Terry Schiavo’s Brother: Jeb Bush 'Legitimately' Concerned About Her Treatment | Daily News | NCRegister.com: As Jeb Bush launches his bid to secure the GOP’s presidential nomination for 2016, the former Florida governor’s past intervention in the battle to end the life of Terri Schiavo has drawn scrutiny.
“The media is trying to make it a campaign issue,” acknowledged Bobby Schindler, Terri Schiavo’s brother.
A devout Catholic, he has helped to establish a Philadelphia-based foundation, Terri Schiavo Life and Hope Network, which aids families with legal support to fight efforts to remove feeding tubes from relatives who are diagnosed to be in “a permanent vegetative state.”
Tuesday, March 31, 2015
German bishops may take Italian soccer star to court over €1.7m in unpaid Church taxes
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Blogtrottr <busybee@blogtrottr.com>
Date: Tuesday, March 31, 2015
Subject: CATHOLIC HERALD: German Church may take Italian football star to court over unpaid taxes
To: kcknight@gmail.com
Italian footballer Luca Toni could be taken to court by the Catholic Church in Germany over unpaid church taxes, according to reports.
According to Sport Mediaset, Toni did not pay the Kirchensteuer (church tax) while playing for Bayern Munich from 2007 to 2010 and a trial is now possible as the German Church attempts to claw back around €1.7m.
It has has been reported that Toni, who currently play for Hellas Verona in Serie A, was initially registered in Germany as an atheist, but later changed this registration to Catholic. He is said to owe €500,000 per year over a three year period and a further €200,000 in interest.
A tribunal suggested that the footballer, who was part of Italy's World Cup winning squad in 2006, pay €500,000, with his accountant paying the same and Bayern Munich paying €700,000. The club, however, reportedly rejected this proposal, meaning a trial is now a possibility.
#kk2churchnews| Manage or unsubscribe from this feed at Blogtrottr. |
Fwd: MARK SHEA: Hysteria about the Indiana RFRA is the Ebola Panic for Lefties
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Blogtrottr <busybee@blogtrottr.com>
Date: Tuesday, March 31, 2015
Subject: MARK SHEA: Hysteria about the Indiana RFRA is the Ebola Panic for Lefties
To: kcknight@gmail.com
AUTHOR=Mark SheaSHEA:
Political parties increasingly function by ginning up panic. The Right has become a past master of this with weekly hysterias about Lattegate, Benghazi, and, most egregiously last fall, the Great Ebola Panic, which evaporated at exactly the same moment the elections ended, but which saw the most deranged in GOP leadership calling for mass executions of ebola victims and, of course, Something to Be Done about Obama, who was somehow to blame for it. The purpose of such panics is, of course, to keep the flock agitated and fearful–and then to tell the flock that unless it throws its support to the Fearmonger, nothing can save them from the horrors that await should The Other Side have its way.
It's a method that has worked for ages, and only works better as an increasingly ignorant populace leaves off the business of thinking in terms of the common good and instead thinks only in terms of tribal loyalties. The Other becomes, in such a politics, a sort of subhuman bogeyman capable of almost any heinous evil. So during the Great Ebola Panic, the Tea Party seriously proposed that Obama was seeking an ebola epidemic on our shores. Why? Because he's just that evil and only Our Team can save you from him. The base was well and truly ginned up by this idiotic lie because they *wanted* to believe that. The self-sustaining fusion reaction of lies and hatred worked like a charm until it was no longer needed and the Noise Machine controllers shut it down.
But, of course, the GOP isn't the only party capable of ginning up moral panics to stampede the herd. A very successful one is under way against Indiana right now. It seems the state passed a Religious Freedom Restoration Act, pretty much like ones on the books in 19 other states, as well as one signed into law by the currently-fake-outraged Hillary Clinton's husband in 1993. Indeed, not long ago, noted gay persecutor Barack Obama had no problem with such legislation.
So why the sudden moral panic that the state of Indiana is just about to march gays into theocratic concentration camps and rename itself the Republic of Gilead? Because it's useful and because moral panics are a quick and dirty way to stampede people, rather in this vein:
The real deal is this: People in flyover country are being told the terms of their surrender. This is not about "toleration" and never has been. It's about the attempt to force people, against their conscience, to approve of homosexual acts and gay "marriage".
The reality is that the vast majority of the people this law means to protect are not interested in quizzing strangers about their sex lives and then punishing tthem. Nobody goes into a grocery or hardware store and gets grilled on whether they are gay and nobody wants to know. But the goal of gay lobby is to target people likely to have qualms of conscience about appearing to support gay "marriage"–people who have real issues of conscience–and use the cudgel of the state force them to give the appearance of approval to what they are regard as sin. It's a form of bullying, something the gay lobby talks about constantly and practices skillfully.
Hence the moral panic as businesses like Apple, which have no trouble trading with Communist butchers in China (and exploiting slave labor there) or gay-murdering butchers in the U.A.E. suddenly develop a "conscience" and bravely face the applause of the Chattering Classes in the US. Here in Washington (which has an RFRA on the books) the mayor of Seattle is jumping on the moral panic bandwagon (as the shipping containers from China fill up our port). Hysterical Lefties now do their best Glenn Beck imitation and compare Christians with a tender conscience to Nazis (threatening that it "will not end well") for them. Because if you can't target some mom and pop Christian bakery in Bloomington, smash them with the iron rod of the state (instead of just going to the bakery down the street), and drive them into destitution, you might as well just gas everybody now. By such low tactics (from people who talk perpetually about "bullying"), the Girardian scapegoat will again be sacrificed as the community expends its fury on another in a long trail of designated Emmanuel Goldsteins in order to assure itself of its moral purity.
But no real justice will have been done. The people who do not and never will be able to pretend that gay "marriage" is real or that homosex is not sinful will go on doing so. Power will have been exercised, but not justice. Gay "marriage" remains what it always has been: an ontological impossibility. And gay sex remains what it has always been: intrinsically disordered. No amount of force, fear, and intimidation will change that. Nor will endless attempts to link this to Jim Crow work. Steve Greydanus explains why:
#kk3alwaysI find it helpful to think of this discussion in the context of two deliberately NON-PARALLEL control cases: a) racist or bigoted objections to accomodating minorities or other targets of prejudicial sentiment, and b) minority or non-racist objections to accommodating racists or others with offensive views. (Did I say NON-PARALLEL emphatically enough? Do I need to clarify that this is explicitly excludes and rejects any suggestion of moral equivalency?)
We decided in this country about half a century ago that anyone has the right to sit down at a lunch counter, or to walk into any business or other place of public accommodation, and get the same service as anyone else, regardless of prejudicial attitudes about factors like race.
Let's agree that this principle applies to gays, and to same-sex couples, and also holds true of racists and others with offensive views. So if a skinhead or a known KKK member walks into a diner, even if it is owned and staffed by minorities or by non-racists who hold the strongest possible objections to his views, he should get the same service as anyone else.
Likewise, I can fathom no basis for saying that religious proprietors or employees of any business should be permitted (or should wish) to refuse service to gays or to same-sex couples.
On the other hand, we recognize the right of advertisers to refuse to accept advertising projects with messages they deem offensive, for instance. A KKK member has a right to the same diner service as anyone else, but he does not have the right to ask graphic designers to create a hateful message for him or ask billboard owners to display it.
Why? Because the latter involves a form of speech or expression. A graphic designer doesn't simply provide a service, he invests his work with his creativity and energy in the cause of making a statement. It doesn't have to be a statement he agrees with, but if it's a statement he finds sufficiently offensive, it becomes problematic to ask him to participate in that speech. Likewise, the right of equal accommodation doesn't mean the billboard owner owes anyone a forum to express their message.
If a racist walks into a bakery owned by blacks or Jews and asks for a cake, he should get one. If he asks for a cake decorated with a frosting swastika or a burning cross, I think it should be the right of the owners to refuse, even if they otherwise accommodate requests for decorative images.
Equally, this means I think a racist proprietor who must bake a cake for a black client should not be forced to decorate it with messaging that he finds offensive. This may impose some slight inconvenience on black patrons to find a nonracist baker willing to accommodate them, but this inconvenience seems to me a reasonable tradeoff for the sake of free speech. (And who wants a cake for their special event baked and decorated by someone with such antithetical attitudes, anyway?)
| Manage or unsubscribe from this feed at Blogtrottr. |
Monday, March 30, 2015
Why ‘left v. right’ is a category mistake for the Church in Africa
Why ‘left v. right’ is a category mistake for the Church in Africa | CruxALLEN: For Catholics in Europe and North America, the burning question we usually want to ask about the coming of age of the Church in Africa, which today represents 16 percent of the global Catholic population and is marked by a new sense of self-confidence, is whether it’s going to drive Catholicism to the left or the right.
Conventional wisdom holds that it will make Catholicism both more conservative on sexual morality and the “wars of culture,” and more liberal on social justice issues such as income inequality, war and peace, and the environment.
Conventional wisdom holds that it will make Catholicism both more conservative on sexual morality and the “wars of culture,” and more liberal on social justice issues such as income inequality, war and peace, and the environment.
During the upcoming Year of Mercy, let us extend God's mercy to unborn babies...
A Pro-Life Year of Mercy - Truth and Charity ForumMCCLOSKEY: Recently, Pope Francis announced an upcoming Year of Mercy that will begin on December 8, 2015, the 50th anniversary of the end of the Second Vatican Council (and of course the feast day of the Immaculate Conception, which holds special significance for us in the U.S., who enjoy the patronage of the Immaculate Conception) and conclude on November 20, 2016, the Feast of Christ the King.
What is mercy? One dictionary defines it in the following way: “kind or forgiving treatment of someone who could be treated harshly; kindness or help given to people who are in a very bad or desperate situation.”
What is mercy? One dictionary defines it in the following way: “kind or forgiving treatment of someone who could be treated harshly; kindness or help given to people who are in a very bad or desperate situation.”
When my young son was badly burned in an accident, our whole family entered the Mystery of the Cross...
When God’s Love Hurts. | Faith in our FamiliesPOPPE: Crosses. Suffering. The human race has been plagued with hardship ever since that fateful day in the Garden of Eden, when Adam and Eve desired more than the goodness God had already given them. And from that point on, most viewed suffering as a punishment from God – until that first Good Friday when Our Lord transformed punishment into a blessing. It seems natural for us to try to alleviate hardships when they come. A painkiller, a massage, an adjustment to the thermostat. How many little things do we do each day, each hour, to tweak the comfort level around ourselves? As these first 2 paragraphs were written, I have already adjusted my posture, scratched an itch and taken a sip of my drink. All actions taken almost without thinking and all done to increase my comfort.
As this Holy Week begins, pray for the grace to keep your eyes fixed on Christ...
Holy Week BeginsETIENNE: Today, we proclaim him as King, while the events of this week will unfold to reveal what Kingship looks like through the eyes of God.
Let us accompany him to the Upper Room where he washes the feet of his apostles, teaching them that true leadership is service.
Let us follow him to Gethsemane where we will pray with him in his hour of handing everything over to the Father.
Let us stay close as he is arrested, betrayed, handed over to the chief priests and elders to be condemned.
May we listen to the false testimony against him, and watch as he is spat upon and humiliated.
Let us accompany him to the Upper Room where he washes the feet of his apostles, teaching them that true leadership is service.
Let us follow him to Gethsemane where we will pray with him in his hour of handing everything over to the Father.
