Go here to read the article. The usual Open Thread rules apply: be concise, be charitable and, above all, be amusing!
Open Thread
- Donald R. McClarey
Donald R. McClarey
Cradle Catholic. Active in the pro-life movement since 1973. Father of three, one in Heaven, and happily married for 43 years. Small town lawyer and amateur historian. Former president of the board of directors of the local crisis pregnancy center for a decade.
most are humanists (homosexual) now, don’t bother looking for any accountability.
setup an automatic weekly donation to an SSPX Chapel an hour a way. i won’t be able to make it there every week but my check will.
Our current gaggle of shepherds (with some very limited exceptions) brings to mind the line of Satan from Paradise Lost about how it it better to reign in hell than serve in heaven.
When they finally opened the churches, we found that they had replaced the holy water fonts with Purell dispensers. The fonts have returned, but it seems the Purellificator has become a permanent fixture in the Sanctuary, and the Rite of Purellification is all but written into the rubrics of the Mass.
“Be not afraid!” … Except for germs
CAG,
My friends and I began referring to the Purelling of the Extraordinary Ministers prior to Communion as the Rite of the Holy Hand Sanitizer. It still occurs in the parishes I attend.
The fact that the Purellificator has become part of the Mass kit during our modern times is shown by the fact that no one has endeavored to make it beautiful.
Open thread, so…
Anybody else still depressed by the oppressively beige main page?
I know the page can’t stay the same forever (because that offends the Lords Of Tech, or something) but I’d love to see something better than the current brown paper bag palette.
Beauty matters.
Josh,
I read your post and I could only hear the “Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch.” Too funny!
Bill,
Automatic +1 for Monty Python references!
Here it is August and they are still begging at weekend Masses to donate to the Bishop’s Lenten Appeal. Some of us Catholics in the Arlington VA diocese have long memories. However the collections are not down if the money stays within the parish.
During COVID No Masses in church, no Masses out of doors. Then Communion service allowed outside but autos had to be parked no closer that 6 feet. The priest was in a tent with clear shower curtains on all sides. The Eucharist was received through a cut in the plastic.
When the bishop became more lenient inside services allowed. Only 10 persons allowed inside with 1 porter outside. Towards the end of the epidemic Mass inside but 6 feet on all sides between attendees. Masks required. Between services church disinfected. I stay outside in a car until communion then donned my mask went inside to receive and out again. Funerals, weddings only 6 allowed. Last rites or Anointing of the Sick nope. Governor Northam sent plain clothes agents into churches to photograph or take notes. Where were our two bishops?
On Easter Sunday word was out that the Baptists gathered in their church parking lot to have an in car service. Not the Catholics. Not even the bells were rung.
In Minnesota the bishops did fight back, but only after the situation became beyond absurd.
We had a a stupid “dial” system where every type of institution had a different “setting” saying what they could do. For example, closed down completely, open with limited occupancy, etc. Eventually these were relaxed for most businesses, up to 50% occupancy.
However, religious gatherings had a specific dial that was still nearly as restrictive as possible. 25% occupancy, or 10 people, whichever was lower. So the Cathedral of St. Paul, which can accommodate thousands of people, was only allowed to have 10 people in the entire building. And from Tampon Tim Walz’s speeches, it sounded like he intended to keep it at that level until all other restrictions were lifted. That is, you could potentially have businesses open for normal operations, except for face masks, and masses still limited to 10 people.
The bishops revolted and finally said “if you don’t allow masses, we’re just going to have masses anyway.” Unfortunately they still managed to grasp defeat from the jaws of victory by accepting church services to be allowed with 25% occupancy (at a time when nearly all businesses allowed 50% occupancy.)
Can anyone link to reputable documentation of migrants from Africa and other parts of the Muslim world perpetrating violence in Europe?
Not sure about the background color of comments but it is easier to read. Just noted the commentators names are in green ink.
Linked is a study on rape in Sweden from 2000-2020. Immigrants in Sweden are heavily from Muslim countries:
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/08862605241311611
Ethnicity of perpetrators is not kept statistical track of in many European nations due to the results giving ammunition to oppose an open border’s policy, intimidation of police and governments also playing a role.
Dispensing from the obligation to attend Mass in the early weeks or few months of the pandemic, and even canceling public Masses, at that time was understandable IMO. We DID NOT know for sure how virulent COVID was going to be and you can’t blame people for not having 20/20 hindsight.
However, once it became obvious that people were not dropping dead in the streets and COVID was not the second coming of the Black Death (the summer or at latest, the fall of 2020), normal Mass schedules should have resumed. In my diocese (Springfield IL) public Masses started up again in June 2020, albeit with social distancing restrictions and limited seating (at least one parish we attended asked you to make “reservations” online before coming). The general dispensation from the Sunday Mass obligation remained in effect for about a year; it probably could have been reinstated sooner but at least Bp Paprocki didn’t wait as long as some other bishops did. The one permanent change from COVID is that most people now just wave at each other during the Sign of Peace instead of shaking hands, that is, if they even do the Sign of Peace.
