There seems to be quite a knock down drag out discussion on both The Dawn Patrol and Feministe. I've been impressed with the relative level of maturity that has been shown in the comments.
Zuzu writes:
Both Dawn Eden and recent bannee Deep Thought really stuck in my craw. I realized that what really bugged me about them was their converts' zeal and their preachiness on Catholic doctrine - their insistence that they knew it all about Catholicism, that they had all the answers, that only people who hewed slavishly to their views on could claim the name Catholic. And on. It doesn’t help that both are very quick on the "you just hate Catholics" thing when challenged.
I don't believe Dawn has ever said she knows all about Catholicism. I have been a Catholic for 46 years, and I don't know all about Catholicism. What Dawn seems to know a lot about is Catholic reproductive and sexuality issues. I can make that determination because I've studied the writings of Pope John Paul II in The Theology of the Body, and his Familiaris Consortio. I have read Pope Benedict XVI's Deus Caritas Est, and in the case of artificial birth control, I've read Paul VI's Humanae Vitae.
I don't say: "You hate Catholics". I say: "You hate the Catholic faith". There is a real difference between the two statements. The first I'm sure is not true. The second I'm sure is (going by your past postings, that is).
Um, folks, I was raised Catholic. I’m of an ethnic group (Irish) where I am presumed to be Catholic. My aunt is a nun. Anyone who hears that there are six children in my family almost invariably mentions Catholicism. Even though I am officially an apostate now (ask me how!), I still have trouble not thinking of myself as Catholic, and I know that others assume I am still one. I know that piny comes from a Catholic background, as does Magis, another one who got tarred with the anti-Catholic brush. I’m not sure about Jill, but I’ve never seen her write anything anti-Catholic.
Being "raised Catholic" can mean anything from being baptized and attending mass occasionally on Easter, to being raised in a family that attends the Tridentine Latin Mass every Sunday and holy day of obligation (with your head covered).
Being a cradle Catholic doesn't buy you much credibility with regard to familiarity with Catholic doctrine (I know because I am a cradle Catholic who was raised by devout Catholic parents and sent to 8 years of Catholic elementary school and I'm aware of the abysmal catechesis I was given).
Commenter PHLAF chimes in:
Frankly, I think it would serve Dawn and her readers/commenters well if she’d lay off the chastity kick for a while and would focus more on humility and charity.
And here is the crux of the issue. And to be fair, this is a weblog mostly populated by feminists and their hangers-on, so Catholic teaching with regard to chastity, marriage and abortion will probably not be well accepted.
But the fact is this. True charity springs from love (caritas). When you love someone, you want what's best for them. This might mean telling them things for their own good that they really don't want to hear. Charity does not mean keeping silent in the face of persistent and public sin. It does not mean "supporting" them whatever it is that they want to do. Sometimes true charity is a kick in the ass.
Dawn comments on posts she finds on this weblog. It's like talking to the wall, sometimes, but that's ok. When you see a bunch of sheep being led to a poison spring, you have to tell them to stop. You have to tell them this is bad for you, and you shouldn't do it. You tell them this not because you are "holier than thou", but because you care deeply about their welfare and want them to have the best life possible here, and in the hereafter.
I think one of the big problems is Dawn's criticism of artificial birth control. PHLAF says in a subsequent comment:
I don’t believe the Church should be an exclusive club at all. Hence my disgust with those of Ms. Eden’s ilk who claim that only those who meet her personal approval may call themselves Catholic. She’s been Catholic for all of five minutes, considers herself absolutely perfect and without fault, and tells the rest of us we don’t really love our children or husbands.
I have to ask myself what's really bugging her? Is it the message, or the tone of the messenger? Why is she so concerned about the opinion of someone who she holds in such disdain?
The feminist dream of "free love" and belly bumping without responsibility has reduced a whole generation of both women and men to dumpster diving for their intimacy needs. These people are doing the equivalent of eating out of dumpsters to attempt to satisfy their sexual appetites. They call this "liberation". I call it slavery. What else do you call returning to the same behavior that cloys but doesn't satisfy and brings you back to the same dumpster for another meal.
I say there is an alternative. There is a sumptuous feast available for anyone who wants to wait for it.
If you don't believe that the Creator of the Universe designed sex to allow husbands and wives to partner in His continuing plan of creation, you can stop reading right now.
Marital intimacy is best realized in the joining of a husband and wife with the possible creation of new life in the balance. You don't have to be trying for a baby each and every time you have sex, God builds women to be infertile about 25 days a month. But you have to be open for it each and every time.
