John Allen of Crux makes a good point. When President Obama pandered for Catholic votes by accepting the President of Notre Dame’s invitation to speak at Notre Dame’s commencement and receive an honorary degree, the president, rabidly pro-choice and willing to allow for the slaughter of babies in partial birth abortions, jumped at the opportunity to speak in order to show that a renowned Catholic University loved him and Catholics can vote for a politician who is not opposed to abortion, even the hideous partial birth murder of babies. The President knew he would divide and conquer the Catholic Church by that photo op. He could also poke in the eye the local bishop who opposed the President’s pandering for votes and had not be notified in advance of Notre Dame’s invitation to the pandering President.
Of course President Obama didn’t have to gas any protesting the victims of murder that his pro-choice politics has inflicted on millions of babies in order to get to Notre Dame for more than just a photo op. Notre Dame simply ignored those who might have protested and marginalized them including their bishop whom they failed to notify about the invitation given to the President which he had accepted.
John Allen says the Knights of Columbus failed to notify Archbishop Gregory of Washington about the President’s visit when it was conceived prior to the President’s photo-op in front of St. John’s Protestant Episcopal Church. He held a bible in front of their sign which says clearly “All are Welcome” except President Trump seeking a photo op with Bible in hand in order to pander to Christians for their votes.
To be honest with you, I despise seeing politicians in churches pandering for votes. It happens all the time in black churches and they get away with it without having their tax exempt status challenged.
Catholic priests who might invite politicians to speak at Mass (after Holy Communion of course) would be challenged and called to task about threatening the Catholic Church’s tax excerpt status.
Archbishop Gregory’s fatal flaw wasn’t calling out President Trump but making no mention by name of Vice President Joe Biden’s on-going reception of Holy Communion and insisting he’s a good Catholic. That is pandering for votes too and the protesters he has cleared have all been killed by the abortions laws he supports and avidly promotes, including killing black babies.
Shouldn’t all lives matter? Isn’t the fact that some lives don’t matter at the heart of our country’s current racial crisis?
Archbishop Gregory, good for you for standing up to President Trump and his pandering for Catholic votes. Catholics are waiting for you now to deal with those under your authority as Archbishop of Washington, the Catholic politicians like Nancy Pelosi and Joe Biden who must have Canon Law edicts applied to them. Interdict them and tell them that they are not to receive Holy Communion in any parish in your Archdiocese.
In fact, wouldn’t it be better to tell them not to visit any Catholic Church until they repent??????
85 comments:
"He held a bible in front of their sign which says clearly “All are Welcome” except President Trump seeking a photo op with Bible in hand in order to pander to Christians for their votes."
If "All are Welcome" means what you think it means, applying to any and every person who wants to come onto their church property, then the good Episcopalians of St. John's Church should have welcomed the arsonists who set their building on fire. After all, "All are Welcome"......
"All are Welcome" means all, doesn't it?
No, it doesn't. And using that signage to defend President Trump's unwanted and unwarranted intrusion onto the church property for a partisan political photo-op is completely bogus.
So some sinners are welcome and others aren’t. The “All are welcome” meme in vogue within liberal Christianity as it pertains to moral and immoral sexuality. The meme is a lie though and should not be on any church sign or sung in any church service. It is politically motivated.
Hey "progressive" Clergy, is your plan to be eaten last by YOUR party members?
From the New York Post:
Turns out desecration is no crime in New York City.
The Queens man arrested for scarring the landmarked façade of St. Patrick’s Cathedral during a George Floyd protest is now free — because the Manhattan District Attorney’s office declined to prosecute him.
Archbishop Vigano is defending President Trump against fake catholic Wilton Gregory
I find any person, Catholic, politician, priest, bishop who spends the majority of their lives concerned with things of Man and all his lusts for sex, power, money, and fleeing its boredom through ever greater depravity for entertainment, to be tiresome ignorant fools.
Who among these leaders follows the most basic principle of returning God's love with all their heart, mind, soul and strength so that they then are able to love their neighbor as their own self?
The answer is, they do not...and then, why should I follow them? You cannot teach what you do not know, but these fools persist in proclaiming a Way they have never glimpsed, and even worse fools follow them to utter destruction.
As a lay Catholic, it appears to me that the problem is that many (most?) of the leaders of the Catholic Church, up to and including many bishops and recent popes, have decided that the leftist positions they themselves hold, as expressed in their many statements that take sides in political issues (economic issues, health care issues, social issues, etc.), are more important to them than protecting the lives of unborn children or in fulfilling their pastoral responsibility to address the scandalous pro-abortion positions of Catholic politicians by applying the appropriate canonical sanctions against them.
Their (the bishops') refusal to discipline these politicians is itself a scandal within the Church that hurts the very people the bishops are supposed to shepherd (lead) to heaven, and damages the Church's image outside of it, which may prevent many people who have left the Church from returning to it or coming into it if they are not already Catholic. Although Archbishop Vigano has apparently labeled only Archbishop Gregory a "false shepherd," it appears to me that we may have many false shepherds leading the faithful astray.
As for the current "racist" foolishness, there has not been ONE indication that this was anything more than run of the mill excessive use of force coupled with poor judgement leading to an unneccessary death.
All the bleating sheep answering the media driven clarion call of RACISM are simply prostituting themselves to public opinion in a gigantic and pathetic #metoo movement of virtue signalling, saying only "THEY may be a racist, but not ME! SEE?!"
Rather than courage, they are only cowards, whose meaning in life is only that in the court of fickle public opinion which frequently eats its own young. Meanwhile, they are assisting various forces seeking to destabilize a country for own gain, individual to political.
They are FOOLS.
The phrase "All are Welcome" at St. Johns Church is not a lie.
Nor is is aptly applied to a President who uses violence to disperse a crowd of protesters so that he can engage in a staged, partisan political photo-op in front of the church.
Hey, Anon@1007,
you kinda sorta neglected to mention the part that these "protestors" had already attempted to burn the historic landmark church, and that lack of shooting vandals and looters has shown admirable (perhaps) restraint. Or, is it racist to mention that part, too?
