More funny but biting commentary from Lutheran Satire!

Posted on 10 April 2015 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

More biting commentary from Lutheran Satire. Fun. Watch to the end.

Posted in Lighter fare, Our Catholic Identity | Tagged Lutheran Satire, Nancy Pelosi
5 Comments

ASK FATHER: Crossing arms to receive Communion

Posted on 10 April 2015 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

From a reader…

QUAERITUR:

I have been regularly attending the Traditional Latin Mass for the last two years and have been an altar boy at the TLM for the past year and a half. I have noticed that a fair number of communicants at the TLM cross their arms in the shape of an “X” when they receive Holy Communion. I have seen it commonly done in Byzantine Catholic Churches and I thought that crossing your arms when going up for Holy Communion was a sign to the priest that you were not receiving Holy Communion (at least in the Ordinary Form)? Is there a reason why some communicants cross their arms to receive Holy Communion in the Extraordinary Form? What’s the point in doing that? Were these people taught to receive Holy Communion by crossing their arms? This is quite confusing to me!

I see no reason to cross your arms to receive Communion, at least in the Latin Church, either in the Ordinary Form or the Extraordinary Form.

It could be that some of those people attending the TLM had sought refuge for a while at an Eastern Catholic church for their reverent Divine Liturgy. They started doing that and carried it over.

I don’t see anything especially wrong with it, but,these days, it sends a confusing signal.

The custom that has arisen – wrongly I think, for Communion time is NOT the time to give blessings – of people presenting themselves with crossed arms at Communion time for a blessing may confuse others into thinking that that is the way it is done. So, when faced with people who have their arms crossed, it can be tough to tell if they are seeking to communicate or seeking a blessing.

As a matter of fact, I sometimes see people kneel at the Communion rail to receive on the tongue and they put their hands out! These are usually TLM newbies.

Some people don’t think much about what they are about when they do things in Church. They get into patterns. But, hey!… it has every been so.

It is good to think about what we do in church and why.

Posted in "How To..." - Practical Notes, ASK FATHER Question Box, Liturgy Science Theatre 3000 | Tagged blessings at Communion, Communion
23 Comments

Friday Abstinence, the Octave of Easter and You

Posted on 10 April 2015 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Each year during the Octave of Easter – and of Christmas – there is a Friday. Fridays are days of penance, usually observed by abstinence from meat.

So, can one eat meat on Friday in the Octave of Easter?

The 1983 Code of Canon Law says in can. 1251:

Abstinence from meat, or from some other food as determined by the Episcopal Conference, is to be observed on all Fridays, unless a solemnity should fall on a Friday… (Can. 1251)

The General/Universal Norms for the Liturgical Year and the Calendar 24 says that:

The first eight days of the Easter season make up the octave of Easter and are celebrated as solemnities of the Lord.

It seems that on Friday in the Octave of Easter we are exempt from the obligation to abstain.

This is not, by the way, the case with Friday in the Octave of Christmas.

That said, Fridays are penitential days. I don’t think you sin if you maintain something of a penitential spirit, even when Friday is in the Octave of Easter. Maybe a Santa Cristina could grace your dinner table rather than your usual 1990 Brunello di Montalcino and you might have three courses instead of your usual four.

Posted in "How To..." - Practical Notes, Liturgy Science Theatre 3000, Our Catholic Identity | Tagged can. 1251, Friday abstinence, Octave of Easter, penance
27 Comments

Stop talking about schism! Wherein Fr. Z rants.

Posted on 9 April 2015 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

The upcoming Synod of Bishops in October is probably going to be a knock-down, drag-out over a few issues. The Germans are set on achieving a progressive agenda and have hinted at doing their own thing if the Synod doesn’t go their way. Others are set on defending the Church’s doctrine.

Some people are talking about “schism” because of the Synod.

No matter what happens at the Synod, there will be no schism by either side.

Schisms are passé. Catholics don’t schism.