It's awesome. It's transcendent. It's sacramental. Your love for each other and God is so great, that in nine months you might have to give it a name.
I am not saying this stuff because I want PHLAF to feel bad about her love life. I'm not saying this because I want to feel superior to her (which I don't). I'm saying this because I want her and everyone else to have what I have.
Which I think is a lot more loving (caritas, not eros) than simply supporting her in the life she has chosen to lead.
Barbara Nicolosi (with whom I've had words in the past) has a fabulous rant on her blog regarding The DaVinci Code:
She writes:
And here's another thing that troubles me about the "opportunity for dialogue" stance. The debate is all on hell's terms. I am somebody who reads about exorcisms. I don't know why. I just do. And one of the first rules of exorcism is that you never answer the devil's questions. You don't debate the devil. You do not give evil the authority to question God. DVC represents a debate in which the questions start with Satan's presumptions. I find it beyond naive to convince myself that the folks who are lapping up DVC are on a "search for truth." They're not. They are on a crusade to validate their own rejection of the authority of Christ and the Church.
I never thought of it quite like that. It's a lot like debating with people who make up their "facts" as they go along. Every time you address one of their points, they have a bigger and better "whopper" to hit you with.
She continues with:
And I also hate the idea that some of the sheep would be scandalized away from Jesus by this idiotic story. And they will.
The sheep have been systematically prepared for slaughter by forty years of post-Consiliar insanity. Ineffective and insufficient catechesis and lack-lustre preaching. Liturgical chaos. Too often, the cruel injustice of liberal, intolerant leadership which so often had the added indignity of manifest hypocrisy.
The flock has been bred as teeming little narcissist lambs who stubbornly consider themselves "special" no matter how mediocre their understanding and living out of their life of discipleship. We have a global pasture full of sheep pasturing themselves, with coats shamefully besmirched by loving their sins. They bleat defiance and pride of their filth, and insist that Jesus is indifferent to their degradation and shame. "Who knows, Jesus is probably just like us!" They don't know, and don't know that they don't know, or don't know, and don't care that they don't know.
And now The Da Vinci Code comes along to sheepish ears that are primed and ready to be told that holiness is impossible. And that is why this damn book is a success. It says to people, "If Jesus was a sham, then anything is permissible." (Ref. "You shall be like gods!")
And in this she is absolutely correct. Why reinvent the wheel when it comes to temptation and corruption. The oldest lines are the best lines. If it worked for Adam and Eve, why shouldn't it work for the sons of Adam and the daughters of Eve?
She concludes with:
Don't go see this stupid movie. Don't pay money to have the insidious lies of the enemy introduced into your heart and mind.
Othercott DVC on May 19th. Go see Over the Hedge instead. And pray for everyone associated who is dancing with the devil through this movie.
I can't repeat this enough. Please, please, please take the opportunity to see Over the Hedge with your family. It'll be fun, it'll be an opportunity to have some enjoyable family time. It'll also be an opportunity to kick The DaVinci Code in the nuts at the box office.
I had a suggestion I posted in the comments section of Barbara's post:
I just got a real interesting thought. Instead of attacking The DaVinci Code with truth ahd facts, maybe we ought to be attacking it with fiction. A fiction that leads the reader through a maze of violence, senseless sex and intrigue to the final climax that the whole story of Jesus is actually true!!! And we could make up all kinds of fictional stuff to support it, the more outlandish the better (and we'd probably be able to make a ton of money too).
Maybe if we're really lucky, Dan Brown would sue us and the ongoing publicity would bootstrap the subsequent movie produced by Mel Gibson. What comedic actor whose acting career is in hiatus would we have to play the part of the radical Atheist protagonist who in the final scene of the movie is baptized, receives communion and is confirmed in St. Peters by the Holy Father after an hour and a quarter of being chased by Masonic assassins as he closes in on the truth even he doesn't suspect? I know. Bill Murray!
There seems to be much speculating in St. Blog's parish, not about whether the Holy Father will issue a universal indult to allow any priest who wishes to celebrate the Tridentine Latin Mass (TLM), but when. This has been met by much salivating in the halls of St. Blogs. Some, like Gerald at The Cafeteria is Closed, might need a lobster bib to catch all the saliva.
Let me start off by saying I am a victim of Vatican II who has recently made his way back to God. I've done it in spite of Vatican II (more accurately the evil "spirit" of Vatican II) which spawned numerous liturgical "innovations" and turned our Catholic masses into yet another form of entertainment.