Let us stay close as he is arrested, betrayed, handed over to the chief priests and elders to be condemned.
May we listen to the false testimony against him, and watch as he is spat upon and humiliated.
Why non-Catholic Christians should not be received into full communion at the Easter Vigil...
My Unquiet Heart: Why non-Catholic Christians Should Not be Received into Full Communion at the Easter VigilHILLIS: I love the Easter Vigil. I love the new fire, I love the candles, I love the Exsultet, and I love the baptisms. It's a beautiful service to which I look forward every Lent with anticipation.
Less happy for me is when I see Christians from other traditions being received into the Roman Catholic Church at the Easter Vigil. I need to explain this. I am myself a convert to Roman Catholicism - I've described this transition to Rome elsewhere - so I'm obviously not opposed to the idea of non-Catholic Christians becoming Roman Catholics. What I object to, rather, is receiving these Christians into the Church at the Easter Vigil.
In the history of Christianity, the Easter Vigil was traditionally the time when catechumens were baptized after a long period of preparation. Those who had not experienced new birth through water and the Spirit experience that new birth at the Easter Vigil as we celebrate the renewal of life in and through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Less happy for me is when I see Christians from other traditions being received into the Roman Catholic Church at the Easter Vigil. I need to explain this. I am myself a convert to Roman Catholicism - I've described this transition to Rome elsewhere - so I'm obviously not opposed to the idea of non-Catholic Christians becoming Roman Catholics. What I object to, rather, is receiving these Christians into the Church at the Easter Vigil.
In the history of Christianity, the Easter Vigil was traditionally the time when catechumens were baptized after a long period of preparation. Those who had not experienced new birth through water and the Spirit experience that new birth at the Easter Vigil as we celebrate the renewal of life in and through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
This book makes great Easter reading...
Resurrection: Eden’s Book Makes Great Easter Reading!SCALIA: The Thrill of the Chaste is about how doing the right thing, the affirmative thing (and, in our era, the sadly unusual thing) becomes, at its core, the daringly optimistic thing, because it draws you continually toward meeting God in the midst of daily mystery. Eden has found that thrilling enough to have discerned a call to live in consecrated celibacy. The joy with which she writes of this calling nearly leaps off the page. It testifies that answering the ever-affirming “yes” of God with a “yes” of one’s own is the key to discovering a simple reality: our lives are meant not to meander but to be grounded in the steady vocation to which every one of us is called, within our spheres.
4 reasons to pray the Stations of the Cross daily
Four Reasons to Pray the Stations of the Cross Daily | Philip KosloskiKOSLOSKI: The Way of the Cross held a special place in the heart of St. John Paul II. He grew up near an ancient shrine in the city of “Kalwaria Zebrzydowska.” The shrine there was erected on a landscape of hills and was fashioned to resemble the Way of the Cross in Jerusalem. There are numerous chapels whereby a pilgrim can trace Jesus’ passion, death and resurrection. Visiting the site when he became pope, John Paul II said...
Every single thing the Church warned about contraception has happened...
The Church isn't anti-contraception because... :: Catholic News Agency (CNA)JENNYUEBBING: One of the most difficult Catholic teachings to accept - for believers and non believers alike - is the Church's position on contraception.
I imagine (actually no, it's not imagined. I get these questions all the time.) that people are confused primarily about the motives behind the teaching, while simultaneously reeling in disbelief that anyone could - or would - choose to live without artificial birth control in the modern world.
First, let's start with a couple reasons why the Church doesn't forbid contraception.
I imagine (actually no, it's not imagined. I get these questions all the time.) that people are confused primarily about the motives behind the teaching, while simultaneously reeling in disbelief that anyone could - or would - choose to live without artificial birth control in the modern world.
First, let's start with a couple reasons why the Church doesn't forbid contraception.
Indiana has shown that it values religious freedom. Will Notre Dame embrace it?
Will Notre Dame Continue to Betray its Catholic Identity? - Crisis MagazineREILLY: Indiana has shown that it values religious freedom. The University of Notre Dame has a moral obligation to embrace it.
On Thursday, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence signed the state’s new Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), which says that government may not “substantially burden” religious exercise, except when using the “least restrictive means” of advancing a “compelling government interest.”
It’s similar to the federal law with the same name, which has been cited in a number of federal court cases involving religious freedom. The federal RFRA was central to last year’s Hobby Lobby ruling, in which the Supreme Court exempted certain private companies from the Obama administration’s requirement that employee health plans must cover sterilization and contraceptives, including some that cause early abortions.
On Thursday, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence signed the state’s new Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), which says that government may not “substantially burden” religious exercise, except when using the “least restrictive means” of advancing a “compelling government interest.”
It’s similar to the federal law with the same name, which has been cited in a number of federal court cases involving religious freedom. The federal RFRA was central to last year’s Hobby Lobby ruling, in which the Supreme Court exempted certain private companies from the Obama administration’s requirement that employee health plans must cover sterilization and contraceptives, including some that cause early abortions.
Jesus' house and the willful misunderstanding of unreasonable atheists
Jesus' House and the Willful Misunderstanding of Atheists - AleteiaMARTIGNONI: You may have seen the article floating around the internet over the last few weeks about the possible discovery of Jesus’ house in Nazareth. The headline read: “Archaeologist May Have Discovered Jesus’ Childhood Home."
It’s an interesting article about a house in Nazareth that was initially found in the 1880’s by an order of nuns that accidentally discovered an ancient cistern, started digging around it, and eventually unearthed a complex of walls and structures and caves that had long been buried. In the 1930’s, a priest, who had been an architect, did some more excavations at the site and uncovered some more of the buried structures.
It’s an interesting article about a house in Nazareth that was initially found in the 1880’s by an order of nuns that accidentally discovered an ancient cistern, started digging around it, and eventually unearthed a complex of walls and structures and caves that had long been buried. In the 1930’s, a priest, who had been an architect, did some more excavations at the site and uncovered some more of the buried structures.
What is monasticism? Monasticism is simply Christian life lived more explicitly and intensively...
The Ordinariness of MonasticismMANN: People want to know what it is like for me to have joined a monastery – a hard question to answer. In part it is difficult to explain, as you would expect, because of the great difference between this life and the one I had before. I do not want to overstate that difference; but the commitment made by a contemplative monk (or nun) is quite a radical one, and in many ways one cannot understand such a life without some taste of it. I sought a break with the past in coming here; and while that was not my entire or only intention, it is certainly being fulfilled.
Yet there is another side to this. It is also – perhaps surprisingly – difficult to describe this life because of how ordinary and normal it is. Whatever my aims may have been in the past, I am not becoming a monk in order to escape the world or to be different from others.
Yet there is another side to this. It is also – perhaps surprisingly – difficult to describe this life because of how ordinary and normal it is. Whatever my aims may have been in the past, I am not becoming a monk in order to escape the world or to be different from others.
Time-lapse video: Chicago's St. John Cantius Church transforms from Good Friday to Easter Sunday...
St John Cantius Church - Chicago: Watch 8 hours of work in 30 seconds. After Good Friday services there is a complete transformation at Chicago’s St. John Cantius Church. The stripped altar with its stark violet veils blooms with Easter flowers and decorations in preparation for the glorious Easter Mass.
The accompanying music is by St. John Cantius’ own St. Cecilia Choir singing the motet Cantate Domino canticum novum by Heinrich Schuetz.
The accompanying music is by St. John Cantius’ own St. Cecilia Choir singing the motet Cantate Domino canticum novum by Heinrich Schuetz.
Hope and fear in Nigeria as election results are awaited
Hope and fear in Nigeria as results are awaited Vatican Radio: Results are expected to start trickling-in Monday from potentially the closest contest since the end of military rule in 1999. The African Union in a statement Monday described the weekend voting as broadly credible despite widespread logistical challenges.
The election pits President Goodluck Jonathan against former military ruler Muhammadu Buhari for the favour of an electorate divided along a complex mix of ethnic, regional and in some cases religious lines in Africa's most populous nation.
The election pits President Goodluck Jonathan against former military ruler Muhammadu Buhari for the favour of an electorate divided along a complex mix of ethnic, regional and in some cases religious lines in Africa's most populous nation.
Celibacy is a sign that every other love, every lesser love, is a form of the love of God
Dismantling the Cross by Patricia Snow | Articles | First Things: Generally speaking, there are two principal vocations in the life of the Catholic Church: marriage on the one hand, and celibate priesthood and religious life on the other. Both are expressions of conjugal love. In the normal calling of marriage, an individual binds himself for life to another human being. In the exceptional calling of priesthood or religious life, an individual binds himself eternally to God.
The Christian version of "Cheat the Oracle" is much better than the pagan one...
Cheating the Oracle |Blogs | NCRegister.comSHEA: The idea is that Heaven decrees the hero's fate and nothing can change it. The hero (or perhaps the hero's parents or guardians if the hero is an infant) then attempts to cheat the oracle by hiding the hero in a distant land or selling him into slavery or something. In so doing, this sets in motion the fulfillment of the prophecy. And so, in ancient Greece, Oedipus is fated to kill his father and marry his mother. In ancient Israel, Joseph is fated to rule over his brothers and father. Oedipus' guardians and Joseph's brothers labor to thwart their respective oracles, but every step they take is just one step closer to their fruition.
Notably, it is the pagan story which describes heaven in sinister conspiracy against man. The gods pull what amounts to a sick practical joke on Oedipus. In contrast, the story of Joseph is, if anything, merry. God has been "conspiring" to rescue everybody from starvation by His choice of Joseph. It is Joseph's brothers who connive and plot. God simply takes all the plotting and "dooms" everybody to reconciliation and joy that makes for perhaps the sweetest ending to a story in all of pre-Christian antiquity.
Notably, it is the pagan story which describes heaven in sinister conspiracy against man. The gods pull what amounts to a sick practical joke on Oedipus. In contrast, the story of Joseph is, if anything, merry. God has been "conspiring" to rescue everybody from starvation by His choice of Joseph. It is Joseph's brothers who connive and plot. God simply takes all the plotting and "dooms" everybody to reconciliation and joy that makes for perhaps the sweetest ending to a story in all of pre-Christian antiquity.
Spend this week with Jesus: A daily chronology of our Lord's "last" seven days...
Spend This Week With Jesus – A Daily Chronology of Jesus’ “Last” Week � Archdiocese of WashingtonPOPE: At the heart of our faith is the Paschal mystery: the Passion, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus Christ. All of salvation history leads up to and goes forth from these saving events. The purpose of this post is to describe Jesus’ final week. We call this “Holy Week” because Jesus’ public ministry culminates with His suffering, death, and resurrection.
What follows is a brief description of each day of Holy Week. I hope you will print out this flyer (Walking-with-Jesus-In-Holy-Week) and read it each day this week. Prayerfully walk with Jesus in His most difficult yet most glorious week.
What follows is a brief description of each day of Holy Week. I hope you will print out this flyer (Walking-with-Jesus-In-Holy-Week) and read it each day this week. Prayerfully walk with Jesus in His most difficult yet most glorious week.
Lent is a time of penance, but does penance have a role in the Christian life throughout the year?
Penance: More than Lenten Practice | Those Catholic MenSTAUDT: Penance is an essential and even obligatory part of the Christian life. This can be seen in the fact that Confession requires the performance of penance and in the mandated days of fasting and abstinence. Beyond these expressions, penance has played a large role in the Christian life, primarily through reparation and meritorious suffering, although this centrality of penance has been eclipsed in our time. The lessening focus on penance is nothing short of a spiritual and cultural crisis that must be addressed for renewal.