Indifference and apathetic drifting are the real threats.

Conservatives have no where else to go (e.g., the SSPX simply not an option). Conservatives accept Vatican II AND the Catechism of the Catholic Church AND Code of Canon Law.

Liberals love to hear conservatives talk about “schism”, because liberals are actually the ones trying to bring it about. As they try to impose NewChurch, liberals are already in de facto schism. But they’ll never make it official. They are basically Congregationalists. They are still in the cafeteria. They take what the want and leave the rest. Schism would take too much effort and money.

Schism talk is for journalists only, for headline effect. But it’s to the liberals’ advantage.

So, I want to assures the world that there will not be a schism.

There is no real threat of schism from the right. There will be no formal schism on the left, for different reasons.

So – get over it. Stop the distraction.

Schism talk benefits mainly liberal kooks.

Sorry… that was redundant.

Posted in Liberals, Our Catholic Identity, Synod, Wherein Fr. Z Rants | Tagged schism, Synod of Bishops
31 Comments

Phyllis Zagano trusts Google Translate, slanders Card. Müller

Posted on 9 April 2015 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Over at the Fishwrap, our dear old friend Phyllis Zagano has a fantastic piece this week. It’s a classic!

First, let me say – as I have said before – that Phyllis is solidly pro-life. She is firmly against abortion and for that I give her props.

However, this week she resorted to a nasty trick that she has used before: false moral equivalence.

In her recent offering, she drew a moral equivalence between ISIS, the Taliban, Boko Haram and… wait for it… Ludwig Gerhard Card. Müller, Prefect of the CDF.

Bizarre, I know, but that’s what she did.

Ms. Zagano looked at an interview that Card. Müller gave to the French outlet La Croix. HERE In that interview the Cardinal addressed issues facing the upcoming Synod, include Communion for the divorced and remarried.

She saw his phrase “Il est impossible d’avoir deux femmes!”.

She translated this as “It is impossible to have two women!”, and had a melt down.

Really?

What Card. Müller actually said:

Q: Sur la question des divorcés-remariés, ne peut-on imaginer, après un chemin de pénitence, de reconnaître une seconde union qui n’aurait pas de caractère sacramentel?? [On the question of the divorced-remarried, can we imagine, after a path of penance, recognizing a second union which wouldn’t have a sacramental character?]

Card. G.L. M.?: Il est impossible d’avoir deux femmes?! Si la première union est valide, il n’est pas possible d’en contracter une seconde en même temps. Un chemin de pénitence est possible, mais pas une seconde union. La seule possibilité est de retourner à la première union légitime, ou de vivre la seconde union comme frère et sœur?: telle est la position de l’Église, en accord avec la volonté de Jésus. J’ajoute qu’il est toujours possible de chercher à obtenir une déclaration de nullité devant un tribunal ecclésiastique. [It is impossible to have two wives! If the first marriage is valid, it is not possible to contract a second at the same time. A path of penance is possible, but not a second marriage. The only possibility is to return to the first legitimate marriage, or to live the second marriage as brother and sister: that is the Church’s position, in accord with the will of Jesus. I’ll add that it is always possible to seek to obtain a declaration of nullity/invalidity before an ecclesiastical tribunal.]

It is perfectly clear what Card. Müller said (i.e., “wives“), but Zagano chooses the weirdly false meaning of “femme” because that fits her agenda: to slander Card. Müller.

Read all of her strange piece over there, if you wish.

Consider:

Is there anyone who has been at least through freshman French (sorry, freshperson) who doesn’t know what “femme” means? Did she miss the class that taught that “femme” means not only “woman” but also, and commonly, “wife”?

Obviously, Card. Müller said that “It is impossible to have two wives“, not “two women”.

The premise Phyllis uses, in order to draw a moral equivalence between ISIS, the Taliban, Boko Haram, etc. and Card. Müller is her mistranslation of “d’avoir deux femmes” as “have two women”, implying ownership or that women are objects.

