrong?
I guess I don't necessarily agree that there has to be a dichotomy between literature and pop culture. It used to be that artists created their work for the consumption of ordinary people. Shakespeare entertained the groundlings. Dickens is one of the literary greats of the 19th century and he wrote for the ordinary Joe. The Lord of the Rings is, at once, great literature and an icon of pop culture. But when the professional critics get involved, there is alwasy the temptation to pull "litritchuh" away from the unwashed herd and seal it into a mausoleum of upper crust sensibility. It think its possible (for somebody else, not me) to write fiction informed by a Catholic sensibility that is both good and popular. No telling though, how that will happen.
An opportunity to put the parable of the Sheep and the Goats into Action
A brother in Christ needs a little help. Locate the Paypal button on his right rail. Grip mouse. Let conscience guide hand.
A brother in Christ needs a little help. Locate the Paypal button on his right rail. Grip mouse. Let conscience guide hand.
A reader asks:
You're right. I'm not the guy to help answer this question because I've given it very little thought. I haven't familiarized myself with the teaching of the bishops on this matter and am of two minds about the subject. On the one hand, it seems to me that Caesar certainly has a right and even a duty to maintain his borders, particularly in an age of terrorism.
On the other hand, I don't take civil law as an absolute. The law is made for man, not man for the law. If, as is the case, the American economy is willing to quietly let illegals across the border in order to exploit them as a bottomless pool of cheap labor, then it seems to me fair that these human beings should enjoy the accomodation of the country that is exploiting them. If that means more paperwork for a bureaucrat, well then, so be it.
I think the notion that the Church is siding with the exploited illegal is due to some desire to pack the pews is silly and something only believable to a neanderthal like Michael Savage. From the Church's perspective, the biblical mandate is clear: you shall not oppress the alien, the orphan, and the widow, for the Lord himself is their avenger. This is nothing new and is obviously what drives the Church's thinking here. Whether the exact policies being advocated by Mahony et al are the best way to implement that thinking, I don't know. But that is the theological rationale, not some stupid notion that packing the pew with destitute migrant workers will somehow politically benefit the Church.
Beyond those vague thoughts, I'm not much help. We don't have too many illegals pouring over the border from Canada and so the issue simply hasn't been on my mind much.
I'm not sure if you are the guy to help answer this but I thought I would give it a shot anyway: I'm a faithful Catholic here in the Archdiocese of Denver (a born-again cradle Catholic if you will) but also an American who believes in a sustainable immigration policy, controlling our borders, actually enforcing our laws, and not rewarding law-breakers. Obviously the mass recent pro-illegal immigrations demonstrations have been in the news lately. In that news and the resulting commentary, I've heard a couple of talk show hosts railing against the Catholic Church for actively promoting these demonstrations and undermining this country and its laws (Michael Reagan and Michael Savage to be precise--both have been laudatory of the Church in the past so I don't think its outright anti-Catholic bigotry). The motive they purport being the Church needs people in the pews and the easiest way is to get Catholics from Mexico. I understand the Church's teaching and I also want what is best for all involved. However, I don't want a wide-open border for any number of logical reasons. And I certainly don't want my Church actively involved in undermining this country's borders or its laws and promoting people to come here illegally, either directly or indirectly. I've tried to find more exact reporting of the Church's involvement in these types of activities but have not been able to find anything other than some rather disconcerting pro-illegal immigration sentiments by the Archbishop of Los Angeles (I have found stuff about Marxist organization and Spanish media outlets promoting the demonstrations). Would you have any insight into what the Church's actual role in these demonstrations or other efforts that might be considered counter-productive to maintaining what is left of our border and our immigration laws might be? Your personal thoughts of course would be more than welcome.
You're right. I'm not the guy to help answer this question because I've given it very little thought. I haven't familiarized myself with the teaching of the bishops on this matter and am of two minds about the subject. On the one hand, it seems to me that Caesar certainly has a right and even a duty to maintain his borders, particularly in an age of terrorism.
On the other hand, I don't take civil law as an absolute. The law is made for man, not man for the law. If, as is the case, the American economy is willing to quietly let illegals across the border in order to exploit them as a bottomless pool of cheap labor, then it seems to me fair that these human beings should enjoy the accomodation of the country that is exploiting them. If that means more paperwork for a bureaucrat, well then, so be it.
I think the notion that the Church is siding with the exploited illegal is due to some desire to pack the pews is silly and something only believable to a neanderthal like Michael Savage. From the Church's perspective, the biblical mandate is clear: you shall not oppress the alien, the orphan, and the widow, for the Lord himself is their avenger. This is nothing new and is obviously what drives the Church's thinking here. Whether the exact policies being advocated by Mahony et al are the best way to implement that thinking, I don't know. But that is the theological rationale, not some stupid notion that packing the pew with destitute migrant workers will somehow politically benefit the Church.
Beyond those vague thoughts, I'm not much help. We don't have too many illegals pouring over the border from Canada and so the issue simply hasn't been on my mind much.
Ancient Romans Took Their Prurient Decadence Straight and Didn't BS Themselves That they were serving some Higher Purpose
Apostate Puritans cloak their decadence in Science.
Our Swedish Manufacturers of Culture: Chloroforming the last drowsy vestiges of a troubled post-Christian conscience.
Apostate Puritans cloak their decadence in Science.
Our Swedish Manufacturers of Culture: Chloroforming the last drowsy vestiges of a troubled post-Christian conscience.
Wednesday, March 29, 2006
Pro-Lifers and Pro-Aborts Both Driven Crazy by New South Dakota Abortion Law
How good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell together in unity!
How good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell together in unity!
The Hopes of the Secular Post-Christian West Encapsulated
Wafa Sultan (an American non-religious woman of Arabic descent) Clashes with Muslim Cleric
The hope of the secular post-Christian West is that there will rise up from the Islamosphere a whole lot of Wafa Sultans: people who are culturally and religiously indistinguishable from the editorial board of the NY Times but dressed in Arab skin. These mythic legsions will then, it is hoped, make Bronze Age Fanatics go away by arguing them down on Larry King.
The West suffers from a fundamental failure to grasp that a diseased and inflamed spirituality can only be confronted by a healthy spirituality, not another diseased spirituality like Wester post-Christian secularism and New Age drivel.
Wafa Sultan (an American non-religious woman of Arabic descent) Clashes with Muslim Cleric
The hope of the secular post-Christian West is that there will rise up from the Islamosphere a whole lot of Wafa Sultans: people who are culturally and religiously indistinguishable from the editorial board of the NY Times but dressed in Arab skin. These mythic legsions will then, it is hoped, make Bronze Age Fanatics go away by arguing them down on Larry King.
The West suffers from a fundamental failure to grasp that a diseased and inflamed spirituality can only be confronted by a healthy spirituality, not another diseased spirituality like Wester post-Christian secularism and New Age drivel.
Things I don't need in my comboxes
"I mean this - you are a truly evil human being."
It appears St. Blog's resident cockeyed optimist, Mr. Sullivan, made somebody mad yesterday. Chris says lots of things I believe to be absurd. He tries to enjoin his private decision to be a pacifist on everybody as a duty of the Faith and use the Catechism to do it. I politely refuse to buy that. He has some sort of theory that Islam and Christianity are really the same thing. I laugh. He appears to believe we can be certain hell is empty and its compulsory heaven for all. Most recently, he was arguing that Ordinatio Sacerdotalis (in which the Pope states "in order that all doubt may be removed regarding a matter of great importance, a matter which pertains to the Church's divine constitution itself, in virtue of my ministry of confirming the brethren (cf. Lk 22:32) I declare that the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgment is to be definitively held by all the Church's faithful") can somehow be used to prove that women should be ordained.
Chris, in short, has a genius for torturing texts until they say what he wants them to say.
That said though, it is obvious to anybody that Chris would not hurt a fly. Pacifist to a quixotic fault? Yeah. Indifferentist? Yep. Unwilling to part with pet idea even if the Pope dropped a brick on his head saying "You're wrong!"? Granted. But evil? Come on!
What ocassioned this little outbreak of hysteria was a confluence of two posts. In one, my other resident eccentric, Pace, remarked (pausing from his periodic theorizing that his favorite films are somehow avatars or incarnations of the Blessed Trinity) to offer this mysterious remark "I'll say it even if no one else will: 9/11 was a gift to America. It gave us the gift of silence and peace. We all felt it. We could have forgiven. We could have even been thankful."
Not surprisingly, people were offended by this. The same poster who declared Sullivan "evil" also told Pace to "sleep well in hell". And cyberspace being what it is, nobody paused to reflect on the fact that a) Pace has a lot of views which are, as I said, eccentric and b) what he was saying was weirdly true.
So it fell to Chris to point out the biblical facts by noting that Paul (and the logic of the whole Christian tradition does, in fact, bid us to "Giv[e] thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ" (Ephesians 5:20).
It was for this that Chris was declared "truly evil". The problem is: he's right. Paul does say this. And the reason he says this is because he knows that if God's crucifixion can be an occasion of thanksgiving, then there is nothing the devil can devise (including 9/11) that is not also going to ultimately be an occasion of grace.
Obviously this is not to say that sin and evil are not sin and evil (though Chris' extreme refusals to acknowledge the reality of evil may put us at odds here). But my point is this: In the midst of our national anguish after 9/11 there *was* a curious sense of silence and peace. It was not the peace of external circumstance. There was tremendous suffering. But there was also the peace of moral clarity, of a people driven to its knees in prayer and finding (for a brief while) that the Permanent Things were the things that still mattered. In that sense, we can truly say Satan meant 9/11 for evil, but God turned it to good. If we deny this, then it seems to me we give Satan the Victor's Laurels in 9/11.
I see nothing self-flagellating in that. Nor do I see anything wrong with the proposition that we might have forgiven. We are, after all, commanded to do so by our Lord. Of course, what most people hear in that is, "We should have turned the other cheek and not destroyed the Taliban and launched the war in Afghanistan". I don't believe forgiveness means that. I think just War and forgiveness are reconcilable. I think it is possible to say, "Since you pose a danger to my family and do not intend to cease, I will destroy you" without tagging on to that "and I hope you are damned forever".
All of which is to say, I guess, when you meet an eccentric in a combox, try the experiment of reading him charitably before immediately declaring him "truly evil" and damning him to hell". He might have something worthwhile to say now and then.
"I mean this - you are a truly evil human being."
It appears St. Blog's resident cockeyed optimist, Mr. Sullivan, made somebody mad yesterday. Chris says lots of things I believe to be absurd. He tries to enjoin his private decision to be a pacifist on everybody as a duty of the Faith and use the Catechism to do it. I politely refuse to buy that. He has some sort of theory that Islam and Christianity are really the same thing. I laugh. He appears to believe we can be certain hell is empty and its compulsory heaven for all. Most recently, he was arguing that Ordinatio Sacerdotalis (in which the Pope states "in order that all doubt may be removed regarding a matter of great importance, a matter which pertains to the Church's divine constitution itself, in virtue of my ministry of confirming the brethren (cf. Lk 22:32) I declare that the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgment is to be definitively held by all the Church's faithful") can somehow be used to prove that women should be ordained.
Chris, in short, has a genius for torturing texts until they say what he wants them to say.
That said though, it is obvious to anybody that Chris would not hurt a fly. Pacifist to a quixotic fault? Yeah. Indifferentist? Yep. Unwilling to part with pet idea even if the Pope dropped a brick on his head saying "You're wrong!"? Granted. But evil? Come on!
What ocassioned this little outbreak of hysteria was a confluence of two posts. In one, my other resident eccentric, Pace, remarked (pausing from his periodic theorizing that his favorite films are somehow avatars or incarnations of the Blessed Trinity) to offer this mysterious remark "I'll say it even if no one else will: 9/11 was a gift to America. It gave us the gift of silence and peace. We all felt it. We could have forgiven. We could have even been thankful."
Not surprisingly, people were offended by this. The same poster who declared Sullivan "evil" also told Pace to "sleep well in hell". And cyberspace being what it is, nobody paused to reflect on the fact that a) Pace has a lot of views which are, as I said, eccentric and b) what he was saying was weirdly true.
So it fell to Chris to point out the biblical facts by noting that Paul (and the logic of the whole Christian tradition does, in fact, bid us to "Giv[e] thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ" (Ephesians 5:20).
It was for this that Chris was declared "truly evil". The problem is: he's right. Paul does say this. And the reason he says this is because he knows that if God's crucifixion can be an occasion of thanksgiving, then there is nothing the devil can devise (including 9/11) that is not also going to ultimately be an occasion of grace.
Obviously this is not to say that sin and evil are not sin and evil (though Chris' extreme refusals to acknowledge the reality of evil may put us at odds here). But my point is this: In the midst of our national anguish after 9/11 there *was* a curious sense of silence and peace. It was not the peace of external circumstance. There was tremendous suffering. But there was also the peace of moral clarity, of a people driven to its knees in prayer and finding (for a brief while) that the Permanent Things were the things that still mattered. In that sense, we can truly say Satan meant 9/11 for evil, but God turned it to good. If we deny this, then it seems to me we give Satan the Victor's Laurels in 9/11.
I see nothing self-flagellating in that. Nor do I see anything wrong with the proposition that we might have forgiven. We are, after all, commanded to do so by our Lord. Of course, what most people hear in that is, "We should have turned the other cheek and not destroyed the Taliban and launched the war in Afghanistan". I don't believe forgiveness means that. I think just War and forgiveness are reconcilable. I think it is possible to say, "Since you pose a danger to my family and do not intend to cease, I will destroy you" without tagging on to that "and I hope you are damned forever".
All of which is to say, I guess, when you meet an eccentric in a combox, try the experiment of reading him charitably before immediately declaring him "truly evil" and damning him to hell". He might have something worthwhile to say now and then.
Michael Totten's Tour of a Former Baath Prison
A reader asked me to put this up to "complement" linking the Buchanan piece. I quite agree that both realities must be weighed. Real horrors were committed under Sadaam's regime. Similarly (though obviously not quite in the same vein), I have never said the Afghanistan war was unjust. A real evil was confronted and destroyed when we wiped out the Taliban.
My point in linking Buchanan was not to say the Afghanistan war was unjust. It wasn't. My point is that we are being extremely naive to think we can patch two products of the Christian tradition (democracy and capitalism) on to a culture that has, for a thousand years, been specifically and carefully organized to repudiate that Tradition, including especially its view of the freedom and dignity of the human person ("Freedom go to hell!"). It is, quite rightly, the best we can do. But that's my point: the best the secular post-Christian West can do is not going to be good enough to deal with the problem. Which means the secular post-Christian West is either going to have to return to its Christian roots or embrace failure and its consequences.
In other words, my point is "Repent! And believe the Good News!" That seems to be where Jesus started his preaching and it still seems like a good place for us to begin.
A reader asked me to put this up to "complement" linking the Buchanan piece. I quite agree that both realities must be weighed. Real horrors were committed under Sadaam's regime. Similarly (though obviously not quite in the same vein), I have never said the Afghanistan war was unjust. A real evil was confronted and destroyed when we wiped out the Taliban.
My point in linking Buchanan was not to say the Afghanistan war was unjust. It wasn't. My point is that we are being extremely naive to think we can patch two products of the Christian tradition (democracy and capitalism) on to a culture that has, for a thousand years, been specifically and carefully organized to repudiate that Tradition, including especially its view of the freedom and dignity of the human person ("Freedom go to hell!"). It is, quite rightly, the best we can do. But that's my point: the best the secular post-Christian West can do is not going to be good enough to deal with the problem. Which means the secular post-Christian West is either going to have to return to its Christian roots or embrace failure and its consequences.
In other words, my point is "Repent! And believe the Good News!" That seems to be where Jesus started his preaching and it still seems like a good place for us to begin.
Nick Thomm Update
Last updated 03/28/06
I had an encouraging consultation Monday with a brain tumor specialist at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit. He feels that through two additional minor tests, he can obtain the much-desired diagnosis of "tumor" or "not a tumor." If it is not a tumor, it is a hamartoma, an abnormal collection of cells, which does not grow or present any other adverse effects. The seizures would be controlled, and hopefully ended, through medication. If it IS a tumor, the bad news is I would have to undergo a second biopsy. As the first biopsy resulted in a temporary paralyzing of my right hand, I have my obvious fears about a second one. But we will cross that bridge if we come to it, and God will provide the sufficient graces (and guidance to the doctors) :-) Thank-you again for your continued prayers. It can't be explained how blessed I feel.
-Nick
News of the Weird
When I think "Culture of Life" I think "Britney Spears".
I think two miniature versions of these would make real conversation starters if used as bookends.
When I think "Culture of Life" I think "Britney Spears".
I think two miniature versions of these would make real conversation starters if used as bookends.
Tuesday, March 28, 2006
In my ongoing quest to dominate American media...
I will be on the radio twice today. First, I'll do my usual Tuesday gig on Heart Mind and Strength with the mellifluous Greg Popcak and his star-spangled wife, Lisa. Together, we shall recite the entire libretto of the Pirates of Penzance in five minutes. Look for me around 2:45-2:50 PM EST.
Then, at 4:00 PM EST, I will be the featured guest on Dave Burns' show on WHON 930 AM in Centerville, IN. We'll be talking about The Da Vinci Deception (a book you badly need to buy from me and read, if you haven't yet). It's a call-in show, so that should be interesting.
Both shows stream on the web.
I will be on the radio twice today. First, I'll do my usual Tuesday gig on Heart Mind and Strength with the mellifluous Greg Popcak and his star-spangled wife, Lisa. Together, we shall recite the entire libretto of the Pirates of Penzance in five minutes. Look for me around 2:45-2:50 PM EST.