Quiz: Can you name the schools with the most Final Four appearances?
Name the Schools With the Most Final Four Appearances | Mental Floss: Note: This quiz was created before this weekend's games, so Wisconsin is not included as one of the 25 schools with four or more appearances.
Israeli students build epic Rube Goldberg machine to celebrate Passover
New Advent: Israeli students build epic Rube Goldberg machine to celebrate Passover: Technion students get ready for Passover, the festival of freedom, and let their imagination run wild. Watch closely as this Rube Goldberg Machine created by students from the Faculties of Mechanical Engineering and Architecture and Town Planning relates highlights of the Passover story. Filmed in the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering in The Sydney & Shirley Gendel and Emanuel Friedberg Family Creative Design Student Laboratory, a Project of the American Technion Society, Cleveland Chapter.
How cheese changed the course of Western civilization
Cheese changed the course of Western civilization - Quartz: This is the story you’ll often hear about how humans discovered cheese: one hot day 9,000 years ago, a nomad was on his travels, and brought along some milk in an animal stomach—a sort of proto-thermos—to have something to drink at the end of the day. When he arrived, he discovered that the rennet in the stomach lining had curdled the milk, creating the first cheese.
Sunday, March 29, 2015
Prayers needed: Cardinal George readmitted to Loyola Hospital
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Blogtrottr <busybee@blogtrottr.com>
Date: Sun, Mar 29, 2015 at 4:54 AM
Subject: KATHY SCHIFFER: PRAYERS NEEDED: Cardinal George Readmitted to Loyola Hospital
To: kcknight@gmail.com
From: Blogtrottr <busybee@blogtrottr.com>
Date: Sun, Mar 29, 2015 at 4:54 AM
Subject: KATHY SCHIFFER: PRAYERS NEEDED: Cardinal George Readmitted to Loyola Hospital
To: kcknight@gmail.com
AUTHOR=Kathy SchifferSCHIFFER: Could you take a few minutes to say a prayer for Cardinal George? For the second time this month, Cardinal Francis George, retired archbishop of Chicago, has returned to Loyola Hospital–this time for pain management and hydration issues. The 78-year-old cardinal, who has been facing recurrent cancer in his liver and kidney, returned to the [Read More...] #kk2mugshot
| Manage or unsubscribe from this feed at Blogtrottr. |
Christianity is intrinsically patriarchal, but the patriarch is to be a papa...
Must Catholicism Be Patriarchal? | Daily News | NCRegister.comLONGENECKER: Someone was joking recently that the reason the Eastern Orthodox cannot have women bishops is because one can’t call a woman “Patriarch.” Behind the wisecrack is some wisdom, and the existence of women ministers in non-Catholic denominations raises the question of just how patriarchal the Christian religion must be.�
Is it necessary to call priests “Father” and refer to the Pope as “Holy Father”? The title “Abbot” comes from the ancient term “Abba-Father,” and “pope” comes from the Greek word pappas — “daddy.” Are these no more than human traditions? Are these just social constructs? Or is the idea of “Father Knows Best” woven inextricably into the Catholic faith?
Is it necessary to call priests “Father” and refer to the Pope as “Holy Father”? The title “Abbot” comes from the ancient term “Abba-Father,” and “pope” comes from the Greek word pappas — “daddy.” Are these no more than human traditions? Are these just social constructs? Or is the idea of “Father Knows Best” woven inextricably into the Catholic faith?
The invention of the baby carrot
The Invention of the Baby Carrot: The year is 1986, and you operate one of the largest carrot farms and processing plants in California. The weather is beautiful, your farm is vast, and business is good. Life is perfect except for one thing: every day, you need to throw out tons of the vegetables you worked so hard to grow, because they just aren’t pretty enough to sell.
Up to 400 tons of them, actually -- up to 70% of each haul. That’s multiple blue whales' weight in carrots, every single day. This is the position carrot farmer and producer Mike Yurosek found himself in.
Up to 400 tons of them, actually -- up to 70% of each haul. That’s multiple blue whales' weight in carrots, every single day. This is the position carrot farmer and producer Mike Yurosek found himself in.
Secular messianism: An explanation for why the Angry Left is so angry...
Why Is the Angry Left So Angry?: One of my Federalist colleagues recently observed that, “When I write pieces that upset liberals, I get angry, personal hate mail. When I write pieces that upset social conservatives, I most often get this: ‘I appreciate your well written article and I will pray for you, sir, that you will find the God who loves you.'”
This absolutely tracks with my experience—and as an atheist, I’ve got a certain track record of writing pieces that upset religious readers. I get the occasional angry or dismissive comment, but on the whole the reaction is an almost annoying amount of Christian charity. Not so when I take on, say, the environmentalists.
This absolutely tracks with my experience—and as an atheist, I’ve got a certain track record of writing pieces that upset religious readers. I get the occasional angry or dismissive comment, but on the whole the reaction is an almost annoying amount of Christian charity. Not so when I take on, say, the environmentalists.
The once-deadly cliffside path called the "world's most dangerous trail" reopens this week...
"The World's Most Dangerous Trail" Reopens This Week | Travel | Smithsonian: It’s only three feet wide, clinging to a sheer cliff. Three hundred feet below lies a rocky gorge and the Guadalhorce River. Its 1.9 miles provide stunning views of southern Spain’s natural beauty. The El Caminito del Rey, once called “the world’s most dangerous path,” has been in disrepair for nearly a hundred years. But on March 28, coinciding with Spain’s Holy Week, the walkway near the small Spanish village of El Chorro will officially reopen for the first time in over ten years, thanks to a reported $5.8 million restoration effort that has made the trail safe and accessible for hikers.
Pope Francis and the ambivalence of popularity
Pope Francis and the ambivalence of popularity | CruxALLEN: If Pope Francis were the President of the United States, he would now be on the other side of his first midterm election, having marked his two-year anniversary on March 13, and all indications are his party would have done exceptionally well.
The pope’s poll numbers remain sky-high, with the most recent Pew Forum study putting his approval rating among American Catholics at 90 percent. While a president would probably take that and run, being pope is a bit more complicated.
For one thing, a pope is expected to be not an electoral dynamo, but a living saint. As “House of Cards” proves definitively, Americans long ago abandoned the conceit that our civic leaders are or should be paragons of virtue.
The pope’s poll numbers remain sky-high, with the most recent Pew Forum study putting his approval rating among American Catholics at 90 percent. While a president would probably take that and run, being pope is a bit more complicated.
For one thing, a pope is expected to be not an electoral dynamo, but a living saint. As “House of Cards” proves definitively, Americans long ago abandoned the conceit that our civic leaders are or should be paragons of virtue.
The Passion accounts don't merely describe people long since gone. They're portraits of you and me...
See What the End Shall Be – A Palm Sunday Reflection � Archdiocese of WashingtonPOPE: The Passion, which we read in today’s liturgy, is too long to comment on in detail. I’ll examine just a portion of it in today’s blog.
The usual villains, such as the temple leaders, Judas, and the recruited crowd shouting “Crucify him!” are fairly obvious. They openly display their sinfulness and are unambiguously wicked. But there are other participants in the Passion accounts whose sinfulness, struggles, and neglect are more subtle yet still contribute significantly to the Lord’s sufferings on Good Friday. It is perhaps in these figures that we can learn a great deal about ourselves. For while we may not directly shout “Crucify!” we are often not as holy and heroic as the persecutors were wicked and bold.
The usual villains, such as the temple leaders, Judas, and the recruited crowd shouting “Crucify him!” are fairly obvious. They openly display their sinfulness and are unambiguously wicked. But there are other participants in the Passion accounts whose sinfulness, struggles, and neglect are more subtle yet still contribute significantly to the Lord’s sufferings on Good Friday. It is perhaps in these figures that we can learn a great deal about ourselves. For while we may not directly shout “Crucify!” we are often not as holy and heroic as the persecutors were wicked and bold.
Fwd: ANTHONY LILLES: Saint Teresa of Avila's Way, on the 500th anniversary of her birth
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Blogtrottr <busybee@blogtrottr.com>
Date: Sat, Mar 28, 2015 at 4:20 PM
Subject: ANTHONY LILLES: Saint Teresa of Avila's Way - on the Quincentennial of her Birth
To: kcknight@gmail.com
From: Blogtrottr <busybee@blogtrottr.com>
Date: Sat, Mar 28, 2015 at 4:20 PM
Subject: ANTHONY LILLES: Saint Teresa of Avila's Way - on the Quincentennial of her Birth
To: kcknight@gmail.com
AUTHOR=Anthony LillesLILLES:
"When our actions and our words are one, the Lord will unfailingly fulfil our petitions. He will give us His kingdom and help us by means of supernatural gifts...which the Lord bestows on our feeble efforts." Teresa of Avila, Way of Perfection, Chapter 37
Today, Saturday, March 28, is a great day of rejoicing for Carmelites everywhere and for the whole Church. Five hundred years ago the daughter of Alonso Sanchez de Cepeda and Beatriz de Ahumada y Cuevas, in the heart of the Iberian Peninsula, in the province of Avila, in the small town of Gotarrendura, she became a pioneer in the renewal of contemplative prayer that swept through Spain in the 16th Century. In her work, Way of Perfection, she offers a meditation on the Lord's Prayer. For her, this prayer aims towards the heights of mystical contemplation, but starts in the simplicity of a humble petition.
Teresa is convinced that the prayer that Christ commanded us to say demands the same humble movement of faith whether from the simple minded or else the most genius, the most disciplined or the least. Only as the disciplined realize the insufficiency of their own efforts do they glimpse the spiritual logic that she contemplates in this Gospel message. Only as a great mind humbly bows down in wonder can it begin to explore the pathway to perfection that she sees in these seven petitions entrusted to us by the Lord.
The pathway to the progress that she sees in this prayer revealed by the Word of the Father is the way of authenticity, the alignment of what we say with what we do. We are so out of harmony with ourselves, with each other and with God that only God Himself can bring us back into tune. She herself knew from first hand experience how His saving intervention comes in the nature of a gift that we welcome by humble efforts informed by living faith. Her encounter with the Man of Sorrows in her convent in Avila helped her understand that this saving gift is the heart piercing realization of how much He loves us, a consuming desire to contemplate the suffering love by which He contemplates us.
She suggests in so many ways that the Lord is never indifferent to even the most tepid efforts of devotion if only we will trust Him and not lose heart. What starts as a spark becomes a consuming fire. What seems to take so much effort at first soon washes over the soul like a refreshing rain. The silken cocoon of good works we make by God's grace but with great difficulty becomes a transforming place of new spiritual freedom. She describes a quietness of soul filled with the fulness of God, a sacred stillness exploding like a fountain of living water. Although bringing the way we live into harmony with those noble intentions the Holy Spirit has stirred in our hearts may seem impossible, she insists every act of devotion exposes us to these splendors of heaven...provided we keep our hearts fixed on His great love.
What amazes me is her confidence in God. She is acutely aware of human weakness and our capacity for self-deception. She knows how given we are to self-torment. She is no stranger to the host of irrational anxieties that can assail a soul. She is even more aware, however, of the astonishing immensity of God's love.
