Tag Archives: Pope Benedict XVI

St. Teresa of the Andes – Letter 115

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I am having trouble being in the world, but not of it. Paul’s word’s challenge me.  Pope Benedict XVI wants them to push me into the mind of Paul and the arms of the Holy Spirit. “Do not conform yourselves to this age but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and pleasing and perfect.” Romans 12:2

As Pentecost draws near, I’m reminded that it is the Holy Spirit not my spirit that will transform me into conformity with Christ of the Cross and the Resurrection. Tomorrow morning, God willing, I’ll find myself before the Blessed Sacrament once again.  Here are the words I will take with me into the silence:

“How poor, how graceless, as I see it, the worship we offer to God sacramentally present! What scant respect we have for the One before whom the seraphim cover themselves with their wings, prostrating themselves before Him. And He bears it all in silence, remaining without splendor, hidden beneath the bread, that He may live in the midst of those He created. Oh, how good He is! What infinite love He has! Why aren’t we crazy with love for Him?”  St. Teresa of the Andes – Letter 115

Whispers….. Remembers

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Whispers in the Loggia reminds us:

“…it was year ago tonight when, not far from where I’m sitting now, I got to behold a beautiful, almost magic experience unfolding in these streets.

The Big PopeTrip to the nation’s capital and this “capital of the world.”

Liberal View / Moral Monster

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Pope Benedict XVI must be doing something right because the press is crucifying him again.  Monsignor Raun writes, “On his way to Africa, the Pope was asked what the Church thought of AIDS and condoms.  Our Holy Father answered that the real answer was sexual morality, not pieces of plastic.  The press dubbed him ‘a moral monster’.”

The liberalized world and press avoid the Truth, especially on issues of life.  They prefer to propagandize, for the furtherance of liberal, secular, “progressive” agenda’s, which leave God out of such deliberations.  As if an investigation without Truth could be substantive.

“I suspect every abortion, every “compassionate” bit of euthanasia has the evil one stamping his foot in triumphant glee.” says the Anchoress.  In speaking of God’s influence and grace in the world, she submits that such grace is “subdued in  the world” when those “enthusiastic about subduing new life – of judging how much life there should be, and of what quality” play God.

Monsignor Raun makes a few points of his own:

1. Ten to twenty percent of the time, condoms don’t
work. For argument’s sake, let’s say they don’t
work 1 percent of the time. Would anyone say it
was moral to do something that there was a one-ina-
hundred chance of giving someone a deadly illness?
Would any sane person take such a chance
with their own life? (If there was a one-in-a hundred
chance that holy water could give you
AIDS, would any of you put your fingers in the
fount, or allow your children to do so?)
2. And the sad fact is that some people think they are
“invulnerable” if they wear a condom, and so they
are all the more promiscuous – all the more spreading
the possibilities of infecting others with the disease.
Condoms are the answer to AIDS for those people who
are only willing to do what it takes to stop this horrible
disease as long as sexual freedom is preserved – which
for liberal society has become the ultimate good in life.
If you don’t want to get sexually-transmitted AIDS, be
faithful to your spouse or live a chaste single life. This
and this alone, is guaranteed to be 100% effective. It is
also the moral teaching of Christ and His Church –
which is the Holy Father’s duty to teach. To teach anything
else is cruel, and to gamble with peoples lives.

And, from Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, we have this:

To achieve the maximum protective effect, condoms must be used both consistently and correctly. Inconsistent use can lead to STD acquisition because transmission can occur with a single act of intercourse with an infected partner. Similarly, if condoms are not used correctly, the protective effect may be diminished even when they are used consistently. The most reliable ways to avoid transmission of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), including human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), are to abstain from sexual activity or to be in a long-term mutually monogamous relationship with an uninfected partner. However, many infected persons may be unaware of their infections because STDs are often asymptomatic or unrecognized.

The above report sounds like Russian Roulette to me.  Chastity is still the best policy, even according to disease control scientific and statistical reports.


Neuhaus’ The One True Church

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Richard John Neuhaus writes in a previously unpublished essay appearing now in First things of how the Church may best characterize herself in relationship with other ecclesial communities of the Body of Christ.  Neuhaus wants us to think more fully about this, saying, “We need to clarify what the Catholic Church claims for herself and what she does, and does not, acknowledge with respect to other Christian communities.”  He acknowledges that it is a tricky business. In the long search for a greater visible unity of the Body of Christ in the world,  a  miss-step, misunderstanding or misspoken phrase can produce ever greater dis-unity and contention in tribal disharmony.

Neuhaus quotes Christopher J. Molloy, writing in his essay titled “Subsistit In: Nonexclusive Identity or Full Identity?” in reflecting on the uniqueness of the Catholic Church.  Molloy states, “one can affirm both the essential fullness of the ecclesial reality of the Catholic Church and the concrete poverty and woundedness of her lived life, together with her practical need of the expressive ecclesial riches found outside her visible boundaries.”

On the Church, Lumen Gentium, the Constitution on the Church, reads:

“This is the one Church of Christ which in the Creed is professed as one, holy, catholic, and apostolic, which our Savior, after his Resurrection, commissioned Peter to shepherd, and him and the other apostles to extend and direct with authority, which he erected for all ages as ‘the pillar and mainstay of the truth.’ This Church, constituted and organized in the world as a society, subsists in the Catholic Church, which is governed by the successor of Peter and by the Bishops in communion with him, although many elements of sanctification and of truth are found outside of its visible structure. These elements, as gifts belonging to the Church of Christ, are forces impelling toward catholic unity.”

