In 1867, Matthew Arnold wrote "Dover Beach", a haunting poem evoking the "melancholy, long, withdrawing roar" of the Sea of Faith. As a boomer who finished Catholic elementary school in 1964 and then watched my Church falter, I've found the roar all too audible. So here I wait, listening for the whispers of that Sea's invincible return.
Our Sunday Visitor offers a story out of the Southwest.
"There's a syncretism here..." says Fr. Jamison. No kidding! And it's not a good thing. The worship of creation and the worship of the Creator can't be reconciled. It is no kindness to Native Americans to pretend that it can. Unless Sr. Clissene and Fr. Jamison were very, very sure that those doing the crown dance were not worshipping nature, they should not have associated themselves with it.
Archbishop Timothy Dolan has issued a remarkably clear and brief decree (PDF here) about same-sex marriage. It is all the more remarkable among the pronouncements of American Catholic bishops (not to mention that blather factory, the USCCB) in that it is clear, and it is brief. Here's the money quote:
(2) No Catholic facility or property, including but not limited to parishes, missions, chapels, meeting halls, Catholic educational, health, or charitable institutions or benevolent orders, or any place dedicated, consecrated, or used for Catholic worship may be used for the solemnization or consecration of same-sex marriages.
Bishop McGrath, can we hope for a similar decree from you?
Germany's biggest Catholic-owned publishing house has been rocked by disclosures that it has been selling thousands of pornographic novels with titles such as Sluts Boarding School and Lawyer's Whore with the full assent of the country's leading bishops.
Catholic bishops responded with a statement claiming that "a filtering system failure" at the publishing house had allowed the books to stray on to the market. "We will put a stop to the distribution of possibly pornographic content in future," they said.
But Bernhard Müller, editor of the Catholic magazine PUR, dismissed the clerics' reaction as grossly hypocritical. He alleged that the pornography scandal at Weltbild had been going on for at least a decade with the Church's full knowledge. Mr Müller said that in 2008, a group of concerned Catholics had sent bishops a 70-page document containing irrefutable evidence that Weltbild published books that promoted pornography, Satanism and magic. They demanded that the publisher withdraw the titles.
But their protests appear to have been completely ignored. Writing in the Die Welt newspaper, Mr Müller said most of the bishops refused to respond to the charges. "The sudden proclaimed astonishment of many church leaders that pornographic material is being distributed by their publishing house, is play acting – bad play acting," Mr Müller said. "Believers have been complaining to their bishops about this for years."It'll be interesting to hear how this story unfolds, and what the facts really are. At this point, it's completely possible that part or all of this apparent scandal is a frame-up. But given the dismal state of European Catholicism these days, the current narrative is all too believable.
From the chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee, Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, comes the news that one of our Church's core moral teachings is "extreme" and "divisive."
For self-described progressive Catholics, the choice is becoming too clear to paper over any longer: the left wing of the Democratic Party, or your Church.
Death, or life.
Cursing, or blessing.
Time's up. What's your final answer?
Good news for all those folks (Al Gore and Joe Biden, for example) who were so ecstatic about the so-called Arab Spring: move to Tunisia and you'll soon be able to have four wives! For feminists, unfortunately, there's no word yet on how many husbands a woman will be able to have. Since the party rising to dominance in Tunisia has declared that Sharia will be the basis for Tunisian law in future, I'm guessing that the latter number will be 1 -- or more accurately, perhaps, one quarter.
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
It's good to see the USCCB pushing back against the efforts of the Obama administration to force Catholic entities to pay for contraception and sterilization in their health insurance benefits. It's even better to see that our parish's bulletin contained the bishop's flyer about this issue.
Rather than cave in to this latest Progressive pressure -- if it succeeds, which it could well do -- Catholic employers should drop health insurance coverage out of their compensation packages. Give their employees the same money as was being paid for their insurance premiums (yes, I know it'll amount to less in total, because it'll be taxed), and have them secure their own insurance.