The benign conclusion is that Ms. Zagano doesn’t know any French, and therefore plugged the text into Google Translate. That’s why she got the entire premise of her thing wrong. Here’s what happened when I used Google for that phrase:

I would rather think that that is what happened than that she purposely mistranslated what the Cardinal said. That would be mendacious.

But she did begin with drawing a moral equivalence between murdering Islamic terrorists and Card. Müller.

Sapienti pauca.

Posted in Green Inkers, Liberals, One Man & One Woman, Synod, The Drill, Throwing a Nutty, What are they REALLY saying?, You must be joking! | Tagged al-Shabab, Boko Haram, Card. Müller, French, Google Translate, ISIS, La Croix, Phyllis Zagano, Taliban
25 Comments

ACTION ITEM! Support Our Lady of Hope Clinic!

Posted on 9 April 2015 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

I have an ACTION ITEM for you good readers. You have been generous to causes I have mentioned in the past. Sometimes people have a hard time finding causes to support. This is one of them that I admire.

I have written about Our Lady of Hope Clinic before. This is one of the worthiest causes I have seen for a while and it could use your help, wherever you are.

They have a DONATION page.

Contact Julie Jensen, Director of Development, at Julie -AT- ourladyofhopeclinic -DOT- org, or by calling (608) 957-1137.

In the clinic you see a sign on the wall explaining that

“Our Lady of Hope Clinic practices medicine consistent with the teachings of the Catholic Church”

Therefore, they will not refer for abortion, prescribe contraception, refer for sterilization, refer for in vitro fertilization, etc.

And…

“We will practice in complete accord with the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church.”

This is a worthy cause.

I received an email today, about a fundraiser event for Our Lady of Hope clinic. They told me that whenever I mention them on the blog, they get donations from all over.

Posted in ACTION ITEM!, Emanations from Penumbras, Our Catholic Identity | Tagged Affordable Care Act, Our Lady of Hope Clinic
2 Comments

Your mobile phone and you

Posted on 9 April 2015 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

On another note, I saw a post at the Charles Carroll Society page about how some government agencies have used “StingRay” tech to get into your mobile phone.

I am not overly concerned about this myself, since I am probably already being monitored by 17 national security agencies, and, hey!, this is just one more thing. But … I found this interesting, because we are living in increasingly interesting times.

From the post:

[…]

What is StingRay?

StingRay devices or what geeky people call IMSI-catchers are a line of products made by Harris corporation and others that are fake cell phone towers. Your phone is constantly trying to connect to any and all cell phone towers. When you are connected, it shows up as “bars” on your phone. “Bars” indicate how well you are connected to the nearest cell phone tower. The Harris RayFish line of devices are fake towers. They appear to your cell phone to be a real AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, etc. towers. They trick your phone in to disconnecting from your normal cell phone tower and automatically connecting to the Harris fake cell phone towers. You should think of this connection as a physical cable directly connected to your cell phone. Once your cell phone has been connected to the cell tower, the StingRay device can monitor your calls, text, web usage, search terms and track the phone’s movements very accurately into a few feet even indoors.

Why do I care?

One issue is that if the government is tracking “bad Bob” across the street or in an airport your phone is also being tracked and hacked by the government. You see all cell phones in the area will connect, not just “bad Bob.” We know this is a fact because an FBI Agent under oath confirmed our worse suspicions. Special Agent Bradley S Morrison said under oath that the StingRay devices collect data “…from all wireless devices in the immediate area of the [device] … including those of innocent, non-target devices.” We also know this by reviewing the documents Snowden leaked to the public that several capabilities exist to hack your cell phone.

[…]

Remember, when it comes to your tech and everything you do online or by phone, do not expect privacy.

I’ll turn on the moderation queue for this.

Posted in "How To..." - Practical Notes, The future and our choices | Tagged cell phone towers, cellular phones, mobile phones, StingRay
15 Comments

Reasons why more men don’t go to Mass

Posted on 8 April 2015 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

I have to share this video from You Tube I was sent by email as reason #756 for Summorum Pontificum.