Then, at 4:00 PM EST, I will be the featured guest on Dave Burns' show on WHON 930 AM in Centerville, IN. We'll be talking about The Da Vinci Deception (a book you badly need to buy from me and read, if you haven't yet). It's a call-in show, so that should be interesting.
Both shows stream on the web.
Incubus is now available on DVD!
The unforgettable all-Esperanto film starring William Shatner. If you don't love this, you don't love the movies (or, at least, you don't love William Shatner.... or maybe just Esperanto)!
The unforgettable all-Esperanto film starring William Shatner. If you don't love this, you don't love the movies (or, at least, you don't love William Shatner.... or maybe just Esperanto)!
The Webelves Savor Victory as Abdul Rahman is Released
But they also remind us that the Afghanis promptly jailed two more Christians and thousands more fear execution at the hands of the glorious democratic regime.
It's like a perfect storm for the Christians in the Islamosphere. Democracy frees Muslims to get in touch with their Inner Bronze Age Fanatic. The vast majority of the world, including our Courageous Press, says nothing because it's just Christians being murdered, after all. It's not like drawing insulting cartoons or something really serious. Meanwhile, the Administration has to act to save Rahman or its nation-building efforts look even more silly than they already do. But at the same time, the Administration also benefits if the Courageous Press ignores the plight of the Christians, because then at least one failure is not being hammered on by reporters. So unless activists are able to maintain a level of excitement for the *next* batch of Christians threatened with death in the Islamosphere (and such moods are very hard to maintain the public mind), the Administration will have much less reason to draw attention to the fact that we have made Afghanistan safe for sharia and Christian persecution and are laboring to do the same for Iraq.
This is what I think is meant by "mission creep".
But, at any rate, thanks be to God for Abdul Rahman's freedom and (God willing) safe asylum in the US.
But they also remind us that the Afghanis promptly jailed two more Christians and thousands more fear execution at the hands of the glorious democratic regime.
It's like a perfect storm for the Christians in the Islamosphere. Democracy frees Muslims to get in touch with their Inner Bronze Age Fanatic. The vast majority of the world, including our Courageous Press, says nothing because it's just Christians being murdered, after all. It's not like drawing insulting cartoons or something really serious. Meanwhile, the Administration has to act to save Rahman or its nation-building efforts look even more silly than they already do. But at the same time, the Administration also benefits if the Courageous Press ignores the plight of the Christians, because then at least one failure is not being hammered on by reporters. So unless activists are able to maintain a level of excitement for the *next* batch of Christians threatened with death in the Islamosphere (and such moods are very hard to maintain the public mind), the Administration will have much less reason to draw attention to the fact that we have made Afghanistan safe for sharia and Christian persecution and are laboring to do the same for Iraq.
This is what I think is meant by "mission creep".
But, at any rate, thanks be to God for Abdul Rahman's freedom and (God willing) safe asylum in the US.
Reverse Peter Kreeft Syndrome
I love Peter Kreeft. He's a great writer, a wise man, a funny guy, and somebody I am honored to have spent a little time with. He was a hugely important guide for me in coming into the Church, and was very generous with his time in corresponding with both me and Sherry Weddell as we wrestled with the sorts of stuff Evangelicals wrestle with as they struggle with the Church's claims.
One of Peter's more endearing qualities is that he adores C.S. Lewis, who was also a huge influence on me. In fact, he adores Lewis so much, that his highest form of praise for a writer is to compare him with C.S. Lewis. This works when the writer is actually like C.S. Lewis, but it can have funny results when the writer is "like Lewis" only in the sense that both are writing in the English language.
I mention this because something similar often seems to obtain in our political discourse when we are looking for superlatives for our enemies. Very quickly, we fall for Godwin's Law and start comparing them to Hitler and/or Stalin. Here, for example, is Dennis Prager announcing that the Islamic threat is greater than German and Soviet threats were.
I can't help but be reminded of a discussion I recently had over on the Secret Agent Man blog with Joe D'Hippolito, who insisted, despite all reason and evidence, that Islam is "totalitarian".
Ultimately it seemed to me to come down to the fact that because Joe hates Islam, he insisted on calling it totalitarian and "religious Nazism" because those were the worst insults he could think of, even if they had nothing to do with actually describing the phenomenon of Islam. In much the same way, it appears to me that many Western thinkers tend strongly to describe this new global-historical conflict in terms which evoke WWII and the Cold War, even though it is highly dubious that there is much in common between them beyond the broad notion of a "clash of civilizations".
Is Islam a huge danger? Of course. Does that danger look anything like the great totalitarian systems of the 20th century? Well, not really, so far as I can see. It's radically decentralized nature is, in some way, almost the exact opposite of a totalitarian system. But until we doff our secular glasses, we're going to continue to talk as though this is WWII/Cold War redux--and say a great deal of nonsense in the process.
I love Peter Kreeft. He's a great writer, a wise man, a funny guy, and somebody I am honored to have spent a little time with. He was a hugely important guide for me in coming into the Church, and was very generous with his time in corresponding with both me and Sherry Weddell as we wrestled with the sorts of stuff Evangelicals wrestle with as they struggle with the Church's claims.
One of Peter's more endearing qualities is that he adores C.S. Lewis, who was also a huge influence on me. In fact, he adores Lewis so much, that his highest form of praise for a writer is to compare him with C.S. Lewis. This works when the writer is actually like C.S. Lewis, but it can have funny results when the writer is "like Lewis" only in the sense that both are writing in the English language.
I mention this because something similar often seems to obtain in our political discourse when we are looking for superlatives for our enemies. Very quickly, we fall for Godwin's Law and start comparing them to Hitler and/or Stalin. Here, for example, is Dennis Prager announcing that the Islamic threat is greater than German and Soviet threats were.
I can't help but be reminded of a discussion I recently had over on the Secret Agent Man blog with Joe D'Hippolito, who insisted, despite all reason and evidence, that Islam is "totalitarian".
Ultimately it seemed to me to come down to the fact that because Joe hates Islam, he insisted on calling it totalitarian and "religious Nazism" because those were the worst insults he could think of, even if they had nothing to do with actually describing the phenomenon of Islam. In much the same way, it appears to me that many Western thinkers tend strongly to describe this new global-historical conflict in terms which evoke WWII and the Cold War, even though it is highly dubious that there is much in common between them beyond the broad notion of a "clash of civilizations".
Is Islam a huge danger? Of course. Does that danger look anything like the great totalitarian systems of the 20th century? Well, not really, so far as I can see. It's radically decentralized nature is, in some way, almost the exact opposite of a totalitarian system. But until we doff our secular glasses, we're going to continue to talk as though this is WWII/Cold War redux--and say a great deal of nonsense in the process.
A reader writes:
You're both partly right. Jesus has atoned for our sin by his cross and resurrection (which is what your Evangelical friend is keyed into). However, as Paul makes clear, we are *participants* in the work of Christ in the world, by Christ's own grace. And so our sufferings (both voluntary and involuntary) are given both meaning and power to help others. The Evangelical conception of salvation has always had trouble finding a place for suffering. Amalgamated to an American ethos which says that suffering is always to be avoided, comfort is always to be sought, and anyone who disagrees is "sick", Evangelicalism can often become a tradition which not only avoids suffering but condemns those who experience it as "not having enough faith", etc. Typically, when this happens, there will be voices in the Evangelical community who will speak out on behalf of the sufferer, but that's about as far as it will go. Suffering will then be called a "mystery" (which it indeed is) and then simply dropped. The idea that there is some positive good--and emphatically some atoning virtue--in suffering is profoundly opposed by Evangelical theology because it is thought to rob Christ of the glory of his atoning work.
Paul sees it differently. That is why he tells the Colossians (in a verse that is weirdly invisible to Evangelical theology: "Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I complete what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church." (Colossians 1:24). This is a classic example of a passage which, if it had not been in the Bible already when Evangelicalism was invented, would *never* have gotten in. It's point is utterly and thoroughly Catholic. It does not mean "Jesus didn't sufffer enough, so we have to make up the difference. It means that Christ has made us sharers in his work on earth and our sufferings are part of the means by which he is continuing to save the world. When we bear suffering we are, in a profound way, united with Christ crucified. When we do it with mercy and patience and love, we are being made agents, by the power of the Spirit, through which Christ takes away the sins of the world. If that were not the case, then there would be no point whatever in our sufferings (or indeed, in anything we do). For only what we do in God will remain.
I wonder if you can help me with this question. An evangelical co-worker of mine and I were discussing acts of penance yesterday. He asked, "Why do you punish yourself?" I explained that penance is not punishment. He asked what is it then. I replied that t is an act of atonement for sin. He very firmly said that sin has already been atoned for, etc., what we have to do is accept it, no one can do anything to atone for sin, faith not works, etc.
I think I mishandled this out of an imperfect understanding of penance. Can you help?
You're both partly right. Jesus has atoned for our sin by his cross and resurrection (which is what your Evangelical friend is keyed into). However, as Paul makes clear, we are *participants* in the work of Christ in the world, by Christ's own grace. And so our sufferings (both voluntary and involuntary) are given both meaning and power to help others. The Evangelical conception of salvation has always had trouble finding a place for suffering. Amalgamated to an American ethos which says that suffering is always to be avoided, comfort is always to be sought, and anyone who disagrees is "sick", Evangelicalism can often become a tradition which not only avoids suffering but condemns those who experience it as "not having enough faith", etc. Typically, when this happens, there will be voices in the Evangelical community who will speak out on behalf of the sufferer, but that's about as far as it will go. Suffering will then be called a "mystery" (which it indeed is) and then simply dropped. The idea that there is some positive good--and emphatically some atoning virtue--in suffering is profoundly opposed by Evangelical theology because it is thought to rob Christ of the glory of his atoning work.
Paul sees it differently. That is why he tells the Colossians (in a verse that is weirdly invisible to Evangelical theology: "Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I complete what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church." (Colossians 1:24). This is a classic example of a passage which, if it had not been in the Bible already when Evangelicalism was invented, would *never* have gotten in. It's point is utterly and thoroughly Catholic. It does not mean "Jesus didn't sufffer enough, so we have to make up the difference. It means that Christ has made us sharers in his work on earth and our sufferings are part of the means by which he is continuing to save the world. When we bear suffering we are, in a profound way, united with Christ crucified. When we do it with mercy and patience and love, we are being made agents, by the power of the Spirit, through which Christ takes away the sins of the world. If that were not the case, then there would be no point whatever in our sufferings (or indeed, in anything we do). For only what we do in God will remain.
Schiavo Laws Succumbing to Culture of Death
Before kingdoms change, men and women must change.
Meanwhile, poor Stephen Hand is faced with a bitter choice and chooses to do the right thing. God bless him and his family!
Before kingdoms change, men and women must change.
Meanwhile, poor Stephen Hand is faced with a bitter choice and chooses to do the right thing. God bless him and his family!
A reader writes:
Seagull is just drivel. You are right to lobby for something (virtually anything) else. For heaven's sake, when I was in ninth grade, we read Great Expectations. Your fellow faculty are sending a very clear message to the students: "You're too dumb to read a really challenging book. Have some goo instead."
Here's a poll for my readers, name some of the books you were reading at that age, whether on your own or as homework. In addition to Great Expectations, I remember The Time Machine, The War of the Worlds, Lord of the Flies, The Great Gatsby, the transcript of the Scopes Trial, and the poetry of Carl Sandburg off the top of my head. If I search my memory I could find plenty more. (I also read crap, but it wasn't assigned by lazy teachers).
Since you mention Lewis, I would heartily recommend either his Space Trilogy or Till We Have Faces.
Anybody have their high school bibliography at hand?
I teach at a Catholic high school, and a couple of my collegues in the Religion dept. asked me if I was ok with their idea that the summer read for all students 9-12, be Richard Bach's Jonathan Livingston Seagull. I said that my understanding of Richard Bach from reading a few things by him, was that he was a classic New Ager. My memory of Seagull was that it was a none-too-subtle slam on organized religion and authority in general- perhaps the theme of we are our own God as well. Can you and your readers provide me with more info? I suggested that since we only have 1 book to select we should be looking at something more explicitly Catholic or Christian a la CS Lewis. What do you think?
Seagull is just drivel. You are right to lobby for something (virtually anything) else. For heaven's sake, when I was in ninth grade, we read Great Expectations. Your fellow faculty are sending a very clear message to the students: "You're too dumb to read a really challenging book. Have some goo instead."
Here's a poll for my readers, name some of the books you were reading at that age, whether on your own or as homework. In addition to Great Expectations, I remember The Time Machine, The War of the Worlds, Lord of the Flies, The Great Gatsby, the transcript of the Scopes Trial, and the poetry of Carl Sandburg off the top of my head. If I search my memory I could find plenty more. (I also read crap, but it wasn't assigned by lazy teachers).
Since you mention Lewis, I would heartily recommend either his Space Trilogy or Till We Have Faces.
Anybody have their high school bibliography at hand?
When the nicest person in the California Legislature wants to kill the feebs and geezers, who can argue with that?
Another triumph of American Catholic catechesis. Sentiment uber alles.
Another triumph of American Catholic catechesis. Sentiment uber alles.
Geocentrism Hits the South Mississippi Press!
Evidence in favor of geocentrism includes the fact that nobody could convince Bob Sungenis to part with a thousand dollars by admitting he was wrong. Also, it turns out Einstein's theory of relativity means that everywhere is the center of the universe, so why not earth? This would be a workable argument, except that Bob himself claims to have disproven Einstein, so why trot him out now?
Oh, and if you get in a helicopter and hover in one spot, the earth doesn't turn underneath you, so it's not rotating (no mention made of the fact that the atmosphere is moving too).
Sigh.
Evidence in favor of geocentrism includes the fact that nobody could convince Bob Sungenis to part with a thousand dollars by admitting he was wrong. Also, it turns out Einstein's theory of relativity means that everywhere is the center of the universe, so why not earth? This would be a workable argument, except that Bob himself claims to have disproven Einstein, so why trot him out now?
Oh, and if you get in a helicopter and hover in one spot, the earth doesn't turn underneath you, so it's not rotating (no mention made of the fact that the atmosphere is moving too).
Sigh.
Monday, March 27, 2006
From our "Democracy Will Fix Islam" Files
Here the Wisdom of the Voters calls for the trial (and inevitable execution) of Abdul Rahman for converting to Christianity.
In other news, members of the Chattering Classes courageously wring their hands over the Imminent Theocracy just about to be imposed on the United States by Fr. Richard John Neuhaus.
On the bright side, Rahman's plight bears out the truth again that the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church.
Here the Wisdom of the Voters calls for the trial (and inevitable execution) of Abdul Rahman for converting to Christianity.
In other news, members of the Chattering Classes courageously wring their hands over the Imminent Theocracy just about to be imposed on the United States by Fr. Richard John Neuhaus.
On the bright side, Rahman's plight bears out the truth again that the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church.
A reader writes:
I'm about the wrongest guy in the world to ask about stuff like this. I know nohting about "financial success", so I know very little about how to approach it spiritually. "Seek first his kingdom, and everything else will be added as well" seems to me to be sound, as does "Do not worry about tomorrow" and "Your heavenly Father knows what you need". Beyond that, I have nothing intelligent to add. Maybe some of my readers do.
I am looking for some resources which will help give a Catholic scripture reference point on how we are to approach "success" in our work. How do you reconcile personal desires for financial success and accomplishment in our work with what is truly the will of God for our lives. I am in sales and the emphasis is always on meeting certain production requirements. I believe there is a science to sales in that the more people you call on the more predictable will be your sales success if you only maintain a certain number of prospect contacts. This results in a certain number of sales and from that you can calculate what your income will be. If the sales are NOT resulting in sufficient income based on MY personal goals, how can I use the words of scripture to gain wisdom that this is what God in fact wants me to do. I hope you understand where I am coming from on this. Worry and often anxiety accompany me daily on this challenge. Any suggestions or advise would be appreciated.
I'm about the wrongest guy in the world to ask about stuff like this. I know nohting about "financial success", so I know very little about how to approach it spiritually. "Seek first his kingdom, and everything else will be added as well" seems to me to be sound, as does "Do not worry about tomorrow" and "Your heavenly Father knows what you need". Beyond that, I have nothing intelligent to add. Maybe some of my readers do.
Satan Infiltrates Homeschool Movement
Harry Potter site run by a homeschool kid! Eek! Rowling is tunnelling under your house!
Harry Potter site run by a homeschool kid! Eek! Rowling is tunnelling under your house!
A reader writes:
I'm sure the blogosphere will be talking about this article by Joy Jones: Marriage is for white people. The problem is, most of the discussion will be off the mark. As I read the article, I noticed a distinct materialist point of view, and one that bordered on anti-personalist. The tragic state of affairs in the Black community seems to be exacerbated by the view of marriage that is economic, and not spiritual. The tone seems to be "what do I get from marrying you?" instead of "what do I give?"
Joy Jones seems to be in desparate need of a little Theology of the Body.
A reader writes:
I don't know. My *guess* is that She would, for such a detailed and specific situation as yours, refer you to experts in care for the mentally and emotionally disabled. In short, She would invoke the principle of subsidiarty, whereby the people closest to the problem are like the people who know best what to do. At the same time, of course, she would also point to the elementary virtues of prudence and justice. But I doubt you will find a detailed program from some bishop on how to handle your particular situation. Perhaps one of my readers can point you to some resources. I will also check with my wife, who has some expertise in this area.