Anonymous K,
You forgot that your wooden god, Obama, authorized the widespread use of drone killings and even quipped "he's really good at killing." But I imagine he would be welcome at your parish.
You may recognize this from today’s second reading:
“Brothers and sisters, rejoice.
Mend your ways, encourage one another,
agree with one another, live in peace,
and the God of love and peace will be with you.”
2 Corinthians 13: 11
We cannot pick and choose whom we love. Our priest today (a very traditional priest in a very traditional parish) homilized: “Love is the greatest attribute of God.” We don’t always have like someone’s life choices, but we must choose to live in peace for our God of love to be with us.
Okay, blast away...
Anon12
Bob - What the protesters did or did not do has NOTHING to do with what Trump did. You, typically, engage in "what-about-ism." It's a useless deflection.
The true FOOLS are the ones who, in their frustration and desperation, continue to defend and utterly indefensible president.
Anon12:
Good point: "We don't always have to like someone's life choices, but we must choose to live in peace for our God of love to be with us." True. At the same time, we do not have to condone someone's "life choices," we do not have to vote in favor of their "life choices" to make them legal if we, following the Church's teachings, know them to be immoral. Nor should we have to pay for them, as some have tried to force taxpayers and employers to do.
"Living in peace" applies both ways: Those who make certain "life choices" should also say to those who may not approve, "I know you may not agree with what I believe and do, and I will never ask you to believe, do or pay for, anything that violates your beliefs or conscience."
If someone really loves those who may disagree with him, then he will not force them, it seems to me, to violate their own consciences in support of the "life choices" he makes. Wouldn't you agree?
SAV
SAV, thanks for your response.
Of course our faith informs our life choices. No question. And, of course I would just love if it “applies both ways”! But reality is where I live while on this earth, and I cannot control another person’s choices except through my model of Christian daily living (which includes voting for candidates that most model what I believe), praying for changed hearts and minds, and supporting those who are working in the vineyard. I have to do my best to take the higher road. I am absolutely required as a Catholic Christian to try to do that. My last comment was simply to say that today’s Mass readings challenge me to keep focused on this higher road and not be distracted by what others are saying/doing. True Christian living is not a popularity contest. The higher road is so tough, and a daily challenge. Do I get angry and burned out with the challenges? Absolutely. But we keep on keepin’ on trying to do the next right thing. God help us all.
Anon12
The New York Times, the liberals portable brain, demands you ascribe to the Black Lives Matter movement, otherwise your family should cut you off. Just another example of liberal “tolerance.”
"We cannot pick and choose whom we love"
Er, Uhmm...like loving our President for instance? Yes, even our President.
I don't see or feel much love from the protestors though. There is plenty of what seems to be a lot of hate-filled rhetoric and anti-authoritarianism.
The Catechism has a few things to say about our Christian duty to respect those in authority over us. For some reason at this time, some of our Catholic leaders ignore that part.
As far as the president standing in front of the church and holding a bible, shouldn't the question be asked as to why the Episcopal rector was not there instead?
And as far as the president standing at the Pope St John Paul II center, shouldn't the question be asked as to why the good Archbishop of Washington was not there instead?
Anon@212
So, you are saying rioting, burning, stealing are absolutely unrelated to level of response by government, and that whether having a peace filled pot smoking sit-in or engaged in smash/grab/burn/loot is unrelated to proper response? Have you ever been schooled in anything remotely associate with science, logic, and cause and effect, or is gravity and its effects when you next jump off a roof a new concept to you?
Imagine...shutting down a debate by calling cause and effect "only useless deflecting what-about-ism", and in short, your wittiest reply is to cup hands over ears and scream, "I CAN'T HEAR YOU!" when confronted by proven facts such as when people start burning historic structures that it is time to throw the bums out and that this is exactly what happpened.
Or, maybe by your scheme of things, the clearing action actually was done a week or two earlier, before ever the rioting destructive mob ever assembled? No wonder you are bitter over such a paradoxical world view and driven to reject reason as superfluous. You and your pals are walking buckets of psychosis lashing out at anyone and anything in your bitter rage.
Over what will you be outraged, next? I suspect it will NOT be over attempts at internal unelected power coup players trying to bring down a legitimately elected government, or attempts to stifle a nation's people and economy in time of plague leading up to election time, or attempts to turn a police brutality incident into street revolution by force just in time for elections which you see as standing in the way of your demented idea of "progress". You will not be outraged by that, as your meaningless self admits no such thing as true morals, and that evil means justify your objective ends.
In short, you are everything which you claim to hate. Good thing you are too busy screaming to read that. My advice is to have another few beers and a few more smokes to calm that bleary red-eyed rage and you can look on tomorrow morning with a fresh and hangover recharged rage, maybe find a new place to rant on the net rather than pay for your own.
Bob, who is “Anon@212 you are addressing here?
Bob,
The lefty anonymous crew never want to address inconvenient facts about the left, they just move to the next lefty talking point.
The US Catholic hierarchy on the whole is a motley crew of intellectual and spiritual underachievers, who could never have passed muster prior to the 1960s. They think they are running an NGO instead of a faith based church. Most of these sorry creatures will be gone over the next 10-15 years and the Church will be a better place for those who still hold the faith.
TJM:
You made an interesting point regarding the qualifications of those who make up the hierarchy of the Church in the United States. If they were evaluated on the basis of their performance in their jobs as employees might be in the private sector (i.e. - how many lapsed Catholics they bring back to our church; how many Christians from other churches they bring into full communion with us; how many previously unbaptized converts they bring into the church through the process of initiation [baptism and confirmation]; how much they increase Mass attendance; how much they increase giving at the parish level, etc.), most of them would be fired.
And, when I look at high-profile American archdioceses, such as the Archdiocese of Washington (DC) and its current archbishop (Wilton Gregory), it's hard to imagine that the Church, in searching for a well-qualified bishop or priest to head the archdiocese in the nation's capital, couldn't find a single bishop or priest, out of approximately 40,000 priests and many bishops in the U.S., who was better-qualified than Wilton Gregory. Yet, in spite of what I would consider his almost complete lack of qualifications, he was selected.
