When politicians make false claims

In Meet the Press recently, US Speaker Nancy Pelosi said the following about the her views on when life begins, within the context of abortion:

"I would say that as an ardent, practicing Catholic, this is an issue that I have studied for a long time. And what I know is over the centuries, the doctors of the church have not been able to make that definition . . . St. Augustine said at three months. We don't know. The point is, is that it shouldn't have an impact on the woman's right to choose."

Mercifully, a quick response came from the Church, this time, via this very straightforward statement coming from Archbishop Charles J. Chaput of Denver. [Links to a PDF file] The short form of his response is that the relevant issue to address is the fact that the Church has always considered abortion objectively and gravely wrong. The Curt Jester posts about several responses from the Church, in fact. I can only add from what I know that some ancient Christian literature such as the Didache and The Epistle of St. Barnabas are clear about this.

Fascinating (and one of the few endorsed) Marian apparitions

From a village in Lithuania, this amazing story about Our Lady of Siluva. Evangelicals these days are not as hostile to the Catholic faith as Protestants were of less recent days. It is reasonable for one to ask why a Christian already sharing a personal relationship with Christ our Lord should even bother with the Blessed Mother. This answer may seem glib, but it's no less true: it is the design and will of God to do so. Just as, for our Lady, it is the design and will of God for her to take us under her motherly love, children won by the salvation of our Lord's love and mercy.

Learning

Nursing a lively little bug that's so far gone through every member of this household, it seems. And now that it's hit me, here's a little insight prompted by watching "Batman Begins" on DVD:

Why do we get hurt? So that we'd know how others feel when they are hurt.

[The inspiration comes from this nasty bug and Bruce Wayne's memory of this question: Why do we fall, Bruce?

All is quiet here.. but not in the real world

On the contrary, life has been fairly hectic. The fact that this blog speaks little of it is actually a good thing. At least my wife would say so. To give a very brief report, life for this little family simply goes on. Kids got sick, they got better. K1 still has authority issues, but that's life; he's eight. I still struggle to strike a balance between discipline and moral support. He is a lively little boy with (I think) advanced social skills for his age. K2 has moderation issues, both with his irrepressible sense of humor (at the expense of his brothers, usually) and his toys. But he has his deep thinking moments, and that irrepressible humor is always a blast of sunshine that is so enjoyable when I open myself to actually enjoying it. K3 is growing up a true gem so far, all five years of him. He is cheerful, except when his brothers are too harsh with him, and he is so alive. Swinging his head this way and that, and sometimes all his limbs, he virtually dances to the liturgy, right there beside me.

And that's a brief report! :-)

As for theology, liturgy, faith and everything else I used to blog so much about, that's all going on in the background. No time to report on all that at this point, except to say ancora imparo: I am still learning. There is so much to learn, after all, and I am such a tiny vessel.

Sobering thoughts about society

and just what might well be at stake.

What is society doing to our girls?

Pornification, it seems. :-(

Good Frisking of Bad Scholarship

Being an academic has its lows, particularly when I read about academics who, wanting to prove their pet thesis so badly, will sacrifice anything -- even their integrity. Mark Shea (as usual) gives a good critique of the latest attempt to discredit Jesus Christ and Christianity using whatever will gain publicity. Nothing is inappropriate when engaging in non-scholarship like this. Even my 6-year old will be puzzled at this sensationalized but utterly insignificant claim that Jesus was Jewish. He'll probably go, "Of course he is. So what?"

Have a read of Mark's frisking above. In the end, all we can do is shake our heads, smile knowingly about this age-old story of the world rejecting Jesus Christ, time and again. The truth is much simpler, but that would be too demanding. So they continue to reject Him. But for all the amusement factor in such stories, for goodness' sake, let's teach our children well. Lest the world fool them into rejecting Christ, too, when we're not looking.

When Talking Beasts.. Stop

In "The Magician's Nephew", Aslan gives a simple warning to the newly born Talking Beasts of Narnia: that they should not go back to the ways of beasts lest they cease to be Talking Beasts.

I was reminded of that in Catherine Deveny's article in The Age where she talks about having shed her faith (sandwiched between layers of exaggerated sarcasm and insults for Catholics and Catholicism). Ms. Deveny at some essay months ago casually mentioned that she was Catholic. Now it's clear: she was Catholic, but she became an atheist years ago. That liberating feeling she describes is indeed a form of freedom, but from what? Sadly, she may not have given that much thought.