For 40 years, the lack of "spiritual hydration" have left us thirsty, and turned our liturgies into a spiritual desert. Many have had this thirst quenched at the scattered oases of the indult TLM. Others have been drinking at the poisoned springs of the schismatic Society of Saint Pius X (SSPX). There has been something missing.
Now comes the rumor of a universal indult. We can finally have the TLM celebrated side by side with the Novus Ordo (NO). There is much rejoicing in the halls of St. Blogs with a healthy dose of smugness, and a now-all-you-Haugen-and-Haas-singers-are-going-to-get-yours-ness.
We are lucky enough to have an indult TLM in my town within 10 minutes of my house. I recently attended with my daughter for a "religious ed. field trip". I spoke about my experiences here.
I loved the TLM as a child. I love it now. I am not convinced that a universal indult for the TLM is a good thing. Sure, I miss the timeless beauty of Gregorian chant in Latin. I miss the transcendence of the old prayers. I most of all miss kneeling to receive my Lord and Savior.
However, after attending the indult in town, I have come to the conclusion that a universal indult may not be an entirely good thing. I have seen two communities in one parish, not one community worshipping God the same way, but two, worshipping God in different ways, each thinking their way is better. I would hate to see this form of fracturing of our church on a grander scale than appears to be happening now.
If the Holy Father revoked the NO, and instituted the TLM as the only mass allowed by the Latin Rite Catholic Church, nobody would be happier than I.
Even allowing individual parishes to only offer the TLM, would be fine with me also. Then you would have a unity within the parish, at least, but would facilitate "parish shopping" (not like that doesn't happen now...). Which brings me to my next point:
With a greater availablilty of the TLM, many people would be abandoning their "innovative", trendy corner parishes for the greener pastures of the Old Rite, leaving the trendy corner parishes full of... well... trendy people.
What will happen to the next generation of Catholics brought up in these parishes without even the weekly example of devotional God-centered people (even if the parish doesn't appear to be God-centered). Who is going to affect the change in these parishes (and who would even want to try) if there is an easy alternative?
I am seeing real liturgical renewal in my parish. This is driven by our new orthodox pastor. He has moved the tabernacle front and center. He had brought a new eucharistic devotion to the mass. Mass has become God-centered, rather than me-centered (what I like; what makes me feel good). We are focusing of the sacrifice of our Lord and Savior, and his real presence on the altar.
I would like to see the NO celebrated as it was designed to be celebrated, not like it was interpreted to be celebrated. I would like to see an adherence to the documents of Vatican II, not the "spirit" of Vatican II. I would like to see the prayers audible, and responses required. I'd like to see transcendent music, both old style chant and polyphony, mixed with good liturgically correct modern music. I'd like to see some of the prayers in Latin (such as the Agnus Dei) and the readings, consecration and homily in the vernacular. I'd like to see us kneel for communion, and all receive on the tongue.
The people who are celebrating the mass in a "less worshipful" manner are not evil. They are simply misguided. They don't understand how beautiful a more traditional and worshipful mass can be because they have never experienced it. Let's show them.
But I don't want to be alone heping to drive these changes, making suggestions, talking to my fellow parishioners and trying to convince them one heart at a time, that this would be so fabulous. I need the help of the people who are thinking of bailing from this sinking ship, rather than working beside me to help patch up the holes.
If we, who love a more God-centered liturgy work together, we, with the grace of Almighty God, can accomplish much. Remember what Jesus said: "faith the size of a mustard seed can move mountains". But we have to put aside our bigotry and compromise, for the good of the Catholic Church, but only compromise on those things that are "in dubiis" (not necessities), and "in omnibus, caritas" (in all things, charity).
Please help me. And if you can't help me, pray for me.
Another part of the truth when it comes to me and the TLM is that I'm running freaking scared of it. Why would I want to start attending the Mass that's dribbled over by a bunch of people who look down on the NO - that's the NO that has nurtured my entire spiritual life, thanks - as though it were a pile of big steaming elephant poo, without even the prospect of justification that ultra-tasty coffee beans would provide. If the two Missals are equivalent, and they are, then I think I'll find myself at the Mass where I'm not snorted at because SHOCK I like responding. The class system is part of British society. It has no place in the Church.