It does make me think that the Church needs to seriously consider the processes by which it selects and evaluates candidates for bishop, if we are to be able in the future to carry out the Church's mission.
SAV
Bob 5:59 - Careful there, your blood pressure seems a little high!
Fr McD 8:16 - “ So some sinners are welcome and others aren’t. The “All are welcome” meme in vogue within liberal Christianity as it pertains to moral and immoral sexuality. The meme is a lie though and should not be on any church sign or sung in any church service. It is politically motivated.”
Actually the Rector and church officials are on record for having said they would have welcomed Trump into their church if he had been willing to meet with some of the protesters, community activists and black representatives to listen to their concerns followed by a prayer service for national healing and unity. So yes, all were welcome at St John’s but Trump chose not to follow that path.
I think it showed good spirit on behalf of the church officials considering they were without prior warning shot at with tear gas and forcibly removed from the entrance porch area without warning or explanation.
Anon 5:39 - “ As far as the president standing in front of the church and holding a bible, shouldn't the question be asked as to why the Episcopal rector was not there instead?”
The reason the Rector and other local church officials weren’t there with Trump was (a) they weren’t invited, nor were they pre-warned or was their permission for the visit sought; and (b) they were forcibly removed by troops from their property having been gathered at the church’s entrance, after they had been shot at with tear gas immediately before Trump started his walk.
Vatican official compares racism to COVID-19
Racism is a virus of the spirit, if not isolated, spreads quickly, says Archbishop Vincenzo Paglia, head of the Pontifical Academy for Life.
The fight against racism, he added, is done "not with violence but in the style of Martin Luther King, Jr.: with words, with culture, with faith, with humanism. It is fought the same way we fight against the coronavirus.""It's not enough to remain silent," the Italian archbishop said. "To prevent the virus of racism from multiplying, those (who oppose racism) must also multiply."
UKSeminarian.
To Bob and all who agree with you, can't you see that your concepts of "logic", "science" and even "reason" are all merely constructs of the white, western patriarchy?
You should broaden your horizons!
Many if not most of your "truths" are basically the ideological assertions of wealthy, white, conservative, American, Catholic males.
UKSeminarian.
TJM, I strongly disagree. US Catholics are blessed to be led by such prelates as Archbishop Wilton Daniel Gregory and Cardinal Blase J Cupich.
Archbishop Gregory has recently stated that he is taking "hope" from the BLM protests and he looks at it as a "different transition moment".
Archbishop Gregory reminds us that the Church "lives in society. The Church does not live behind the 4 walls of the structures where we worship".
The great Second Vatican Council called on us to read "the signs of the times" !!
The Church must listen to, and learn from, the world around it. That includes a modern world where racial minorities (and women and LGBTQI people too) are crying out for equality and fair treatment.
Too many Catholics react with fear to modern life, modern times, rather than interacting with it. We must at times turn a critical eye to the teachings and traditions of the Church.
Reading the signs of our time, we must have a mature faith, we must grow into social sensitivity and take faith-based political stands!
I can strongly recommend Jonathan Haidt's 2012 book "The Righteous Mind". It remains the masterclass in answering "why it is so hard for us to get along?".
(The following could apply perhaps to the TJM et al vs UK Priest etc verbal conflict on this blog)
"The current political civil war is between two groups of educated white people with radically different views about what the country is, what morality is and what we need to do to move forward. The modern civil war is being fought by the extremes. Most Americans are non-political, but in a sense they don't exist...."..
The killing of George Floyd was an act of violence and abuse of police power. Blacks and whites have every justification to protest. But these demonstrations have become about something much bigger - about competing views of America. And the ideological battle between these views is spearheaded largely by rival white politicians, leaders and agitators.
Haidt nailed the core problem by stating the battle between progressives and conservatives was akin to a struggle between "different cultures".
Any nation seeking to save its liberal democracy must work "very hard to turn down tribal identities and intergroup conflicts....... liberal democracy is predicated on the ability of groups to compete but also to cooperate..."
Haidt has predicted violence in the US will increase because this was a contest between moral claims where more people believed "the ends justify the means."
This is the consequence when the universal liberal culture - based around nation, family, community and shared benefits - is weakened from within and without.
The essence of liberalism has been treating people as people regardless of race, gender, religion and ethnicity. This idea is now being dismantled in the USA under the flawed notion of progressive social justice. It attacks the universalism that has been the cement holding the social structure together.
GS.
UK Seminarian,
I feel sorry for the Catholic in Church in England if you are an example of who is going into the priesthood. But I have my doubts that you really are a seminarian.
Any sentient Catholic who studies what Cupich or Gregory, know they are barely Catholic in the meaningful sense of the word. They are empty suits. A British priest, I wish I could recall his name, demolished Cupich intellectually in a public meeting in England not so long ago. Cupich protects the gay mafia in his Archdiocese and attacks faithful priests. Gregory is part of the same ilk. They are leftists.
Citing Vatican Disaster II is poor salesmanship. Prior to that Council the Church was truly an international, vibrant Church and grudgingly respected by the secular world. Since its reforms have been implemented we are a hollow, disunited rump of a Church. But keep drinking that liberal Kool-Aid, it tastes so good.
Anonymous GS,
The problem with modern "liberals" is they are not liberal. In American universities we have speech codes and conservative ideas are mocked or suppressed completely. The national media is much the same.
The Democratic Party owns what happened in Minneapolis. There has not been a Republican mayor there since 1961 (although a Republican held the office for a couple of days in 1978). The Mayor and City Council are all Democrats. The Governor is a Democrat. The police union, which protects bad cops like the one that killed the decedent, is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Democratic Party and give all of their political donations to the Democratic Party. If the Democrats were serious about police abuse they would insist the unions modify its rules to make it easier to get rid of bad cops. But they won't. Our idiot national media cannot, or will not, make this simple connection because it does not advance their narrative that cops are bad but the Democratic Party has no responsibility.