I wonder if you can direct me to any documents on the Church's teaching on managing the mentally handicapped who are incapable of employment, marriage, or even most self-control, but quite capable of producing offspring who will probably be just as damaged as themselves. I am writing because of our son -- twenty-two, burdened with pervasive developmental delay, some form of autism, functional retardation, and emotional problems, but physically more or less normal. Sooner or later (probably sooner, as he is becoming unmanageable) he will have to go into a group home, and what then?
Does the Church give us any guidance?
I don't know. My *guess* is that She would, for such a detailed and specific situation as yours, refer you to experts in care for the mentally and emotionally disabled. In short, She would invoke the principle of subsidiarty, whereby the people closest to the problem are like the people who know best what to do. At the same time, of course, she would also point to the elementary virtues of prudence and justice. But I doubt you will find a detailed program from some bishop on how to handle your particular situation. Perhaps one of my readers can point you to some resources. I will also check with my wife, who has some expertise in this area.
Britain's first IVF "designer baby" clinic is to charge about £6,000 for a made-to-order infant.
The obvious question nobody is asking here is: if baby can be manufactured, bought, and sold, then why cannot human beings be reduced to property again and the slave markets start up their lucrative trade once more?
The obvious question nobody is asking here is: if baby can be manufactured, bought, and sold, then why cannot human beings be reduced to property again and the slave markets start up their lucrative trade once more?
E.M. Vidal is excited about the new film on Marie Antoinette
She also hopes she will be canonized someday.
Don't know enough about Marie to say one way or another, but my inclination is to think that the victims of the French Revelution probably got the shaft from historians general sympathetic to Revolutionary polemics. Maybe one of my readers can comment from a more informed perspective.
She also hopes she will be canonized someday.
Don't know enough about Marie to say one way or another, but my inclination is to think that the victims of the French Revelution probably got the shaft from historians general sympathetic to Revolutionary polemics. Maybe one of my readers can comment from a more informed perspective.
From our "Show me a culture that despises virginity and I'll show you a culture that despises children" file
The tortured conscience of our sex-obsessed culture tries to figure out a way to reconcile its deep belief that Consent is the sole arbiter of morality with the knowledge that there is something wrong with statutory rape. As ever, when denizens of the culture of hedonism wrestle with their conscience, the conscience loses.
The tortured conscience of our sex-obsessed culture tries to figure out a way to reconcile its deep belief that Consent is the sole arbiter of morality with the knowledge that there is something wrong with statutory rape. As ever, when denizens of the culture of hedonism wrestle with their conscience, the conscience loses.
Fr. Pavone Scorches the Insufferable Michael Schiavo
Meanwhile reader July Loesch Wiley send this along:
Meanwhile reader July Loesch Wiley send this along:
REMEMBRANCE of EASTER 2005
Crowd my eyes, you bevies of daffodils,
And you forsythias in throngs of cheer,
Dandelion galaxies and fountains of trees.
Fill my mouth with the breath of hyacinths, you purple air
And you roistering breeze.
And you quince-buds so eager, you swelling seeds,
You squirrels running stitches across the loom
Of woven grasses, inflorescent weeds;
Jasmine-bush, loop me with your lariats of perfume.
Fill me, small birds, with your versicles,
And chuckled replies.
She is bleeding from the mouth and eyes.
Sate me then, Sun, all dapple and spangle
Crowd out all else
Lade me and load me, you skies
With blessings of warmth and breath
Let me see nothing else
But everything springing and skyey.
From the mouth and eyes.
. . . . . . . . .
for Terri Schindler Schiavo
by Juli Loesch Wiley
The Webelves Continue to Track the Abdul Rahman Story
The next hurdle, after the state relents, is protecting him from freelance justice from family and neighbors in the Religion of Peace.
The next hurdle, after the state relents, is protecting him from freelance justice from family and neighbors in the Religion of Peace.
A reader writes:
I was much like your husband when I made my first confession. I thought God would play "Simon says" with me and if I inadvertantly overlooked something God would not forgive it. However, the understanding of the Church is that *all* sin is forgiven in the sacrament so long as we have a sincere intention to confess our sins and repent. So if you accidently forget something, it's covered. Obviously, if you *deliberately* withhold something that's a different matter, but I doubt your husband aims to do that. The point is that the sacraments are not reducing valves intended to keep out the weak and forgetful. They are instead meant to be the *sure* place where we meet the grace of God, the God who is for us, not against us. God will not be standing over your husband with a stick, ready to hit him if he accidently forgets something. He's the father of the prodigal, running to welcome him home.
My husband had decided to go to confession after 45 years--and it's this coming Wednesday.
I smoothed the way by speaking with Father who will hold our Wednesday evening confessions in his office (not together of course). My husband is getting scruples BUT more than that---he's wondering if there was a booklet for someone like him to offer clues or ideas or direction.
Have you written anything about those who haven't gone since they were kids and how to not feel guilty about forgetting things? He's so worried. It's not so much that he's scared (yeah right) but he's worried that he'll forget to say everything and that it won't count.
I've told him it's OK. Just express sincere remorse and that God knows! But... do you have anything?
I was much like your husband when I made my first confession. I thought God would play "Simon says" with me and if I inadvertantly overlooked something God would not forgive it. However, the understanding of the Church is that *all* sin is forgiven in the sacrament so long as we have a sincere intention to confess our sins and repent. So if you accidently forget something, it's covered. Obviously, if you *deliberately* withhold something that's a different matter, but I doubt your husband aims to do that. The point is that the sacraments are not reducing valves intended to keep out the weak and forgetful. They are instead meant to be the *sure* place where we meet the grace of God, the God who is for us, not against us. God will not be standing over your husband with a stick, ready to hit him if he accidently forgets something. He's the father of the prodigal, running to welcome him home.
Joseph Pearce and Pavel Chichikov will be presenting a recital of our poetry at Ave Maria University, in Naples, Florida, on Thursday, March 30, at 8 pm.
You can get Pavel's Mysteries and Stations in the Manner of Ignatius here.
You can get Pavel's Mysteries and Stations in the Manner of Ignatius here.
Interesting and Beautiful Reflection from then-Cdl. Ratzinger
A reader writes:
A reader writes:
In the book Journey towards Easter, a collection of retreat talks then-Cardinal Ratzinger gave in the Vatican in the presence of Pope John Paul II during the Lenten season of 1983, there is a chapter well worth reading and especially so during this time of the liturgical year. "Chapter 4: The Paschal Mystery." It is divided into four sections:
1. Holy Thursday
2. The Washing of the Feet
3. The Connection between the Last Supper, the Cross and the Resurrection
4. Risen on the Third Day.
I just finished the third section. There are some powerful and prevocative thoughts here. Discussing the relation and root of the Songs of the Servant of God to understanding Jesus' death, Ratzinger writes:He made of his death an act of prayer, an act of adoration. ... [H]e cried "with a loud voice" the opening words of Psalm 21, the great Psalm of the just man suffering and set free: "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?".
... [T]his dying cry of Jesus was the messianic prayer of the great Psalm of Israel's suffering and hope, which concludes with the vision of the poor satisfied and all the ends of the earth returning to the Lord. ... [T]he whole story of the passion is shot through with the threads of this Psalm, weaving in and out continually in an interchange between words and reality. ... It thus becomes clear that Jesus is the true subject of this Psalm ....
... [W]hat took place at the Last Supper is an anticipation of the death, the transformation of the death into an act of love. ...
The death without the Supper would be empty, without meaning; the Supper without the actual realisation of the death it anticipated would be a gesture without reality. Supper and Cross together ... The Eucharist does not spring from the Supper alone; it springs from this oneness of Supper and Cross ....
Therefore the Eucharist is not simply Supper .... The Eucharist is the presence of Christ's Sacrifice, ... it is Christ distributing himself under the figure of bread and wine.
... "given for you", "poured our for many for the remission of sins". These words are found in the Songs of the Servant of God handed down to us in the book of the prophet Isaiah. These Songs presuppose the exilic period: Israel no longer has its Temple, the only legitimate place in which to adore God. So it seems exiled from God also--forlorn in the desert. No longer can sacrifices or expiation and praise be offered. The inevitable question arises: how can there now exist any relationship with God, on which depends the salvation of the people and of the world? In this passion, in this suffering of a life lived away from their homeland, a life far from their own culture, Israel underwent a new experience: the solemn praises of God could no longer be celebrated. The only possibility for drawing near to God was suffering for God. Inspired by the Holy Spirit, the Prophets understood that the suffering of believing Israel was the true sacrifice, the new liturgy, and that in this true litrugy Israel represented the world before the face of God. ... The hope found in their passion was that the suffering people were an anticipation of the true servant of God, and so, as 'sacramentum futuri' [a sacrament of things to come] , shared in his grace. By applying to the Last Supper these words about the Servant of God, Jesus says: I am this Servant of God. My passion and death are that definitive liturgy, that glorification of God which is the light and salvation of the world.
Here is where one experiences the preceding as a crescendo of sorts as Ratzinger builds up to then deliver the powerful and--to some or perhaps even to many--provacative lines about the people of Israel and their relation to the sacrifice of Christ in the Eucharist:
Here we touch upon an important point for the celebration of the Eucharist. Israel concelebrated the Eucharist with Jesus, in that they shared in the sufferings of the Servant of God. To participate in the Eucharist, to communicate with the body and blood of Christ, demands the liturgy of our life, a sharing the passion of the Servant of God. In this participation our sufferings become 'sacrifice' and so we can complete "in [our] flesh what is lacking in Christ's affliction" (Col 1, 24).
--Journey towards Easter, pp. 103-107. Emphases added
Dem Ex-Gov of WA Wants a Culture of Death
A Neat, Clean Culture of Death:
Some people wodner why JPII slogged on for years and made a spectacle of himself, drooling, his face mask-like, his speech slurred. Booth Gardner is why. He was a living testament to the fact that people are not things to throw away. We can't even throw ourselves away. Gardner is a pathetic testament to how much the imperial automonous self of the West has forgotten this fundamental human fact.
A Neat, Clean Culture of Death:
"I could go out in the garage and blow my brains out, but that's not what I'm talking about," says Gardner, who describes his body and spirit as progressively weakened by Parkinson's disease, with which he was diagnosed 13 years ago. "That's not dignity."
Some people wodner why JPII slogged on for years and made a spectacle of himself, drooling, his face mask-like, his speech slurred. Booth Gardner is why. He was a living testament to the fact that people are not things to throw away. We can't even throw ourselves away. Gardner is a pathetic testament to how much the imperial automonous self of the West has forgotten this fundamental human fact.
Friday, March 24, 2006
Prayer Requests
Reader Rosemarie writes:
And Stephen Hand's family has suffered a terrible tragedy.
Lord Jesus, hear the cry of your servants and send them help and healing by your powerful Holy Spirit.
St. Luke, pray for them!
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Reader Rosemarie writes:
Please pray for my sister-in-law; she was hospitalized today with a very low blood oxygen count. It could be due to a recent head injury. We would really appreciate your prayers. They have helped us in the past with many crises. Thank you and God bless all.
And Stephen Hand's family has suffered a terrible tragedy.
Lord Jesus, hear the cry of your servants and send them help and healing by your powerful Holy Spirit.
St. Luke, pray for them!
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
A reader writes:
It seems to me that you've actually got a very good situation if you can learn to see the gifts God has given you in the people around you. One of the big temptations for young bucks who have a deep conversion experience is that they very naturally get in touch with their inner warrior and want to go out and contend for the Faith. Nothing wrong with that. But we have to always bear in mind Paul's counsel: you wrestle not with flesh and blood.
Too many young guys forget that and essentially start buying into a sort Adversarial Posture Evangelism thing. They forget that the first duty of the evangelist is to proclaim, not defend, the truth in love. Therefore, we are not to view people with incorrect opinions and ideas as adversaries to be defeated but to presume good will until it's obvious that we are wrong.
Apologetics is the handmaid, not the master, of Evangelism. If you assume a posture of defensiveness, you will likely alienate and create enemies before you even start. This would be a pity because your are surrounded by people who agree with you on 99 things out of a hundred. You don't need to compromise your faith in the slightest. But you also don't need to think and speak of the folks at your school as though you are an "alien" and as though they are consciously "undermining" anything. Never ascribe to malice what can be sufficiently explained by ignorance.
A reading of the Decree on Ecumenism is in order here. For instance, it is (you will be surprised to hear) not in keeping with the teaching of the Church to say "REAL unity can only be under the Pope while sharing the same Eucharist."
Why? Because the choice is not between "real" and "fake". It is between "partial" and "full". The Church declares (dogmatically, even) that a baptized Protestant is in real, albeit imperfect union with the Church. That's one of the implications of "We believe in one baptism for the forgiveness of sins". And of course, with your average Evangelical, that unity extends to a common belief in virtually everythign the creed has to say. Yes, there are real differences (Eucharist, sacraments, Mary, Pope) and those mustn't be whitewashed. But neither must they dominate so much as to block out the real unity that exists. Nor can they become excuses for uncharity and a sort of testosterone-driven need to do somebody down in an argument.
My point: it was a saint of the Church, Francis de Sales, who said he would "shake the walls of Geneva with love". He also said you catch more flies with honey than vinegar. Truth and love are not opposites. You are not compromising the truth if you love your neighbor and speak gently rather than presuming that he is out to attack the Church if his tradition has never introduced him to (or has mischaracterized) some aspects of Catholic teaching.
I'm going on too long so let me simply recommend a piece I wrote sometime ago which aims to address this very matter.
Hope it helps!
Oh, by the way, I don't know nuthin' bout the National Workshop for Christian Unity. Sorry!
I'm currently a junior at a Protestant College. I finally came to my senses and came back to the Catholic Church after many years of being a Protestant. This happened while I have been a student here and the conversion has definitely taken over my life. Reading your blogs and buying the books I have seen recommended on your blogs have really helped me understand the faith. My library is growing somewhat slightly out of control. Like other converts I am really enthusiastic about the Church and take Church teaching very seriously. I make no apologies for what the church teaches.
My life on campus has been somewhat hard because this is a vibrant Protestant Christian college and I feel like an alien here sometimes. The Catholic population is about 2% of the student body and those students who are Catholic really don't take it seriously. I want to talk about distinctly Catholic topics, but I don't get a good reception. It's hard. Then comes other things such as the theology and Bible department here that only help to subtly undermine Magisterial authority.
The point of this whole email is in regards to something called the National Workshop for Christian Unity. I received an email from one of our Newman Club advisors asking if I was interested. After looking at the site, I wasn't quite sure what to think. My dilemma is this: I've read so many stories on your blogs about Catholic groups which do things that undermine Church authority, and I'm wanting to make sure that this organization isn't one of these groups. Have any of you heard about this place?
I'm having such a hard time lately with so many things. Because I take the Catholic Church as being the one, true, church, I'm having such a hard time communicating with my brothers and sisters in Christ who aren't Catholic. I absolutely refuse to compromise any Catholic beliefs, and I guess I'm under the mindset that REAL unity can only be under the Pope while sharing the same Eucharist. So with that, any talks of unity for me scare me because I'm not sure how I will react when people press things that I absolutely cannot accept.
Do any of you have any experience or knowledge of the activities of the National Workshop for Christian Unity? What advice can you give me?
It seems to me that you've actually got a very good situation if you can learn to see the gifts God has given you in the people around you. One of the big temptations for young bucks who have a deep conversion experience is that they very naturally get in touch with their inner warrior and want to go out and contend for the Faith. Nothing wrong with that. But we have to always bear in mind Paul's counsel: you wrestle not with flesh and blood.
Too many young guys forget that and essentially start buying into a sort Adversarial Posture Evangelism thing. They forget that the first duty of the evangelist is to proclaim, not defend, the truth in love. Therefore, we are not to view people with incorrect opinions and ideas as adversaries to be defeated but to presume good will until it's obvious that we are wrong.
Apologetics is the handmaid, not the master, of Evangelism. If you assume a posture of defensiveness, you will likely alienate and create enemies before you even start. This would be a pity because your are surrounded by people who agree with you on 99 things out of a hundred. You don't need to compromise your faith in the slightest. But you also don't need to think and speak of the folks at your school as though you are an "alien" and as though they are consciously "undermining" anything. Never ascribe to malice what can be sufficiently explained by ignorance.
A reading of the Decree on Ecumenism is in order here. For instance, it is (you will be surprised to hear) not in keeping with the teaching of the Church to say "REAL unity can only be under the Pope while sharing the same Eucharist."
Why? Because the choice is not between "real" and "fake". It is between "partial" and "full". The Church declares (dogmatically, even) that a baptized Protestant is in real, albeit imperfect union with the Church. That's one of the implications of "We believe in one baptism for the forgiveness of sins". And of course, with your average Evangelical, that unity extends to a common belief in virtually everythign the creed has to say. Yes, there are real differences (Eucharist, sacraments, Mary, Pope) and those mustn't be whitewashed. But neither must they dominate so much as to block out the real unity that exists. Nor can they become excuses for uncharity and a sort of testosterone-driven need to do somebody down in an argument.
My point: it was a saint of the Church, Francis de Sales, who said he would "shake the walls of Geneva with love". He also said you catch more flies with honey than vinegar. Truth and love are not opposites. You are not compromising the truth if you love your neighbor and speak gently rather than presuming that he is out to attack the Church if his tradition has never introduced him to (or has mischaracterized) some aspects of Catholic teaching.
I'm going on too long so let me simply recommend a piece I wrote sometime ago which aims to address this very matter.
Hope it helps!
Oh, by the way, I don't know nuthin' bout the National Workshop for Christian Unity. Sorry!