This is:

Easter Vigil Liturgy of St Patrick Catholic Church, Seattle, [NB] 2010. The seven readings from the old testament are presented in Word, Sign, Music and Dance. Here, the third reading from from the book of Exodus is sung and danced.

She gets the tambourine at about 1:00 and then the view pulls back so that you can see the whole thing, the combo with the bongos on the right, the person doing sign language on the left, the girl in the middle jumping around.

No wonder men don’t go to church.

That said, I saw this story at Catholic World Report:

The Case for a Mass Conversion of Men
Research shows that almost 9 out of 10 Catholic men don’t participate in a Catholic activity outside of attending Mass; if men aren’t being reached in the Mass, they aren’t being reached.

Despite the fact the New Evangelization has been an ongoing emphasis by the Catholic Church for over forty years, it has failed to stem the disastrous losses of the faithful in the U.S. Since 2000, 14 million Catholics have left the faith, parish religious education participation of children has dropped by 24%, Catholic school attendance has dropped by 19%, baptisms of infants has dropped by 28%, baptism of adults has dropped by 31% and sacramental Catholic marriages have dropped by 41%. Something is desperately wrong with the Church’s approach to the New Evangelization.

Of Mass and Men

One reason the New Evangelization is faltering is because it is missing men. The New Emangelization Project has documented the serious Catholic “man-crisis” in the United States. 1 in 3 baptized Catholic men have left the faith and of those who remain, 50-60% of them are “Casual Catholics”, men who don’t know and don’t practice the faith. Of those who practice the faith, many are lukewarm, not converted to the point of conviction, a conviction in which they are prepared to make disciples for Christ and His Catholic Church. The New Evangelization has largely ignored men, with no substantial or sustained efforts to directly confront the Catholic “man-crisis”.

The Catholic “man-crisis” matters. The souls of men matter and many are being lost; for example, two thirds of Christian men are looking at porn at least monthly and the numbers are much higher for younger men. The faith of the children matter and huge numbers of young people are leaving the faith because they have followed their fathers out of the Church. Without a New Emangelization in which millions of Catholic men become newly committed to Christ and His Church, there can be no New Evangelization.

While a complex set of forces have driven the Catholic “man-crisis”, including both massive cultural changes outside the Church and serious missteps within the Church, the lack of engagement of men in the Mass is a major contributing factor: men don’t understand the Mass and well-meaning, but misinformed priests in many parishes have de-sacralized the Mass causing many men to simply “drift away.”

Why is the Mass a key driver of the Catholic “man-crisis”? Research shows that almost 9 out of 10 Catholic men don’t participate in a Catholic activity outside of attending Mass; if men aren’t being reached in the Mass, they aren’t being reached. Only about 1/3 of Catholic men are attending Mass on a weekly basis. Only 1 in 50 Catholic men have a monthly practice of Confession, underscoring the fact that many are attending Mass without a proper preparation to receive the Eucharist. 48% of Catholic men are “bored” in the Mass and 55% of Catholic men don’t feel they “get anything out of the Mass.” These statistics confirm what dozens of the New Emangelization Project interviews with top Catholic men’s evangelists know: men don’t understand the Mass. No man can truly understand the Mass and be bored.

[…]

Read the rest there.

Posted in Liturgy Science Theatre 3000, New Evangelization, Our Catholic Identity, The future and our choices, You must be joking! | Tagged liturgical dance, men, New Evangelization
159 Comments

Double (anti-Christian) standard in Colorado

Posted on 8 April 2015 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Remember my post about when homosexualists come to destroy your Christian business? HERE

Now there is this!

At Town Hall I saw that someone is fought back.

Colorado Double Standard: Bakers Should Not Be Forced to Make Anti-Gay Cakes

Bill Jack wants to make one thing perfectly clear: Bakers should not be forced to make a cake that would violate their conscience or freedom of expression.

