A Stubborn Pope

A stubborn pope -- chicagotribune.com

From the ChicagoTribune.com

[My comments in red.]

A stubborn pope
in an age of shifting morality

Kathleen Parker

April 23, 2008

Pope Benedict XVI's visit to the U.S. has afforded the American media and others an opportunity to remind us that the Catholic Church is "out of step" with modern times. That is both a criticism and compliment—praising with faint damnation. What exactly about modern times would compel a pope to change his institutional mind about the fundamental belief in, say, the dignity of all human life? The central life issue is, of course, abortion, about which even a majority of American Catholics (58 percent) differ from the church's view. [I don't know where this statistic comes from. It sounds way high to me. In my circle of friends and fellow Catholics, I know less than a handful that are Pro-abortion. And they may call themselves Catholic but they are not. You must be in communion with the Church to be Catholic.] Other related concerns include embryo-destructive research, cloning and assisted suicide. The Catholic Church persists in opposing all of the above, insisting that life begins at conception, all life has value, no human being has the right to terminate the life of another. Case closed. And, really, who would insist otherwise? In the abstract, few. In practice, millions. Though we know that life biologically begins at conception, we've decided to disagree about when that life becomes "human." And, though we sort of [sort of?] believe that all life has value, our actions suggest that we think imperfect life has less value. Increasingly, Down syndrome babies today are terminated, for instance. If we quantify human life only according to productivity, then imperfect life inarguably is less valuable. [That's the problem. You do not value life based on productivity.] But is it less human? Nazi eugenicists thought so. But measuring productivity requires a detached calculation—and, inevitably, bureaucratic enforcement—that defines inhuman. This is not, by the way, a judgment of people who have made difficult choices. None of us really knows which path we would take until presented with the intersection that forces such contemplations. Finally, all agree that no human being has the right to take an other's life except in self-defense. Since most abortions are for reasons other than the mother's health, our current practices are possible only if the unborn are considered "not human." [Now how can the unborn be not human? If it is a human baby after the passage through the birth canal then surely it is a human baby before.] Keeping that definition alive is the trick. Human or not? Who decides? A majority of Americans are comfortable with the view that a woman, her doctor and her God should decide. But what if there were irrefutable proof that a fetus at conception is fully human? [What other proof is necessary? Life continues from one generation to another. It does not become non-human. If it is not human, what is it?] Would we then feel that government has a role in protecting unborn life? [Of course it does. As it has an obligation to protect us all from external or internal threats.] These questions are especially tricky for Catholics. For those who side with the pope, the answer is clear: If life is a gift of the Creator, then only the Creator can be the ultimate arbiter of conception (though the church does allow for limiting and spacing babies on the basis of informed conscience, just not through artificial means). To believe in God's autonomy over human life, however, is a hard sell. How does one justify creating more mouths when so many can't be fed? My own Catholic grandmother, the youngest of 11 children, was handed over to the nuns at age 4 when her family could no longer feed her. And yet, the nuns did feed my grandmother. And she did manage to grow up and marry and create my father, who then created me. So, Pro-choice arguments are, nonetheless, compelling. [Not really!] Privacy from government intrusion, yes. Women's autonomy over their own bodies, yes. [The unborn baby is not part of the woman's body, if can be a different sex, it has different DNA.] All children wanted, well, of course. But none of those testaments to logic alters the essential truth that life begins when egg and sperm commingle and that every one of us was at that far end of the life continuum before we were able to dabble in ethics and trifle with electronic keyboards. The question is how we reconcile what is true with what is merely convenient? That we might choose a path other than the pope's is the prerogative of a free people [but not the taking of another life] —and no one recognizes that freedom with greater consistency than this pope. No one has to be Catholic. But to ask Benedict to change the church's rules to suit modern appetites and lifestyles is to ask that he forsake the sanctity of human life for the benefit of earthly delights. Those are not his concerns. Even for non-Catholics like me, there's something comforting about a stubborn pope in a world of moral relativity. Like a strong father, he ignores his children's pleas for leniency knowing that his rules, though tough, serve a higher purpose. [This, my friends, is what we really need. Strong fathers. Men have been disenfranchised from this issue, and we are to blame.] If Benedict were to relent and compromise the value of human life, what would be left to debate? Perhaps only one's own time to die. And then . . .Who decides? [God!]