Nobody can ever accuse her of being opinionated, can they? :)
We have yet another young celiac girl whose parents want her to have a rice host for her first communion. The Lowell Sun editorializes:
The church's idea of compromise was to say that Victoria could take the wine instead of the host. Leaving aside the questionable idea of giving wine to a 7-year-old (the Catholic Church does, after all, consider itself above the law in some instances), it is unwise from a health standpoint for Victoria to consume wine.
So I guess the thousands of Catholic in Massachussetts are all criminals every week. I guess the editors of the agenda-driven left wing rag haven't figured out that most states have an exemption for sacramental wine in their underage drinking laws.
But because of a good friend, Victoria will not be alone on communion day. One of her friends said she would take the wine with her if they find it is safe enough for Victoria to drink.
This is fabulous. The parents could learn something from Victoria's friend. Both Victoria and her friend will be abundantly blessed at their First Communion.
This Holy Week has been amazing for me. I have sung in my parish choir for 16 years now, and every other year I felt like I was getting ready for a concert. We usually began praparing for the Triduum in the beginning of February.
This year we have a new choir director. She started Ash Wednesday, and we have been preparing both Sunday liturgies and the Triduum during our 1-2 hour rehersal every week.
Our choir director is getting used to us, and we're getting used to her. We have a handful (seven) of choir members , and we have all the voice parts covered, but I have been used to an almost 40 voice choir.
Now we have to work harder to make our sound mesh, and learn each others strengths and weaknesses.
This weekend so far has been amazing. We have been doing old hymns, chants and interludes. Rather than "performing" the songs, we have been praying them. I hope I don't sound too silly, but during the singing of Behold the Lamb, I felt the wind of the spirit brush the back of my neck, and I finished the song with tears in my eyes. (There goes my manly man image.)
Tonight is vigil. I am nervous, even though I shouldn't be, because if God is with me who could be against me. We have a lot of new material with not a lot of rehersal time.
I guess it's time to just open up and tell God: "Here I am... use me as you will"
Please pray for us.
Update: Thank you all for your prayers. Everything went fabulously. A couple minor glitches, but a moving prayer-filled mass for all. Our pastor commented that this was the best vigil mass he's ever celebrated, and after mass, as an announcement, mentioned that our new music director had been here 40 days, and she's led us from the musical "wilderness" to the "promised land".
In the mold of Moloch Now, we have the "other side" weighing in. Wondering what the Devil thinks of our world and our church, well tune in to From the Depths....
I hope the dark lord keeps up with this, because his minion, Moloch, seems to be far to busy to do any blogging recently.
It seems that archeologists have uncovered and authenticated the Gospel of Judas. Yes, that's right, that Judas, he who has become in modern parlance to traitors what Xerox has become to copiers.
The Gospel of Judas gives a different view of the relationship between Jesus and Judas, offering new insights into the disciple who betrayed Jesus. Unlike the accounts in the canonical Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, in which Judas is portrayed as a reviled traitor, this newly discovered Gospel portrays Judas as acting at Jesus' request when he hands Jesus over to the authorities.
Those of you who read my blog regularly, probably know that I have a soft spot in my heart for Judas. It has seemed to me that when Jesus said, at the Last Supper: "One of you will betray me", the die was cast. Jesus is God, and God can't lie. So from that point on, one of the apostles had to do it.
I'm not ready to cast Judas into the role of "hero" yet. For one thing, if Jesus was in on the plan, why did Judas succumb to despair and kill himself? And I was thinking, that should Judas actually be in hell, Jesus would have been right when he said: "The one who betrays the Son of Man will wish he was never born". Can you imagine how Satan treats the guy who was instrumental as Judas was in the salvation of mankind?
But when we pray for the souls in purgatory, we always pray for "the one soul most forsaken". I send up a prayer for Judas. I can't imagine anyone else but me helping to pray his way into heaven.
Dawn Eden is on patrol again. She brings us a story about the discussion in what used to be Great Britain about a finding by the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health that halping babies born "too soon" puts a drain on resources that could better be used for other, healthier babies.
Research to be presented at the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health's annual conference later this month shows babies born at 25 weeks or under cost almost three times as much to educate by the time they turn six as those born at full term.
In its response to an in-depth inquiry into premature babies by the Nuffield Council on Bioethics, the RCOG writes: "Some weight should be given to the economic considerations (of neonatal intensive care) as there is a real issue in neonatal units of 'bed blocking', whereby women have to be transferred in labour to other units, compromising both their and their babies' care. One of the problems of the 'success' of neonatal intensive care is that the practitioners are always pushing the boundaries. There has been a constant need to expand numbers of cots to cover the increasing tendency to try to rescue baby at lower and lower gestations."