Some will argue that this will reduce the ability of Catholic organizations to compete with secular ones in attracting good job candidates. My question to them would be: exactly what constitutes a "good" candidate for a Catholic entity's jobs? One who has a nice shiny degree from Stanford or Harvard, for instance, but rejects most, if not all, of the Church's teachings?
The always-cogent Phil Lawler has provided a good analysis of what's presently known about the dust-up between Fr. Pavone of Priests for Life and his bishop.
Today came the news of the suspension of Fr. Frank Pavone, of Priests for Life. Bishop Zurek of Amarillo, the diocese in which until recently PFL kept its offices under the aegis of a different bishop who was supportive, suspended him from his pro-life operations, with allusions to unspecified financial concerns, and recalled him to Amarillo. It's too early to tell what's going on here, but Fr. Pavone's response certainly is eloquent, obedient, yet resolute. We'll see.
Via CNS comes this tidbit that should be of interest to Catholics:
Thirteen U.S. senators who oppose the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) participated in a video for the pro-homosexual “It Gets Better” project, in which they encourage lesbian and gay youth to persevere and be optimistic about the future. In discussing the release of the video on Wednesday, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) said, “DOMA, folks, is on the wrong side of history.”
Would that be the history in which every society has defined marriage as the union of a man and a woman? The history in which homosexual behavior has almost never been encouraged, let alone honored with the mantle of marriage? The history of two thousand years of consistent teaching of the Catholic Church on homosexual behavior? In case you were actually wondering about that, the answers to those questions is No. The history they have in mind is the recent history they have themselves concocted, the history in which every shred of sexual restraint with which societies have shielded themselves must go, because it's -- well -- so old-fashioned.
The senators featured in the video are: Al Franken (D-Minn.), Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), Mark Udall, (D-Colo.), Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) and Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.)
Please, all you Catholics who have cozied up to Democratic politicians because of their support for your favorite "social justice" issues, remember all those D's. No R's, only D's. And for fellow Californian Catholics, remember that, please, the next time Dianne Feinstein comes up for re-election.
A note for non-Catholics:
The Catholic Church does NOT teach that people with homosexual inclinations are worthless human beings who ought to kill themselves. It teaches that such people should do the same thing as everyone else who is tempted toward some evil (that is, all of us): just don't do it.
In contrast with this humane recognition of a transcendent worth in all human beings that's independent of their behavior, the suicides that are deplored in the Senators' video are just what's to be expected from a secular culture that ties people's entire identities to their sexuality. To these Senators and the millions who support them, gays aren't really people; they're labelled counters in a political game of power.
Just what you'd expect from the party whose leader doesn't want his daughters to be "punished" with an unexpected child who interferes with their plans.
Catholic Culture : Latest Headlines : Christian groups agree on ethical standards for proselytism
The agreement categorically condemns violence, “including the violation or destruction of places of worship, sacred symbols, or texts.”
That's all well and good, but unfortunately the signatories to this statement do not include those who are most often doing exactly that: Muslims and Hindus.
Not to mention that any statement that the World Council of Churches will agree to can't possibly be good for the spread of Christianity.
Well-put here, from the Heritage Foundation:
Rather than a natural institution designed to bring the two sexes together around the mutual task of forming homes and raising the next generation of children, marriage has become in some locales a list of temporary bargains between adults that is meant to secure interests and benefits. The result is a less child-centered, duty-based, and future-focused institution. Redefining marriage continues a trend away from policies that focus social resources on children and long-term civil society.
Whatever the defects of pre-Vatican-II Catholic schools, they were clear about one thing: they were Catholic. They existed because the Church wisely insisted that it was vital for children to be taught the Faith every day, along with reading and arithmetic and the other common subjects. Central to the program was the proposition that there was a distinctively Catholic way of looking at everything, that the Faith informed every part of life.
Math? We heard about the beauty of the order that God had placed in the universe, which math could reveal. Reading? Our textbooks were peppered with little examples of Catholics being Catholic. Geography? We read about the experiences of a family of Catholic missionary teachers in China in the early 1930's. Catholic parents were instructed that it was part of their duty to send their children to Catholic schools unless serious reasons prevented it, because the Catholic viewpoint was different from that of the culture around them.