Cardinal George Defended by a Surprising Voice
Andrew Greeley, whose assessment of the situation seems reasonable to me.
Andrew Greeley, whose assessment of the situation seems reasonable to me.
Interesting Argument between me and my friend Greg Krehbiel
Greg was responding to this.
I still don't see how Greg's "If a Pope is not an economist, then we can pretty much ignore what he says about economic justice" position couldn't be used by anybody, anywhere, at anytime to dismiss any Catholic moral teaching that inconveniences them. What exactly is to stop anybody from adopting Greg's logic and saying, "What does the Magisterium know about the technical details of cloning, abortion, military strategy, police work, or democratic governance? So we don't have to bother when the Church teaches about these things. They are just interfering ninnies who need to stick to their abstract little world of Transubstantion and similar abstruse subjects. Let the experts call the shots and the Church mind its own business."
I think Greg's last post basically compounds the problem by adopting an "all or nothing" approach to Catholic teaching that both neglects our freedom and posits an absurd relationship between the Church as Teacher and us as disciples. The Church has never functioned on the basis of "that which is not compulsory is forbidden". It does not follow from this that any Church guidance that is not laid down as dogma with threats of anathema is therefore basically dismissible if it irritates us.
Greg was responding to this.
I still don't see how Greg's "If a Pope is not an economist, then we can pretty much ignore what he says about economic justice" position couldn't be used by anybody, anywhere, at anytime to dismiss any Catholic moral teaching that inconveniences them. What exactly is to stop anybody from adopting Greg's logic and saying, "What does the Magisterium know about the technical details of cloning, abortion, military strategy, police work, or democratic governance? So we don't have to bother when the Church teaches about these things. They are just interfering ninnies who need to stick to their abstract little world of Transubstantion and similar abstruse subjects. Let the experts call the shots and the Church mind its own business."
I think Greg's last post basically compounds the problem by adopting an "all or nothing" approach to Catholic teaching that both neglects our freedom and posits an absurd relationship between the Church as Teacher and us as disciples. The Church has never functioned on the basis of "that which is not compulsory is forbidden". It does not follow from this that any Church guidance that is not laid down as dogma with threats of anathema is therefore basically dismissible if it irritates us.
Freedom, by its nature, must be chosen, and defended by citizens, and sustained by the rule of law and the protection of minorities. And when the soul of a nation finally speaks, the institutions that arise may reflect customs and traditions very different from our own. America will not impose our own style of government on the unwilling. Our goal instead is to help others find their own voice, attain their own freedom, and make their own way. - George W. Bush, 2nd Inaugural
These are noble sentiments and true ones. I'm fond of Bush's second inaugural because it really does seem to capture something of the essence of this nation with the soul of a Church.
At the same time, the tension inherent in these words must be acknowledged. If we are going to insist that minorities be protected (as we should in, for instance, the case of Christians being murdered by Afghans for the crime of being Christian) then it seems to me we *must* impose our own style of government on the unwilling. And, indeed, to Bush's great credit, that is what he is trying to do as he pressures Karzai into sparing Abdul Rahman. At the same time, we can't nanny the whole world. Sooner or later we have to take our hands off and really let people determine their own destinies. But when we do "help others find their own voice, attain their own freedom, and make their own way" we have to face the fact that, in a devout Islamic culture, that probably means they will freely and democratically vote in sharia and the execution of "apostates". That's the problem we've set ourselves in the quest to remake the Islamosphere in the image and likeness of American democratic capitalism.
These are noble sentiments and true ones. I'm fond of Bush's second inaugural because it really does seem to capture something of the essence of this nation with the soul of a Church.
At the same time, the tension inherent in these words must be acknowledged. If we are going to insist that minorities be protected (as we should in, for instance, the case of Christians being murdered by Afghans for the crime of being Christian) then it seems to me we *must* impose our own style of government on the unwilling. And, indeed, to Bush's great credit, that is what he is trying to do as he pressures Karzai into sparing Abdul Rahman. At the same time, we can't nanny the whole world. Sooner or later we have to take our hands off and really let people determine their own destinies. But when we do "help others find their own voice, attain their own freedom, and make their own way" we have to face the fact that, in a devout Islamic culture, that probably means they will freely and democratically vote in sharia and the execution of "apostates". That's the problem we've set ourselves in the quest to remake the Islamosphere in the image and likeness of American democratic capitalism.
A Thomist Philosopher Friend writes:
I think there's a lot to this. Perhaps the confusion has arisen partly because the guys who were leading the charge here are primarily scientists, not philosophers, by training. I get the strong impression that much of ID still consists of people talking until they figure out what it is they are saying. I don't object to this as strongly as some, because it's often the way I work through things too. But it's also fraught with danger because when you think out loud, people are inclined to take what you say as your final opinion.
ID's big argument seems to me to be the basic notion, used every day by everybody from Mom's to forensic pathologists, that specified complexity *always* denotes Mind at work. The cow drawn on the wall in crayon was not a fortuitous deposit of hydrocarbons caused by candle smoke: Billy did it. The hole in the victim's head was not caused by a nickel iron meteor that happened to be shaped like a bullet. He was shot.
When we look at the extreme complexity of living systems, we intuit, as St. Paul says, that "Ever since the creation of the world his invisible nature, namely, his eternal power and deity, has been clearly perceived in the things that have been made." (Rom 1:20). I've never seen anything wrong with this reasoning and it seems to me, at the end of the day, to be what the ID guys are saying. This seems to me to be a philosophical statement, but it seems to me to be a philosophical statement that it is legitimate to back up with illustrations from science (and art, ethics, and many other disciplines). I suspect the problem comes in when we try to say that science "proves" this statement as distinct from "supports" it. If we are not careful, we wind up asking science to do things it's not built to do. We can also wind up giving the impression that *only* living systems are the subject of Providence, when in fact, everything is. I suspect the ID guys know thiis and would argue that they point to living systems because there the hand of God seems to be particularly obvious, not that the hand of God is not involved in the rest of Creation as well.
Anyway, as I've said before, I think there are two sets of big obvious dots being connected and I don't see why I have to choose. One set is common descent. It appears obvious to me that the fossil record (and genetics) shows a slow development over time of creatures who bear a remarkable resemblance to their immediate ancestors. It also appears obvious to me that when you look at the universe, you are looking at an artifact of something more like a Mind than anything else we know. ID seems to be trying to make that common sense case and,f or the life of me, I don't seek what's the matter with that.
A couple of things: (1) It struck me yesterday that if the ID people do figure out and admit that they are making philosophical claims rather than positive-scientific claims, everybody will stop paying attention to them. It's only because the ID people say they are being scientific that people are up in arms about them (pro and con).
On the other hand, there are quite a fair number of theist, creation-claiming philosophers, and they talk into thin air as far as "the world" is concerned. Nobody pays attention to philosophers. It won't even help to remind people that "philosophy is the queen of the human sciences." It just ain't FAIR.
I think there's a lot to this. Perhaps the confusion has arisen partly because the guys who were leading the charge here are primarily scientists, not philosophers, by training. I get the strong impression that much of ID still consists of people talking until they figure out what it is they are saying. I don't object to this as strongly as some, because it's often the way I work through things too. But it's also fraught with danger because when you think out loud, people are inclined to take what you say as your final opinion.
ID's big argument seems to me to be the basic notion, used every day by everybody from Mom's to forensic pathologists, that specified complexity *always* denotes Mind at work. The cow drawn on the wall in crayon was not a fortuitous deposit of hydrocarbons caused by candle smoke: Billy did it. The hole in the victim's head was not caused by a nickel iron meteor that happened to be shaped like a bullet. He was shot.
When we look at the extreme complexity of living systems, we intuit, as St. Paul says, that "Ever since the creation of the world his invisible nature, namely, his eternal power and deity, has been clearly perceived in the things that have been made." (Rom 1:20). I've never seen anything wrong with this reasoning and it seems to me, at the end of the day, to be what the ID guys are saying. This seems to me to be a philosophical statement, but it seems to me to be a philosophical statement that it is legitimate to back up with illustrations from science (and art, ethics, and many other disciplines). I suspect the problem comes in when we try to say that science "proves" this statement as distinct from "supports" it. If we are not careful, we wind up asking science to do things it's not built to do. We can also wind up giving the impression that *only* living systems are the subject of Providence, when in fact, everything is. I suspect the ID guys know thiis and would argue that they point to living systems because there the hand of God seems to be particularly obvious, not that the hand of God is not involved in the rest of Creation as well.
Anyway, as I've said before, I think there are two sets of big obvious dots being connected and I don't see why I have to choose. One set is common descent. It appears obvious to me that the fossil record (and genetics) shows a slow development over time of creatures who bear a remarkable resemblance to their immediate ancestors. It also appears obvious to me that when you look at the universe, you are looking at an artifact of something more like a Mind than anything else we know. ID seems to be trying to make that common sense case and,f or the life of me, I don't seek what's the matter with that.
The Invaluable Tom Kreitzberg Puzzles Over the Torture Polling Data
He also identifies the weak spot in the nonetheless interesting Crunchy Con debate.
He also identifies the weak spot in the nonetheless interesting Crunchy Con debate.
Apparently the Metrosexual Class is All Agog for Beards These Days
All my fashion sense is completely accidental. I grow my beard every winter because, well, it's warmer. But come Easter or so, it goes because, well, it's cooler.
All my fashion sense is completely accidental. I grow my beard every winter because, well, it's warmer. But come Easter or so, it goes because, well, it's cooler.
Michael Schiavo Projects Himself into the Book of Revelation
The narcissism is breathtaking, even for a member of Generation Narcissus:
At once I was in the Spirit, and lo, a throne stood in a TV studio, with one seated on the throne! And he who sat there appeared tanned and rested, and round the throne was a rainbow that looked like an emerald. Round the throne were twenty-four thrones, and seated on the thrones were twenty-four MSM interviewers, clad in expensive suits, with golden mikes in their hands. From the throne issue flashes of promotion for his new book, and voices and peals of thunder, and before the throne burn seven torches of fire, which are the seven cameras of the MSM; and before the throne there is as it were a sea of glass, like a TV screen.
And round the throne, on each side of the throne, are four living creatures, full of eyes in front and behind: the first living creature like Larry King, the second living creature like Oprah, the third living creature with the face of Mike Wallace, and the fourth living creature like Jon Stewart. And the four living creatures, each of them with six wings, are full of eyes all round and within, and day and night they never cease to sing,
“Holy, holy, holy, is Michael Schiavo,
who was and is and is to come!” And whenever the living creatures give glory and honor and thanks to him who is seated on the throne, who lives for ever and ever, the twenty-four MSM interviewers fall down before him who is seated on the throne and worship him who lives for ever and ever; they cast their crowns before the throne, singing, “Worthy art thou, Michael Schiavo,
to receive glory and honor and power,
for thou didst create all things,
and by thy will they existed and were created.” (Rev. 4:2-11, Revised Schiavo Version)
The narcissism is breathtaking, even for a member of Generation Narcissus:
"She's up there right now praising me . . . and saying thank you."
Adds Jodi Schiavo: "That is one of the qualities in him that I so admire. That up against everything, he stuck by her."
At once I was in the Spirit, and lo, a throne stood in a TV studio, with one seated on the throne! And he who sat there appeared tanned and rested, and round the throne was a rainbow that looked like an emerald. Round the throne were twenty-four thrones, and seated on the thrones were twenty-four MSM interviewers, clad in expensive suits, with golden mikes in their hands. From the throne issue flashes of promotion for his new book, and voices and peals of thunder, and before the throne burn seven torches of fire, which are the seven cameras of the MSM; and before the throne there is as it were a sea of glass, like a TV screen.
And round the throne, on each side of the throne, are four living creatures, full of eyes in front and behind: the first living creature like Larry King, the second living creature like Oprah, the third living creature with the face of Mike Wallace, and the fourth living creature like Jon Stewart. And the four living creatures, each of them with six wings, are full of eyes all round and within, and day and night they never cease to sing,
“Holy, holy, holy, is Michael Schiavo,
who was and is and is to come!” And whenever the living creatures give glory and honor and thanks to him who is seated on the throne, who lives for ever and ever, the twenty-four MSM interviewers fall down before him who is seated on the throne and worship him who lives for ever and ever; they cast their crowns before the throne, singing, “Worthy art thou, Michael Schiavo,
to receive glory and honor and power,
for thou didst create all things,
and by thy will they existed and were created.” (Rev. 4:2-11, Revised Schiavo Version)
From our Frog in the Pot files
New film tells story of boy with a homosexual crush on his teacher.
It's important to get used to the idea of such relationships if we are to create a society where homosexuality receives the unlimited glory it deserves as the source and summit of all that is noble, true, good, and beautiful. However, we must take small steps because people have an unaccountable sense of dis-ease about such things.
This is, of course, just to titillate and get you used to the idea so as to help you past your backward sense of queasiness. So, in this film, the teacher is Just and Wise and does not exploit the boy.
No word yet on whether future films will push the envelope of "queasy, inappropriate material" in the ongoing quest of the film industry to prove the axiom that a culture which despises virginity despises children. Much depends on how quickly the public comes round to recognizing that the sole arbiter of morality is whatever two (or more) consenting parties want. We're not there yet. But with sufficient applications of mind massage from the manufacturers of culture, we'll get there.
New film tells story of boy with a homosexual crush on his teacher.
It's important to get used to the idea of such relationships if we are to create a society where homosexuality receives the unlimited glory it deserves as the source and summit of all that is noble, true, good, and beautiful. However, we must take small steps because people have an unaccountable sense of dis-ease about such things.
The subject matter is certain to make some moviegoers squeamish, yet that
was exactly what drew Buchbinder to the project.
"It was the combination of the queasy, inappropriate potential with the, I guess you could say, wholesome aspect of first love," said Buchbinder, who teaches film at Toronto's York University.
This is, of course, just to titillate and get you used to the idea so as to help you past your backward sense of queasiness. So, in this film, the teacher is Just and Wise and does not exploit the boy.
No word yet on whether future films will push the envelope of "queasy, inappropriate material" in the ongoing quest of the film industry to prove the axiom that a culture which despises virginity despises children. Much depends on how quickly the public comes round to recognizing that the sole arbiter of morality is whatever two (or more) consenting parties want. We're not there yet. But with sufficient applications of mind massage from the manufacturers of culture, we'll get there.
Bill Cork asks:
Beats me. Anyone? If you know, please email Bill.
Do you know of any diocesan webpages with discussion boards or chat rooms? I'd appreciate any leads.
Beats me. Anyone? If you know, please email Bill.
The Catholic Blogosphere: Making Possible Cool (and Weird) Things That No Previous Generation Could Have Done
For Cool, ya gotcher Consistory Mega-Post, with more information than you can stand about the Consistory.
For Weird, there's yer basic "Who's Your Favorite Cardinal?" beauty contest. So hard to choose. Arinze has dreamy eyes, but O'Malley's beard is to die for. And who can resist the prose stylings of Cdl. Lustiger? Martino, when asked (during the swimsuit competition) what he would most want, inspired the judges by saying, "I feel that I would like to see world peace and everybody getting along and having good feelings and stuff." But there's also much to be said for Zen's cool inscrutability and Eastern charm.
Decision 2006!
For Cool, ya gotcher Consistory Mega-Post, with more information than you can stand about the Consistory.
For Weird, there's yer basic "Who's Your Favorite Cardinal?" beauty contest. So hard to choose. Arinze has dreamy eyes, but O'Malley's beard is to die for. And who can resist the prose stylings of Cdl. Lustiger? Martino, when asked (during the swimsuit competition) what he would most want, inspired the judges by saying, "I feel that I would like to see world peace and everybody getting along and having good feelings and stuff." But there's also much to be said for Zen's cool inscrutability and Eastern charm.
Decision 2006!
Continuing Excitement Over Bird Flu
I'm not an epidemiologist, so I have to defer to the people who are and suppose that this is huge potential threat. At the same time, I'm old enough to remember Comet Kohoutek, Global Cooling, the Great Famine of 1978 that was to be caused by the Population Bomb, the Y2K bug and various other world historical pieces of scientific hype that didn't pan out. So it may be that the hysteria is being generated in newsrooms rather than labs. Hard to tell, from where I sit. At present, I will not worry too much about an epidemic that has only killed 100 people out of 7 billion.
I'm not an epidemiologist, so I have to defer to the people who are and suppose that this is huge potential threat. At the same time, I'm old enough to remember Comet Kohoutek, Global Cooling, the Great Famine of 1978 that was to be caused by the Population Bomb, the Y2K bug and various other world historical pieces of scientific hype that didn't pan out. So it may be that the hysteria is being generated in newsrooms rather than labs. Hard to tell, from where I sit. At present, I will not worry too much about an epidemic that has only killed 100 people out of 7 billion.
Thursday, March 23, 2006
A Marine's Journal
Can't help but love these guys. There's such a self-sacrificial nobility shining through these entries. Beautiful.
Can't help but love these guys. There's such a self-sacrificial nobility shining through these entries. Beautiful.
There's not so much a "Wall of Separation" between Church and State as a semi-permeable membrane.
Oppose abortion or gay marriage? You are a Dangerous Christianist Theocrat imposing your religious vision on America.
Bark orders at the CDF to approve of gay adoption or declare that the GOP is disobeying the Bible regarding illegal immigration? You are a Statesman of the Left.
Oppose abortion or gay marriage? You are a Dangerous Christianist Theocrat imposing your religious vision on America.
Bark orders at the CDF to approve of gay adoption or declare that the GOP is disobeying the Bible regarding illegal immigration? You are a Statesman of the Left.