Washington Post Writers Group Kathleen Parker is a syndicated columnist. E-mail: kparker@kparker.com
Copyright © 2008, Chicago Tribune

Scandal Given by Catholics

Thanks to LifeSiteNews I found the following article:

Pope Decries the "Scandal Given by Catholics Who Promote an Alleged Right to Abortion"

By John-Henry Westen

WASHINGTON, DC, April 18, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - At a Q&A session following Pope Benedict XVI's Wednesday address to the Bishops of the United States, he addressed the "particular problem" of secularism in America. While it allows profession of belief in God, it "can subtly reduce religious belief to a lowest common denominator," he said. Thus there is a separation "of faith from life: living 'as if God did not exist'."

The Pope noted that rather than "thinking with the Church", some Catholics believe they have "a right to pick and choose" in the faith, "maintaining external social bonds but without an integral, interior conversion to the law of Christ."

"We have seen this emerge in an acute way in the scandal given by Catholics who promote an alleged right to abortion," he lamented.

It is this internal betrayal by Catholics that seems to most deeply distress the Holy Father. Besides the much publicized cases of sexual abuse by priests, and the proliferation of homosexuality within certain seminaries, the scandalous behavior of a majority of Catholics in political life also gives rise to the Pontiff's deep sadness. As he said in his homily at Nationals Park Thursday, the Church "senses, often painfully, the presence of division and polarization in her midst, as well as the troubling realization that many of the baptized, rather than acting as a spiritual leaven in the world, are inclined to embrace attitudes contrary to the truth of the Gospel."

At the Q&A session with the Bishops, again at the Wednesday Mass, and again in his address to the United Nations today, the Pope stressed as the solution to many of these problems the tie between faith and reason; "the intrinsic relationship between the Gospel and the natural law"; and the "sound understanding of freedom, seen in positive terms as a liberation both from the limitations of sin and for an authentic and fulfilling life."

Fully Protecting Our Children

I quote in its entirety a post by Postscripts From The Catholic Spitfile Grill which deserves repeating.

While rightly charging United States bishops with doing all in their power to heal the dreadful wounds caused by priests who forsake their vows and prey on children, the Holy Father also right draws attention to the wider context of what it means to fully protect children. Although I have seen attacked and accused of shifting the blame, I don't think that is what the full text of his remarks indicates. Here is one paragraph....

If they are to achieve their full purpose, however, the policies and programs you have adopted need to be placed in a wider context. Children deserve to grow up with a healthy understanding of sexuality and its proper place in human relationships. They should be spared the degrading manifestations and the crude manipulation of sexuality so prevalent today. They have a right to be educated in authentic moral values rooted in the dignity of the human person. This brings us back to our consideration of the centrality of the family and the need to promote the Gospel of life. What does it mean to speak of child protection when pornography and violence can be viewed in so many homes through media widely available today? We need to reassess urgently the values underpinning society, so that a sound moral formation can be offered to young people and adults alike. All have a part to play in this task - not only parents, religious leaders, teachers and catechists, but the media and entertainment industries as well. Indeed, every member of society can contribute to this moral renewal and benefit from it. Truly caring about young people and the future of our civilization means recognizing our responsibility to promote and live by the authentic moral values which alone enable the human person to flourish. It falls to you, as pastors modelled upon Christ, the Good Shepherd, to proclaim this message loud and clear, and thus to address the sin of abuse within the wider context of sexual mores. Moreover, by acknowledging and confronting the problem when it occurs in an ecclesial setting, you can give a lead to others, since this scourge is found not only within your Dioceses, but in every sector of society. It calls for a determined, collective response.

Full Text

Indeed....what does it mean if we put out the fire in the trash bin but ignore the other fires and let the house burn down around our ears?