Jack, of Castle Rock, Colo., is making national headlines over an experiment he conducted in the wake of attacks on Christian business owners who refuse to provide services for same-sex marriages.

Last year, the Colorado Civil Rights Commission ruled that the Masterpiece Cakeshop in Lakewood unlawfully discriminated against a gay couple who wanted a wedding cake. Jack Phillips, the owner of the cake shop, is a devout Christian, and his attorneys argued that to force him to participate in the gay wedding would violate his religious beliefs.

The Civil Rights Commission saw it differently.

So if Christian bakers who oppose gay marriage are compelled under law to violate their beliefs – what about bakers who support gay marriage? Would they be compelled to make an anti-gay marriage cake? [Who wants to make a bet?]

Jack, who is a devout Christian, asked three bakeries to produce two cakes – each shaped like an open Bible.

On one side of one cake he requested the words, “God hates sin – Psalm 45:7.” On the other side he wanted the words, “Homosexuality is a detestable sin – Leviticus 18:22.”

On the second cake he asked them to write another Bible verse: “While we were yet sinners Christ died for us – Romans 5:8” along with the words “God loves sinners.”

And finally, Jack wanted the bakers to create an image – two grooms holding hands, with a red “X” over them – the universal symbol for “not allowed.”

Now if you read the national news accounts of Jack’s experiment – you would’ve read that he wanted gay slurs written on the cakes. But that wasn’t true.

According to the commission’s own report, there’s no mention of Jack using any gay slurs – unless you consider Bible verses to be gay slurs.

Mark Silverstein, the legal director for Colorado’s chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, accused Jack of wanting obscenities written on the cakes. [Figures. It’s the ACLU.]

“There’s no law that says that a cake-maker has to write obscenities in the cake just because the customer wants it,” he told the Associated Press.

Does the ACLU consider the Bible to be obscene?

As you probably guessed, the bakeries rejected Jack’s request for what some would call “anti-gay” cakes.

“If he wants to hate people, he can hate them not here in my bakery,” Azucar Bakery owner Marjorie Silva told 7NEWS. She called the writing and imagery “hateful and offensive.”

So Jack filed a discrimination complaint with the Colorado Civil Rights Commission – just as the gay couple did in the Masterpiece Cakeshop case.

Using the commission’s logic – if a Christian baker is forced to violate his beliefs, shouldn’t all bakers be forced to violate theirs, too?

Absolutely not, says the Colorado Civil Rights Commission.

It ruled that Azucar did not discriminate against Jack based on his creed. It argued that the bakery refused to make the cakes because of the “derogatory language and imagery,” The Denver Channel reported.

Jack told me it’s a double standard – pure and simple.

“I think it is hypocritical,” he said. “It’s unequal treatment before the law. The Colorado Anti-Discrimination Act is being used to coerce businesses to participate in events that violate their consciences.”

Jack said he decided to conduct his experiment to prove the Colorado law was “only being applied to Christian business people.”

[NB] “Christians need to understand that this is the state of Christianity in the United States,” he said. “We are now second-class citizens. Our free speech is being censored.”

[…]

Read the rest there.

This is coming to us, my friends. It’s coming fast, too.

Posted in One Man & One Woman, Our Catholic Identity, Si vis pacem para bellum!, The Coming Storm, The future and our choices, The Last Acceptable Prejudice | Tagged baker, bakery, cakes, Colorado, double standard, homosexual agenda, homosexualists
31 Comments

Why is Religion News Service – RNS – so liberal?

Posted on 8 April 2015 by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

It’s almost always the case that when I post anything about Religion News Service (RNS), it’s because what they publish is liberal editorializing rather than religious news. David Gibson of RNS seems to go out of his way to make conservative Catholics look bad. Remember what he did recently to Cardinal Burke? Keep reading.

In a National Catholic Register/CNA piece today we read about funding to RNS from homosexual groups.

