Matthew and I just wanted to pause and thank all of our readers, both new and old, for coming here each day. Thank you. Thank you very much.
As a result, we have had our best month ever here on CMR.
I meant to write a post a few weeks ago when we passed the 4 million unique visitor mark on CMR. I didn’t get around to it then and we are now just over 4.4 million unique visitors with just about 7 million page loads lifetime.
This all has made 2010 a remarkable year for the website passing the 2, 3, and 4 million unique visits marks just this year!
Matthew and I would never have guessed at this when we first started CMR.
Thank you everyone for your readership, your loyalty, and for making this the funnest place on the Catholic interwebs!!
May God bless all of you.
Posted by Patrick Archbold
November 30, 2010
Editor’s Note: AlwaysCatholic extends a big thank you and congratulations to Creative Minority Report for a job so well done!
Matthew and Patrick helped to launch AlwaysCatholic by responding to our call for help in our initial stages.In fact, Patrick was the very first visitor to our site!
They put us on their blogroll immediately and have continued to support AlwaysCatholic by publishing many of our posts on Creative Minority Reader.
The two reasons that we are becoming so well-received also on the Catholic blogosphere is because of the hard work of the staff of ACBlog but so importantly, the support of CMR.
Yes, Patrick it is the funnest place on the Catholic interweb but also the most charitable place with two guys that are a class act!
A few months back I was watching one of my beloved movies from childhood, “The Sound of Music”. I loved the part when the nuns sing “How do you solve a problem like Maria?” Maria, of course, is the main character who is as much as a handful as you can get in a monastery full of strict nuns. Her personality, as the Mother Superior realizes, was made and loved by God Himself. It was that very personality that found her true vocation.
Archbishop Timothy Dolan seems to be a more complete version of Maria von Trapp. Where Maria leaves the Religious life to answer her true vocation, Archbishop Dolan clearly knows where his vocation is. However, Dolan is like Maria in one way…His personality is larger than life and full of joy.
Believe me this is not a bad thing. To the contrary, a loving, fun, exciting personality is a joyous thing in a vocation to the priesthood and Religious Life. Only one problem (spoken from experience) there is a time for joy and laughter but there is also a time for reverence and awe.
In the movie, Maria shows her true awe and reverence at her Nuptial Mass. Ironic, since she was already living the Religious Life and had access to the Mass everyday. It took just the right place in life for Maria to understand decorum , awe and reverence.
Now given that analogy, here is my opinion : (yeah I know that and $5 will buy you a cup of coffee) when this election took place EVERYBODY on the Catholic Blogosphere was
soooo excited and I published Lisa Graas piece because she was the most sensible.
I like Archbishop Dolan BUT (and there always is a but) I was not impressed with the very,very informal way he handled himself in the sanctuary and at the Mass. I appreciate his demeanor and it is necessary to have people like him and many like ourselves with outgoing personalities to get this orthodox Catholic thing going…
But…in the sanctuary there are no room for personalities…I prefer the Extraordinary Form of the Holy Mass because the ONLY place a priests personality comes through is at the homily. He worships facing east with us as he offers the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and it is not about him… Well, enough ranting about that…
All I can say is I should have told you so, because as I was pleased that Bishop Kincanas didn’t get it (Deo Gratias) although I still had reservations about Archbishop Dolan. Now, we will see… I hope I don’t have to come back again soon and say I told you so.
AMDG,
Sofia
Michael Voris and Me…On ‘What is Archbishop Dolan Thinking?’
by Lisa Graas
November 26, 2010
Michael Voris of RealCatholicTV (of which I am a premium subscriber) brings up a comment made by Archbishop Timothy Dolan on Fox and Friends. I was not tuning in to the show and so I am hearing about it now for the first time in the video excerpt Mr. Voris provides.
I have to agree with Mr. Voris on this one wholeheartedly. Failing to say that you believe Jesus is God because you’re afraid it will offend someone is inexcusable in that we cannot refrain from strongly objecting.
Lisa Graas is a pre-emminent Catholic blogger and we are so proud to have her here on ACBlog.Lisa’s Blog is http://www.lisagraas.com
and is on Twitter @LisaGraas and on Facebook. Lisa also is a regular blogger at David Horowitz’s News Real Blog.