“Forgive them Father for they know not what they do”
As a man. the Son of Man forgave His murderers. The Son of Man then placed the unforgivable crimes of man into the hands of His Father to forgive; sins and crimes against the Holy Spirit that can only be forgiven by the Infinite Supreme Sovereign Being, by God the Father in union with Jesus Christ, the Son of God and the Son of Man.
After Jesus Christ ascended into heaven and before the Holy Spirit descended upon the Apostles and the Catholic Church, Jesus Christ presented redeemed creation to His Father and received from His Father the forgiveness for which He asked from His Father before His death on the cross.
It is important to understand that forgiveness of God the Father in heaven is necessary to fulfill the complete and eternal forgiveness of sinners.
I can forgive my murder. I cannot forgive your murderer without becoming an accessory after the fact (of the crime). I beg God the Father in heaven as did Jesus Christ crucified to forgive the crimes against the Holy Spirit: the scandals, the heresies, the blasphemies, the atheism by placing these crimes into the hands of God and thanking God for the brokenness of man being redeemed, repaired and the Catholic Church to sustain God’s forgiveness, through the Mother of God, Mary Immaculate, Perpetual Virgin.
Yes, the Muslims of Islam reverence the Blessed Virgin Mary because of her Perpetual Virginity. The Blessed Virgin will convert the Muslims as She converted the cannibals in Guadeloupe.
I belonged to the Consolata Mission Women’s Guild. There they had a shrunken head, an elephant’s foot and an African hut among ebony carved articles made in Kenya. The bishop of Marsabit, Kenya, Most Reverend Ambrose Ravasi, welcomed me as though he had waited his whole life just to say “Hello” to me. That was when Father Ambrose was Superior General of the Consolatas in Somerset, New Jersey.
He learned the language, built a seminary and Church in Marsabit. He is laid to rest in Marsabit.
His requiem Mass is on You Tube and an interview. His sense of humor was not diminished despite chiggers, malaria and very old age. He said: ” What was I to do, say “No” to God?”
Blessed be God in His angels and his saints.
Jesus Christ, true God and true man rose from the dead and ascended into heaven because Jesus Christ the Son of God and the Son of Man was innocent. Death is the wages of sin. Jesus was innocent. Therefore death had no hold on Him.
In a like manner, our Blessed Mother, the Mother of God was immaculate, the Perpetual Virgin in body, mind and soul. Mary was assumed into heaven because Mary was innocent. Death had no hold on her.
In Mary her only desire was to do the will of God perfectly. Therefore, God endowed Mary with the fulness of grace to fulfill her desire to serve Him perfectly.
Our Sorrowful Mother understood and realized the suffering of her Son, Jesus Christ, more perfectly than any other mother or person might since Mary’s soul was innocent and united with Christ in Joy, in Sorrow and in Glory.
This union with Jesus Christ brought about her Assumption with Christ into heaven, an Assumption that all souls are called to share when our souls have become innocent through the Catholic Church and the Seven Sacraments.
The Killer and rapist of a five year old child has destroyed the innocence of our standard of Justice, scandalized his victim and violated the fabric of the family and society.
The killer was condemned to death and capital punishment. Let us hope and pray the death penalty washed his soul from the mortal sin of homicide in the first degree.
Let us hope that the condemned killer used the death penalty to bring about Justice and remedy his guilt.
As a citizen of mankind his original innocence into which he was created brought him to repent and renew his original innocence and his image of God in his soul. This turn toward God would exorcise the devil from his soul and relieve his guilt as well as return Justice to the victim, to the family and to society.
=
The Latin Mass is celebrated in every soul as religion is man’s response to the gift of Faith from God in a loving and intimate relationship between the soul and his God.
No one can deprive a man of his relationship with God except the man himself. No one with God’s help and grace, sanctifying grace, can separate man from his conscience.
I showed up at my home parish after the governor of AR started recommending opening the churches with restrictions during the time the scarf lady (friend of Fauci) was saying you couldn’t sing in church because it would spread Covid. I was particularly horrified about the not singing part because music is my favorite means of worship. I was met by people at the front of our vestibule who walked to me, gave me a 4 digit code verbally in a rapid fashion, told me to memorize the code which I had already forgotten, & told me they were going to take me to my seat. I told them that I had to pee before service. This disrupted their plan. So this one woman told me to pee & then come back to her with the code I had already forgotten and they would take me to my seat. I looked at her like she was crazy. I told her the reason I had come to church early was so I could pray in the peace of the church. I was very upset as these strangers were inserting themselves in the middle of my worship & time. After telling this woman I had wanted to pray in peace, I simply turned around & walked out the door. I have never been back to my home parish. I have attended other parishes locally.
I was greatly horrified & disappointed by Catholic leadership who did not understand that the soul is more important than the body & thereby closed down their churches. It shows that when they come to their faith, they are physical cowards.
Don’t get me started on our governor & state government who played dictators during this time.