{On this great day in the life of the Church, Teresa helps us consider how the Lord permits himself to be bound by our love. It is love that makes our prayer authentic, God's love at work in us that brings into harmony what we say and what we do. If however our efforts to repeat what the Lord has told us to say move in our hearts in even the most subtle of ways, it is only because the Holy Spirit used our frail efforts to blow new life in us. This is the Kingdom of Heaven that the wisdom of Saint Teresa of Avila sees coming, and today, on the threshold of Holy Week, may we all come to see it too!}
#kk3always Today, Saturday, March 28, is a great day of rejoicing for Carmelites everywhere and for the whole Church. Five hundred years ago the daughter of Alonso Sanchez de Cepeda and Beatriz de Ahumada y Cuevas, in the heart of the Iberian Peninsula, in the province of Avila, in the small town of Gotarrendura, she became a pioneer in the renewal of contemplative prayer that swept through Spain in the 16th Century. In her work, Way of Perfection, she offers a meditation on the Lord's Prayer. For her, this prayer aims towards the heights of mystical contemplation, but starts in the simplicity of a humble petition.
Teresa is convinced that the prayer that Christ commanded us to say demands the same humble movement of faith whether from the simple minded or else the most genius, the most disciplined or the least. Only as the disciplined realize the insufficiency of their own efforts do they glimpse the spiritual logic that she contemplates in this Gospel message. Only as a great mind humbly bows down in wonder can it begin to explore the pathway to perfection that she sees in these seven petitions entrusted to us by the Lord.
The pathway to the progress that she sees in this prayer revealed by the Word of the Father is the way of authenticity, the alignment of what we say with what we do. We are so out of harmony with ourselves, with each other and with God that only God Himself can bring us back into tune. She herself knew from first hand experience how His saving intervention comes in the nature of a gift that we welcome by humble efforts informed by living faith. Her encounter with the Man of Sorrows in her convent in Avila helped her understand that this saving gift is the heart piercing realization of how much He loves us, a consuming desire to contemplate the suffering love by which He contemplates us.
She suggests in so many ways that the Lord is never indifferent to even the most tepid efforts of devotion if only we will trust Him and not lose heart. What starts as a spark becomes a consuming fire. What seems to take so much effort at first soon washes over the soul like a refreshing rain. The silken cocoon of good works we make by God's grace but with great difficulty becomes a transforming place of new spiritual freedom. She describes a quietness of soul filled with the fulness of God, a sacred stillness exploding like a fountain of living water. Although bringing the way we live into harmony with those noble intentions the Holy Spirit has stirred in our hearts may seem impossible, she insists every act of devotion exposes us to these splendors of heaven...provided we keep our hearts fixed on His great love.
What amazes me is her confidence in God. She is acutely aware of human weakness and our capacity for self-deception. She knows how given we are to self-torment. She is no stranger to the host of irrational anxieties that can assail a soul. She is even more aware, however, of the astonishing immensity of God's love.
{On this great day in the life of the Church, Teresa helps us consider how the Lord permits himself to be bound by our love. It is love that makes our prayer authentic, God's love at work in us that brings into harmony what we say and what we do. If however our efforts to repeat what the Lord has told us to say move in our hearts in even the most subtle of ways, it is only because the Holy Spirit used our frail efforts to blow new life in us. This is the Kingdom of Heaven that the wisdom of Saint Teresa of Avila sees coming, and today, on the threshold of Holy Week, may we all come to see it too!}
| Manage or unsubscribe from this feed at Blogtrottr. |
Pope's Palm Sunday homily: "God's way is humility"
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Blogtrottr <busybee@blogtrottr.com>
Date: Sun, Mar 29, 2015 at 6:07 AM
Subject: ROCCO PALMO: In Holy Week, "God's Way Is Humility"
To: kcknight@gmail.com
At the heart of this celebration, which seems so festive, are the words we heard in the hymn of the Letter to the Philippians: "He humbled himself" (2:8). Jesus' humiliation.
These words show us God's way and, consequently, that which must be the way of Christians: it is humility. A way which constantly amazes and disturbs us: we will never get used to a humble God!
{Humility is above all God's way: God humbles himself to walk with his people, to put up with their infidelity. This is clear when we read the the story of the Exodus. How humiliating for the Lord to hear all that grumbling, all those complaints against Moses, but ultimately against him, their Father, who brought them out of slavery and was leading them on the journey through the desert to the land of freedom.}
This week, Holy Week, which leads us to Easter, we will take this path of Jesus' own humiliation. Only in this way will this week be "holy" for us too!
We will feel the contempt of the leaders of his people and their attempts to trip him up. We will be there at the betrayal of Judas, one of the Twelve, who will sell him for thirty pieces of silver. We will see the Lord arrested and carried off like a criminal; abandoned by his disciples, dragged before the Sanhedrin, condemned to death, beaten and insulted. We will hear Peter, the "rock" among the disciples, deny him three times. We will hear the shouts of the crowd, egged on by their leaders, who demand that Barabas be freed and Jesus crucified. We will see him mocked by the soldiers, robed in purple and crowned with thorns. And then, as he makes his sorrowful way beneath the cross, we will hear the jeering of the people and their leaders, who scoff at his being King and Son of God.
This is God's way, the way of humility. It is the way of Jesus; there is no other. And there can be no humility without humiliation.
Following this path to the full, the Son of God took on the "form of a slave" (cf. Phil 2:7). In the end, humility also means service. It means making room for God by stripping oneself, "emptying oneself", as Scripture says (v. 7). This – the pouring out of oneself - is the greatest humiliation of all.
There is another way, however, opposed to the way of Christ. It is worldliness, the way of the world. The world proposes the way of vanity, pride, success… the other way. The Evil One proposed this way to Jesus too, during his forty days in the desert. But Jesus immediately rejected it. With him, and only by his grace, with his help, we too can overcome this temptation to vanity, to worldliness, not only at significant moments, but in daily life as well.
In this, we are helped and comforted by the example of so many men and women who, in silence and hiddenness, sacrifice themselves daily to serve others: a sick relative, an elderly person living alone, a disabled person, the homeless....
We think too of the humiliation endured by all those who, for their lives of fidelity to the Gospel, encounter discrimination and pay a personal price. We think too of our brothers and sisters who are persecuted because they are Christians, the martyrs of our own time – and there are many. They refuse to deny Jesus and they endure insult and injury with dignity. They follow him on his way. In truth, we can speak of a "cloud of witnesses" – the martyrs of our own time (cf. Heb 12:1).
During this week, let us set about with determination along this same path of humility, with immense love for him, our Lord and Saviour. Love will guide us and give us strength. For where he is, we too shall be (cf. Jn 12:26).
-30- #kk3always
From: Blogtrottr <busybee@blogtrottr.com>
Date: Sun, Mar 29, 2015 at 6:07 AM
Subject: ROCCO PALMO: In Holy Week, "God's Way Is Humility"
To: kcknight@gmail.com
AUTHOR=Rocco PalmoPALMO:
HOMILY OF POPE FRANCIS
PALM SUNDAY OF THE PASSION OF THE LORD
ST PETER'S SQUARE
29 MARCH 2015
PALM SUNDAY OF THE PASSION OF THE LORD
ST PETER'S SQUARE
29 MARCH 2015
At the heart of this celebration, which seems so festive, are the words we heard in the hymn of the Letter to the Philippians: "He humbled himself" (2:8). Jesus' humiliation.
These words show us God's way and, consequently, that which must be the way of Christians: it is humility. A way which constantly amazes and disturbs us: we will never get used to a humble God!
{Humility is above all God's way: God humbles himself to walk with his people, to put up with their infidelity. This is clear when we read the the story of the Exodus. How humiliating for the Lord to hear all that grumbling, all those complaints against Moses, but ultimately against him, their Father, who brought them out of slavery and was leading them on the journey through the desert to the land of freedom.}
This week, Holy Week, which leads us to Easter, we will take this path of Jesus' own humiliation. Only in this way will this week be "holy" for us too!
We will feel the contempt of the leaders of his people and their attempts to trip him up. We will be there at the betrayal of Judas, one of the Twelve, who will sell him for thirty pieces of silver. We will see the Lord arrested and carried off like a criminal; abandoned by his disciples, dragged before the Sanhedrin, condemned to death, beaten and insulted. We will hear Peter, the "rock" among the disciples, deny him three times. We will hear the shouts of the crowd, egged on by their leaders, who demand that Barabas be freed and Jesus crucified. We will see him mocked by the soldiers, robed in purple and crowned with thorns. And then, as he makes his sorrowful way beneath the cross, we will hear the jeering of the people and their leaders, who scoff at his being King and Son of God.
This is God's way, the way of humility. It is the way of Jesus; there is no other. And there can be no humility without humiliation.
Following this path to the full, the Son of God took on the "form of a slave" (cf. Phil 2:7). In the end, humility also means service. It means making room for God by stripping oneself, "emptying oneself", as Scripture says (v. 7). This – the pouring out of oneself - is the greatest humiliation of all.
There is another way, however, opposed to the way of Christ. It is worldliness, the way of the world. The world proposes the way of vanity, pride, success… the other way. The Evil One proposed this way to Jesus too, during his forty days in the desert. But Jesus immediately rejected it. With him, and only by his grace, with his help, we too can overcome this temptation to vanity, to worldliness, not only at significant moments, but in daily life as well.
In this, we are helped and comforted by the example of so many men and women who, in silence and hiddenness, sacrifice themselves daily to serve others: a sick relative, an elderly person living alone, a disabled person, the homeless....
We think too of the humiliation endured by all those who, for their lives of fidelity to the Gospel, encounter discrimination and pay a personal price. We think too of our brothers and sisters who are persecuted because they are Christians, the martyrs of our own time – and there are many. They refuse to deny Jesus and they endure insult and injury with dignity. They follow him on his way. In truth, we can speak of a "cloud of witnesses" – the martyrs of our own time (cf. Heb 12:1).
During this week, let us set about with determination along this same path of humility, with immense love for him, our Lord and Saviour. Love will guide us and give us strength. For where he is, we too shall be (cf. Jn 12:26).
-30- #kk3always
| Manage or unsubscribe from this feed at Blogtrottr. |
Saturday, March 28, 2015
Fwd: NCREGISTER: A 'culture of life' or a 'tyrant state'? St. John Paul II's prophetic wake-up call to the West...
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Blogtrottr <busybee@blogtrottr.com>
Date: Saturday, March 28, 2015
Subject: NCREGISTER: A 'Culture of Life' or a 'Tyrant State'?
To: kcknight@gmail.com
AUTHOR=JOAN FRAWLEY DESMOND: Cardinal Sean O'Malley of Boston can still recall the excitement he felt when Pope John Paul II asked bishops across the world to forward ideas to him for his new encyclical on life issues. Back in the early... #kk2churchnews
| Manage or unsubscribe from this feed at Blogtrottr. |
Friday, March 27, 2015
The Logos, the second person of the Trinity, is a glorious and paradoxical mystery
I Believe in Jesus Christ : The Integrated Catholic Life™RUMMELSBURG: To profess belief in the second person of the Most Holy Trinity carries with it unfathomable implications because full understanding lies rooted inconceivably beyond human reach in our eternal Creator. The Catechism elucidates the incarnation as we read: “we believe and confess that Jesus of Nazareth, born a Jew of a daughter of Israel at Bethlehem at the time of King Herod the Great and the emperor Caesar Augustus, a carpenter by trade, who died crucified in Jerusalem under the procurator Pontius Pilate during the reign of the emperor Tiberius, is the eternal Son of God made man. He ‘came from God’, ‘descended from heaven’, and ‘came in the flesh’ For ‘the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.”1 Such profound words constitute a poetic promise by those of us who utter them and compel us by the most strenuous efforts to apprehend (aided by the gifts of the Holy Spirit) who Christ Jesus is and what our belief in Him demands from us.