Interesting discussion down below concerning my notion that most of the NeoCon Bigwigs appear to be, in practice, as materialistic as Marx in their view of history
A reader writes:
Accusing somebody of materialism is, it seems to me, accurate if they are basically arguing that democracy capitalism will fix the Islamosphere. And this position is *obviously* one held by a great many of the neocon strategists and promoters from Ledeen to Limbaugh. Like it or not, the notion that, at the end of the day, the human story is basically all about power and economics is a materialist view. It is also the reigning strategy dominating our entire policy toward the Islamosphere. Neocons are not adamantly atheist as Marx was. But they are also only very passively theistic. They will, like Jonah Goldberg, doff their caps to a vague American civil religion. But that's about it. The *real* energy is directed toward the conviction that there is, in Dubya's classic formulation of the spirit of American pious blasphemy: "power, wonder-working power, in the goodness and idealism and faith of the American people".
As I said yesterday, such pious blasphemy is part of the warp and woof of America from the beginning. Largely, the belief that we are a city on a hill has had the happy consequence of making us a nation with the soul of a Church. But it also carries within it the seeds of a secular messianism that is very dangerous indeed, precisely because it goes on operating long after God has been forgotten and the Strategists who think only in terms of money and power remain.
I don't think Michael Novak is a bad guy. I do think that the attempts by the Money and Power guys who are writing policy to hold up Novak as a sort of Voice of Catholic Teaching Blessing our Policies vs. the Euroweenie opinions of our Peacenik Pope and his Clueless Bishops was highly cynical. I wish Novak had been more vociferous in saying that it is precisely at the moment when the whole world is shouting for one thing and an almost unanimous chorus of bishops is saying "Whoa!" that the duty of the Catholic is to inform his conscience with the teaching of the Church, not join the shouting throng. But I also think Novak is not a materialist so much as a guy who has been beating the drum of democratic capitalism for a long time and who naturally gravitated toward people who found him...useful.
Finally, I'm really surprised to hear you are puzzled at the concept of "thinking with the Church". It doesn't mean agreeing with every prudential judgment to come out of some dicastery in Rome. Nor does it mean "that which is not forbidden is compulsory". It means attempting to think about things in light of the Tradition and the Magisterium's articulation of it. In this case, thinking with the Church means paying attention to just war teaching and using it as a tool to evaluate circumstances. It means paying attention to the way in which the bishops and Holy Father evaluate it. Ratzinger's remark that "pre-emptive war is not in the catechism" is, very simply, right. In addition, there are numerous other reasons that Novak failed to sell the Bushie line in Rome and numerous more which became apparent as the war unfolded. I detailed my difficulties here.
Note this: the teaching of the Church is Just War Doctrine. In addition, it is the bishop's reading of that tradition to which we must give due consideration. But the Church still leaves it up to us to make the judgement call about whether a particular situation warrants going to war. I come away from this encounter with the tradition convinced that the bishops got it right. But that's my take, not "the teaching of the Church".
I likewise come away from my encounter with the thinking of many on the Right with the uneasy sense that such thinking is dominated by the notion that democracy and economics will fix the Islamosphere. Apart from the active hatred of religion that characterized Marxism, I can see no major difference between this view and the Marxist one. A system that essentially ignores religion at every turn seems to me to be just as doomed to failure as one that persecutes it. At the end of the day, both seem to me to be about the project of secular messianism and a false anthropology.
A reader writes:
Well, accusing someone of materialism is pretty damning. Likening someone to Marx is also pretty damning. Calling someone a "court theologian" is downright mean. How does one "think with the Church" on exclusively temporal, prudential issues?
Accusing somebody of materialism is, it seems to me, accurate if they are basically arguing that democracy capitalism will fix the Islamosphere. And this position is *obviously* one held by a great many of the neocon strategists and promoters from Ledeen to Limbaugh. Like it or not, the notion that, at the end of the day, the human story is basically all about power and economics is a materialist view. It is also the reigning strategy dominating our entire policy toward the Islamosphere. Neocons are not adamantly atheist as Marx was. But they are also only very passively theistic. They will, like Jonah Goldberg, doff their caps to a vague American civil religion. But that's about it. The *real* energy is directed toward the conviction that there is, in Dubya's classic formulation of the spirit of American pious blasphemy: "power, wonder-working power, in the goodness and idealism and faith of the American people".
As I said yesterday, such pious blasphemy is part of the warp and woof of America from the beginning. Largely, the belief that we are a city on a hill has had the happy consequence of making us a nation with the soul of a Church. But it also carries within it the seeds of a secular messianism that is very dangerous indeed, precisely because it goes on operating long after God has been forgotten and the Strategists who think only in terms of money and power remain.
I don't think Michael Novak is a bad guy. I do think that the attempts by the Money and Power guys who are writing policy to hold up Novak as a sort of Voice of Catholic Teaching Blessing our Policies vs. the Euroweenie opinions of our Peacenik Pope and his Clueless Bishops was highly cynical. I wish Novak had been more vociferous in saying that it is precisely at the moment when the whole world is shouting for one thing and an almost unanimous chorus of bishops is saying "Whoa!" that the duty of the Catholic is to inform his conscience with the teaching of the Church, not join the shouting throng. But I also think Novak is not a materialist so much as a guy who has been beating the drum of democratic capitalism for a long time and who naturally gravitated toward people who found him...useful.
Finally, I'm really surprised to hear you are puzzled at the concept of "thinking with the Church". It doesn't mean agreeing with every prudential judgment to come out of some dicastery in Rome. Nor does it mean "that which is not forbidden is compulsory". It means attempting to think about things in light of the Tradition and the Magisterium's articulation of it. In this case, thinking with the Church means paying attention to just war teaching and using it as a tool to evaluate circumstances. It means paying attention to the way in which the bishops and Holy Father evaluate it. Ratzinger's remark that "pre-emptive war is not in the catechism" is, very simply, right. In addition, there are numerous other reasons that Novak failed to sell the Bushie line in Rome and numerous more which became apparent as the war unfolded. I detailed my difficulties here.
Note this: the teaching of the Church is Just War Doctrine. In addition, it is the bishop's reading of that tradition to which we must give due consideration. But the Church still leaves it up to us to make the judgement call about whether a particular situation warrants going to war. I come away from this encounter with the tradition convinced that the bishops got it right. But that's my take, not "the teaching of the Church".
I likewise come away from my encounter with the thinking of many on the Right with the uneasy sense that such thinking is dominated by the notion that democracy and economics will fix the Islamosphere. Apart from the active hatred of religion that characterized Marxism, I can see no major difference between this view and the Marxist one. A system that essentially ignores religion at every turn seems to me to be just as doomed to failure as one that persecutes it. At the end of the day, both seem to me to be about the project of secular messianism and a false anthropology.
I'm liking this MercatorNet site
Here's a great piece on one of the great blunders of our time: the notion that Nature=Eden. This idea, popularized by everybody from Rousseau to John Denver, turns on the blunder that we can get back to Eden by being "natural". The only problem is: it's false. Humans become *less* natural when they try to imitate nature, a) because we are greater than nature and b) because nature shares in the effects of the fall of men and angels.
St. Paul tells us that "he creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God; 20 for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of him who subjected it in hope; 21 because the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and obtain the glorious liberty of the children of God." (Romans 8:19-21). Nature is not our mother. It is our sister, even (by grace) our younger sister. It has the character, not of a Master, but of a bridesmaid. It is awaiting the chance to enter into the joy of the new heaven and earth. And that day is waiting for the moment in which our Lord decides that his Bride has "attain[ed] to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ." (Ephesians 4:13). There *is* not way back to Eden. Henceforth, we are awaiting not a Garden, but a City (Revelation 21). To be sure, Nature will participate in that, for it is a new Heaven and a *new Earth* we are promised. But we will never return to what Adam and Eve knew in innocence. That's because we will have something better: participation in the very life of the Blessed Trinity himself. As is God's custom, he extravagantly turns even our sins into ocassions of grace that are greater than if we had never sinned.
O happy fault! O necessary sin of Adam, that won for us so great a salvation!
Here's a great piece on one of the great blunders of our time: the notion that Nature=Eden. This idea, popularized by everybody from Rousseau to John Denver, turns on the blunder that we can get back to Eden by being "natural". The only problem is: it's false. Humans become *less* natural when they try to imitate nature, a) because we are greater than nature and b) because nature shares in the effects of the fall of men and angels.
St. Paul tells us that "he creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God; 20 for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of him who subjected it in hope; 21 because the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and obtain the glorious liberty of the children of God." (Romans 8:19-21). Nature is not our mother. It is our sister, even (by grace) our younger sister. It has the character, not of a Master, but of a bridesmaid. It is awaiting the chance to enter into the joy of the new heaven and earth. And that day is waiting for the moment in which our Lord decides that his Bride has "attain[ed] to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ." (Ephesians 4:13). There *is* not way back to Eden. Henceforth, we are awaiting not a Garden, but a City (Revelation 21). To be sure, Nature will participate in that, for it is a new Heaven and a *new Earth* we are promised. But we will never return to what Adam and Eve knew in innocence. That's because we will have something better: participation in the very life of the Blessed Trinity himself. As is God's custom, he extravagantly turns even our sins into ocassions of grace that are greater than if we had never sinned.
O happy fault! O necessary sin of Adam, that won for us so great a salvation!
Tabloid News by John Leax
My friend Greg Wolfe runs Image: A Journal of the Arts and Religion. Consequently, I get wind of cool poets and writers from time to time. Here's a sample of Leax's work, from a volume of poetry based entirely on tabloid news headlines:
The book also includes such gems as "Duck Hunters Shoot Angel" and "Baby Born with Antlers".
My friend Greg Wolfe runs Image: A Journal of the Arts and Religion. Consequently, I get wind of cool poets and writers from time to time. Here's a sample of Leax's work, from a volume of poetry based entirely on tabloid news headlines:
Leaping Turtles Invade US
Suppose a leaping turtle launching himself
four feet into the sultry air to fasten
his hooked beak in a woman’s breast
and dangle as tenderly as a jewel.
Or suppose, lacking sufficient spring to reach
the breast, the turtle settling
for the vulnerable lower groin of an unsuspecting male.
Suppose one million turtles
possessing the reported temperament of killer bees
were heading north from a Mexican mountain camp.
Would you go out? Would you risk with your lover
a pondside stroll or a tryst beneath the shade
of a willow overhanging a sluggish stream?
You know you wouldn’t.
You’d arm yourself against the terror
with a heavy-bladed kitchen knife
or a monumental cudgel or a pilfered .45.
Your first thought would be the thought of war
and your second would be of soup.
Suppose, this once, the headline has it right—
except for a small confusion about the leaping beast
that seizes the nurturing fount,
the engendering source.
Suppose that beast is you.
Could you doubt that turtles, outraged,
might adapt, give natural selection—-their place
in the present scheme of things—the old heave-ho,
build their bodies and master martial arts?
Could you doubt that, shaped and disciplined
by persistence and age, they would emerge,
shells trimmed to a minimum weight,
muscles toned to steel by four thousand leg lifts
and as many painful squats, prepared to leap?
Suppose that leaping turtles are the active voice
of nature’s long endurance.
Forget war. Forget soup. Think truce.
The book also includes such gems as "Duck Hunters Shoot Angel" and "Baby Born with Antlers".
Defensor Veritas: A blog devoted to Catholic/Mormon Apologetics
One of the Dominican students from Oakland, the wonderful Br. Jerome, did an internship at my parish a couple of years ago. He was interested in the conversation with Mormonism (about which I know little since I've frankly never been able to take it seriously). So he have a little presentation on how he argues with Mormons which I thought was delightfully elegant in its simplicity.
Essentially the Mormon claim comes down to saying "The Church apostatized. It needed to be restored. We are the restoration of the Church." Here in Protestant/post-Protestant America, where people take dumb junk like the Da Vinci Code seriously, the major premise is widely granted: the Church apostatized. So a certain percentage are therefore suckers for the middle term: the Church must be restored. And a certain percentage of those are suckers for various Mormon arguments like the "burning in the bosom" and so forth. In a world that takes DVC seriously, there's one born every minute. And, in addition, there is the fact that Mormons do, in fact, outshine most of our culture in terms of large, happy families and robust community life. "See how they love one another" is still a powerful persuader even if it does not actually establish the truth claims of Mormonism.
Br. Jerome basically demands that Mormons really demonstrate the major premise: that the Church apostatized. This works for people who know nothing of the early Church. All you have to do is wave your hands and shout something about Mary, indulgences, purgatory, and Borgia Popes and you are home free with most Americans. But a closer look at the Fathers begins to throw copious monkey wrenches into this happy consensus as Br. Jerome acquaints yet another Mormon with the disturbing fact that Newman pointed out: "To be deep in history is to cease to be a Protestant." I take Mormonism to simply be a more extreme form of Protestantism: one that has rejected, not just late medieval Catholic developments, but early Greco-Roman ones, and substituted for them an amalgam of the Charismatic Founder's own notions.
If, however, it can be demonstrated that there is absolutely no evidence for the Great Apostasy (as, in fact, there is not) then the need for a Restored Church vanishes and the question arises "What if Joseph Smith was just making all this crap up?" It's a less gentle form of inter-religious dialogue than some might wish. But I think it has the merits of getting straight to the point.
One of the Dominican students from Oakland, the wonderful Br. Jerome, did an internship at my parish a couple of years ago. He was interested in the conversation with Mormonism (about which I know little since I've frankly never been able to take it seriously). So he have a little presentation on how he argues with Mormons which I thought was delightfully elegant in its simplicity.
Essentially the Mormon claim comes down to saying "The Church apostatized. It needed to be restored. We are the restoration of the Church." Here in Protestant/post-Protestant America, where people take dumb junk like the Da Vinci Code seriously, the major premise is widely granted: the Church apostatized. So a certain percentage are therefore suckers for the middle term: the Church must be restored. And a certain percentage of those are suckers for various Mormon arguments like the "burning in the bosom" and so forth. In a world that takes DVC seriously, there's one born every minute. And, in addition, there is the fact that Mormons do, in fact, outshine most of our culture in terms of large, happy families and robust community life. "See how they love one another" is still a powerful persuader even if it does not actually establish the truth claims of Mormonism.
Br. Jerome basically demands that Mormons really demonstrate the major premise: that the Church apostatized. This works for people who know nothing of the early Church. All you have to do is wave your hands and shout something about Mary, indulgences, purgatory, and Borgia Popes and you are home free with most Americans. But a closer look at the Fathers begins to throw copious monkey wrenches into this happy consensus as Br. Jerome acquaints yet another Mormon with the disturbing fact that Newman pointed out: "To be deep in history is to cease to be a Protestant." I take Mormonism to simply be a more extreme form of Protestantism: one that has rejected, not just late medieval Catholic developments, but early Greco-Roman ones, and substituted for them an amalgam of the Charismatic Founder's own notions.
If, however, it can be demonstrated that there is absolutely no evidence for the Great Apostasy (as, in fact, there is not) then the need for a Restored Church vanishes and the question arises "What if Joseph Smith was just making all this crap up?" It's a less gentle form of inter-religious dialogue than some might wish. But I think it has the merits of getting straight to the point.
Sioux Leader Moves to Establish Planned Parenthood Clinic on Pine Ridge Reservation
Native Americans: Our All-Wise Eco-Masters, Living in Close Harmony with Mother Earth and Caring for All Life That the Great Spirit Has Bestowed
Native Americans: Our All-Wise Eco-Masters, Living in Close Harmony with Mother Earth and Caring for All Life That the Great Spirit Has Bestowed
The Combination of Completely Unrealistic Wishful Thinking and Dishonest Political Lobbying that is the Women's Ordination Movement Strikes Again!
Some priest asks Benedict whether it was right to consider giving women greater responsibilities within the Church. Benedict says, "Seems fine to me."
Women's ordination drum beater naturally concludes that this is a ringing clarion call for the "restorationi" of the women's diaconate.
And, of course, by a similar leap of logic, the "women's diaconate" is exactly the same as the ordained office of deacon. And, of course, by further leaps we can conclude that The Spirit is Doing a New Thing In the Land and admitting women to the rest of the ordained office is just around the corner. St. Mary Magdalene, Warrior Princess, pray for us.
There's just so much that's silly about this "bombshell", beginning with the relentless clericalism that underlies this whole way of thinking. It never occurs to the people making these spectacular leaps of logic that "women can have greater responsibilities in the Church" might refer to *lay* women. It is, after all, we laity who do 99.9999999% of the heavy lifting in the Church because there are, like, a billion of us and only a few thousand of the ordained. If you want to go where the action is in terms of enormous responsibility, the ordained office is not your only option. Women are responsible for hospitals, factories, schools, orphanages, stock portfolios, and all the rest of lay life (not to mention bearing a huge and increasingly disproportionate burden of responsibility for the raising of children as the glorious sexual revolution continues to ensure that men can obey their inner coyote and walk when they don't feel like committing). All this is utterly overlooked in the rush to assume that the only *real* Catholic is an ordained Catholic.
Second, what is overlooked is the fact that the evidence is very thin that the term used of figures like Phoebe (Romans 16:1) is intended to refer to the same office occupied by, say, Stephen. The only way to really know what is meant by the term is to follow the development of the Church's understanding over time. When you do, you basically find that First Nicaea tells us (Canon 19) "Deaconnesses who have been led astray, since they are not sharers of ordination, are to be reckoned among the Laity." In short, whatever a deaconess is, she's not a sharere in the sacrament of Holy Orders.