Searching for human triumph

John F. Schumaker, clinical psychologist, makes very poignant observations and poses even more poignant questions in this article from The Age, "Triumph of the Trivial Life". He begins with this:

THE RESULTS of the cultural indoctrination stakes are not yet in but there is a definite trend — triviality leads, followed closely by superficiality and mindless distraction. Vanity looks great while profundity is bringing up the rear. Pettiness is powering ahead, along with passivity and indifference. Curiosity lost interest, wisdom was scratched and critical thought had to be put down. Ego is running wild. Attention span continues to shorten and no one is betting on survival.

Perhaps because the hope espoused by humanists cited were even flimsier than faith in God ever was:

	.. Erich Fromm .. forecast a utopian society based on "humanistic communitarianism" that would nurture our higher "existential needs".
	..
	.. Carl Rogers .. believed that we — those "people of tomorrow" — would minister over a growth-oriented society, with "growth" defined as the full and positive unfolding of human potential.
	..
	Maslow claimed that human beings naturally switch attention to higher-level needs (intellectual, spiritual, social, existential) once they have met lower-level material ones. In moving up the pyramid and "becoming", we channel ourselves towards wisdom, beauty, truth, love, gratitude and respect for life.

I do not consider myself a cynic, but the empirical data suggests that these hopes expressed by thinkers of the past century were futile. Perhaps in their exclusion of the supernatural, their conclusions have missed out by a mile. After all, premises count, and I suppose the incongruity between theory and experience can be explained by having assumed a false premise.

It isn't that I think mankind to be so far removed from nobility and greatness of spirit. It is only that what the Church has been saying for so long captures the true story. Man is made in the image of God, and so bears His greatness. But the Fall did compromise man's ability to be true to his own divine destiny. Without God to heal the rift, that destiny cannot be fulfilled, much less taken up deliberately.

In the end, Mr. Schumaker's essay seemed to me an incomplete story. His observations are as striking as his questions -- but the answer was left out. Man's greatness is obvious to anyone who is deliberately hates mankind, but this greatness is incomplete and insufficient. Our capacity for evil and savagery is a stark reminder of this. We bear a great wound in ourselves that separates us from the nobility we all share in varying degrees, but glimpsed among the greatest of our heroes. I sincerely believe that we are only healed through the One who took our fall into his body, by whose stripes we are healed. By his grace alone are we saved, and by His Spirit are we restored to who we are destined to be. Humanism is nice but let's call its greatest aspect by name: love. That which, beyond logic, beyond expectation, gives all for love.

But healing takes time -- a lifetime -- as well as nurture. If humanists were only to allow this thought: that the answer eludes mankind because that which will let us rise above the superficial is truly above us, that it is not natural but rather supernatural. That it has indeed come in the flesh and dwelt among us, in love, so that we, outsiders, may be co-heirs of all that is holy and all that is love. Then and only then will all our hopes of human destiny be fulfilled.

Prayer from the lips of children

I must say, I felt immensely joyful hearing my son Patrick reading from Psalm 85 (86) at bedtime tonight. And likewise when I saw that his older brother Justin had been filling up his reading journal (for school) with chapters from his children's Bible. Little saints in the making. If only their dad would stop getting in the way!

Thank you, Lord, for the three arrows in my quiver. They fill me with joy (when I stop taking myself too seriously), bring me to laughter, and fill me with hope. Through them, I catch a glimpse of the enormity of Fatherhood, a peek into the gift of Sonship, and a foretaste of holy Love. They hold up a mirror to me, confronting me with what it means to love and to be loved.

Sower and Seed, and the Soil

Dr. Marcellino D'Ambrosio has an insightful essay about the parable of the sower and the seed.

Fr. Jerome Magat has his own insightful angle about being fertile soil.

Journalism has seen better days

If this is a measure of rigorous research among journalists, then how far they have indeed fallen:

• "Ancient text sheds light on Jewish-Christian links" from Reuters.
  
  Good grief, you mean there's a link? And what, there's a Jewish origin for the whole notion of a suffering messiah who rises from the dead? Stop the press! Oh wait, don't the Jewish books of Wisdom (deuterocanonical), Isaiah and Jonah already include allegories or explicit prophecies about all that?
• "Higher CO2 levels may be good for plants: German Scientists" from AFP.
  
  Gotta love the comments about photosynthesis.

And I thought objectivity was all that got thrown out of the window for today's brave new breed of journalists.

So what's new?

I am reading The Imitation of Christ and find it immensely edifying. The advice on admitting the distractions of the world around us is most apt. I suspect that a substantial amount of my time is wasted on such distractions, reading up news from at least three continents each day, a handful of my favorite blogs, writing my own blog posts ..