Debunking some myths behind the 'new cosmology'
Debunking myths behind the 'new cosmology': Advances in cosmology — the science of the origin and development of the universe — over the last century have revolutionized our ideas about the beginning of the universe. Some of these advances are the work of Catholic cosmologists; for example, a Catholic priest, Georges Lemaître, was the principal architect of the Big Bang theory. Others, such as Stephen Barr, use new scientific discoveries to revitalize medieval proofs for the existence of God. Theologians like Pierre Teilhard de Chardin used the new cosmology to understand in contemporary terms the full cosmic significance of God’s revelation in Christ.
"If you did not touch him, you did not meet him"
My Unquiet Heart: "If you did not touch him, you did not meet him"HILLIS: My son and I went for a drink at a café last night, and sat at a table in the front window. There was a homeless man sitting on the porch, alone. As Isaac and I drank our root beers, a young woman quietly walked up to the man and spoke with him. She came inside, purchased a coffee, filled it with cream and sugar, then went back outside to deliver it to the man.
This was impressive enough. The woman was discreet, and clearly didn't want to draw attention to herself. But what impressed me most deeply about her was that she didn't just buy this man a coffee. She talked with him, looked him in the eye, and touched him on the shoulder unselfconsciously and with evident care. She provided for me, as a parent, a teaching moment as I pointed out to Isaac what she was doing. She also taught me by modelling the kind of generous love to which we are called as Christians.
This was impressive enough. The woman was discreet, and clearly didn't want to draw attention to herself. But what impressed me most deeply about her was that she didn't just buy this man a coffee. She talked with him, looked him in the eye, and touched him on the shoulder unselfconsciously and with evident care. She provided for me, as a parent, a teaching moment as I pointed out to Isaac what she was doing. She also taught me by modelling the kind of generous love to which we are called as Christians.
Failure to charge womb-cutter for murder is "travesty of justice," says Archbishop of Denver
STATEMENT: Failure to charge Lane for murder is "travesty of justice," says archbishop - ArchDen.org: Today Boulder County District Attorney Stanley Garnett announced that he would not charge Dynel Lane, the Colorado woman accused of attacking Michelle Wilkins and removing a 7-month-old unborn baby from her body; a baby girl she planned to name Aurora.
Many cannot understand how such a situation could be possible in Colorado. People from around the country and here in Colorado hear and read about this tragedy and cannot comprehend why Ms. Lane would not be charged for the murder of baby Aurora. The answer is just as inadequate as the Colorado law. Colorado law sadly does not recognize the unborn child as a person capable of having a crime, such as homicide, perpetrated against it.
Many cannot understand how such a situation could be possible in Colorado. People from around the country and here in Colorado hear and read about this tragedy and cannot comprehend why Ms. Lane would not be charged for the murder of baby Aurora. The answer is just as inadequate as the Colorado law. Colorado law sadly does not recognize the unborn child as a person capable of having a crime, such as homicide, perpetrated against it.
Sisters of Life, St. Charles Borromeo Missionaries to establish houses in Colorado
PRESS RELEASE: Denver welcomes Sisters of Life, St. Charles Borromeo Missionaries - ArchDen.org: Two young orders of religious sisters— the New York-based Sisters of Life and the Rome-based Missionaries of St. Charles Borromeo—will establish houses in the Archdiocese of Denver this summer.
Four Sisters of Life will take up residence and begin their mission in Denver by mid-August. This is the first mission for the community in the Western United States.
Four Sisters of Life will take up residence and begin their mission in Denver by mid-August. This is the first mission for the community in the Western United States.
9 things you need to know about Palm (Passion) Sunday
9 things you need to know about Palm (Passion) Sunday |Blogs | NCRegister.comAKIN: Palm Sunday--or is it Passion Sunday?--marks the beginning of Holy Week.
This day commemorates not one but two very significant events in the life of Christ. The day is called both "Palm Sunday" and "Passion Sunday."
This day commemorates not one but two very significant events in the life of Christ. The day is called both "Palm Sunday" and "Passion Sunday."
The first name comes from the fact that it commemorates Jesus' triumphal entry into Jerusalem, when the crowd had palm branches (John 12:13).
The second name comes from the fact that the narrative of the Passion is read on this Sunday (it otherwise wouldn't be read on a Sunday, since the next Sunday is about the Resurrection).
Pope Francis may be nearing a tipping point with the Barros mess in Chile
Pope Francis may be nearing a tipping point on sexual abuse | CruxALLEN: Staffers in the Vatican paid to think about such things sometimes sit around trying to identify possible tipping points in the public romance with Pope Francis, meaning a calamity that might put a serious dent in his high approval ratings.
One no-brainer on the list would be a perception that he’s backtracking on “zero tolerance” when it comes to sexual abuse in the Church, and two recent story lines suggest it’s not an abstract worry.
One no-brainer on the list would be a perception that he’s backtracking on “zero tolerance” when it comes to sexual abuse in the Church, and two recent story lines suggest it’s not an abstract worry.
What was it like for the soldiers standing guard at the Tomb that Easter morning?
Empty Tomb: The Improbable FirstSCALIA: He was not afraid. Of course he was not.
Only, he could not seem to open his eyes.
The air was soft, light on his skin. In the sun’s warmth it should have felt as soothing as a woman’s caress, and yet…how is it the small hairs on his arms, on his hands and the back of his neck were raised like quills?
By Jupiter, he thought, what has occurred?
He had seen women approaching, and there had been a light, and a roar — such a white, dazzling light, full and lively; it seemed to fizz and sparkle, like the waters near Vesuvius, and then had come a sound: a sharp crack! followed by a rumble, and a humming tidal wave of sound.
Only, he could not seem to open his eyes.
The air was soft, light on his skin. In the sun’s warmth it should have felt as soothing as a woman’s caress, and yet…how is it the small hairs on his arms, on his hands and the back of his neck were raised like quills?
By Jupiter, he thought, what has occurred?
He had seen women approaching, and there had been a light, and a roar — such a white, dazzling light, full and lively; it seemed to fizz and sparkle, like the waters near Vesuvius, and then had come a sound: a sharp crack! followed by a rumble, and a humming tidal wave of sound.
Fwd: CNA: 'This is your house' – Pope Francis meets homeless in Sistine Chapel
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Blogtrottr <busybee@blogtrottr.com>
Date: Fri, Mar 27, 2015 at 11:45 AM
Subject: CNA: 'This is your house' – Pope Francis meets homeless in Sistine Chapel
To: kcknight@gmail.com
#kk2churchnews
From: Blogtrottr <busybee@blogtrottr.com>
Date: Fri, Mar 27, 2015 at 11:45 AM
Subject: CNA: 'This is your house' – Pope Francis meets homeless in Sistine Chapel
To: kcknight@gmail.com
Vatican City, Mar 27, 2015 / 11:24 am (CNA/EWTN News).- {Pope Francis stopped by to visit with 150 of Rome's homeless in the Sistine Chapel after they were invited for dinner and a private tour by the Vatican.
"Welcome. This is everyone's house, and your house. The doors are always open for all," the Pope told his homeless guests during their March 26 visit to the Vatican Museums. He said that their visit was like a tender caress from God.
The group was invited by Papal Almoner Archbishop Konrad Krajewski, who oversees the office of papal charities.}
In the course of the visit, the homeless guests received a tour of the Vatican City State, passing by the Santa Martha guesthouse where the Pope lives, as well as several galleries in the Vatican Museums, culminating with the Sistine Chapel.
Although cameras and photographers were prohibited, the Vatican's press office said that the Pope was with the group for at least 20 minutes, and greeted each person individually with a handshake.
Francis thanked Archbishop Krajewski for putting the initiative together. He told the group, "Pray for me. I'm in need of prayers by people like you," and asked that the Lord would "protect and help you in the path of life and make you feel His tender love of a Father."
After their meeting with the Pope, the homeless were invited to dinner in the restaurant of the Vatican Museums.
Before going to the Sistine Chapel, the group's tour of the Vatican Museums first included a stop at the Carriage Pavilion and then went on to the Upper Galleries – including the Gallery of the Candelabra and the Gallery of Maps – before visiting the apartment of Pius V and finally the Sistine Chapel itself.
Their tour of the museums was guided, and included headphones as well as custodians who helped them carry their personal belongings, which many homeless individuals carry with them at all times.
The initiative is the latest in a string of charitable initiatives enacted by Archbishop Krajewski on behalf of Pope Francis since his election two years ago.
In November of last year, Archbishop Krajewski met a homeless man who said that although a sandwich was easy to find in Rome, a way to keep clean was not. As a result, the archbishop had the public bathrooms in St. Peter's Square remodeled to include showers and clean underclothes for those in need.
Completed in February of this year, the bathroom initiative rolled out alongside a haircut service for the homeless, who receive the free services on Mondays – when many other barbershops are closed – at the hands of volunteer stylists.
Other acts of charity include the December distribution of sleeping bags for the homeless coinciding with the Pope's birthday, as well as the handing-out of 300 umbrellas to those living on the streets during Rome's rainy month of February.
Pope Francis on Sunday commissioned 400 of Rome's homeless residents to assist him in distributing a pocket-sized book of the Gospels to faithful who had gathered for his weekly Angelus prayer, saying to receive the Word of God from their hands was a reminder that it is the poor who preach the Gospel to us.
In addition to offering lunch to the homeless who helped in the square Sunday, the Pope's almoner also helped to deliver 1,000 pounds of food to the poor in Rome's Tor Bella Monaca neighborhood with the help of the Institute of Medicine Solidarity Onlus.
Pope Francis had been in the neighborhood March 8 for his visit to the parish of Santa Maria Madre del Redentore. Archbishop Krajewski was scheduled to deliver the food March 21.
| Manage or unsubscribe from this feed at Blogtrottr. |
How Colorado failed Michelle Wilkins
How Colorado Failed Michelle Wilkins | Brianna HeldtHELDT: By now, most people have heard the tragic story of how a pregnant woman here in Colorado, responding to a CraigsList advertisement for baby clothes, was attacked, beaten, and stabbed. The precious seven-month-old baby in her womb was stolen, and died. Somehow the mother managed to survive, and has since been released from the hospital.
Today the perpetrator will appear in court.
Of course the original news wasn’t more than a few hours old before all of the, ahem, �political posturing began. Any person with half a brain can draw a parallel to abortion, and so a few pro-life people and organizations seized upon the opportunity to make this comparison. Yet as pro-life as I consider myself to be, I found it all to be in horrible taste. Because this is a real woman and a real baby, for whom something really and truly terrible happened. It is a disgrace to use them to prove your own point so soon after the incident, as true or good a point it may be. Sometimes it is better to simply care, keep your mouth shut, and pray.
Today the perpetrator will appear in court.
Of course the original news wasn’t more than a few hours old before all of the, ahem, �political posturing began. Any person with half a brain can draw a parallel to abortion, and so a few pro-life people and organizations seized upon the opportunity to make this comparison. Yet as pro-life as I consider myself to be, I found it all to be in horrible taste. Because this is a real woman and a real baby, for whom something really and truly terrible happened. It is a disgrace to use them to prove your own point so soon after the incident, as true or good a point it may be. Sometimes it is better to simply care, keep your mouth shut, and pray.