The standard trick employed at this point by WO enthusiasts is to suddenly morph into a sola scriptura Protestant and try to divorce the text of Scripture from the community that received it from the apostles. It's a free country. But adults who actually know the Catholic faith will no more buy this than the attempt by JW's to claim that the Church "suppressed" the True Meaning[TM] of Jesus' remark "the Father is greater than I" in order to declare Jesus of one being with the Father (also at Nicaea).
Bottom line: it's not a matter of "showing charity to women" by ordaining them. It's a matter of what Jesus did and did not authorize. Women are not in the least inferior to men in dignity, just as wine is not in the least inferior to water. It's just that wine is the wrong matter for baptizing people (though it is the *right* matter for the Eucharist). In the same way, woman are the wrong matter for the sacrament whereby a man becomes an image of the Cosmic Bridegroom who is Christ. Generally speaking, men make better husbands.
Some priest asks Benedict whether it was right to consider giving women greater responsibilities within the Church. Benedict says, "Seems fine to me."
Women's ordination drum beater naturally concludes that this is a ringing clarion call for the "restorationi" of the women's diaconate.
And, of course, by a similar leap of logic, the "women's diaconate" is exactly the same as the ordained office of deacon. And, of course, by further leaps we can conclude that The Spirit is Doing a New Thing In the Land and admitting women to the rest of the ordained office is just around the corner. St. Mary Magdalene, Warrior Princess, pray for us.
There's just so much that's silly about this "bombshell", beginning with the relentless clericalism that underlies this whole way of thinking. It never occurs to the people making these spectacular leaps of logic that "women can have greater responsibilities in the Church" might refer to *lay* women. It is, after all, we laity who do 99.9999999% of the heavy lifting in the Church because there are, like, a billion of us and only a few thousand of the ordained. If you want to go where the action is in terms of enormous responsibility, the ordained office is not your only option. Women are responsible for hospitals, factories, schools, orphanages, stock portfolios, and all the rest of lay life (not to mention bearing a huge and increasingly disproportionate burden of responsibility for the raising of children as the glorious sexual revolution continues to ensure that men can obey their inner coyote and walk when they don't feel like committing). All this is utterly overlooked in the rush to assume that the only *real* Catholic is an ordained Catholic.
Second, what is overlooked is the fact that the evidence is very thin that the term used of figures like Phoebe (Romans 16:1) is intended to refer to the same office occupied by, say, Stephen. The only way to really know what is meant by the term is to follow the development of the Church's understanding over time. When you do, you basically find that First Nicaea tells us (Canon 19) "Deaconnesses who have been led astray, since they are not sharers of ordination, are to be reckoned among the Laity." In short, whatever a deaconess is, she's not a sharere in the sacrament of Holy Orders.
The standard trick employed at this point by WO enthusiasts is to suddenly morph into a sola scriptura Protestant and try to divorce the text of Scripture from the community that received it from the apostles. It's a free country. But adults who actually know the Catholic faith will no more buy this than the attempt by JW's to claim that the Church "suppressed" the True Meaning[TM] of Jesus' remark "the Father is greater than I" in order to declare Jesus of one being with the Father (also at Nicaea).
Bottom line: it's not a matter of "showing charity to women" by ordaining them. It's a matter of what Jesus did and did not authorize. Women are not in the least inferior to men in dignity, just as wine is not in the least inferior to water. It's just that wine is the wrong matter for baptizing people (though it is the *right* matter for the Eucharist). In the same way, woman are the wrong matter for the sacrament whereby a man becomes an image of the Cosmic Bridegroom who is Christ. Generally speaking, men make better husbands.
Wednesday, March 22, 2006
Another Little Rumble of Discontent From a God-and-Family-First Conservative at the Mammon-First Masters of the Right
Dale Price: Bomb-Throwing Marxist
By the way, Rod Bennett and I had a loverly dinner with Dale and Heather at Zach Frey's house last Friday. Zach picked us up at Steve Ray's and drove us through the bustling metropolis of Ypsilanti where we beheld the Freudian spectacle of the extremely erect Ypsilanti Water Tower, dramatically silhouetted against the setting sun.
We had yummy corned beef and cabbage as the Freys, Prices and we out of state interlopers cracked each other up with stories, watched the various Frey fry and Price small change run around, and discussed the fortunes of the Plucky Rebel Alliance Episcopalians vs. the Evil Empire of ECUSA. A good time was had by all.
Dale Price: Bomb-Throwing Marxist
By the way, Rod Bennett and I had a loverly dinner with Dale and Heather at Zach Frey's house last Friday. Zach picked us up at Steve Ray's and drove us through the bustling metropolis of Ypsilanti where we beheld the Freudian spectacle of the extremely erect Ypsilanti Water Tower, dramatically silhouetted against the setting sun.
We had yummy corned beef and cabbage as the Freys, Prices and we out of state interlopers cracked each other up with stories, watched the various Frey fry and Price small change run around, and discussed the fortunes of the Plucky Rebel Alliance Episcopalians vs. the Evil Empire of ECUSA. A good time was had by all.
It's Wednesday...
So instead of being a robotic shill for the GOP and somebody who ignores the war and the poor, today's my day for being told I'm basically a closet Lefty, who is recapitulating, mirabile dictu, the counterculture (I discover to my surprise) that I grew up in.
Folks can label me a Leftist all they like, but the fact is I'm thinking theologically here, not politically, as is my custom if people would just take my word for it. Many American conservatives have fallen for the notion that democracy and capitalism are part of the revelation. America: the Light and the Glory and all that. It's as American as apple pie to see ourselves as a City on a Hill. It's a myth that has ennobled America, I think, because it has driven us to be, in Chesterton's phrase, a nation with the soul of a church.
The trouble is, we go on with our missionary endeavors even when we devolve into a nation of apostate Puritans. We stop exporting missionaries and flood the world with Madonna and M-16s. We start talking as though democracy and capitalism are, by themselves, salvific and transformative. They are not. They are *products* of the Christian tradition working on the cleverness and prudential judgments of human beings. They are very good things, but they are not salvific and they cannot do the work of transforming the human heart, which is what the Middle East (and we) desperately need.
Essentially the analysis of the Neo-Con Big Thinkers seems to me just as materialistic as that of Marx. The idea is that democracy and capitalism (along with sufficent applications of raw force) will fix what ails the Islamic world. It won't. Only Christ can.
So instead of being a robotic shill for the GOP and somebody who ignores the war and the poor, today's my day for being told I'm basically a closet Lefty, who is recapitulating, mirabile dictu, the counterculture (I discover to my surprise) that I grew up in.
Folks can label me a Leftist all they like, but the fact is I'm thinking theologically here, not politically, as is my custom if people would just take my word for it. Many American conservatives have fallen for the notion that democracy and capitalism are part of the revelation. America: the Light and the Glory and all that. It's as American as apple pie to see ourselves as a City on a Hill. It's a myth that has ennobled America, I think, because it has driven us to be, in Chesterton's phrase, a nation with the soul of a church.
The trouble is, we go on with our missionary endeavors even when we devolve into a nation of apostate Puritans. We stop exporting missionaries and flood the world with Madonna and M-16s. We start talking as though democracy and capitalism are, by themselves, salvific and transformative. They are not. They are *products* of the Christian tradition working on the cleverness and prudential judgments of human beings. They are very good things, but they are not salvific and they cannot do the work of transforming the human heart, which is what the Middle East (and we) desperately need.
Essentially the analysis of the Neo-Con Big Thinkers seems to me just as materialistic as that of Marx. The idea is that democracy and capitalism (along with sufficent applications of raw force) will fix what ails the Islamic world. It won't. Only Christ can.
A reader writes:
This is why I'd like to see a healthy Dem party re-emerge. Opposite evils, so far from balancing, aggravate one another. A Wilsonian Drunken Sailor Safety Through Torture Right inflames an hysterical angry vengeful Left. Meanwhile, when Elephants and Donkeys fight, it is the grass that suffers. The Left fanatically aims for the maximum number of babies to die, while the Right continues pissing away our grandchildrens savings and trying to make the world into the image and likeness of Michael Novak through the exportation of our democratic capitalist system at the point of a gun (only to wind up with Muslims who tend to see the image and likeness of Madonna instead--and to to hate us all the more).
Increasingly, I come to believe that our problems cannot be solved politically. The only word our country needs to hear is "Repent! For the kingdom of God is at hand." Until we really listen to that and stop trying to get enough of what we don't really need, we're going to keep beating our heads against the wall.
It's a tragedy that we humans require so much pain before we will allow God to love us.
I read your most recent political post, & I agree with it to a point. The problem is the current political situation is essentially a battle of wills between the Left and the essentially apolitical middle.
The apolitical middle is essentially conservative in temperment, but they have no real commitment or intellectual understanding of many issues, so the demands they make on people rankle the AM, just as they would anyone else. Unfortunately, discomfort gets associated with the Right, instead of the nature of reality itself, which is where it belongs.
This leaves an opening for the Left. The Left essentially tells the AM, "We get to have abortion on demand, gay marriage, etc., whether you like them or not because at the end of the day you really can't vote for _them_", ie the evil Right.
The AM replies, "Sure we can, watch us."
And that's where things stand right now, more or less. The AM has the numbers and is theoretically sovereign. But the AM is essentially nonchalant about the whole thing whereas the Angry Left has all the tenacity.
In this scenario, I fear that unless the Angry Left is decisively beaten, it will end up breaking the AM through sheer force of will, and the price for that will be very heavy. When and if the Angry Left is beaten, the sort of gripes you have against the Right will be more topical.
This is why I'd like to see a healthy Dem party re-emerge. Opposite evils, so far from balancing, aggravate one another. A Wilsonian Drunken Sailor Safety Through Torture Right inflames an hysterical angry vengeful Left. Meanwhile, when Elephants and Donkeys fight, it is the grass that suffers. The Left fanatically aims for the maximum number of babies to die, while the Right continues pissing away our grandchildrens savings and trying to make the world into the image and likeness of Michael Novak through the exportation of our democratic capitalist system at the point of a gun (only to wind up with Muslims who tend to see the image and likeness of Madonna instead--and to to hate us all the more).
Increasingly, I come to believe that our problems cannot be solved politically. The only word our country needs to hear is "Repent! For the kingdom of God is at hand." Until we really listen to that and stop trying to get enough of what we don't really need, we're going to keep beating our heads against the wall.
It's a tragedy that we humans require so much pain before we will allow God to love us.
Derbyshire Demonstrates the Callous Disregard for Human Beings that Made British Imperialism So Beloved
Summary: Looks like our experiment in nation-building isn't panning out. Oh well, screw 'em. They're probably not even grateful to us for destroying their country!
To his credit, Rich Lowry at least evinces some sense that our choice to plunge Iraq into a vast and bloody social science experiment encumbers us with some responsibility. However, I think he's going to lose this fight ultimately. Because the fact is, the people who rooted, pushed, begged, pleaded and threatened in order to get us into this war don't know what to do now that it's gone south. It never entered their heads that there were flaws in their Wilsonian Plan to Redeem the World. I think not a few of the Big Thinkers who were so sure about it all are going to follow Derbyshire in advocating we pull out (both Derb and Lowry make clear that such voices are already gaining strength on the Right). So they'll wring their hands about their noble intentions, and move on. After all, they won't have to deal with the consequences of their actions, Iraqis will.
Summary: Looks like our experiment in nation-building isn't panning out. Oh well, screw 'em. They're probably not even grateful to us for destroying their country!
To his credit, Rich Lowry at least evinces some sense that our choice to plunge Iraq into a vast and bloody social science experiment encumbers us with some responsibility. However, I think he's going to lose this fight ultimately. Because the fact is, the people who rooted, pushed, begged, pleaded and threatened in order to get us into this war don't know what to do now that it's gone south. It never entered their heads that there were flaws in their Wilsonian Plan to Redeem the World. I think not a few of the Big Thinkers who were so sure about it all are going to follow Derbyshire in advocating we pull out (both Derb and Lowry make clear that such voices are already gaining strength on the Right). So they'll wring their hands about their noble intentions, and move on. After all, they won't have to deal with the consequences of their actions, Iraqis will.
Mahony's Right
It's not the job of the Church to be the Immigration police. When a hungry person comes to the door, the Bible does not say to check IDs.
It's not the job of the Church to be the Immigration police. When a hungry person comes to the door, the Bible does not say to check IDs.
Cool News for Us Western Washingtonians
If you can possibly make it to Fr. Michael's presentation on the encyclical (not to mention Mass) please do. He's a great teacher and really understands the thought of both JPII and Benedict (not to mention St. Thomas).
Fr Michael Sweeney, formerly of Blessed Sacrament Parish and now president of the Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology in Berkeley, CA., will preach at all Masses on the weekend of Mar. 25th-26th, and take up a collection for the support of the school.
He will also have a presentation on the new encyclical "Deus Caritas Est" at 7:00 pm on Sat. evening, following a potluck dinner at 6:00 pm in the Parish Hall.
If you can possibly make it to Fr. Michael's presentation on the encyclical (not to mention Mass) please do. He's a great teacher and really understands the thought of both JPII and Benedict (not to mention St. Thomas).
The IRS is quietly moving to loosen the once-inviolable privacy of federal income-tax returns. If it succeeds, accountants and other tax-return preparers will be able to sell information from individual returns - or even entire returns - to marketers and data brokers.
Remember when the GOP (that would be the party that controls the gov't at present) said they believed in a smaller, less-intrusive state? Remember all that talk about the rights of the individual trumping the demands of Leviathan?
It turns out that "individual" doesn't refer to the human person. It refers to the fictive *legal* individual known as the Corporation. That is where the money is after all.
Remember when the GOP (that would be the party that controls the gov't at present) said they believed in a smaller, less-intrusive state? Remember all that talk about the rights of the individual trumping the demands of Leviathan?
It turns out that "individual" doesn't refer to the human person. It refers to the fictive *legal* individual known as the Corporation. That is where the money is after all.
My Lai in Iraq?
Horrible. But at the same time, some perspective has to be kept. This was not policy. This looks like the act of men who were lashing out at the death of a comrade. That does not excuse it, but it does morally distinguish it from the deliberate policy of targeting civilians as a matter of policy, which is pretty much all the terrorist in Iraq do.
Horrible. But at the same time, some perspective has to be kept. This was not policy. This looks like the act of men who were lashing out at the death of a comrade. That does not excuse it, but it does morally distinguish it from the deliberate policy of targeting civilians as a matter of policy, which is pretty much all the terrorist in Iraq do.
Mammon-First Wing of Stupid Party Once Again Heaps Casual Contempt on God and Family First Conservatives
"As one Citibank executive has candidly observed, "They are the ones who provide most of our profit."
Exhibit A in the "Why Dreher's book is hitting a nerve among conservatives who sense that all is not well in Con-ville".
"As one Citibank executive has candidly observed, "They are the ones who provide most of our profit."
Exhibit A in the "Why Dreher's book is hitting a nerve among conservatives who sense that all is not well in Con-ville".
John Farrell on the Naivete of Rationalists
Rationalism is the thin consomme of the spirit. It will never satisfy the massive hunger for meaning and love that gloriously afflicts the human soul. People who think it will are, in the precise terminology of sacred Scripture, fools.
Mysticism, the thick gumbo of the spirit, will also--oddly--never be enough, which is why the jumbled paganism of the New Age fascinates and bedazzles, but ultimately leaves people befogged.
Lewis points out that essentially only two religious traditions have managed to combine the enlightened philosophical moral system so precious to rationalists with the dark and mysterious blood rituals that speak to a different part of the heart: Judaism and Christianity. In paganism, they co-existed but were not really combined. An enlightened rationalist like Lucretius could despise the superstition of, say, a Mithras cult. But St. Thomas could turn from writing the most profound philosophical ruminations to celebrate the Sacrifice of the Body and Blood of Christ.
I'm not sure what rationalists will do should it ever really become apparent to them that most people will never be rationalists. In my experience, the uniform reaction of rationalists so far has been simple elitist contempt for Man the Mystic. I see no particular reason for that not to continue. I wonder if it will one day cast off the remaining shreds of American mysticism and simply abandon the utterly non-empirical dogma (inherited from Christianity) that "All men are created equal" and frankly embrace the notion that rationalists are simply Superior Beings. Dennett seems to me to be toying with idea with his bullshit about there being some sort of genetic proclivity to religion of which he is blessedly free. I wonder if Rationalists--excuse me, "Brights"--are going to seriously begin speaking of themselves as some sort of incipient Master Race.
That could be highly amusing--unless of course they acquire the political clout to act on such a loony idea. Nazism, after all, would be hilarious too had it not acquired the capacity to act on it kooky notions.
Rationalism is the thin consomme of the spirit. It will never satisfy the massive hunger for meaning and love that gloriously afflicts the human soul. People who think it will are, in the precise terminology of sacred Scripture, fools.
Mysticism, the thick gumbo of the spirit, will also--oddly--never be enough, which is why the jumbled paganism of the New Age fascinates and bedazzles, but ultimately leaves people befogged.
Lewis points out that essentially only two religious traditions have managed to combine the enlightened philosophical moral system so precious to rationalists with the dark and mysterious blood rituals that speak to a different part of the heart: Judaism and Christianity. In paganism, they co-existed but were not really combined. An enlightened rationalist like Lucretius could despise the superstition of, say, a Mithras cult. But St. Thomas could turn from writing the most profound philosophical ruminations to celebrate the Sacrifice of the Body and Blood of Christ.