The icing on the cake, is if you call a cop to tell them that your garage has been broken into you are now a white supremacist. You don't need to take my word for it, here are the words of a moron from the Minneapolis City Council:
"If you are a comfortable white person asking to dismantle the police I invite you to reflect: are you willing to stick with it? Will you be calling in three months to ask about garage break-ins? Are you willing to dismantle white supremacy in all systems, including a new system?" Minneapolis City Council President Lisa Bender tweeted."
That is the statement of a so-called rational liberal. Pray tell, how do you reason with someone like that?
So the good Archbishop of D.C. tells his priests to wear cassock's to protest against our ELECTED leader of the United States President Trump, its called a march for life give me a break! This man is the most Pro-Life president in history and has done more for Christians than ANY PRESIDENT EVER! Hey guys time to wake up and see what is happening in this country this is not about race its about the total take down of The United States of America and to install a Marxist-Leninist system.
And they spray painted the Ghandi statue in front of the Indian Embassy in D.C., and tore down Confederate monuments in Richmond, Birmingham, Charlotte and Nashville, the United States as we know it will cease to exist in less than a decade. Now we have police officers wiping the feet of rioters in Boston and laying prostate before BLM rioters asking for forgiveness YES police officers. I only take knee and bow before Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ the King NOT human beings who are burning, destroying, looting, killing.
TJM
UKSeminarian is not a real person. The comments at 12:40 and 2:37 are clearly ironic. But rather than to draw attention to the absurdities of the leftist argument by overstating it, the aim is to get people to take it seriously and reply. It's classic trollery.
TJM,
Would you agree that progressives, radicals and "modern liberals" have pulled apart and even betrayed what originally liberalism was meant to be about; ie limited but effective government, an independent judiciary, responsive public officials and free and fair elections etc ?
Would you include yourself among "the alienated ranks of Catholic intellectuals who are in ferment, who are appalled by the damage being done to human life particularly among children, and equally appalled at the decline of cultural tradition, the attrition of Christianity and the growing inroads of progressive 'morality' ..." ?
Francis Fukuyama said back in 1999 that: Liberal democracy has always been dependent on certain shared cultural values to work properly.
I think you are saying that you believe the "modern liberals" in the USA and the Democratic Party in our times has moved so far in the direction of "looney left" you would share almost no cultural values with such people.
(By the way, I think "UK Seminarian" here is doing a mocking imitation of a certain type of leftist "progressive" seminarian.)
While standing on the sidelines of these discussions, something has always bugged me about TJM. He too perfectly embodies the crazy, irrational, angry, racist conservative that liberals often like to portray. The dude is obviously messing with you all. He's probably an extreme leftist, and possibly not even a real Catholic - but most of all he probably just likes to mess with people for a laugh regardless of their politics.
Seriously, watch some Saturday Night Live skits and late nite TV where they make fun of conservatives and you'll see where he gets it all. The phrases, talking points, everything - it's just too perfect. TJM can't possibly really be the person he portrays online.
In the age of the internet and social media it is all about the Meme. No need for books or essays or debates. All that is needed is the #hashtag, a snippet of image, and a slogan. Yup, I am disgruntled and disgusted.
Not necessarily "classic trollery".
I found it amusing when, in a thread on the endless overuse of the word " community", "UK Seminarian" confided to UK Priest that he had red hair, loved cats, had suffered from both bipolar disorder and herpes and he was wondering whether he should identify as a member of London's "red haired community" or London's "herpes suffering community".
He was then (and again here) making a point in a silly way.
John Nolan,
Great detective work. Thanks. I should not feed the trolls!
Anon@11.49,
Now that is a very interesting insight!
The great critic, Cyril Connolly, once wrote of Orwell and D H Lawrence that they were men whose personalities shone out in everything they ever said or wrote.
With many ordinary people, too, their personalities can often shine out in what they write.
For well over 5 years I followed this blog from the sidelines (before I very occasionally posted a comment).
To me, Bee, Gene, Fr K, Mark Thomas and John Nolan etc seemed to be very much real individuals with interesting and varied insights.
Do you really think it possible if the real person behind TJM was a radical leftist non-Catholic person just messing with people here for his or her or their own amusement then:
1. Don't you think such a person would get bored with such a game and not take the time and effort to play TJM so often over a period of YEARS?
2. What motive could one have for continuing this game over years once the novelty of the joke had worn off?
3. Don't you think if you are right such a person behind TJM would slip up at times and instead of hints there would at least occasionally be clearer indications of such a game being played that people who regularly follow this blog would have picked up on by now?
I look forward to TJM's response.
I imagine the next step here could be that UK Priest or you Anon@11.49 will suggest that Fr A McD invented the character TJM and let this TJM character rave on for YEARS as a crazy, angry, conservative and elderly Catholic man, so this creation occasionally could articulate views Fr McD himself held or this creation could at times aggressively and rudely insult people who held views on religion, society and politics that Fr McD himself opposed.
I myself find it very hard to believe how anyone could follow this blog long term if he or she was not very interested in Catholic liturgy, Catholic teachings and what is going on with the Church, the papacy etc in our era.
I don't think Fr McD created TJM. They are obviously different people. However, I have noticed TJM is very one-note, often repeating the same things over and over again. This would make it easy to keep up the ruse long term.
I likely went too far is suggesting that he is an extreme leftist and not Catholic, but it's obvious he gets joy out of messing with people. Is the idea that TJM is largely a troll persona anymore crazy than the idea that Fr K maintains dozens of blogger accounts pretending to be different people over the course of years?
Sorry if this is a bit off topic, but I've recently read the Catholic, Cambridge historian, Eamon Duffy's "Saints and Sinners", a history of the papacy.
One pages 274-275, he wrote something I found fascinating.
He wrote that in the immediate post-Conciliar years, the Council resulted in most Catholics having to cope with a "bewildering stream of directives from above" while significant numbers of Catholics "found themselves sleep walking ....loyal to an authority which was calling them to embrace attitudes which the same authority had once denounced as heresy...."
As someone too young to have any memories of 1965 to 1975, was that really what it was like for many Catholics in those times?