Faithful Catholics who are involved in politics are bound to end up debating both conservatives and progressives who are not Catholic or who are Catholics who don’t understand or value their own Faith. We see some rather shocking views on both sides of the aisle. With progressives, we generally take issue with a government that is becoming too socialist and policies concerning abortion, contraception and homosexuality. With conservatives, our disagreements generally have something to do with healthcare, immigration, war or poverty.
All of the issues we Catholics disagree with conservatives and progressives on have something to do with human dignity. It can be said, then, that if there is one thing Catholics can claim unity on during these troubling times, it is that we all seek to advance human dignity. Those of us on the Left and those of us on the Right in the Catholic Church in America share a desire for justice which is reflected in our desire to help in the fulfillment of human dignity. Ultimately, the goal of the Catholic Left should not be to “convince the Catholic Right to vote for Democrats” and the goal of the Catholic Right should not be to “convince the Catholic Left to vote for Republicans”. We should all be working together to make both parties reflect our values.
In my meanderings around the online political community, I’ve seen an appalling level of ignorance about dignity on both the Left and the Right. I know that my Catholic compatriots on both sides of the political aisle would agree with that, though they may point fingers of blame in different directions depending on whether they identify more with Republicans or Democrats. We all should be identifying with our Catholic values FIRST. Until we do, we will be talking past each other when we discuss these issues…and we will continue to talk past each other unless we, and the people we deal with daily, can come to an authentic understanding of what dignity is.
Those Catholics who have embraced far right views in opposition to human dignity have failed to live up to their duty. Those Catholics who have embraced far left views in opposition to human dignity have failed to live up to their duty. As it stands, we have two large political parties to choose from on election day. Both of these parties have strayed so far from our values that both are indeed practically unworkable vehicles for Catholics to work within to advance respect for human dignity. I will be speaking here to those Catholics on the Left and the Right who know we have to get our act together as Catholics and reject such failures wherever we see them. We need to look to our catechism, particularly what it tells us about human dignity.
Below is information about dignity from the Catechism that every Catholic should agree with, regardless of party.
The dignity of the human person is rooted in his creation in the image and likeness of God (article 1); it is fulfilled in his vocation to divine beatitude (article 2). It is essential to a human being freely to direct himself to this fulfillment (article 3). By his deliberate actions (article 4), the human person does, or does not, conform to the good promised by God and attested by moral conscience (article 5). Human beings make their own contribution to their interior growth; they make their whole sentient and spiritual lives into means of this growth (article 6). With the help of grace they grow in virtue (article 7), avoid sin, and if they sin they entrust themselves as did the prodigal son to the mercy of our Father in heaven (article 8). In this way they attain to the perfection of charity.
Lisa graciously allows AlwaysCatholic to post her work with abandon. We are extremely grateful to have LIsa as a colleague and a friend.
Lisa is a pre-emminent Catholic blogger and we are so proud to have her here on ACBlog.
Lisa’s Blog is http://www.lisagraas.com and is on Twitter @LisaGraas and on Facebook. Lisa also is a regular blogger at David Horowitz’s News Real Blog.
Act of Thanksgiving for Blessings of the past year
~~~~~~
O God, the beginning and the end of all things, Who art always the same, and Whose years fail not, we now, at the close of another year, kneel in adoration before Thee, and offer Thee our deepest thanks for the fatherly care with which Thou has watched over us during the past, for the many times Thou hast protected us from evils of soul and body, and for the numberless blessings, both temporal and spiritual, which Thou hast showered upon us. May it please Thee to accept the homage of our grateful hearts which we offer Thee in union with the infinite thanksgiving of Thy divine Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, Who with Thee liveth and reigneth forever and ever. Amen.
~~~~~~
Thanksgiving Day Prayer
Oh, Heavenly Father,
We thank thee for food and remember the hungry.
We thank thee for health and remember the sick.
We thank thee for friends and remember the friendless.
We thank thee for freedom and remember the enslaved.
May these remembrances stir us to service,
That thy gifts to us may be used for others.
Amen
May the spirit of Thanksgiving be shared by one and all!
Have a Wonderful Thanksgiving,
and may God Bless you and yours.