Andrew Johnson Amaing Voice /Britains got Talent

Now and then you run into something very special. This is one of them.

Prayer for Guidance

O creator past all telling,
you have appointed from the treasures of your wisdom
the hierarchies of angels,
disposing them in wondrous order
above the bright heavens,
and have so beautifully set out all parts of the universe.
You we call the true fount of wisdom
and the noble origin of all things.
Be pleased to shed
on the darkness of mind in which I was born,
The twofold beam of your light
and warmth to dispel my ignorance and sin.
You make eloquent the tongues of children.
Then instruct my speech
and touch my lips with graciousness.
Make me keen to understand, quick to learn,
able to remember;
make me delicate to interpret and ready to speak.
Guide my going in and going forward,
lead home my going forth.
You are true God and true man,
and live for ever and ever.

~St Thomas Aquinas, 1225 -1274

Psalm 14 (Contemporary English Version)

Psalm 14
1Only a fool would say,
"There is no God!"
People like that are worthless;
they are heartless and cruel
and never do right.
2From heaven the LORD
looks down to see
if anyone is wise enough
to search for him.
3But all of them are corrupt;
no one does right.
4Won't you evil people learn?
You refuse to pray,
and you gobble down
the LORD's people.
5But you will be frightened,
because God is on the side
of every good person.
6You may spoil the plans
of the poor,
but the LORD protects them.
7I long for someone from Zion
to come and save Israel!
Our LORD, when you bless
your people again,
Jacob's family will be glad,
and Israel will celebrate.

h/t The Anchoress

Quote of the Day

"In the first place, God made idiots. That was for practice. Then he made school boards."
Mark Twain

Church Bells

What happened to church bells? I can't recall the last time I heard them anywhere.

I'm sure this is an effect of the Church's aquiescence to the pressures of the seculars and athiests.

Our call to prayer is effectively dead.

Here is an article I found, "Bring back the bells": http://www.adoremus.org/1001bells.html

Liturgy of the Hours

I've been praying the Liturgy of the Hours for a long time - so long I can't recall when I started. And I do so not because I'm obligated to do so as a Secular Franciscan, but because now it is a habit, and if I miss a Morning or Evening prayer I feel buggy.

I pray Morning and Evening prayer and on the weekends the Office of Readings - I just can't find time during the week to pray the Readings - but I'm working on it.

My first exposure to Morning and Evening prayer, as I said a long time ago, was when I purchased a paperback book "A Christian's Prayer Book". It's byline is Psalms, Poems and Prayers for the Church's Year. I recently ran across this in one of my bookshelves and noted it was published by the Franciscan Herald Press - small world.

Years later, browsing in a St. Paul's media center store I ran across "Christian Prayer: The Liturgy of the Hours". So I graduated to the "official" text of the Hours. During this phase I was praying it on and off as I found time. I had not yet developed the habit. But I found it rewarding to pray the prayers of the church. I was one of many throughout the world praying the hours incessantly to our Lord. I was praying the same Psalms our Jewish brothers had some 3000 years ago.

I guess it was around the time I was discerning to become a Franciscan that I obtained the one volume of the Hours for Franciscans that included the proper of Franciscan Saints. And soon I obtained the four volumes which included the Office of Readings.

I would encourage everyone to get into the habit of praying the Hours. It does take some time finding the time and getting into the habit. But I find it very rewarding.

Wikipedia Article here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liturgy_of_the_Hours

Franciscan Resources has the Franciscan Liturgy of the Hours here:
http://franciscanresources.com/store/category/ao3g/Franciscan_Prayer_Books_and_Books_About_Prayer.html

The Gifts and Fruits of the Holy Spirit

Apprentice of St. Joseph http://apprenticeofstjoseph.blogspot.com/ Has an interesting article on the Gifts and Fruits of the Holy Spirit. Check it out here: http://apprenticeofstjoseph.blogspot.com/2008/04/gifts-and-fruits-of-holy-spirit.html