And Catholic schools couldn't be built fast enough to meet the demand in my little suburban area near Los Angeles. My elementary school classrooms never had fewer than 45 students in them, some years as many as 55. Yet many Catholic kids had to be turned away because no more could be squeezed in.
Fast-forward forty years, and St. Mary's School in Fullerton had to be closed due to low enrollment. In most urban areas, Catholic schools are disappearing fast. Why? Though there have been many intertwined causes, the most important, in my opinion, is that they gradually lost almost everything distinctively Catholic about the education they offered.
If Catholic schools had continued to emphasize the most important thing, the Faith, they would have retained their unique value in parents' eyes. Instead, they gave up on their "brand", accepted the secular model, and touted their better test scores. More and more students in Catholic schools were non-Catholic, so pressure grew to downplay the religious content of each day, relegating the Faith to its own "Religion" class. But now that well-funded charter schools are catching up on that measure, Catholic schools appear to have little left to offer. As indeed they do.
Carrying the Faith forward to the next generation will always be a winning proposition for Catholic schools. But live by the test score, die by the test score.
Obedience can be based on fear or upon love; fear of penalties for disobedience, or such great love that we can hardly conceive of being disloyal by disobeying. Most human obedience is a mix. Clearly though, God wants the latter.
"Why do bad things happen to good people?"
That question has gotten asked a lot in the past couple of decades. James Dobson wrote a book by that name, and when I was attending a Presbyterian church, before my return to Rome, it was often the topic of sermons. But I have to say I'm puzzled that Christians would even seriously pose the question. Here's why.
When God created the human race, He gave Adam and Eve a really terrific place to live: Eden. In fact, it wasn't just terrific; it was perfect for us.
But note that after Adam and Eve have their confrontation with God, they're banished from Eden. There was apparently a lot of Earth that wasn't Edenic at all. Good, of course, since God had created it; but not the perfect garden that our first parents had been given. I suspect that if things had turned out differently, God was going to invite Adam and Eve and their children (us) to spread the perfect order of Eden throughout the entire planet, in an immense act of what J.R.R. Tolkien referred to as "sub-creation."
But the Fall short-circuited that plan. Adam and Eve betrayed God's trust in them, expressed in His single request, and instead grabbed for the Knowledge of Good and Evil that the forbidden fruit would bring them. Once they made their decision, I believe, they changed immediately and radically. They no longer "fit" in Eden.
At that point, God's choices included (1) just wipe out the human race and try again, (2) pat A&E on the head and say, "now, now, Daddy's going to give you another turn", and (3) send A&E out into the world whose management they had coveted more than their love for Him. The first would have been just but unmerciful. The second would have violated their dignity as human beings, able to choose and be held to the consequences of their choices. Only the third held out hope for a redemption of the human race; free will would be honored, and a long job of bringing the human will back into line with God's could begin.
So A&E would have to go into the outer world, still unshaped to the Edenic model, and live the best way they could devise with their new fancy Knowledge. And every day of our lives, we all experience just how great that turned out.
Murder, cruelty, war. Deception, slavery, death. And all the thousand ills that flesh is heir to.
So why do bad things happen to good people? Because this is the world we have crafted. It's not The Garden, that exquisitely ordered Creation that God, in His infinite wisdom, fashioned in one corner of the good but still raw Earth. It's the world that we children of Adam and Eve have fashioned after our own lights, using that nifty Knowledge of Good and Evil that we, their kids, still just can't pass up.
"The issue about the direction we are taking, to build other nuclear power plants, is an important question,” said Auxiliary Bishop Michael Goro Matsuura of Osaka. “Together with the Justice and Peace Commission of the Japanese Bishops, which I headed up until last year, we have raised awareness to fight the construction of new nuclear power plants in Japan and globally. I believe that this serious incident should be a lesson for Japan and for the entire planet, and will be an incentive to abandon these projects. We call on the solidarity of Christians worldwide to support this campaign.This is a classic example of the tendency of today's bishops to spend time delivering opinions on subjects in which they have good intentions but no competence whatsoever.