P.S.Why not invite a friend who lives alone to share a Thanksgiving meal–
or better yet, call and say, I’m coming to get you
and I’ll see that you get home safely.
Try it this Thanksgiving Day, and
God will surely Bless you…
Editor’s Note: Sofia, Sean, Mary and all the contributors of Always Catholic Blog wish our readers and colleagues a blessed and holy Thanksgiving.
It’s that time of year again! The American Red Cross and Pitney Bowes have teamed up for the fourth annual Holiday Mail for Heroes program.
From now until December 10th you are invited to send holiday cards to our American service members, their families, and veterans all over the world. Anyone can send a card and you can send as many as you would like! Please send all cards to
Holiday Mail for Heroes
PO Box 5456
Capitol Heights, MD
20791-5456
The deadline for this year is December 10th. Unfortunately, if your cards are not postmarked by December 10th they cannot be delivered. After Pitney Bowes collects and screens the mail received in the PO Box, Red Cross workers deliver holiday greetings to service men and women in their communities. Check out how our uniformed men and women and their families expressed their gratitude for the Holiday Mail program when it delivered cards to Walter Reed Army Medical Center.
Our Holiday Mail for Heroes YouTube playlist features videos capturing last year’s successes.
Each year the American Red Cross provides assistance to over 2 million service members and many of our nation’s 24 million veterans. At the core of the Service to the Armed Forces mission is our commitment to support military families, military and veterans hospitals and provide emergency communications across the globe.
You can support the Service to the Armed Forces mission of the American Red Cross.
Editor’s Note: AlwaysCatholicBlog is asking our readers to send Religious cards only to this program. Religious cards are allowed and do not worry if the serviceman or woman that receives the card is not Christian. They will separate the cards before distributing them to our heroes. Anyway, nothing like acknowledging it’s Jesus’ birthday, right?
From the best on the Catholic blogoshpere about the typical MSM spin attack on Pope Benedict’s recent interview. The MSM excises one paragraph that appears to say that Benedict is changing on condom use. NOT! NOPE. NO WAY!
ACBlog proudly presents the bests of the best in repudiating the nonsense. Enjoy the read, it’s business as usual with the MSM. LOL!
Pope Benedict Not Changing Catholic Teaching on Condoms
A forthcoming book “Light of the World: the Pope, the Church and the Signs of the Times” by Peter Seewald is generating significant buzz because it reportedly has the Pope significantly changing Church teaching on the usage of condoms.
But book says the Pope indicates there may be an “exceptional situation” when using condoms may be appropriate, such as cases of sexual intercourse that may threaten the life of another person because of a transmission of a potentially deadline sexual disease. That might justify their usage in instances such as male prostitutes using them to stop the spread of HIV.
“There may be a basis in the case of some individuals, as perhaps when a male prostitute uses a condom, where this can be a first step in the direction of a moralization, a first assumption of responsibility, on the way toward discovering an awareness that not everything is allowed and that one cannot do whatever one wants,” the Pontiff said.
“But it is not really the way to deal with the evil of HIV infection. That can really lie only in a humanization of sexuality,” Benedict added.
Peter Seewald, a German reporter who conducted the interview, followed up by asking: “Are you saying, then, that the Catholic Church is actually not opposed in principle to the use of condoms?”
According to a Catholic News Service transcript, Pope Benedict responded: “She of course does not regard it as a real or moral solution, but, in this or that case, there can be nonetheless, in the intention of reducing the risk of infection, a first step toward a different way, a more human way, of living sexuality.”
Concerning this report from the AP regarding remarks from Pope Benedict XVI on condom use, everyone is expecting clarifications. We can be pretty certain of that, but in the meantime, I’ll offer one.
The key phrase that explains everything that will go right over the vast majority of people’s heads? ”Re-develop the understanding”.
From the AFP [emphasis mine]:
Benedict offered the example of a male prostitute using a condom.
“There may be justified individual cases, for example when a male prostitute uses a condom, where this can be … a first bit of responsibility, to re-develop the understanding that not everything is permitted and that one may not do everything one wishes,” Benedict was quoted as saying.