This REALLY interests me. And I would greatly appreciate a view on the above from anyone at this blog who is old enough to have been an adult 1965-1975 and have some clear memories of that era.
And if Duffy is correct what were these "attitudes" (not teachings?) ? That is the attitudes Catholics were being called on to embrace which the Church pre 1962-65 had denounced as heresy.
This just doesn't interest me. It is very important to me.
Paul.
Were it not for the fact that I know people who are VERY like TJM, I would consider the possibility that he is a phantom creation.
His "crazy, irrational, angry, racist conservative" outbursts are typical for others I encounter in various social media outlets. The thing is, I know too many of them personally to dismiss them as fictional.
TJM also comments on NLM but in a less polemic vein. NLM doesn't get involved in secular politics.
When posting a comment here one can choose a nom de plume to suit or choose Anonymous. There is no need to have multiple accounts.
For example, this comment.
Many of the comments of "UK Seminarian" remind me of the banal words of some young Catholics who have just completed some first year university courses in philosophy or literature etc; and have recently been introduced to the key ideas of Nietzsche, Sartre or Derrida etc by a leftist, secular humanist lecturer.
In real life most who hold those views or are influenced by them quickly leave the Church which in one way is a good thing as staying on in the Church and becoming real life "Susan from the Parish Council" - type Catholic parishioners ends up doing harm to other Catholics who still believe.
Paul - For the period you name I was between 7 and 17 years old. So my memories of what was going on church-wise are fairly limited.
I don't know that many typical folks at that time, or even in the present day, could describe with much accuracy anything that has been denounced as heresy.
Much of what the people in the pews experienced or took away from that period would have been, I suggest, very much influenced by the pastors in their parishes. There are stories of those who worked very hard to understand for themselves and make sensible to their parishioners the changes in the liturgy. Some grumbled, but went along as obedient priests. Some dug trenches, set up barricades, started boiling oil, and had to be removed under vows of obedience to their bishops. Some went the other direction and started doing pretty much whatever they liked.
We've heard stories here about folks who became disaffected after they could see the priest's face at mass. Given some of the priests I have known, I can understand why.... But I digress.
I'm trying to think where you might read on the attitudes of Catholic folks who were "with it" in terms of being active, practicing Catholics at the time. You might try a religious house and speak with some of the older sisters. Monastic orders tended to be a bit withdrawn, as is the nature of their calling.
It is an interesting question. Let us know if you find anything.
Anonymous at 3:27,
Racist? Sorry to disappoint you but the real racists are guilt ridden white liberals and folks like Obama who see every social ill through the prison of race. Liberals have invented white privilege and see racism under any rock, like the liberal loonies running Minneapolis. Who suffered most from the burning and lootings? The black community, that’s who. And black police officers died but liberals could care less about that. You liberals can ignore the facts, but you will do so at your peril. Some day those looters may come to your neighborhood.
Back in Illinois many virtue signalers have signs in their yards reading: Hate Has No Place in this House. There should be a big asterisk that reads: except we hate conservatives, Republicans and Faithful Christians who follow the tenets of their faith.
I think many of you suffer from the bigotry of low expectations
I note that when lefties want to shut down debate, they scream racism, homophobia or some other such nonsense. They also employ an Orwellian use of language, like many lefty posters here. I challenged anyone here to find an example of my alleged “racism” so I may properly respond.
I am sorry someone mentioned that I post at NLM. My fear is that some of the folks here might try to ruin that fine website, whose commenters are overwhelmingly, solid, faithful Catholics, and ruin it with their Trump Derangement Syndrome and other such liberal nonsense. I doubt the editor there would put up with their puerile antics
It seems the DC Archbishop was actually invited to the President's visit to the shrine days before it took place.
He declined “the kind invitation to attend the event celebrating International Religious Freedom on Tuesday, June 2, 2020 at the Saint John Paul II Shrine.“
https://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/archbishop-gregory-invited-to-jpii-shrine-trump-event-days-before-public-st
oy vey
Darn, I forgot TJM posts on NLM. That pretty much shoots down my theory. Oh well.
Also, it's funny TJM demands evidence of him being racist as he has no problem telling everyone else who they are and what they believe without any evidence whatsoever. Nobody here is treating you half as bad as you treat others.
Well...
If black lives "really mattered", we would see lots of marches to the local Planned Parenthood "clinic" where lots---hundreds of thousands I would suspect---of black lives are snuffed out, What? No marches? Even though far more blacks die in abortion clinics than from police shootings or black on black crime? Maybe the DC mayor should have had "Black Lives Matter" painted on the streets in front of Planned Parenthood clinics---sure there are plenty of those in DC. There is just so much hypocrisy when it comes to these marches. Tucker Carlson of FOX pointed out last week that 10 unarmed blacks were killed by police last year---ten---and that was from the liberal Washington Post. In contrast, some 7,400 blacks were murder victims last year. Don't see any marches about that. Maybe because most of that is black on black crime? It gets greater media coverage when it is a black attacked by a white, whether a cop or someone else.
As for Wilton Gregory not really being qualified (?) to be archbishop of Washington, I suspect the reason for the appointment was that he will become the first black cardinal of the United States. Why else would you send a 72-year old (now 73) to the new post? I don't know of any other explanation, as it is about as open a process as selection of members of a fraternity or country club. If we don't know who the other candidates were, how are we to judge whether he was the most qualified of the three the pope typically chooses from.
As for Trump, well I hoped the loss of 40 or so GOP congressional seats in 2018---the worst Republican losses since Watergate 44 years earlier---would have modified Trump's behavior, but obviously that was misplaced optimism. If he is re-elected, probably 50-50 at this stage, he'll most likely be dealing with a Democratic House once again (control of the US House almost never changes in a presidential year). Good luck...
Question for all. What will you do when the Red Guard comes and drags you out of your home?
TJM:
“I note that when lefties want to shut down debate, they scream racism, homophobia or some other such nonsense.”
I agree, and it is not helpful to meaningful conversation. Similarly, one could also add that when some other people want to shut down debate, they scream abortion, which is also not helpful to meaningful conversation.