Free divers are rewriting the science of the human body
Free Divers Are Rewriting the Physiology of the Body—Underwater: In 2011, Hanli Prinsloo decided she wanted to break the woman’s world record in free diving. She would need to dive to 213 feet below the surface of the Mediterranean Sea and hold her breath for about four minutes. Until the 1960s, scientists believed it was not humanly possible. The increased water pressure at that depth, they argued, would crush her lungs.
A luxury liner docks, and the countdown's on...
A Luxury Liner Docks, and the Countdown’s On - NYTimes.com: Once a week, after touring the Caribbean, the cruise ship Oasis of the Seas calls into its home port in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., for what is called “turnaround day.”
Just as an airplane makes money only when it is flying, keeping a cruise ship out at sea is essential for its profitability. But instead of turning over a few hundred airline passengers, this ship offloads 6,000 people, takes on new supplies and welcomes 6,000 more travelers — all in under 12 hours.
Just as an airplane makes money only when it is flying, keeping a cruise ship out at sea is essential for its profitability. But instead of turning over a few hundred airline passengers, this ship offloads 6,000 people, takes on new supplies and welcomes 6,000 more travelers — all in under 12 hours.
Cardinal Müller to Cardinal Marx: Bishops’ conferences are not the magisterium
Cardinal M�ller to Cardinal Marx: Bishops’ Conferences Are Not the Magisterium | Daily News | NCRegister.com: Cardinal Gerhard Müller prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, has told a French newspaper that doctrinal, or even disciplinary, decisions regarding marriage and family are not up for determination by national bishops’ conferences.
“It is an absolutely anti-Catholic idea that does not respect the Catholicity of the Church,” Cardinal Müller said when asked, “Could certain doctrinal or disciplinary decisions on marriage and family be delegated to the episcopal conferences?”
“It is an absolutely anti-Catholic idea that does not respect the Catholicity of the Church,” Cardinal Müller said when asked, “Could certain doctrinal or disciplinary decisions on marriage and family be delegated to the episcopal conferences?”
Catholicism in space: Houston, do we have a problem?
Nineteen Sixty-four: Catholicism in Space: Houston, do we have a problem?: Twin astronauts Mark and Scott Kelly (raised Catholic in an Irish-American family) are about to embark on an important scientific experiment on Friday. Scott Kelly will begin spending a year in space on the International Space Station (ISS) while his brother stays back here on earth as a control subject. NASA will be studying how extended time in space changes Scott relative to his brother Mark. Living for an extended time outside the gravity of earth and partially exposed to the radiation of space can impact one’s bones, heart, eyes, muscles, and who knows what else.
Let's ditch the prom
Let's Ditch the Prom |Blogs | NCRegister.comFISHER: A Pennsylvania Catholic high school is requiring girls to submit photos of their prom dresses for approval, before the actual night. Deacon Greg Kandra passses along the story here. Such policies always sound a little heavy-handed (and students claim that the guidelines were issued at the last minute, which means that already-purchased, non-returnable dresses may be ruled inappropriate), if not downright oppressive (well, by American standards of oppression), but I sympathize with the school. If students showed up in appropriate dresses, the policy would not be necessary; but flat out hooker wear is still very much in vogue. So schools can't simply count on kids, or their parents, to exercise good sense or good taste. The school most certainly has the right to tell kids what they can and cannot wear at school functions.
On the lost justice of the "Sabbath rest"
On the Lost Justice of the “Sabbath Rest” � Archdiocese of WashingtonPOPE: Some of us who are older remember that Sundays were once quiet in downtown; in shopping areas, parking lots were empty. Most businesses were closed and few people had to work on Sundays. Surely there were exceptions, such as medical personnel, emergency workers, and those who ran essential services like power plants. But for most, Sunday was a day off. And although the biblical Sabbath was Saturday, in a largely Christian nation Sunday was the “Sabbath” day of rest.
Gay activists and celebrities lash out against Indiana, demand restrictions on religious freedom
Miley Cyrus swears at Indiana's governor on Twitter: Indiana Governor Mike Pence's signed the controversial Religious Freedom Restoration Act in a private ceremony, but that did nothing to quiet a very loud public reaction through social media, where business leaders and celebrities lashed out at the law via Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.
Thursday, March 26, 2015
The dangers of living in a Catholic bubble
The Dangers of Living in a Catholic Bubble - AleteiaMILLS: “I don’t see many examples of rich involvement in public spaces that are open to strangers and friends alike,” says a millennial writer named Erin Lane, interviewed in the Evangelical magazine Christianity Today. “That’s one of the unique features of the church, at least right now, that it offers a common space between your private friends and the larger community. I think we’re losing some of those rich public spaces where anyone can show up, regardless of fitness or food preferences or economic status and ability to work.”
How the Church is portrayed as a ship in theology and architecture
How the Church is Portrayed as a Ship in Theology & Architecture | Philip KosloskiKOSLOSKI: This beautiful imagery did not take long to find physical form in the art and architecture of churches. For example, the area between the narthex and the sanctuary was called the “nave.” This word comes from the Latin navis, or ship and was meant to portray the reality that the Church is a ship, protecting those inside it from the waves and buffets of the world.[ii]
�
Irsee Abbey, Bavaria – photos � 2013 Fraternitas Sacerdotalis Sancti Petri – www.fssp.org
Architecturally, many artists would make this analogy even more visible by constructing the ceiling over the nave in a vaulted fashion, exposing the wooden beams, which resembled the reversed look of a ship’s keel. Furthermore, inside the nave can sometimes be found a pulpit that is made to look like a ship. This accents the symbolism and visibly puts the priest as the pilot of the congregation, leading them to distant shores. Furthermore, it has been said that the exterior flying buttresses of Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris represent oars and further realize this image of the Church as a ship who brings her people to safe harbors.
�
Irsee Abbey, Bavaria – photos � 2013 Fraternitas Sacerdotalis Sancti Petri – www.fssp.org
Architecturally, many artists would make this analogy even more visible by constructing the ceiling over the nave in a vaulted fashion, exposing the wooden beams, which resembled the reversed look of a ship’s keel. Furthermore, inside the nave can sometimes be found a pulpit that is made to look like a ship. This accents the symbolism and visibly puts the priest as the pilot of the congregation, leading them to distant shores. Furthermore, it has been said that the exterior flying buttresses of Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris represent oars and further realize this image of the Church as a ship who brings her people to safe harbors.
The 5 essentials of conversion
From Here to Eternity: Five Essentials of Conversion (Part One: From Now to Then) - The Coming Home NetworkHOWELL: Becoming a Catholic can be a difficult row to hoe. The process of conversion is a complex one that involves almost every aspect of a person’s life. When people experience internal struggles of faith, marital discord because of possible conversion, the alienation of family members, or the loss of employment, the inherent obstacles of conversion hit them right in the face.
Yet, those who come as adults to the Catholic Church from another background do not have proprietary rights on the title of convert. The word “convert” derives from the Latin verb convertere and literally means “to turn to be with” (con = with, vertere = turn). It expresses the same meaning as the Greek word metanoia, the word used in the New Testament regularly translated as “repentance.” Converts are people who have changed their life and have moved closer to God through faith and repentance. Conversion in the Catholic sense is a lifelong process of repentance (metanoia), faith, and good works that yields a profound internal change of heart, ultimately leading to final union with God. In the final analysis, becoming Catholic is not about changing churches or adopting a new religion; it is a movement from Here to Eternity.
Yet, those who come as adults to the Catholic Church from another background do not have proprietary rights on the title of convert. The word “convert” derives from the Latin verb convertere and literally means “to turn to be with” (con = with, vertere = turn). It expresses the same meaning as the Greek word metanoia, the word used in the New Testament regularly translated as “repentance.” Converts are people who have changed their life and have moved closer to God through faith and repentance. Conversion in the Catholic sense is a lifelong process of repentance (metanoia), faith, and good works that yields a profound internal change of heart, ultimately leading to final union with God. In the final analysis, becoming Catholic is not about changing churches or adopting a new religion; it is a movement from Here to Eternity.
There were tornadoes in Oklahoma last night and lucky me, I was there...
Tornadoes in Oklahoma and Lucky Me, I was ThereHAMILTON: Cell phones change everything, including the experience of taking shelter during a tornado.
Last night, while we sat in our storm shelter in Oklahoma City, my husband exchanged texts with his best friend who was a hundred miles away in Sand Springs. His friend was also in a storm shelter.
Okies.
We know tornadoes.
A wave of storms swept through the state yesterday, sending a lot of us into shelters. These weren’t the huge killer tornadoes that come down and stay down for long periods of time, taking out whole communities. They were the hop, skip and jump tornadoes that happen any number of times in this state every single year.
Last night, while we sat in our storm shelter in Oklahoma City, my husband exchanged texts with his best friend who was a hundred miles away in Sand Springs. His friend was also in a storm shelter.
Okies.
We know tornadoes.
A wave of storms swept through the state yesterday, sending a lot of us into shelters. These weren’t the huge killer tornadoes that come down and stay down for long periods of time, taking out whole communities. They were the hop, skip and jump tornadoes that happen any number of times in this state every single year.
There is no escape from God's glory, for there is no escape from God...
The Weight of Glory : The Integrated Catholic Life™KREEFT: We know it from the magic words of the poets; or we know it from the wordless word of great music, work of the Muses, not of man; or we know it from the word spoken by human love, the moment when the world’s most prosaic word suddenly becomes the most wonder-full word in the world, the word “we”; or we know it in high liturgy, in the solemn joy of adoration before the astonishing mystery of God-with-us, when we are side by side with Mary, hailed by the angelic annunciation of the heavenly glory, visited from another world, another dimension; or we meet the glory in great art, when a picture becomes no longer an object in this world but a magic window opening up onto another world for us, a hole in our world, as the stars were to the ancient Greeks and as the painting of The Dawn Treader was to the Pevensie children; or we know it in the electrical shock of an absolutely perfect flower, or in the high, clear, crystal glass of a winter night, or in the seagull’s haunting, harking call to return to Mother Sea.
Is Chip Kelly a great coach or a mad scientist?
Chip Kelly: Coach or Mad Scientist? - Seminarian CasualSeminarian Casual: This has been the most frequently asked question on T.V., Radio, Twitter, Facebook, and NFL blogs this week. It all started at 4:01 p.m. on March 10 when it was announced that the Philadelphia Eagles traded quarterback Nick Foles, a 2nd round pick in the 2016 NFL draft, and a conditional 4th round pick in the 2015 draft to the St. Louis Rams for quarterback Sam Bradford and a 5th round pick in the 2015 draft. What makes this trade so insane in the eyes of some fans is the fact that Sam Bradford has had several injuries since he was drafted 1st overall by the Rams in 2010. In fact, he tore his A.C.L. twice in the same spot only 10 months apart. There was also anger in trading Nick Foles who was only one season removed from throwing 27 touchdowns to only 2 interceptions, winning the Pro Bowl most valuable player award, and posting one of the highest quarterback ratings in NFL history. So is Chip Kelly a coach or some kind of mad scientist?
If we fail to keep Catholic apologetics up-to-date, we fail...
The Apologetics of 1915 | Catholic AnswersKEATING: This year marks the centenary of a rethinking of Catholic apologetics that most Catholic apologists have never heard of.