I'm not sure what rationalists will do should it ever really become apparent to them that most people will never be rationalists. In my experience, the uniform reaction of rationalists so far has been simple elitist contempt for Man the Mystic. I see no particular reason for that not to continue. I wonder if it will one day cast off the remaining shreds of American mysticism and simply abandon the utterly non-empirical dogma (inherited from Christianity) that "All men are created equal" and frankly embrace the notion that rationalists are simply Superior Beings. Dennett seems to me to be toying with idea with his bullshit about there being some sort of genetic proclivity to religion of which he is blessedly free. I wonder if Rationalists--excuse me, "Brights"--are going to seriously begin speaking of themselves as some sort of incipient Master Race.
That could be highly amusing--unless of course they acquire the political clout to act on such a loony idea. Nazism, after all, would be hilarious too had it not acquired the capacity to act on it kooky notions.
Charles Colson Also Weighs in on the Impending Martyrdom of Abdul Rahman at the Hands of the Grateful Recipients of Glorious All-Redeeming Democracy in Afghanistan
Make no mistake. I'm not criticizing the Afghan war. It was just and I've never said otherwise. The Taliban attacked us and we very justly destroyed them. I'm criticizing the extremely naive and quasi-religious notions we Americans have that all the Islamic world needs is an infusion of democratic capitalism and they will naturally rush to join the world of watery pagan Western hedonism and blasphemy. If you believe that, I have a bridge to sell you.
By the way, Get Religion makes the interesting note that Colson is a lot harder on the Bushies for their passivity about this issue than the Washington Press Corps.
But then again, it is just a Christian being murdered, so it's no big deal.
Make no mistake. I'm not criticizing the Afghan war. It was just and I've never said otherwise. The Taliban attacked us and we very justly destroyed them. I'm criticizing the extremely naive and quasi-religious notions we Americans have that all the Islamic world needs is an infusion of democratic capitalism and they will naturally rush to join the world of watery pagan Western hedonism and blasphemy. If you believe that, I have a bridge to sell you.
By the way, Get Religion makes the interesting note that Colson is a lot harder on the Bushies for their passivity about this issue than the Washington Press Corps.
But then again, it is just a Christian being murdered, so it's no big deal.
My Mother: Drunk or Sober!
Columnist covers stupid sentiment in a gauzy haze of sentimentality and foolishly condemns the idea of repenting if we do something wrong as somehow showing weakness.
If your mom's a drunk you don't enthusiastically cheer for her come what may. You try to help her sober up.
Simply invoking Kennedy and Clooney as villains does not automatically make their point invalid--unless we want to argue that the entire prolife movement has been wrong to criticize America for the past thirty years. This is cheap "Shut Up Traitor" jingoism substituting for serious political discourse.
Columnist covers stupid sentiment in a gauzy haze of sentimentality and foolishly condemns the idea of repenting if we do something wrong as somehow showing weakness.
If your mom's a drunk you don't enthusiastically cheer for her come what may. You try to help her sober up.
Simply invoking Kennedy and Clooney as villains does not automatically make their point invalid--unless we want to argue that the entire prolife movement has been wrong to criticize America for the past thirty years. This is cheap "Shut Up Traitor" jingoism substituting for serious political discourse.
Technology Makes it Possible for Individuals and Small Groups of People to Achieve Devastation Far Greater Than our Emotions Can Cope With
Result: Conspiracy theorists who obsess over the Secret History of Our Time rather than deal with reality.
Result: Conspiracy theorists who obsess over the Secret History of Our Time rather than deal with reality.
Buchanan Points Out the Bleedin' Obvious About Democracy and Islam
To a people hungry to relate to God as slaves to Master, democracy affords a quick ticket to imposing despotism on themselves and everybody else. There's nothing magical or sacred about it. It's simply the best way we know of for the mass of humans to get the government they want. If they want Islamic tyranny, they shall have it.
To a people hungry to relate to God as slaves to Master, democracy affords a quick ticket to imposing despotism on themselves and everybody else. There's nothing magical or sacred about it. It's simply the best way we know of for the mass of humans to get the government they want. If they want Islamic tyranny, they shall have it.
Tuesday, March 21, 2006
StrongBad Emails Remain the Quirkiest Form of Humor in the Known Universe
With the exception, perhaps, of whatever They Might Be Giants is doing today.
With the exception, perhaps, of whatever They Might Be Giants is doing today.
Jody Bottum Discusses the Weird Hysteria of the Chattering Class Over the Imminent Evangelical Theocracy
I think this is a classic example of Screwtape's strategy:
I think this is a classic example of Screwtape's strategy:
We direct the fashionable outcry of each generation against those vices of which it is least in danger and fix its approval on the virtue nearest to that vice which we are trying to make endemic. The game is to have them running about with fire extinguishers whenever there is a flood, and all crowding to that side of the boat which is already nearly gunwale under.
SchoolMarm State to Parents: All Your Kids are Belong to Us
Caesar becoming more aggressive in telling parents that children are the property of the state, not the divine gift of God to parents. WaPo enthusiastically agrees.
Reason #938457234598347343539048957394 to homeschool.
Caesar becoming more aggressive in telling parents that children are the property of the state, not the divine gift of God to parents. WaPo enthusiastically agrees.
Reason #938457234598347343539048957394 to homeschool.
Sherry Weddell, Who Knows Everything About Global Christianity, Sends Along the Following:
A fascinating sort of "Christian-creep" in Asia.
More People Claim Christian Faith in Japan
The latest Gallup poll revealed a much higher percentage of Christians in Japan compared to previous surveys, including a surprising high number of teens who claimed the Christian faith, the Christian Post reports. In a country where only one percent is Christian among those who claim a faith, findings from one of the most extensive surveys of the country ever taken showed a Christian population of six percent. The popular, traditional religions - Buddhism and Shintoism - suffered declines. Of the 30 percent of adults who claimed to have a religion, 75 percent considered themselves Buddhists, 19 percent Shintoists and 12 percent Christians, according to Gallup. Of the 20 percent of youths who professed to have a religion, 60 percent called themselves Buddhists, 36 percent Christians and Shintoists. "These projections mean that seven percent of the total teenage population say they are Christians," said George Gallup Jr., who called the numbers "stunning."
What is interesting is that when you do the math, it comes to 4.5 million Christians or 3.5% of the total population, which is almost exactly what David Barrett of the World Christian Encyclopedia has for number of Christians in Japan.
Barrett's figure: 1.3 million are independent/apostolic Christians (29% of Japanese Christians) and 800.000 are "marginals" (i.e., Mormons, Jehovah's Witnesses). Classic Protestants (excluding Anglicanism) = 541,000, Catholics = 528.000, Anglicans 64,000; Orthodox 25,000. 109,000 are "double affiliated" that is claim to be members of two different Christian groups at the same time. Notice that independent Christians, marginal Christians, and Protestants outnumber Catholics - the oldest Christian group in Japan.
As so often happens in Asia, a certain number like 1% has been thrown around by Christians for decades but they haven't noticed the change happening in front of them. (The same phenomena has happened in India. Indian Catholics have told me recently that only 2% of the population is Christian - but the best available numbers show about 4 times that many Christians in the whole country. In India, as well, the largest group of Christians are the "independent/apostolic" Christians, not classic Catholics or Protestants.)
What may affect the significance of the Gallup poll is the number of "double professing" - ie, Japanese who profess a Christian faith and a non-Christian faith at the same time. Barrett estimates that there are 342,000 "double professing" Japanese in mid-2005 or about 7.7% of all Christians also publically profess (in some way, perhaps only on a census) a non-Christian faith. Nearly 1/3 of Christians in India "double-profess" because there are economic and legal penalities for publically leaving Hinduism.
The indication that 7% of Japanese teens claim to be Christians (about two times the percentage of the whole population ) is stunning in light of what has commonly been assumed as is the 80% of Japanese teens who don't claim any religion at all.
Japan would seem to be a "post-Buddhist/Shintoist" culture in much the same way that large numbers of Europeans are "post-Christian". They live in a culture deeply shaped by a historic faith but the vast majority have ceased to have an active faith of any kind. In that sort of environment, new, evangelistic faiths grow - in Japan. apparently by conversion rather than birth.
A fascinating sort of "Christian-creep" in Asia.
More People Claim Christian Faith in Japan
The latest Gallup poll revealed a much higher percentage of Christians in Japan compared to previous surveys, including a surprising high number of teens who claimed the Christian faith, the Christian Post reports. In a country where only one percent is Christian among those who claim a faith, findings from one of the most extensive surveys of the country ever taken showed a Christian population of six percent. The popular, traditional religions - Buddhism and Shintoism - suffered declines. Of the 30 percent of adults who claimed to have a religion, 75 percent considered themselves Buddhists, 19 percent Shintoists and 12 percent Christians, according to Gallup. Of the 20 percent of youths who professed to have a religion, 60 percent called themselves Buddhists, 36 percent Christians and Shintoists. "These projections mean that seven percent of the total teenage population say they are Christians," said George Gallup Jr., who called the numbers "stunning."
What is interesting is that when you do the math, it comes to 4.5 million Christians or 3.5% of the total population, which is almost exactly what David Barrett of the World Christian Encyclopedia has for number of Christians in Japan.
Barrett's figure: 1.3 million are independent/apostolic Christians (29% of Japanese Christians) and 800.000 are "marginals" (i.e., Mormons, Jehovah's Witnesses). Classic Protestants (excluding Anglicanism) = 541,000, Catholics = 528.000, Anglicans 64,000; Orthodox 25,000. 109,000 are "double affiliated" that is claim to be members of two different Christian groups at the same time. Notice that independent Christians, marginal Christians, and Protestants outnumber Catholics - the oldest Christian group in Japan.
As so often happens in Asia, a certain number like 1% has been thrown around by Christians for decades but they haven't noticed the change happening in front of them. (The same phenomena has happened in India. Indian Catholics have told me recently that only 2% of the population is Christian - but the best available numbers show about 4 times that many Christians in the whole country. In India, as well, the largest group of Christians are the "independent/apostolic" Christians, not classic Catholics or Protestants.)
What may affect the significance of the Gallup poll is the number of "double professing" - ie, Japanese who profess a Christian faith and a non-Christian faith at the same time. Barrett estimates that there are 342,000 "double professing" Japanese in mid-2005 or about 7.7% of all Christians also publically profess (in some way, perhaps only on a census) a non-Christian faith. Nearly 1/3 of Christians in India "double-profess" because there are economic and legal penalities for publically leaving Hinduism.
The indication that 7% of Japanese teens claim to be Christians (about two times the percentage of the whole population ) is stunning in light of what has commonly been assumed as is the 80% of Japanese teens who don't claim any religion at all.
Japan would seem to be a "post-Buddhist/Shintoist" culture in much the same way that large numbers of Europeans are "post-Christian". They live in a culture deeply shaped by a historic faith but the vast majority have ceased to have an active faith of any kind. In that sort of environment, new, evangelistic faiths grow - in Japan. apparently by conversion rather than birth.
Interesting piece about the quarrel between the Enlightenment and the Christian Tradition in American Conservatism
People keep asking me why I spend most of my time arguing with conservatives. Much ASCII is expended on the suspicion that I am a closet Lefty.
Sorry to disappoint, but I argue with conservatives and ignore the Left by and large for the same reason that I argue with the great Western religions and ignore Jainists and animists: they are not where the action is. Lefties are dominated by screamers like Howard Dean, pants-wetters and loony conspiracy theorists like the Daily Kos, and narcissists like Cindy Sheehan (not to mention cynical and uncreative triangulators like Hillary, who disgusts even her fellow Lefties). It's been several years since I've heard anything creative come out of the Left. It's all responding to the Right.
Rod Bennett remarked the other day that America needs a healthy Democratic party. I quite agree. Currently, there's little to check the excesses of the Right from the party that gave us John Kerry. So I feel it's the duty of honest conservatives to check those excesses ourselves. That doesn't mean I don't have deep agreements with the Right. On most central issues such as the dignity of the individual over the claims of Leviathan, the notion that small is beautiful, the respect for tradition and religion (int the Roman, if not the Christian sense), the notion that it's better if you control your money rather than Caesar, the common sense awareness of the reality of sin in the world and the need to defend yourself, the jaundiced eye toward the proposition that man is perfectible by socioeconomic means--all this, I think, the conservatives have right.
I simply wish that they acted more like they believed it when somebody isn't dangling the prospect of vast wealth and power in front of them. It wasn't Clinton who launched this dubious nation-building war in Iraq and plowed the budget into the earth's mantle. It wasn't Leftist Nanny Statists who have labored to establish the doctrine of Safety Through Torture. And it wasn't sycophants for Clinton who have labored to excuse the State for spying on dangerous Al Quaeda operatives like the Catholic Worker. Sooner or later, the Right has to face the fact that these acts were done by Our Guys.
People keep asking me why I spend most of my time arguing with conservatives. Much ASCII is expended on the suspicion that I am a closet Lefty.
Sorry to disappoint, but I argue with conservatives and ignore the Left by and large for the same reason that I argue with the great Western religions and ignore Jainists and animists: they are not where the action is. Lefties are dominated by screamers like Howard Dean, pants-wetters and loony conspiracy theorists like the Daily Kos, and narcissists like Cindy Sheehan (not to mention cynical and uncreative triangulators like Hillary, who disgusts even her fellow Lefties). It's been several years since I've heard anything creative come out of the Left. It's all responding to the Right.
Rod Bennett remarked the other day that America needs a healthy Democratic party. I quite agree. Currently, there's little to check the excesses of the Right from the party that gave us John Kerry. So I feel it's the duty of honest conservatives to check those excesses ourselves. That doesn't mean I don't have deep agreements with the Right. On most central issues such as the dignity of the individual over the claims of Leviathan, the notion that small is beautiful, the respect for tradition and religion (int the Roman, if not the Christian sense), the notion that it's better if you control your money rather than Caesar, the common sense awareness of the reality of sin in the world and the need to defend yourself, the jaundiced eye toward the proposition that man is perfectible by socioeconomic means--all this, I think, the conservatives have right.
I simply wish that they acted more like they believed it when somebody isn't dangling the prospect of vast wealth and power in front of them. It wasn't Clinton who launched this dubious nation-building war in Iraq and plowed the budget into the earth's mantle. It wasn't Leftist Nanny Statists who have labored to establish the doctrine of Safety Through Torture. And it wasn't sycophants for Clinton who have labored to excuse the State for spying on dangerous Al Quaeda operatives like the Catholic Worker. Sooner or later, the Right has to face the fact that these acts were done by Our Guys.
Friends are raving about "Sophie Scholl"
She was a member of the White Rose, a Catholic resistance group in Nazi Germany.
Compare her real courage to the fake posturing informing a film like "V for Vendetta".
As Kathy Shaidle tirelessly reminds us, if Amerikkka is a theocratic police state, why aren't the Wachowski brothers lampshades?
She was a member of the White Rose, a Catholic resistance group in Nazi Germany.
Compare her real courage to the fake posturing informing a film like "V for Vendetta".
As Kathy Shaidle tirelessly reminds us, if Amerikkka is a theocratic police state, why aren't the Wachowski brothers lampshades?
Monday/Wednesday/Friday I'm a Dupe of the Jewish Conspiracy for Laughing at Chris Ferrara's Weird Screed Against Jewish Infiltration of EWTN
But on Tuesdays and Thursdays, I'm an anti-semite for suggesting that Israel is basically a secular nation-state that is quite as capable of behaving as cynically as other secular nation-states. Case in point, Israel's nasty little campaign against the hospice of the Daughters of Charity.
But on Tuesdays and Thursdays, I'm an anti-semite for suggesting that Israel is basically a secular nation-state that is quite as capable of behaving as cynically as other secular nation-states. Case in point, Israel's nasty little campaign against the hospice of the Daughters of Charity.
Chesterton: Sensible as Usual
A reader sends this along:
This was prompted by the recent discussion of Mormonism, but it's interesting to me because of Chesterton's insight into the folly of trying to talk about history while ignoring the central issues of the heart for those who made history.
A reader sends this along:
Mormonism
by G K Chesterton
from The Uses of Diversity 1921
THERE is inevitably something comic (comic in the broad and vulgar style which all men ought to appreciate in its place) about the panic aroused by the presence of the Mormons and their supposed polygamous campaign in this country.
It calls up the absurd image of an enormous omnibus, packed inside with captive English ladies, with an Elder on the box, controlling his horses with the same patriarchal gravity as his wives, and another Elder as conductor calling out "Higher up," with an exalted and allegorical intonation. And there is something highly fantastic to the ordinary healthy mind in the idea of any precaution being proposed; in the idea of locking the Duchess in the boudoir and the governess in the nursery, lest they should make a dash for Utah, and become the ninety-third Mrs. Abraham Nye, or the hundredth Mrs. Hiram Boke.
But these frankly vulgar jokes, like most vulgar jokes, cover a popular prejudice which is but the bristly hide of a living principle. Elder Ward, recently speaking at Nottingham, strongly protested against these rumours, and asserted absolutely that polygamy had never been practised with the consent of the Mormon Church since 1890. I think it only just that this disclaimer should be circulated; but though it is most probably sincere, I do not find it very soothing. The year 1890 is not very long ago, and a society that could have practised so recently a custom so alien to Christendom must surely have a moral attitude which might be repellent to use in many other respects. Moreover, the phrase about the consent of the Church (if correctly reported) has a little the air of an official repudiating responsibility for unofficial excesses. It sounds almost as if Mr. Abraham Nye might, on his own account, come into church with a hundred and fourteen wives, but people were supposed not to notice them. It might amount to little more than this, that the Chief Elder may allow the hundred and fourteen wives to walk down the street like a girls' school, but he is not officially expected to take off his hat to each of them in turn. Seriously speaking, however, I have little doubt that Elder Ward speaks the substantial truth, and that polygamy is dying, or has died, among the Mormons. My reason for thinking this is simple; it is that polygamy always tends to die out. Even in the east I believe that, counting heads, it is by this time the exception rather than the rule. Like slavery, it is always being started, because of its obvious conveniences. It has only one small inconvenience, which is that it is intolerable.