The fact that said “lefties” or “other people” do this does not, however, preclude the possibility of having appropriate and meaningful conversations on these topics.
Jonnyc,
I read the article you cited. If the facts are accurate the Archbishop owes President Trump and the people of Washington DC an abject apology. Father McDonald should consider reading the article because unlike many priests, he might just modify his views of the whole affair.
Jonnyc,
I read the article you cited. If the facts are accurate the Archbishop owes President Trump and the people of Washington DC an abject apology. Father McDonald should consider reading the article because unlike many priests, he might just modify his views of the whole affair.
What amazes me with everything going on now is the madness of millions of people especially young people in the west being led by lies to believe a nation like the UK which is in fact one of the least racist nations on earth is in fact one of the most racist!
Many on the Left can rave on about context being everything and then often provide no context.
As in the UK, and even the USA, are racist compared to what? Compared to China where over a million Uyghur Muslims are held in 181 detention camps (where Chinese communists say they are being "reeducated and improving their Chinese language skills") where human rights groups claim this ethnic minority are being brainwashed, psychologically tortured and forced to engage in practices contrary to Islam.
Or the UK and the USA are racist compared to what other nation, state or empire that has had or has wonderful race relations that the racist UK and USA can aspire to emulate?
Another thing lately that amazes me is how a person who claims to be a member of an oppressed racial and or religious minority (in a basically fairly tolerant Western democracy) can be interviewed and he or she is claiming, sometimes with a hint of menace, "You must understand me! You must understand how I have suffered and how I am and have been oppressed" and so on... and then at times almost simultaneously as a "privileged white male" I can be told "You can never understand me! You can never know or never understand how I've suffered!"
Fr K,
After the Council did several 180-degree turns (especially as regards religious liberty, collegiality and the ecumenical movement), would the fact that the Catholic Church c. 1965 to 1975 and after came to recognize the merits and salvation potential of other churches and even other religions..... would this alone not seem like heresy to millions of Catholics (in that era 1965 to 1975) who had been taught by priests, brothers and nuns before 1962, who really believed their Church was the one true Church?
How could the average Catholic of average IQ see it as a "development" in the Church's thinking and teaching when around the world millions of Catholics in the 1950s were forbidden to attend the wedding or funeral of a Protestant friend, but after 1965, lay Catholics were encouraged by many Catholic priests and bishops to pray with Protestants?
Fr K
When Joseph Ratzinger during his phase as a liberal theologian wrote in 1966:
"Liturgical forms and customs, and even dogmatic formulations, thought to have arisen with the apostles now appear as products of complicated processes of growth within the womb of history."
Pre 1962-65, would Rome have regarded that as moving in the direction of Modernism?
And when any educated Catholic layperson post-1965 could listen to or read how many Catholic priests and theologians had embraced a new theology which claimed the inadequacy of every era to define truths for future eras; which stressed the idea of revelation as a personal self-disclosure by which God encounters the total person and communicates with him in a historical dialogue..; ....thus, no formula of faith can exhaust the truth; and past formulas of faith can be exchanged for another formula more meaningful to the contemporary mind ...and every formulation of divine mystery is always only a beginning and so on....and on...
Did not such openly stated theological claims made by priests and theologians post-1965 pretty much define a main aspect of the Modernist Heresy, as it was understood pre 1962?
Father McDonald,
Have you had a chance to read the article at the National Catholic Register?
Lefties,
I am still waiting for evidence of my alleged racism! Is it something like "the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor in 1941. That's racist!"
The "Vatican II Revolution" was to a large degree a phony revolution imposed from above.
Many Church leaders in the early 1960s probably had good motives and intentions, thinking some changes would be healthy and helpful for the Church...
But I believe that in the decade leading up to the Council only a VERY tiny minority of average lay Catholics (as little as 1 or 2%?) were eager for the types of radical changes, especially as regards the Mass, that were to occur after the Council.
I believe that the 1960s and 1970s era being what it was for Western society as a whole, many millions of Catholics were going to walk away regardless of what changes were or were not made in the Church. What I think is a shame is that theologians like Kung, Schillebeeckx and Curran and hundreds of like minded priests did not leave the Church at the same time.
Then millions of Catholics who remained faithful and actually believed the Creed would not have had to read the writings of Catholic priests in good standing denying or disputing most of core Catholic teaching from the Virgin Birth, the Resurrection to transubstantiation etc.
Another example, how TOUGH must it have been for millions of Catholics, who out of love and loyalty had striven to follow traditional Church teaching as regards sexual morality and marriage, to have had to listen to priests like Fr Curran et al claim that official Church teaching re sexual ethics from Humanae Vitae to Persona Humana was:
"Theologically inaccurate, psychologically harmful and pedagogically counterproductive".
Half hearted, luke warm, increasingly secularized Catholics etc could and did walk away in millions.
But many millions of loyal Catholics remained and I believe in that immediate decade or so after 1965 many were being told by many in authority in the Church to embrace beliefs which the same authority had once told them was heresy.
Eamon Duffy was right.
Interesting that so-called anti-racist protesters in London on Sunday vandalized the statue of Winston Churchill on the grounds that he was 'racist'.
The fact that he stood up to the most racist tyranny in human history (Nazi Germany) and played a large part in defeating it, has apparently eluded these morons.
I despise these posturing narcissists. That it makes me a racist in their eyes bothers me not at all.
And over the weekend in CHICAGO 24 African Americans MUREDERED by other African Americans and NOTHING on the MAINSTEAM media at all!! Folks wake up already this NEVER been about race like I've said before its all about the take down of our Government and Donald Trump by Communists with help from the Socialist Democrat Party. Thank you Archbishop Vigano for your letter to President Trump!!
One unfortunate paragraph in the National Catholic Register article on Archbishop Gregory turning down an invitation to appear at the Pope St. John Paul II center in Washington was the below:
"Before the president arrived at the episcopal church, crowds had stood across from Lafayette Square behind the White House, protesting the death of George Floyd and police brutality. Those demonstrators were cleared from the square by police shooting pepper balls and other non-lethal weapons before Trump walked across the square to visit the church."