The scenario offered is of someone in a state of complete ignorance about Catholic teaching. A prostitute doesn’t understand much at all about morality. Perhaps the only morality he can muster is that he shouldn’t do something intentionally that could kill another person. The fact that the Pope used a prostitute as an example shows he’s referring to that type of person. Someone who actively, and as a profession, engages in sex outside of marriage has no inkling of what the Christian moral teaching is on human sexuality. Most of the rest of us have more culpability on the matter than a prostitute. Because most of the rest of us are not prostitutes, we have more “responsibility” than that “first bit of responsibility” a prostitute can muster.
As long as you have an ounce of moral responsibility in you, there is hope that you can “re-develop your understanding”. “Re-developing” your understanding means coming to a more Christian perspective on things. Common sense should tell you that someone who is HIV-positive who goes around intentionally infecting others with HIV is more evil than someone who would say no to that. The Pope was using the extreme example of a prostitute to explain just such a difference.
Does this mean that the Pope is going to approve of the use of condom distribution to prevent AIDS? Nope. His very next statement shows where he is on that.
“But it is not the proper way to deal with the horror of HIV infection.”
The Catholic track record in Africa on this issue is better than the non-Catholic track record.
When remarks by Pope Benedict XVI regarding the use of condoms, as expressed in the upcoming biography Light of the World: The Pope, The Church and The Signs Of The Times, were released for the press, there was much confusion in the interpretation. I’ve already offered some clarification, as have many others of my Catholic compatriots across the blogosphere. As I consider more deeply how serious are the ramifications of this confusion, I thought it best to clarify a bit more.
The Pope gave the example of a male prostitute. I’d like to offer a more detailed scenario, one of a faithful Catholic mother of two grown children. One of her children is a male prostitute and the other is a practicing Catholic who is married to a practicing Catholic wife.
This Catholic mother loves both of her sons equally, as well she should. They both come to her for advice about condom use. What does she advise them?
To the practicing Catholic son, she advises that he follow the Church’s teaching that condom use destroys the procreative aspect of the conjugal act. She explains the Church’s teaching on human sexuality (which he and his wife should have already been instructed in during their Pre-Cana marriage instruction). She advises him also that if he understands and rejects this, that he risks the fires of hell. She is being a good Catholic mother.
To the son who is a male prostitute, she advises, again, the Catholic teaching on human sexuality. She tries to explain it, but he cannot understand it and completely rejects it. He simply cannot get his mind around it. He is adamant that he is going to continue in his lifestyle, no matter what. When she realizes that she is never going to get anywhere with him on this issue, she advises him that if he absolutely insists that it must be this way, then he should use a condom. He agrees that he should think enough of the other person’s value as a human person not to intentionally risk AIDS infection, and she rejoices that he, at least, understands this much about human dignity. It’s enough for her to hope that it is spark enough for him to, as the Pope said, “re-develop his understanding” and come eventually to the fullness of the Faith. Again, as assuredly as she was with her other son, she is being a good Catholic mother.
First, keep in mind that Papa Ratzinger was talking to a guy who had a microphone. How is that the same as an official act of the Vicar of Christ exercising his magisterium?
Also, he was asked if the Church is opposed in principle to the use of condoms. He responded – and it may be important to read all the words. My emphases:
She of course does not regard it as a real or moral solution, but, in this or that case, there can be nonetheless, in the intention of reducing the risk of infection, a first step in a movement toward a different way, a more human way, of living sexuality.
“Of course” means that the Church’s teaching is pretty clear. Also, just as the Pope clarified in a presser on an airplane on his way to make an apostolic visit, condoms are not a real solution because they fail both to prevent disease and conception. They are not a “real” solution. They are not a “moral” solution because of the motive for their use in most cases. Nevertheless, sin is also wrapped up with “intention” in individual cases. Furthermore, there is a human way to respond to the problems for which some people claim condoms are the answer. Condom use is a more human way in individual cases such as that which the Pope identified in his non-magisterial interview. That doesn’t mean that it is yet a good way. It is simply better than the disastrous way employed before a decision was made to move towards a more human way. Also the word human implies that the acting subject is a person, an image of God.
Pope Benedict advocates right sexuality, not condom use, in fight against HIV
Vatican City, Nov 20, 2010 / 07:39 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Excerpts of Pope Benedict XVI’s new book are already causing a stir. Though some media reports claim he offers a change in papal teaching about condom use, Pope Benedict in fact says that a humanized sexuality, not condoms, is the right response to HIV.