Some Thoughts on Catholic Apologetics was published in London in 1915. The author was E. I. Watkin. Born in 1888, he converted in 1908 and died in 1981. He was a long-time friend of historian Christopher Dawson and wrote and translated many books.
I first came across Watkin’s name when I got an abridged version of the book for which he is best known, The Catholic Center (1932). Written for Anglicans and others who were searching for the elusive via media, the book informed them that what they were looking for actually was the Catholic Church. Watkin invited non-Catholic readers to make the same discovery he had made.
Some Thoughts on Catholic Apologetics was published in London in 1915. The author was E. I. Watkin. Born in 1888, he converted in 1908 and died in 1981. He was a long-time friend of historian Christopher Dawson and wrote and translated many books.
I first came across Watkin’s name when I got an abridged version of the book for which he is best known, The Catholic Center (1932). Written for Anglicans and others who were searching for the elusive via media, the book informed them that what they were looking for actually was the Catholic Church. Watkin invited non-Catholic readers to make the same discovery he had made.
Bartenders in U.S. outnumber clergy 12 to 1
BLS: Bartenders in U.S. Outnumber Clergy 12 to 1 | CNS News: According to annual employment data released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) on Wednesday, bartenders in the United States outnumber clergy 12 to 1.
According to the report, there were 46,510 individuals working as members of the clergy as of May 2014, compared to 579,700 working as bartenders. Clergy made an average salary of $47,730.
According to the report, there were 46,510 individuals working as members of the clergy as of May 2014, compared to 579,700 working as bartenders. Clergy made an average salary of $47,730.
Fwd: CNA: Pope Francis to visit President Obama at White House on Sept. 23
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Blogtrottr <busybee@blogtrottr.com>
Date: Thu, Mar 26, 2015 at 9:40 AM
Subject: CNA: Pope Francis to visit White House Sept. 23
To: kcknight@gmail.com
#kk2churchnews
From: Blogtrottr <busybee@blogtrottr.com>
Date: Thu, Mar 26, 2015 at 9:40 AM
Subject: CNA: Pope Francis to visit White House Sept. 23
To: kcknight@gmail.com
Washington D.C., Mar 26, 2015 / 09:08 am (CNA/EWTN News).- {U.S. officials has confirmed that Pope Francis will make a stop at the White House to meet with President Barack Obama on Sept. 23, during his trip to the United States for the World Meeting of Families.
"The President and the First Lady will welcome His Holiness Pope Francis to the White House on Wednesday, September 23," said a March 26 statement from the White House press secretary.}
"During the visit, the President and the Pope will continue the dialogue, which they began during the President's visit to the Vatican in March 2014, on their shared values and commitments on a wide range of issues, including caring for the marginalized and the poor; advancing economic opportunity for all; serving as good stewards of the environment; protecting religious minorities and promoting religious freedom around the world; and welcoming and integrating immigrants and refugees into our communities."
"The President looks forward to continuing this conversation with the Holy Father during his first visit to the United States as Pope," the statement said.
Late last year, Pope Francis officially confirmed that he would be coming to the U.S. for the World Meeting of Families in Philadelphia this September.
A global Catholic event, the world meeting seeks to support and strengthen families. St. John Paul II founded the event in 1994, and it takes place every three years. The Philadelphia gathering this year will take place Sept. 22-27. The papal events during the final days of the meeting are expected to draw crowds as large as 1 million.
Archbishop Bernardito Auza – a member of the organizing committee for Pope Francis' upcoming visit to the U.S. – had told CNA in January that the proposed papal schedule included a projected arrival to Washington, D.C. on the evening of Sept. 22, and a proposed visit to the White House the following morning, where the official welcoming ceremony would take place.
Other details of the proposed itinerary included a Mass at Washington's Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, an address to a joint session of Congress on Sept. 24 and a papal address at the United Nations general assembly in New York on Sept. 25, before heading to Philadelphia to spend Sept. 26-27 at the World Meeting of Families.
Organizers have stressed that the official schedule during his trip to the U.S. in September has yet to be finalized, although individual items on the itinerary – such as the address to Congress and now the White House visit – are gradually being confirmed by U.S. officials.
The Pope has also announced that he will canonize the founder of California's first missions, Blessed Junipero Serra, during his U.S. trip.
The announcement of the Pope's visit to the White House comes at a time of mixed relations between President Obama and U.S. Church leaders.
U.S. bishops have voiced support for some of Obama's initiatives, including immigration reform policies, while strongly opposing others, including a redefinition of marriage and the federal contraception mandate, which has drawn religious freedom lawsuits from several hundred plaintiffs.
The World Meeting of Families will take place shortly before the October 2015 meeting of the Synod of Bishops on the Family, which will discuss the mission of the family in the Church and in the world.
Focusing on the theme, "Love is Our Mission: The Family Fully Alive," the world meeting will include many speakers and breakout sessions. Keynote speakers include Cardinal Sean O'Malley of Boston, Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle of the Philippines, Cardinal Robert Sarah, professor Helen Alvare, and Dr. Juan Francisco de la Guardia Brin and Gabriela N. de la Guardia.
The Philadelphia meeting will mark the first time that the event will be held in the United States.
Registration for the 2015 World Meeting of Families began on Nov. 10.
The World Meeting of Families website is www.worldmeeting2015.org. It is on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/WorldMeeting2015 and on Twitter at https://twitter.com/WMF2015.
| Manage or unsubscribe from this feed at Blogtrottr. |
Fathers and daughters: Is this a missing key to modesty today?
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Blogtrottr <busybee@blogtrottr.com>
Date: Wed, Mar 25, 2015 at 9:37 PM
Subject: ARCHDIOCESE OF WASHINGTON: Fathers and Daughters – Is this a missing key to modesty today?
To: kcknight@gmail.com
From: Blogtrottr <busybee@blogtrottr.com>
Date: Wed, Mar 25, 2015 at 9:37 PM
Subject: ARCHDIOCESE OF WASHINGTON: Fathers and Daughters – Is this a missing key to modesty today?
To: kcknight@gmail.com
AUTHOR=Msgr. Charles PopePOPE: We often speak today of the terrible toll that fatherless homes have on young boys. And this is true. Without a reasonably good (even though not sinless) model of manhood and responsibility, many boys lose their way. Fathers too have a strong roll in disciplining boys, especially as they grow older and stronger than their […] #kk3always
| Manage or unsubscribe from this feed at Blogtrottr. |
How did Paul get his name?
How did Paul get his name? |Blogs | NCRegister.comAKIN: Sometimes people in the Bible experience name changes. Some famous examples include Abram (Abraham), Jacob (Israel), and Simon (Cephas, Peter).
In each of these cases, there was a specific reason, and the new name had special significance (thus the name Peter means “Rock,” with Simon being the rock on which Jesus built his Church; Matt. 16:18).
Often, people propose that Paul belongs in this category.
In each of these cases, there was a specific reason, and the new name had special significance (thus the name Peter means “Rock,” with Simon being the rock on which Jesus built his Church; Matt. 16:18).
Often, people propose that Paul belongs in this category.
Wednesday, March 25, 2015
Egypt and the complexities of keeping Christians safe
Egypt and the complexities of keeping Christians safe | CruxALLEN: Transcendent causes are often born of startlingly clear moral options. Yes or no to equality for African-Americans was the heart of the civil rights movement in the United States, for instance, just as yes or no to self-determination was the basis of decolonization across the developing world.
As those causes develop, however, the choices have a way of becoming complicated. Believing in equality doesn’t dictate whether quotas are the best way to achieve it, and a passion for independence doesn’t suggest what kind of economic or political relationship developing countries should carve out with their former colonial masters.
As those causes develop, however, the choices have a way of becoming complicated. Believing in equality doesn’t dictate whether quotas are the best way to achieve it, and a passion for independence doesn’t suggest what kind of economic or political relationship developing countries should carve out with their former colonial masters.
The indomitable, and effective, Cardinal Pell
The indomitable, and effective, Cardinal Pell - Denver CatholicWEIGEL: Shortly after George Pell was named Archbishop of Melbourne, he instituted several reforms at the archdiocesan seminary, including daily Mass and the daily celebration of the Liturgy of the Hours, both of which had fallen by the wayside in the preceding years. The seminary faculty, enthusiastic proponents of Catholic Lite, thought to call the archbishop’s bluff and informed him that, were he to persist in such draconian measures, they would resign en masse.
The archbishop thanked them for the courtesy of giving him a heads-up, accepted their resignations on the spot, and got on with the reform of the Melbourne seminary—and the rest of the archdiocese.
The defenders of the status quo in the Vatican may have been unaware of this episode when they recently tried to take down the man chosen by Pope Francis to clean up the financial mess the Argentinian pope inherited two years ago. Like their predecessors in Melbourne, the leaders of a nasty campaign of personal accusation against Cardinal Pell, conducted by leaks to the ever-sleazy Italian media, failed. I hope that failure will be a lesson to such scoundrels in the future: don’t mess with a former Australian rules football star who likes contact sports. That may be hope-against-hope. But we are obliged to believe that conversion, even among curialists native to the boot-shaped peninsula, is not beyond the power of God’s grace.
The archbishop thanked them for the courtesy of giving him a heads-up, accepted their resignations on the spot, and got on with the reform of the Melbourne seminary—and the rest of the archdiocese.
The defenders of the status quo in the Vatican may have been unaware of this episode when they recently tried to take down the man chosen by Pope Francis to clean up the financial mess the Argentinian pope inherited two years ago. Like their predecessors in Melbourne, the leaders of a nasty campaign of personal accusation against Cardinal Pell, conducted by leaks to the ever-sleazy Italian media, failed. I hope that failure will be a lesson to such scoundrels in the future: don’t mess with a former Australian rules football star who likes contact sports. That may be hope-against-hope. But we are obliged to believe that conversion, even among curialists native to the boot-shaped peninsula, is not beyond the power of God’s grace.
We need to understand the connection between relativism, contraception, and abortion...
Preach from the Rooftops: Evangelium Vitae at Twenty | Public DiscourseCONLEY: Last week, a young friend of mine attempted to defend the truth about marriage among a group of peers at a secular university. She presented a meaningful argument about families, social stability, and gender complementarity. None of her classmates refuted her arguments. Instead, they accused her of being a bigot and a homophobe, called her intolerant, and changed the topic to something less intellectually taxing.
My friend’s experience is practically a cliché. Americans who offer traditional viewpoints on moral issues in the public square have become accustomed to calumny. They know that reasoned arguments will rarely receive reasoned refutation.
My friend’s experience is practically a cliché. Americans who offer traditional viewpoints on moral issues in the public square have become accustomed to calumny. They know that reasoned arguments will rarely receive reasoned refutation.
Christmas movies for Annunciation Day
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Blogtrottr <busybee@blogtrottr.com>
Date: Tue, Mar 24, 2015 at 11:10 PM
Subject: CATHOLIC EXCHANGE: Christmas Movies for Annunciation Day
To: kcknight@gmail.com
#kk3always
From: Blogtrottr <busybee@blogtrottr.com>
Date: Tue, Mar 24, 2015 at 11:10 PM
Subject: CATHOLIC EXCHANGE: Christmas Movies for Annunciation Day
To: kcknight@gmail.com
AUTHOR=Richard BeckerBECKER: 
With God nothing will be impossible (Lk 1.37).
{The other night, my family and I were playing "Wits and Wagers" – a table game involving wildly random quantitative questions, with players betting on the accuracy of their own and their opponents' guesstimates.