I say unfortunate, because in a recent interview Atty General William Barr said that the demonstrators were throwing projectiles and he even had some thrown in his direction and subsequently had to retreat. So yes, the area was then understandably secured prior to the President's appearance.
John Nolan,
Excellent point on Churchill.
Thus far none of the liberal smear merchants posting here and calling me a racist have come up with no evidence only their subjective analysis. It tells me a lot about them
Barr also said, "No, there were not chemical irritants. Pepper spray is not a chemical irritant. It's not chemical."
PepperBall, a private company that makes products of the same name, advertises that its pepper balls contain "the most effective chemical irritant available."
"The final oleoresin (capsicum), the main ingredient in pepper spray and pepper balls, contains several branched-chain alkyl vanillylamides, in addition to capsaicin, the major component in OC. The predominant capsaicinoid components of OC are capsaicin (70%), dihydrocapsaicin (20%), norhydrocapsaicin (7%), homocapsaicin (1%), and homodihydrocapsaicin (1%)"
So, yeah, let's take Barr's word for it.
Anonynous at 1042 is so right concerning Chicago...and he could have added more casualties from the city's abortion clinics. Interesting that the media ignores the politics where a lot of the alleged police brutality occurs---Minneapolis? Solidly Democratic. New York City? Solidly Democratic. Ferguson, Missouri? Ditto. City of Atlanta? Ok, you get the idea!
And I guess if Trump makes another visit to St. John's, will we have to say it is located along "Black Lives Matter" Square? Or will we say along "Defund the Police" Square?
And for the Georgians on this blog, don't forget it is primary day. Get out to vote---though you might have to wait a while because of safety and new machines. And even more importantly, in November. A lot will be at stake, especially with 2 Senate races which could help determine whether Trump, if re-elected, gets some new judges confirmed or becomes a lame duck. David Perdue will be facing a pro-abortion Democrat (all 3 of the leading candidates are such) and we will likely have a runoff next January between pro-abortion "Reverend" Warnock and either Republican Kelly Loeffler or Doug Collins (for the old Isakson Senate seat). And the presidential race here will be close---whether Trump wins the state will depend on how well he does outside metro Atlanta, as he runs much better there than he does in metro Atlanta.
It's funny TJM objects to being called a racist, but not to being called a crazy irrational pretend conservative. Maybe my theory of him being a troll isn't so crazy after all.
It's interesting that TJM will happily tell people what they are without evidence, yet won't tolerate others doing it to him. That tells me a lot about him.
Anonymous K at 3:39,
I have decided you are a racist, a crazy irrational pretend liberal based on no evidence, just like you do. Grow up
TJM, thanks for proving the old saying: "you can dish it out but you can't take it." I served you a tiny helping of your own medicine and you couldn't choke it down.
I'm not Fr K, of course, but you always bring him up when you want to deflect.
As for "grow up," maybe do the Church and the pro life movement a favor and follow your own advice. Have a nice day.
Anonymous at 5:13,
Are you Father K’s champion or his social secretary?
Do the Church a favor and join the Episcopals. There you can believe anything you like
Neither. Fr K seems to be the only thing you think about. It's weird.
June 9, 2020 at 12:35 PM
I happen to like hot sauce and will liberally sprinkle it on some things.
The main ingredient in the sauce I use is (dada, dada, dada) hot chile peppers.
Hot chile peppers contain capsaicin. Which turns out to be healthy to consume.
Capsaicin (8-methyl-N-vanillyl-6-nonenamide) is an active component of chili peppers, and which is the main ingredient in pepper balls and pepper spray, hence the name.
And unlike man-made substances, it does not harm the environment. So we have a trifecta. It is consumable and healthy for you, it does not harm the environment, and it can be used to disperse rioters.
So, yeah, let's take Barr's word for it.
Richmond Virginia: Statue of Christoper Columbus torn from its pedestal and tossed into the lake in the park! My friends the mob is coming for us led by Antifa, BLM and the Democrat Communists, if I see one more white person grovel at the feet of BLM terrorists including police, and now National Guardsmen doing it I will know for certain The Republic is over! Tucker Carlson on Fox stated it clearly last night, Republicans are liars and frauds, they pretend to protect us but they are shaking in their boots, only we can defend ourselves and Tucker said take up arms now because NOBODY will help you!!! It’s 1984 it has happened and we as a Nation let it, God help us all.
Anonymous at 8:56 AM You are most correct in you statements, yes the statue of Columbus was torn down and tossed in the lake and more and more Confederate monuments are being taken down under the cover of nite, the latest city is Jacksonville Florida. The aim as we all know is not BLACK LIVES MATTER but the total destruction of Western civilization as we know it. Again I ask what about the 24 Black men murdered over the weekend in Chicago 24!!! Not by white police officers but by other Black men, as for all of these white liberals kneeling and prostrating I kid you not asking for forgiveness from Black radicals it is simply mind blowing to see that! I for one will not kneel or bow before any MAN except for Our Lord Jesus Christ. Drew Brees caved in, Roger Goodell of the NFL caved, Amazon, Kroger, Ford, American Airlines, Walmart, NBC, CNN, CBS, MSNBC, ABC, the NBA, NASCAR will not allow the Confederate flag to be waved, Bubba Wallace the only Black driver in NASCAR will drive a car covered in BLM slogans. Has anyone read what the goal of Black Lives Matter is? The total destruction of The United States and you must obey or else,it NEVER has been about Black Lives, it has always been about POWER and the total collapse of the Nation, yet all you sheeple cannot or will not see it. Wake up and start fighting back to protect you and your family and your country because tomorrow when you wake up it might not be here and that is a cold hard fact. This was a total fabrication from the start and it has worked perfectly for the Antifa mobs and the Democrat party, well played indeed, Hitler, Mao,and Lenin could not have been prouder.
Monuments to Confederate leaders are the "Participation Trophies" of the the Jim Crow era.
You know how everyone decries giving a trophy to every kid who plays in the game even though they LOST?