Our real error in such a case is that we do not know or care about the creed itself, from which a people's customs, good or bad, will necessarily flow. We talk much about "respecting" this or that person's religion; but the way to respect a religion is to treat it as a religion: to ask what are its tenets and what are their consequences. But modern tolerance is deafer than intolerance. The old religious authorities, at least, defined a heresy before they condemned it, and read a book before they burned it. But we are always saying to a Mormon or a Moslem--"Never mind about your religion, come to my arms." To which he naturally replies--"But I do mind about my religion, and I advise you to mind your eye."
About half the history now taught in schools and colleges is made windy and barren by this narrow notion of leaving out the theological theories. The wars and Parliaments of the Puritans made absolutely no sense if we leave out the fact that Calvinism appeared to them to be the absolute metaphysical truth, unanswerable, unreplaceable, and the only thing worth having in the world. The Crusades and dynastic quarrels of the Norman and Angevin Kings make absolutely no sense if we leave out the fact that these men (with all their vices) were enthusiastic for the doctrine, discipline, and endowment of Catholicism. Yet I have read a history of the Puritans by a modern Nonconformist in which the name of Calvin was not even mentioned, which is like writing a history of the Jews without mentioning either Abraham or Moses. And I have never read any popular or educational history of England that gave the slightest hint of the motives in the human mind that covered England with abbeys and Palestine with banners. Historians seem to have completely forgotten the two facts-- first, that men act from ideas; and second, that it might, therefore, be as well to discover which ideas. The medievals did not believe primarily in "chivalry," but in Catholicism, as producing chivalry among other things. The Puritans did not believe primarily in "righteousness," but in Calvinism, as producing righteousness among other things. It was the creed that held the coarse or cunning men of the world at both epochs. William the Conqueror was in some ways a cynical and brutal soldier, but he did attach importance to the fact that the Church upheld his enterprise; that Harold had sworn falsely on the bones of saints, and that the banner above his own lances had been blessed by the Pope. Cromwell was in some ways a cynical and brutal soldier; but he did attach importance to the fact that he had gained assurance from on high in the Calvinistic scheme; that the Bible seemed to support him-- in short, the most important moment in his own life, for him, was not when Charles I lost his head, but when Oliver Cromwell did not lose his soul. If you leave these things out of the story, you are leaving out the story itself. If William Rufus was only a red-haired man who liked hunting, why did he force Anselm's head under a mitre, instead of forcing his head under a headsman's axe? If John Bunyan only cared for "righteousness," why was he in terror of being damned, when he knew he was rationally righteous? We shall never make anything of moral and religious movements in history until we begin to look at their theory as well as their practice. For their practice (as in the case of the Mormons) is often so unfamiliar and frantic that it is quite unintelligible without their theory.
I have not the space, even if I had the knowledge, to describe the fundamental theories of Mormonism about the universe. But they are extraordinarily interesting; and a proper understanding of them would certainly enable us to see daylight through the more perplexing or menacing customs of this community; and therefore to judge how far polygamy was in their scheme a permanent and self-renewing principle or (as is quite probably) a personal and unscrupulous accident. The basic Mormon belief is one that comes out of the morning of the earth, from the most primitive and even infantile attitude. Their chief dogma is that God is material, not that He was materialized once, as all Christians believe; nor that He is materialized specially, as all Catholics believe; but that He was materially embodied from all time; that He has a local habitation as well as a name. Under the influence of this barbaric but violently vivid conception, these people crossed a great desert with their guns and oxen, patiently, persistently, and courageously, as if they were following a vast and visible giant who was striding across the plains. In other words this strange sect, by soaking itself solely in the Hebrew Scriptures, had really managed to reproduce the atmosphere of those Scriptures as they are felt by Hebrews rather than by Christians. A number of dull, earnest, ignorant, black-coated men with chimney-pot hats, chin beards or mutton-chop whiskers, managed to reproduce in their own souls the richness and the peril of an ancient Oriental experience. If we think from this end we may possibly guess how it was that they added polygamy.
This was prompted by the recent discussion of Mormonism, but it's interesting to me because of Chesterton's insight into the folly of trying to talk about history while ignoring the central issues of the heart for those who made history.
Monday, March 20, 2006
Blythe Brown, Art Historian
In The Duh Vinci Code, Dan Brown credits his wife as an "art historian" from whom he learned ever so much as he pieced together the Secret History of Our Time.
Here's one of Ms. Brown's scholarly tomes on art history:
In The Duh Vinci Code, Dan Brown credits his wife as an "art historian" from whom he learned ever so much as he pieced together the Secret History of Our Time.
Here's one of Ms. Brown's scholarly tomes on art history:
A puzzling complaint
Down below, I was tweaking Mormonism because there is no evidence for one of its central claims: that Native Americans are the descendants of Israelites. A reader replies:
This is the sort of thing that completely baffles me, particularly when it comes from Christians.
Is the author of Judith an idiot for saying, "For thou hast done these things and those that went before and those that followed; thou hast designed the things that are now, and those that are to come. Yea, the things thou didst intend came to pass, 6 and the things thou didst will presented themselves and said, ‘Lo, we are here’; for all they ways are prepared in advance, and thy judgment is with foreknowledge.'" (Judith 9:5-6).
I have no idea how science could possibly disprove this metaphysical insight. Of course, that leaves the opposite question of how science could prove it. This is why I think the ID guys need to clarify better what it is they are attempting. As I say, there are two sets of dots being connected here. One set of dots points pretty clearly to common descent and natural selection. Another set points (per St. Thomas' demonstration) to an argument from design. The trouble seems to me to be that the ID guys tend to pick out only certain things (say, the DNA molecule) as evidence of design when St. Thomas would argue that *everything* is designed, not just really complicated living things.
Also, of course, "design" is analogical language, just as "foreknowledge" is. God has no foreknowledge for the same reason he has no memory: all time is present to him. In the same way, creation is one continuous act. God does not learn for he knows all. He does not need to reason from premise to conclusion, nor to "design" in anticipation of some future contingency that may occur. But since design is our closest experience of ex nihilo creation, Scripture uses such language just as it uses language about God's hands.
Down below, I was tweaking Mormonism because there is no evidence for one of its central claims: that Native Americans are the descendants of Israelites. A reader replies:
Anyone who routinely supports Intelligent Design in the face of scientific evidence to the contrary has no business mocking "True Believers" whose own beliefs are contradicted by science.
This is the sort of thing that completely baffles me, particularly when it comes from Christians.
Is the author of Judith an idiot for saying, "For thou hast done these things and those that went before and those that followed; thou hast designed the things that are now, and those that are to come. Yea, the things thou didst intend came to pass, 6 and the things thou didst will presented themselves and said, ‘Lo, we are here’; for all they ways are prepared in advance, and thy judgment is with foreknowledge.'" (Judith 9:5-6).
I have no idea how science could possibly disprove this metaphysical insight. Of course, that leaves the opposite question of how science could prove it. This is why I think the ID guys need to clarify better what it is they are attempting. As I say, there are two sets of dots being connected here. One set of dots points pretty clearly to common descent and natural selection. Another set points (per St. Thomas' demonstration) to an argument from design. The trouble seems to me to be that the ID guys tend to pick out only certain things (say, the DNA molecule) as evidence of design when St. Thomas would argue that *everything* is designed, not just really complicated living things.
Also, of course, "design" is analogical language, just as "foreknowledge" is. God has no foreknowledge for the same reason he has no memory: all time is present to him. In the same way, creation is one continuous act. God does not learn for he knows all. He does not need to reason from premise to conclusion, nor to "design" in anticipation of some future contingency that may occur. But since design is our closest experience of ex nihilo creation, Scripture uses such language just as it uses language about God's hands.
Down below, one of my readers is surprised to hear that I was once contacted by the White House
The record of it is here.
I did indeed get a call from the White House in January 2003.
It was a very strange call. They gave me a conference call number and code but no clue what the call was about nor why they wanted me on it. I dialed it and they patched me through. Normally the polite thing to do is announce yourself and then get introduced to the other conferees. So I announced myself. Nobody acknowledged my existence nor introduced themselves. Nor did anybody explain what the call was about nor why I was supposed to be there. A couple of people were talking and I gathered one of them was Deal Hudson. For all I knew there might have been 500 otehr people on the call or it might have just been me. Then some guy came on and introduced Eliot Abrams, who spent about 25 minutes assuring us all that if we could just see the intelligence that crossed his desk every morning, we'd know for sure that Iraq was bristling with WMDs. Then Hudson and somebody else started talking about prolifers for a bit (this was right after Roe v. Wade day). I don't quite remember what that was all about. Then they all bade each other farewell and hung up, leaving me listening to a dial tone and wondering what the hell that was all about.
Totally baffled, I called Hudson to ask what the hell that was all about. What particularly confused me was that Abrams had said it was supposed to be "off the record". So what exactly was I supposed to do about the call? Hudson told me to feel free to share what I had heard, but not to talk about where I heard it.
Translation: My job was to be an Instrument of Policy in the Blogosphere for the Bushies. Strangely, I rather resented this exploitive and utilitarian treatment (a treatment which included making what were subsequently shown to be vastly inflated claims about WMD intelligence). It's a lesson I have not forgotten, albeit not quite the lesson they set out to teach. The Bushies were indeed working overtime to use every media organ at their disposal to whip up enthusiasm for the war. It's but one of the reasons I do not trust politicians, even when they are Our Guys.
The record of it is here.
I did indeed get a call from the White House in January 2003.
It was a very strange call. They gave me a conference call number and code but no clue what the call was about nor why they wanted me on it. I dialed it and they patched me through. Normally the polite thing to do is announce yourself and then get introduced to the other conferees. So I announced myself. Nobody acknowledged my existence nor introduced themselves. Nor did anybody explain what the call was about nor why I was supposed to be there. A couple of people were talking and I gathered one of them was Deal Hudson. For all I knew there might have been 500 otehr people on the call or it might have just been me. Then some guy came on and introduced Eliot Abrams, who spent about 25 minutes assuring us all that if we could just see the intelligence that crossed his desk every morning, we'd know for sure that Iraq was bristling with WMDs. Then Hudson and somebody else started talking about prolifers for a bit (this was right after Roe v. Wade day). I don't quite remember what that was all about. Then they all bade each other farewell and hung up, leaving me listening to a dial tone and wondering what the hell that was all about.
Totally baffled, I called Hudson to ask what the hell that was all about. What particularly confused me was that Abrams had said it was supposed to be "off the record". So what exactly was I supposed to do about the call? Hudson told me to feel free to share what I had heard, but not to talk about where I heard it.
Translation: My job was to be an Instrument of Policy in the Blogosphere for the Bushies. Strangely, I rather resented this exploitive and utilitarian treatment (a treatment which included making what were subsequently shown to be vastly inflated claims about WMD intelligence). It's a lesson I have not forgotten, albeit not quite the lesson they set out to teach. The Bushies were indeed working overtime to use every media organ at their disposal to whip up enthusiasm for the war. It's but one of the reasons I do not trust politicians, even when they are Our Guys.
A reader writes:
There's a fairly small but realistic chance that we may move to the Austin, TX area, specifically the Round Rock/Taylor area. Can anyone give any sort of lay of the land spiritually? Specificially, I mean: where are the good parishes? How is the diocese as a whole? Any good Catholic schools?
From our Sin Makes You Stupid Files
While thin-skinned Bronze Age Thugs burn down Europe over cartoons, the Heros of the Chattering Classes wring their hands about the Imminent Evangelical Theocracy in America.
Does anybody take this stuff seriously outside Manhattan?
While thin-skinned Bronze Age Thugs burn down Europe over cartoons, the Heros of the Chattering Classes wring their hands about the Imminent Evangelical Theocracy in America.
Does anybody take this stuff seriously outside Manhattan?
Episcopal Spine Alert
The interesting thing about this is that it involves a conflict between bishops. Gumbleton got booted from speaking at Dolan's cathedral.
Well done!
The interesting thing about this is that it involves a conflict between bishops. Gumbleton got booted from speaking at Dolan's cathedral.
Well done!
So a liberal, dissenting RCIA candidate wrote to "The Salty Vicar" blog (operated by John Wilkins, an Episcopal priest) to find out if the Episcopal Church would be a more palatable alternative than the Catholic Church for a liberal who believes that divorce, birth control, abortion, homosexuality, and female priests are hunky-dory.
Then Al Kimel entered into the conversation.
Then Al Kimel entered into the conversation.
Reader RadTrad asks me to post the following:
We've already corresponded privately and worked out our differences. He asked I post this in case anybody else has been offended. The guy could use our prayers and he certainly has mine. Go in peace, RadTrad.
I used to post here - and some other places, mostly Mrs. Carrie Tomko's weblog, under the pseudonym you see signed below, "radtrad". It has occurred to me recently that, whatever the merit of the arguments I was making, that I was often if not always doing so in a manner and with a spirit that could be reasonably called "Un-Christian" and that I owe certain people an apology. Since my memory is not inerrant, I cannot recall for certain who all of these people are, but I can offer an apology publically and privately to anyone who wants to email me at radtrad@gmail.com. Please note that I will reply to your email to that address from one using my real name, rather than the pseudonym. I keep it from publication here since those I have not insulted have no reason to know it. Thank you all kindly.
"radtrad"
We've already corresponded privately and worked out our differences. He asked I post this in case anybody else has been offended. The guy could use our prayers and he certainly has mine. Go in peace, RadTrad.
Parenthood as Accessorizing
Upscale women who view children as a right, not a responsibility, demand to get pregnant without a father. It's all about them, not about the needs of the child.
Upscale women who view children as a right, not a responsibility, demand to get pregnant without a father. It's all about them, not about the needs of the child.
DNA Testing is Screwing Up Mormonism
Turns out Native Americans ain't Israelites.
Anybody who thinks this will topple True Believers knows nothing of the resourcefulness of the human heart. Look for a new Mormon revelation showing that God altered Israelite/Indian DNA as punishment for their faithlessness.
Turns out Native Americans ain't Israelites.
Anybody who thinks this will topple True Believers knows nothing of the resourcefulness of the human heart. Look for a new Mormon revelation showing that God altered Israelite/Indian DNA as punishment for their faithlessness.
Reverse Boycotting in the News
Support South Dakota Tourism!
Barb Nicolosi sez: Go to the movies May 19, just don't go see The Duh Vinci Code.
The cool thing about Barb's blog is that this is all Lay-driven. So it undercuts the notion that "The Vatican" is furthering the Conspiracy. It's just intelligent laity.
Support South Dakota Tourism!
Barb Nicolosi sez: Go to the movies May 19, just don't go see The Duh Vinci Code.
The cool thing about Barb's blog is that this is all Lay-driven. So it undercuts the notion that "The Vatican" is furthering the Conspiracy. It's just intelligent laity.
A freaked out reader tells me stories like this freak him out
He asks if he should be freaked out.
My reply: It's not a bad thing to be afraid of the devil. It's much wiser than foolishly ignoring his existence. At the same time, the devil always loves extremes. There are people who are so afraid of the devil that they spend far more time trying to oppose him than trying to worship God. The devil loves such folk because they are easy to manipulate.
My reaction to the Amorth interview is a) here's a subject about which I know very little and so I defer to his experience and expertise and b) here's a subject about which I know very little, and so I wish very much that I had more input than simply the word of Fr. Amorth alone. The trouble with being "the world's most famous exorcist" (largely because you have had a book published by Ignatius and nobody else has) is that your private opinions are easily confused with The Teaching of the Church. Amorth has offered what are, in my opinion, ignorant quack assertions about Harry Potter. So my question is, naturally, how much of his views on the Rite of Exorcism are equally quack? I can't know that until we've heard from other exorcists. So I take the interview seriously, but hold it lightly.
He asks if he should be freaked out.
My reply: It's not a bad thing to be afraid of the devil. It's much wiser than foolishly ignoring his existence. At the same time, the devil always loves extremes. There are people who are so afraid of the devil that they spend far more time trying to oppose him than trying to worship God. The devil loves such folk because they are easy to manipulate.
My reaction to the Amorth interview is a) here's a subject about which I know very little and so I defer to his experience and expertise and b) here's a subject about which I know very little, and so I wish very much that I had more input than simply the word of Fr. Amorth alone. The trouble with being "the world's most famous exorcist" (largely because you have had a book published by Ignatius and nobody else has) is that your private opinions are easily confused with The Teaching of the Church. Amorth has offered what are, in my opinion, ignorant quack assertions about Harry Potter. So my question is, naturally, how much of his views on the Rite of Exorcism are equally quack? I can't know that until we've heard from other exorcists. So I take the interview seriously, but hold it lightly.
NOR Declares Benedict a Failure
The Pope of Oakland weighs the new Pontiff in the balance and finds him wanting.
Does anyone in the Church live up the standards of the New Oxford Review anymore?
The Pope of Oakland weighs the new Pontiff in the balance and finds him wanting.
Does anyone in the Church live up the standards of the New Oxford Review anymore?
I'm Late, But I Still Want to Add My Voice to the Terri Schiavo Memorial Blogburst
Rest in peace, Terri. God sees.
Rest in peace, Terri. God sees.