The questions cover all manner of topics and there's no way anyone could have an advantage when it comes to the minutiae addressed – here's a couple examples from one card: "In what year did a U.S. president first live in the White House?" (1800), and, "In dollars, how much did the average gallon of gasoline cost in the U.S. in 1980?" ($1.22). Who knew?}
On that same card was another question that really caught my attention: "What percent of Americans watch the same movie each year as part of their Christmas holiday tradition?" The card lists defunct Blockbuster Inc. as the source, so I suppose we have to take the answer with a grain of salt. Nonetheless, I was surprised that the number was so low – only 61%.
That's amazing to me. In our family, we have so many annual yuletide movie traditions that it's a real crunch to get them all in. There are the animated classics of course – Rudolph, Frosty, Charlie Brown – and sentimental favorites like The Bells of St. Mary's. For laughs, there's A Christmas Story and the original Home Alone for the older kids. Plus, there are always new ones to add – like our discovery last December of A Child's Christmas in Wales based on the story by Dylan Thomas. It's such a beautifully quiet and evocative film, and bound to become an annual tradition – throw it on the pile!
So, our Advent movie canon grows ever more unwieldy, but there are three films in particular that we keep at the top of the list and rarely skip. They're all older (un-colorized B&W versions preferred) and quite corny. Yet each memorably captures something so elemental about the message and miracle of Christmas – about how the Incarnation radically challenges us and our world – that we always look forward to them.
Before I get to those three, however, let's get the obvious question out of the way: Why all the fuss about Christmas movie traditions right before Holy Week? After all, it's still Lent, and Christmas is still, well, nine months away.
Ah, that's it: Nine months exactly! Today is the Feast of the Annunciation – the day we remember Gabriel's appearance to Mary and his announcement that she'd been chosen to be the mother of the Savior. It's our annual commemoration of the virginal conception of Jesus, and, in effect, a subtle early kickoff for Advent – a foretaste of all that will unfold nine months hence.
So we're observing Lent, and this solemn feast pops up that jerks us ahead to Christmas. It got me thinking that there's liturgical overlap here worth considering – that Mary's humble "yes" (fiat) at the Annunciation is a model for our Lenten conversion. "In saying Yes to God, as Mary did," writes Deacon Keith Fournier, "we are able to discover the path to conversion, to holiness, to authentic spirituality." And conversion – metanoia in the Greek; literally, "turning about" – is front and center in our favorite Christmas movies. They offer us helpful insights into how we ourselves can experience a magnificent Lenten upheaval, just like Our Lady did at the Annunciation.
- Miracle on 34th Street. The old black-and-white version is what you want here, the one starring Maureen O'Hara and John Payne. You'll remember that it also stars Kris Kringle (Edmund Gwenn), who may or may not be the "real" Santa Claus. The story is enchanting, taking us from a Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade (and a drunken Santa-substitute), to Christmas day itself and a magical epiphany straight out of the North Pole. But there are also dark undertones in this story – divorce, disillusionment, and dementedness among others – and the hopes of humanity, it seems, depend on the softening of seriously hardened hearts.Mary's Immaculate Heart, of course, required no such softening, but Gabriel's unprecedented embassy certainly compelled her to realign her plans to match up with God's. And for us sinners? Conversion takes a similar path, though necessarily more complicated: Once our guard is relaxed (by Lenten disciplines, for instance), we can plainly see how far we fall short of even minimal Gospel standards. At that point, we have the chance to acknowledge our need to change as well as be honest about our self-doubt and disinclination.
- It's a Wonderful Life. George Bailey (Jimmy Stewart) is an Everyman who is beset by one setback after another. He is convinced that he's a failure, but his wife (Donna Reed) and everyone else in town knows better. Through supernatural means and the help of a deceptively inept guardian angel, George learns his lesson and celebrates the many blessings of his life – his marriage and family, his meaningful work that gives hope to so many – despite the inevitable disappointments.Yet the conversion that George finally embraces in the end has been unfolding piecemeal throughout the film. Little and by little, this would-be wayfarer bows to his lot and makes peace with his life's parochial path. Unlike the immediate turnabout that St. Paul exhibited on the Damascus road – or the immediate fiat of Our Lady – George Bailey's conversion was more Petrine and halting, like most of ours: Over and over, a stubborn "no!" up front, followed by a murmured and reluctant "yes." What's more, the circumstances of our multiple conversions will rarely square with our grandiose agendas because, as Isaiah knew, God's ways are well beyond our own.
- A Christmas Carol. There are countless adaptations of this festive ghost story by Charles Dickens, but my favorite by far is the 1951 edition starring Alistair Sim as Ebenezer Scrooge. For one thing, the evocative score and the shadowy cinematography lend the film an appropriately eerie air. But it's Sim's portrayal of Scrooge – his utter metamorphosis from miserly wretch to extravagant do-gooder – that I've always found particularly moving. It's an entirely believable performance, and as the old skinflint is tutored by the spooks in the ways of Christian charity, it's hard not to envy him.Envy him? That's right, for despite how we abuse his name today, there's no denying that Scrooge ends up becoming the very model of a converted Christian. "It was always said of him," Dickens wrote of his post-spectral protagonist, "that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge." And keeping Christmas well, as Sim's Scrooge demonstrates in the movie, includes celebratory mirth and giddiness, to be sure, but also plenty of generosity and selfless beneficence – and the more anonymous the better!
Three Christmas movies; three stages of Lenten conversion: From keen self-awareness, to gradual, even plodding transformation, to joyful altruism – and the last is by no means optional as Pope Francis pointed out in his Lenten message this year. "God is not indifferent to our world," he wrote, and God's people need "interior renewal, lest we become indifferent and withdraw into ourselves." Here's the Holy Father's prescription:
Lent is a favourable time for letting Christ serve us so that we in turn may become more like him. This happens whenever we hear the word of God and receive the sacraments, especially the Eucharist. There we become what we receive: the Body of Christ. In this body there is no room for the indifference which so often seems to possess our hearts.
We receive Christ and become Christ – and once again, the Blessed Mother paved the way for us at the Annunciation: We're to become like Mary who, upon receiving the Lord at the Annunciation, couldn't wait to go share him with her expectant cousin.
As Lent winds down in the days ahead, I'm renewing (once again) my resolve to pray the Rosary daily and grow closer to Mary. It's never too late to convert, right? If Scrooge can do it, so can I!
image: BestPhotoPlus / Shutterstock.com
| Manage or unsubscribe from this feed at Blogtrottr. |
A woman wrapped in silence: A meditation for the Feast of the Annunciation
A Woman Wrapped in Silence – A Meditation for the Feast of the Annunciation � Archdiocese of WashingtonPOPE: In preparation for today’s Feast of the Annunciation I picked up Jesus of Nazareth, Vol. 3 (The Infancy Narratives) by Pope Emeritus Benedict. I was very moved by a very brief reflection that he made on Mary as the Angel Gabriel left her. His remarks consider her faith in a very touching manner. I must say that I have always been moved, and intrigued, by the faith of the Blessed Mother, for she is “a woman wrapped in silence,” a phrase that forms the title of an excellent book by Fr. John Lynch. The Pope’s words capture both her faith and her mystery.
Fwd: CNA: Pope Francis on the family synod: 'We need prayers, not gossip'
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Blogtrottr <busybee@blogtrottr.com>
Date: Wednesday, March 25, 2015
Subject: CNA: Pope Francis on the family synod: 'We need prayers, not gossip'
To: kcknight@gmail.com
Vatican City, Mar 25, 2015 / 06:10 am (CNA/EWTN News).- {During his weekly general audience Pope Francis spoke about the gift and call of the Christian family, and urged attendees to pray for the intentions of the upcoming Synod of Bishops on the family.
"The Church needs a prayer full of love for the family and for life," the Pope told pilgrims gathered in a drizzly St. Peter's Square for his March 25 general audience.}
"Because of this, I ask you to pray insistently for the next Synod of Bishops, on the family, so that the Church is increasingly more committed and unified in her witness of the love and mercy of God with all families," he said.
Francis emphasized that ahead of the October meeting, which will gather more than 200 Bishops and representatives from all over the world, "we (the Church) need prayers, not gossip," and asked that "those also pray who feel alienated or are not accustomed to praying."
The Pope's petition for prayer took place during his continued catechesis on the family – a theme he announced last fall would be the subject of every general audience leading up to this year's synod of bishops as a means of preparation.
After last year's Extraordinary Synod of Bishops on the Family, which explored the theme "the Pastoral Challenges of the Family in the Context of Evangelization," set the groundwork, this year's Ordinary Synod on the Family will wrap-up the synodal discussion.
Set to take place Oct. 4-25, this year's ordinary synod will reflect on the theme "Jesus Christ reveals the mystery and vocation of the family." The conclusions of the gathering will be used by Pope Francis to draft his first Post-Synodal Exhortation, which can be expected in 2016.
In his audience address, Francis noted how the day marked the feast of the Annunciation, which commemorates the Archangel Gabriel's announcement to Mary that she would be the Mother of God.
The solemnity, he said, "invites us, in the context of the Church's preparation for the forthcoming Synod on the Family, to consider the relationship between the Incarnation and the mission of the family."
With Gabriel's announcement, "the Lord illuminates and strengthens the faith of Mary, as her husband Joseph will do later, so that Jesus is born and welcomed into the warmth of a family," the Pope explained.
He also pointed out how March 25 celebrates the Day for Life and the 20th anniversary of John Paul II's encyclical "Evangelium Vitae," which the saint authored in 1995 emphasizing the sacredness and value of human life.
The family plays a central role in the encyclical, Francis said, noting that from the beginning of time God blessed man and woman and entrusted them with the task of procreating and forming "a community of love to transmit life."
In the sacrament of marriage Christian spouses commit themselves with this task for life, the Pope said, noting that it is the responsibility of the Church to accompany and support families, especially those most in need.
When a couple is married, he said, "the Church, for her part, is obliged not to abandon the new family, not even when it moves away or falls into sin, always calling it to conversion and reconciliation in the Lord."
However, in order to carry out this mission, the Church needs loving prayers in support of both life and the family, Francis noted, particularly for the Synod of Bishops on the Family.
"I ask you to continue praying for the Synod, so that it will reflect the compassion of the Good Shepherd for his flock and help the Church to be ever more committed and clear in her witness to the truth of God's merciful love for all families," he said.
Francis closed his speech with this appeal for prayer, and went on to greet groups of pilgrims present from various countries around the world.
Among those in attendance at the Pope's audience was Mike Haines, the brother of British aid-worker David Haines, who was murdered by ISIS after being kidnapped while working near the Syrian border with Turkey in 2013.
In a news conference ahead of Wednesday's audience, British Ambassador to the Holy See Nigel Baker said that Mike Haines "will be bringing to the Vatican his message of interreligious understanding."
"Pope Francis has called for a common commitment to end fighting, hatred and violence. Mike Haines is living that commitment in an extraordinary way."
Haines was accompanied to the papal audience by Imam Shahnawaz Haque, from East London.
Archbishop Joseph Coutts of Karachi, Pakistan, was also present during the audience, and exchanged a long handshake and several words the Pope after the event was over.
Numerous attacks against Christians have taken place in Pakistan in recent months, the most recent being a suicide bombing on two Christian churches March 15.
| Manage or unsubscribe from this feed at Blogtrottr. |
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)