The Nov. 21 edition of the Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano (LOR) will release excerpts of the pontiff’s book “Light of the World: The Pope, the Church and the Signs of the Times.”
The book contains the Pope’s responses to questions from Peter Seewald, a German reporter who spoke with him over a week last summer about the most sensitive and important questions in Church life today.
The 21 themes treated in the book are edgy and the reception of the Pope’s words is likely to be varied, but his answers offer a unique look into his teachings and his perspective on the Church and the world.
In the excerpts, just two brief paragraphs provide the Pope’s response to a question on sexuality in the world today. He says that concentrating on the use of the condom only serves to trivialize sexuality.
This trivialization leads many people to no longer see sex as an expression of love, but as a self-administered drug. The fight against the banalization of sexuality is part of a great effort to change this view to a more positive one.
The respected, clear-thinking canonist Ed Peters of In the Light of the Law has offered a blistering assessment of the role of the Vatican’s daily L’Osservatore Romano in regard to the latest in a string of media screw-ups.
My emphases and comments.
The continuing mess at L’Osservatore Romano
While many able others are scrambling to respond to the eruption over the pope’s remarks on condom use by male prostitutes, I want to ask a few questions about the occasion of this public relations fiasco, namely, the decision by L’Osservatore Romano [Note these points] to publish [1] prematurely, [2] out of context, and [3] without commentary, [4] the single most controversial paragraph of the pope’s book, Light of the World, in, if nothing else, apparent violation of the agreement in place between its various publishers concerning a coordinated release of the work. [Elsewhere I mused about the possibility that the Holy See had an agreement with the publisher that they could strike passages deemed inopportune before going to press. So... what happened? No such agreement? Didn't choose to use it? Just wanted to get out ahead of the story?]I frankly wonder whether, even now, L’Osservatore Romano yet realizes what a serious disservice it has committed by arrogating to itself the role of introducing the pope’s book, Light of the World, and by its making that introduction in such a palpably incompetent manner? [C'mon, Ed. You've gotta learn to express yourself!]
Really? The Pope says contraception is ok in some cases? Nope.
VATICAN CITY — Pope Benedict XVI says in a new book that the use of condoms can be justified in some cases, such as for male prostitutes seeking to prevent the spread of HIV.
The pontiff makes the comments in a book-length interview with a German journalist, “Light of the World: The Pope, the Church and the Signs of the Times.” The Vatican newspaper ran excerpts of the book Saturday.
Church teaching has long opposed condoms since they’re a form of artificial contraception. The Vatican has been harshly criticized for its position given the AIDS crisis.
Benedict said that for male prostitutes — for whom contraception isn’t a central issue — condoms are not a moral solution. But he said they could be justified “in the intention of reducing the risk of infection.”
As always, the condom as contraception is always wrong. Condoms used by male prostitutes for whom contraception is not an issue, might be able to use condoms for reducing the spread of infection.
I went hunting this past weekend. In order to be safe from being mistaken for an animal, the prey, hunters are encouraged or even required to wear a bright orange color. This wise safety measure, of course, assumes that all the other hunters in the woods are not color blind.
Now if you know in advance that all the other hunters are color blind, you have no one else to blame but your self when you end up shot.
Translation? You don’t speak French to a bunch of neanderthals and expect NOT to be clubbed.
This is what happened to the Vatican press machine this past weekend with the “Pope approves condoms” story. Actually, this is what always happens to the Vatican press machine.
Let’s face it. The press getting this story wrong is the expected outcome but yet again the Vatican press office was caught flat footed. Yes, they issued a statement that, while correct, is written in the same language of nuance that got them in trouble in the first place.
I must admit that the whole thing has me scratching my head. The question I keep coming back to is “why?” Why did the Pope try to make this VERY nuanced point when it is obvious to even the most casual observer that the media would get this wrong? Did this nuanced point about male prostitutes really have to be made? I mean, have male prostitutes sworn off condoms because the Pope says they are wrong? Why? Why this point?
Pope Benedict’s new book, Light of the World: The Pope, The Church and The Signs Of The Times, isn’t even officially out yet but is already at the center of an online media controversy.