A Homosexual-Rights News Service? RNS Denies LGBT Money Influences Its Religion Coverage

WASHINGTON — The editor of Religion News Service has denied that a grant from a wealthy LGBT advocacy funder has biased its coverage of traditional religion, which includes a recent controversial story on Cardinal Raymond Burke. [This explains quite a bit.]
The Arcus Foundation [arcus is Latin “bow”, as in “rainbow”] dispenses millions of dollars in grants every year to support LGBT activism. Its 2014 grants included $120,000 to the Religion Newswriters Foundation, the owner of the widely syndicated Religion News Service. [I wonder what their $120K bought them?]
The Arcus Foundation’s grant listing said the one year of support was intended “to recruit and equip LGBT supportive leaders and advocates to counter rejection and antagonism within traditionally conservative Christian churches.” [Back in the 80’s the LGBT crowd, when they protested, just wanted to be “left alone”. Now they use mainstream media outlets to shove their advocacy in people’s faces.]
The foundation’s Sept. 23, 2014, announcement said the grant aimed at “fostering a culture of LGBT understanding through the media” by funding the production of feature stories and blog posts “about religion and LGBT peoples of color.” [And to do so by smearing the reputations of traditional Catholics such as Card. Burke and others.]
Kevin Eckstrom, RNS editor in chief, told CNA that receiving money from the advocacy group did not influence editorial choices.
“All editorial decisions about coverage of the LGBT community, or any other issue, are made independent of any foundation support, including Arcus,” he said, adding that RNS welcomes support “from any individual or foundation that supports our aim of informing and challenging our readers.” [Is that so? Would they take money from a conservative donor? QUAERITUR: Have any conservative donors wanted to give money to RNS?]

David Gibson Article

RNS coverage of some Catholic figures has drawn criticism.
On March 27, RNS distributed a story by David Gibson entitled: “Cardinal Raymond Burke: Gays, Remarried Catholics, Murderers Are All the Same.” [Which is simply a falsehood and intellectually dishonest. That’s not what the Cardinal said. On the other hand, Gibson’s RNS piece – reprinted by Fishwrap makes Card. Kasper out to be 5th apparition of Vishnu. To read him, you’d think you were reading the 2nd nocturne.]

[…]

For its part, the Arcus Foundation’s self-described social-justice program aims to cultivate “positive religious leaders and advocates” and to develop “effective faith messages and messengers” that have an impact in target communities. The foundation’s grants also oppose “the abuse of religious freedoms” through religious exemptions[?] and aim to develop “religious and legal strategies to hold exemptions in check,” while challenging “religious opponents of LGBT people in the U.S. and internationally.” [Am I wrong or does that sound like Arcus wants to prevent people such as small business – or even large business – owners from saying “No” when approached by homosexualists for work, such as baking a “gay” cake?]
The foundation’s grant application page said it considers grant applications from organizations whose work “aligns with our values, strategic priorities and EEO requirement.” [Ergo, RNS aligns with the values Arcus describes. And RNS took their money.]
Eckstrom said that the RNS grant proposal to the Arcus Foundation stressed the need to “increase and improve domestic and international coverage of how religion affects a diverse range of LGBT communities.”
“Our job is to offer readers a window into the personalities, theology and institutions that are shaping a momentous social and civic debate,” Eckstrom told CNA.
The $120,000 grant appears significant compared to the Religion Newswriters Foundation’s past revenue. Its tax forms show a total revenue of $216,000 in 2012 and $166,000 in 2011. Religion News LLC, the nonprofit corporation that operates RNS, had $1.8 million in revenue for Fiscal Year 2012-2013.

RNS Reporter Worked for Arcus

One Arcus-sponsored RNS feature story was by Jay Michaelson, a former vice president for social-justice programs at the Arcus Foundation. On March 31, RNS ran a different story by Michaelson about the controversy over Indiana’s religious-freedom bill.

[…]