Today a RCOG spokeswoman said there was "justified concern" about the outcomes in babies born before 25 weeks as mortality and handicap rates were "significant".
She added: "The welfare of all mothers and babies requiring care because of premature birth or delivery is of primary concern to the RCOG. We would welcome further discussion with colleagues about the management of all mothers and babies in this difficult situation."
I know one of those preemies. She's my daughter who is now 16 and on the honor roll at school.
I remember like it was yesterday, the tearful call from my wife informing me that her water had broken 10 weeks before her due date. She was rushed to the hospital where they attempted to treat the rupture, but with no avail. The baby was breech, and there was practically no amnionic fluid in which to move the baby around even if they wanted to.
For three weeks, they held off my wife's labor with asthma medicine (Breathene) and gave her two shots of a steroid to help develop the baby's lungs. When my wife spiked a temperature (indicative of a possible infection) they rushed her into the operating room for an emergency C-section.
When they emerged with the cart with my little daughter on it (4 pounds, no ounces), I followed her into the NICU where they put her on oxygen, a heating tray (reminded me of something they use for french fries at McDonald's), an IV in her head, and a feeding tube up her nose (shades of Terry Schiavo).
I had my priest on speed dial.
The first day, they dialed her off of her heating tray and put her into an isolette. The second day, they dialed back the oxygen and she was breathing room air on her own. The next day I was trying to feed her with a little bottle that looked like a big test tube with a nipple on it. I was telling her that if she took the bottle, they could remove that tube from her nose (like she actually understood what I was saying). The 4th day the pediatrician wanted to release her, but the nurses petitioned to keep her another day. On the 5th day they sent her home with us. She was 17 inches long (coincidentally, the same size as a Cabbage Patch doll). Within the next couple of days she lost 4 oz bringing her to 3 pounds, 12 oz. Then she started "bulking up", and it was out of the woods.
Cost of the hospital for wife and baby: $25,000.
Cost of the candles lit for my wife and baby: $2.50
The smile on my infant daughter's face: Priceless!
You'll have to excuse me if when I hear talk like I quoted above, that I want to roundly back-hand the smug, pseudo-ethical face of the woman speaking those words.
I say to those in the UK, you have a socialist system of medicine there. The last thing you want to do is to allow potential workers to die. Why don't you try weighing the cost of treatment, to the amount of taxes they will pay into your system over the course of their life.
Falling short of that, I figure you doctors are aware that a person uses up the most medical resources in the last years of their life? Do you really want to set this sort of stage for the smug, pseudo-ethecists who will be balancing your perceived worth against the Pounds Sterling and finding you wanting?
But looking further down in the article the REAL reason for this sort of attitude:
Nationally, about 800 babies are born under 25 weeks every year. The normal gestation period is 40 weeks (the current abortion limit in Britain is 24 weeks).
So you have real babies being born alive even earlier than you are allowed to abort them!
People will be taking a long, hard look at the abortion issue, with the ammo that these "fetuses" become "people", and not locked away it a woman's womb where they can't be seen, but out in the stark, well lit, beeping world of NICU with dedicated medical professionals working their absolute hardest to save each and every one of them.
These amazing nurses and doctors are the un-sung, front-line soldiers in the war against the culture of death. Let us say a prayer to God above that more young people will join a profession such as this and no more with join the culture of death, staffing fewer and fewer abortuaries.
C.S. Lewis wrote a book called The Screwtape Letters which were supposed letters from a senior devil named Screwtape (an Under Secretary in the Lowerarchy) to his subordinate "nephew", Wormwood (a very junior Tempter).
This is commentary on the state of society from the viewpoint of Satan. It's kind of like the self help books that teach you how to destroy your marriage in 30 days (basically what not to do). This is on my reading list.
Now, Wormwood, before you object to my calling this book "non-fiction"— since it is technically classified as "fiction"— let me say that it is essentially non-fiction, at least as far as our purposes are concerned. That's because its principle delight for our side is that in the tacky plastic shell of some below-average "fiction" the book parades as "fact" a veritable phalanx of practical propaganda and disinformation that would make our dear Herr Goebbels (Circle Eight, third spiderhole on the right) jade green with envy! Souls by the boatload are blithely believing almost all of the deliciously corrosive non-facts that are congealed everywhere in it, like flies in bad aspic, and it is that precisely which most recommends this glorious effort as worthy of our dedicated and especial study.
The whole thing is fabulous. I suggest you read it.