The controversy erupted Saturday morning when L’Osservatore Romano unilaterally violated the embargo on the book by publishing Italian-language extracts of various papal statements, much to the chagrin of publishers around the world, who had been working on a carefully orchestrated launch for the book on Tuesday.
Among the extracts was one dealing with the use of condoms in trying to prevent the spread of AIDS, and the press immediately seized on this (e.g., Reuters, Associated Press , BBC online).
And so we were treated to headlines like:
* Pope says condoms sometimes permissible to stop AIDS
* Pope: condoms can be justified in some cases
* Pope says condoms can be used in the fight against Aids
Particularly egregious is this statement by William Crawley of the BBC:
Pope Benedict appears to have changed the Vatican’s official stance on the use of condoms to a moral position that many Catholic theologians have been recommending for quite some time.
GAH!
Okay, first of all, this is an interview book. The pope is being interviewed. He is not engaging his official teaching capacity. This book is not an encyclical, an apostolic constitution, a papal bull, or anything of the kind. It is not published by the Church. It is an interview conducted by a German-language journalist. Consequently, the book does not represent an act of the Church’s Magisterium and does not have the capacity to “change[] the Vatican’s official stance” on anything. It does not carry dogmatic or canonical force. The book (which is fascinating and unprecedented, though that’s a subject for another post) constitutes the Pope’s personal opinions on the questions he is asked by interviewer Peter Seewald.
And, as Pope Benedict himself notes in the book:
It goes without saying that the Pope can have private opinions that are wrong.
I don’t point this out to suggest that what Pope Benedict says regarding condoms is wrong (we’ll get to that in a moment) but to point out the status of private papal opinions. They are just that: private opinions. Not official Church teaching. So let’s get that straight.
Among the disservices L’Osservatore Romano performed by breaking the book’s embargo in the way it did was the fact that it only published a small part of the section in which Pope Benedict discussed condoms. As a result, the reader could not see the context of his remarks, giving the reader no way to see the context and guaranteeing that the secular press would take the Pope’s remarks out of context (which they would have anyway, but perhaps not this much). Especially egregious is the fact that L’Osservatore Romano omits material in which Benedict clarified his statement on condoms in a follow-up question.
So L’Osservatore Romano has performed a great disservice to both the Catholic and non-Catholic communities.
Let’s look at the Pope’s remarks and see what he actually said.
Seewald: . . . In Africa you stated that the Church’s traditional teaching has proven to be the only sure way to stop the spread of HIV. Critics, including critics from the Church’s own ranks, object that it is madness to forbid a high-risk population to use condoms.
Benedict: . . . In my remarks I was not making a general statement about the condom issue, but merely said, and this is what caused such great offense, that we cannot solve the problem by distributing condoms. [EMPHASIS ADDED] Much more needs to be done. We must stand close to the people, we must guide and help them; and we must do this both before and after they contract the disease.
As a matter of fact, you know, people can get condoms when they want them anyway. But this just goes to show that condoms alone do not resolve the question itself. More needs to happen. Meanwhile, the secular realm itself has developed the so-called ABC Theory: Abstinence-Be Faithful-Condom, where the condom is understood only as a last resort, when the other two points fail to work. This means that the sheer fixation on the condom implies a banalization of sexuality, which, after all, is precisely the dangerous source of the attitude of no longer seeing sexuality as the expression of love, but only a sort of drug that people administer to themselves. This is why the fight against the banalization of sexuality is also a part of the struggle to ensure that sexuality is treated as a positive value and to enable it to have a positive effect on the whole of man’s being.
One day while reading a colleague's blog, I was moved by his "raison d'etre"The quote from Thomas Storck, [The Catholic Milieu] struck a resonant chord within me. I have forever reasoned that all we do in life must be "Always Catholic" and here, finally was the succinct explanation. "Our entire daily lives cannot be occupied with purely religious practices;all of us have to eat, and most of us have and want to do many other activities besides. So though we cannot always be religious in this sense, we can always be Catholic, that is, the round of our daily activities can be conducted in such a way as to express and be in harmony with our Faith. And [this] can involve more than avoiding sin and exercising virtue.”