The word “subsists” in the Lumen Gentium statement is thought by some a weakening of the Church’s understanding of Herself as the One True Church.  Enter our present Pope Benedict XVI, then Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger.  He clarifies with:

“The word subsistit derives from ancient philosophy, as it was later developed among the Scholastics. It corresponds to the Greek word hypostasis, which of course plays a key role in Christology in describing the union of divine and human natures in the one person of Christ. Subsistere is a special case of esse. It refers to existence in the form of an individual subject. . . . With the word subsistit, the Council wanted to express the singularity and non-multipliability of the Church of Christ, the Catholic Church: the Church exists as a single subject in the reality of history. But the difference between subsistit and est also embraces the drama of ecclesial division: for while the Church is only one and really exists, there is being which is from the Church’s being—there is ecclesial reality—outside the Church.”

Neuhaus writes on, including discussions arising from works of Avery Dulles as well as Molloy, finally, coming to this:

“In sum, Catholics should not fear offending our ecumenical partners by affirming what we believe the Catholic Church to be. To be sure, that affirmation has weighty implications. For instance, Lumen Gentium also says, “Whosoever, therefore, knowing that the Catholic Church was made necessary by Christ, would refuse to enter or to remain in it, could not be saved.” But that, too, should not offend non-Catholic Christians, since we can all agree that such a person would be acting against his conscience and his sure discernment of the will of God. If he continues on that course without repentance, he could not be saved. It is quite a different matter with those who do not know—i.e., do not recognize the truth—that the Catholic Church is what she claims to be. They are wrong about that, of course, but that, presumably, is one reason why they are not Catholics.

And so I think I’ll stay with my admittedly provocative title, “The One True Church.” ….  I will also continue to make the case for the proposition that “the Catholic Church is the Church of Jesus Christ most fully and rightly ordered through time.”

For those who would argue on, here is an olive branch: “All Christians can agree on the formula that there is finally only one Church because there is only one Christ and the Church is his Body.”

Links Home & Abroad

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Just got back from Nebraska so I’m playing catch up with a link-go-round:

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Michelle Malkin ponders the whereabouts and future of Obama’s auntie Zeituni Onyango while the Boston Globe muses:

…”The case is unusual in American history because it’s a relative of the president involved in immigration matters,” said Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Washington-based Center for Immigration Studies. “It really does present the White House with an opportunity or a minefield. If they follow through on a decision that she should go home, that would actually raise the president’s credibility enormously on immigration enforcement.”

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Should hometown America be alarmed?  The Beacon of Light, Bryn T. Jones writes:

I read a disturbing story that showed advancement of the “well funded” civilian security force that candidate Barak Obama promised, and President Obama appears to deliver. The bill is passing under the guise of “volunteer” work, but would be mandatory. The bill stipulates that middle-school children would be required 50 hours per year, high schoolers 100 hours per year, and so on through college. The program included uniforms that the children will wear. I ask, why not ad a spiffy arm band with, perhaps the Obama emblem for good measure. This program will also enlist adults on up to seniors. They will go to camps, which are re-named campuses in order to be trained, or re-educated as the case may be.

This bill has been touted as some form of commemoration of 9/11, a day of volunteer work to commemorate the tragedy of that day.

Someone needs to remind Barak Obama and the Socialists, I mean Democrats, that this is America, the land of the FREE. We do not serve our State. The government is of the people, by the people and for the people. In other words, the government WORKS FOR US.

Where does this end? It ends with our country being policed from within by radicals subscribing to a charismatic leader and following along, lock-step, controlled by mindblock ideology.

Parade Magazine had the Top Ten Dictators listed. Interestingly, many of them have programs identical to what Obama proposes. I suppose, allowing a few years, Parade might be able to add Barak Obama to the list.

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The pronouncement of bishops usually have a kernel of obedience imbedded in it somewhere.  The Notre Dame invitation of President Obama to speak at commencement veers to the Left and beyond.

Bishop Olmstead will have none of it reports Amy Welborn and American Papist and Pontifications report the displeasure:

Olmstead Letter.png

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More British ankst across the Pond as both Obie and Gordon Brown do battle with their financial gurus:

An elegant symmetry is developing between the plight of Gordon Brown and the situation of Barack Obama, in their respective struggles to keep their bankrupt economies afloat. In both cases a deep rift has developed between these saviours of the world and the men who should be their principal lieutenants in the work of salvation.

Of Gordon Brown, England’s Prime Minister, Gerald Werner says:

“He is definitely up there with the Great Charlatan in the Most Destructive Influence on Britain Stakes.”

Touch Down Africa

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Pope Bededict XVI touched down yesterday in Cameroon.  According to the AP, this is the Pope’s first trip as pontiff to Africa. “For Benedict, whose only previous stop in Africa was in Kinshasa in 1987 as a cardinal, the continent presents major challenges and opportunities. He is expected to address them in meetings with Muslim representatives, bishops, health workers and women’s advocacy groups.”

This is the first day in his seven day pilgrimage. The Roman Catholic Church is booming and blooming in Africa. “Africa produces priests at a higher rate than anywhere in the world but finds itself in competition with Islam in Cameroon..”

“Benedict said he wants to invigorate the growing church in Africa. ‘I intend to confirm Catholics in their faith,” he said, and ‘proclaim the peace entrusted to the Church” by Jesus. Benedict said that as he sets out for Africa, he has in mind ‘the victims of hunger, disease, injustice, fratricidal conflicts and every form of violence which unfortunately continue to afflict adults and children, without sparing missionaries’ and volunteers working on the continent.”

“The Catholic Church has been one body that has been consistent in the development of the African continent not only spiritually, but in the provision of quality education, health care, caring for the neglected and victims of natural and man made disasters. It has also spoken up against corrupt and inept leaders in a fearless and constructive manner. The Church is only fulfilling its mandate to bring light to a darkened world and needs to continue this mission unceasingly. Africa definitely needs the Church. Osayawe Ogieva, Nigeria”