Guess what? The Confederacy LOST the war, but southern sympathizers decided they had to get their "Participation Trophies" in the form of monuments, so that little Bobby Lee, Stonie Jackson, Jebbie Stuart, Jimmie Longstreet, and Georgie Pickett wouldn't get their feelings hurt.
Catholic priests who might invite politicians to speak at Mass (after Holy Communion of course) would be challenged and called to task about threatening the Catholic Church’s tax excerpt status.
I don't know what your bishop says but my Archdiocese is very clear that this is not allowed by our own principles, not because of any tax exempt status.
(side issue, a Church's tax exemption is not at issue. The RNC and DNC are tax exempt organizations. What is different is the tax deduction for individuals in the upper income brackets who itemize on their taxes what they give to (c)3 type organizations.) Under the Trump tax reforms, this is now a much more limited group of taxpayers.
Hey Jubilation, those Southerners and Confederate Generals were Americans!! And remember 99% of Southerners DID not own slaves, all about states rights, study your history.
Anon@4.26pm,
99% of Southerners owned slaves?
Are you saying that "southern" people back then did not include black "southern" people (similar to Australian states that, until historically recent times, did not count black aboriginal Australians in their censuses) ?
GS.
The issue was not slave ownership, but treason. God bless the many southerners who were loyalists.
By the way,
When I was studying for a law degree at Sydney University (Australia) almost 40 years ago, I can recall an aboriginal law student showing me some graffiti in the male toilets of the law faculty.
There were 2 pieces of graffiti.
One was:
"Land rights for aboriginals, NOW!!"
Underneath was scrawled:
"Can fauna (ie animals) own land?!"
Strange how that incident has stuck in my memory for almost 40 years.
I wonder if that racist male graffiti-artist law student of 40 years ago stayed equally racist through, for example, a decades long career as a solicitor, barrister or politician etc?
My mind boggles at the consequences for any lawyer or politician in Australia today who was reported to have told such a "joke" at any place in any circumstances... Today!!
Hey Anonymous 4:26 -
Yeah, it was about white supremacy and keeping blacks enslaved.
How do we know this? How about the words of the Vice President of the Confederacy, Alexander Stephens, delivered in Savannah, Georgia, on March 21, 1861.
"Its (the Confederacy's) foundations are laid, its cornerstone rests upon the great truth, that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery—subordination to the superior race—is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth."
But wait, there's more!
"The new Constitution (the Confederacy's) has put at rest forever all the agitating questions relating to our peculiar institution—African slavery as it exists among us—the proper status of the negro in our form of civilization. This was the immediate cause of the late rupture and present revolution. Jefferson, in his forecast, had anticipated this, as the "rock upon which the old Union would split." He was right. What was conjecture with him, is now a realized fact. But whether he fully comprehended the great truth upon which that rock stood and stands, may be doubted. The prevailing ideas entertained by him and most of the leading statesmen at the time of the formation of the old Constitution were, that the enslavement of the African was in violation of the laws of nature; that it was wrong in principle, socially, morally and politically. It was an evil they knew not well how to deal with; but the general opinion of the men of that day was, that, somehow or other, in the order of Providence, the institution would be evanescent and pass away. [...] Those ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong. They rested upon the assumption of the equality of races. This was an error. It was a sandy foundation, and the idea of a Government built upon it—when the "storm came and the wind blew, it fell."
And if you order now...
"Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite ideas; its foundations are laid, its cornerstone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery, subordination to the superior race, is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth. This truth has been slow in the process of its development, like all other truths in the various departments of science."
And, of course, say God (Providence) told you that your notions of superiority are correct...
"May we not therefore look with confidence to the ultimate universal acknowledgement of the truths upon which our system rests? It is the first government ever instituted upon the principles in strict conformity to nature, and the ordination of Providence, in furnishing the materials of human society. Many governments have been founded upon the principle of the subordination and serfdom of certain classes of the same race; such were and are in violation of the laws of nature. Our system commits no such violation of nature's laws."
I've studied my history. Seems you haven't. These excerpts come from what's called the Cornerstone Speech, delivered at the Athenaeum on Chippewa Square, later and now known as the Savannah Theater.
Let’s focus on the south of today and not northern condescending attitudes built on past history. Just where have all the riots been these past two weeks? The north! For the most part the south has seen peaceful, integrated protests. The north is far more racist and suspicious of blacks than the south, our past notwithstanding. Southerners have always had personal relationships with blacks. This is not true of the north at all.
My experience has been the opposite.
We all screamed when GovenorCuomo passed his now infamous abortion rights bill. We literally begged our Bishop to deny him Holy Communion. We were told in a nutshell that denying him Communion would be in effective and we had to "pray" for him.
I prayed for the bishop to come to his senses. ( after I used some UN printable words)
Well Kurt, I'm sorry. As a Christian, hopefully you can imitate Christ and forgive your persecutors. You'll be Ok until the mob starts tearing down statues of Jesus and desecrating churches. Maybe you can even forgive the confederate ancestors of white Southerners who did such horrible things to members of the Body of Christ and move on with thanks for residing in a much better world of today. And hopefully you won't be like the BLM or the malcontents I would occasionally notice years ago with the rebel flag decal in the back window of their pick-up with the phrase "H_ll no I ain't forgetting".
I do forgive my persecutors. What ever made you launch that false accusation against me?
Kurt
Ok. I should have typed "hopefully you have forgiven". I try to cover all bases, operating from a position of ignorance as I am I can fail at that. Although I directed my comment to you, others reading it (and not as magnanimous as you) may see in it something that applies to them.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I was under the impression that when the US Constitution was drawn up the Founding Fathers, although they may have been slave-owners themselves, saw slavery as an institution which would die out sooner rather than later. The number of slaves in 1790 has been estimated at 700,000.
It was the perfection of the cotton gin in the 1790s which gave slavery a new lease of life and ensured that the South became to all intents and purposes a plantation economy, employing 3.2 million slaves by 1850.
It's perhaps being over-simplistic, but it wouldn't be the first or last time that a technological advance had unforeseen consequences.
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