! oops

Order and Discipline

It wasn't surprising that a 12-year-old would sue her own father for grounding her from a school trip for posting objectionable pictures of herself and chatting on websites against her father's objections. Just the logical conclusion of how things have been sliding down the politically correct slope where the superficial is replacing the substance of life, straining gnats while swallowing camels. Thankfully, the notions of order and discipline are intrinsic in human beings. Thus, there is hope, as when Kiwis have had enough of anti-spanking laws that take parenting away from parents.

Church of England no more?

The gospel has been attenuating in the Church of England, I suppose, but here is a turning point, an amplification of sorts:

Dr Jensen said that the Global Anglican Future Conference was acknowledging that a new state of affairs existed within the worldwide Anglican communion, in which the office of the Archbishop of Canterbury was no longer considered dominant. "My way of putting it is to say that the British Empire has now ceased to be, and the British Commonwealth of Nations has come into existence, or the nuclear family has turned into an extended family. This is the new reality."

[Source: The Age, 22/06/2008

Dr. Jennings said that they held the conference in Jerusalem in order to discern "what God's mind is on certain matters" -- and that, I think, is exactly what makes it a turning point. Returning to the root of Church mission -- God's will -- is the only true guide. It won't be easy for the Anglicans (it hasn't been), but there is always reason to hope when that hope springs from faith in God.

The Language of the Liturgy

One might have thought it obvious that great care should be taken that the language used in worshipping the Almighty; that reverence and awe, focusing on the God we are adoring, is only fitting. So why are some bishops seemingly unhappy with endeavors along those lines? Happily, the arguments for maintaining the dignity of liturgical language are not hard to understand, and here given most excellently by Bishop Seratelli (with emphasis and comments by Fr. Z).

The arguments for keeping things simple, resulting in keeping them too simple, remind me of arguments for keeping doctrines simple, which results in watering them down. Like arguments for doing away with homework and examinations in schools, with the result of dumbing down education. They do the intended beneficiaries a disservice, condescendingly treating them as lesser beings than they really are. Baptized into the death and resurrection of Christ, his grace gives us the impulse to be raised up to Heavenly heights. That, after all, is our calling. And if this is not reflected in our liturgy, then we're in trouble, aren't we?

Casting pearls amongst the swines

Or, in this case, a dog. I cannot see the logic of giving a dog 10 or even 2 million dollars when starvation ravages many parts of the world. Exceedingly bizarre.

Right to Life Australia is Protesting outside the office Maxine Morand

From RTLA's mailing list:

ABORTION IS NEVER HEALTHY! COME TO THE PROTEST The Brumby Government is attempting to redefine abortion from being a crime to a 'health procedure'. What is healthy about killing small babies and ruining their mothers' lives? Yet Maxine Morand, Minister for Children and Early Childhood Development and Women's Affairs - and a member of the notorious Emily's List - is guiding the Decriminalisation of Abortion Bill through Parliament. This Minister is supposed to care for children and women! We are going to let her know what we think of trying to pass abortion off as a 'health' item. Please come and join us outside Ms Morand's electoral office this Wednesday. Bring your children if you can! WHERE: 1/40 Montclair Ave, Glen Waverley 3150 MEL 71 B2 WHEN: Tomorrow, Wednesday, June 18 at 11am

Faith versus works

Or the dog that never barked, perhaps. Or the issue that never was.

Dr. Marcellino D'Ambrosio delivers as good an explanation as any, if not better, about this artificial confrontation between faith and works. Many Christians assert "faith alone, but this faith is never alone" (or some permutation), and still find fault in the Roman Catholic position. The obstinacy is sad and frustrating. There is already a common, orthodox understanding of faith and works, not as opposing systems but as necessary components of what is expected of us: a living faith. To nevertheless maintain that there remains a contention hides what the issue really is.

Whatever that/those might be, the disappointments, heartache and frustrations that brought them on are real.

There is the city on a hilltop

I feel less and less inclined to wade into ecumenical debates. There's been one brewing at Cum Ecclesia between the Catholic and Lutheran positions. The primary issues at hand are authority and the question of where the Church is.

I can't count the number of times that I had prepared a lengthy comment in the comment box only to find myself aborting the comment in the end. Not because I wasn't sure of what I wanted to say, but because my comments seem futile in the end. The Lutheran position does not hold much hope to me of dialogue. It is too subjective, it seems, and the Lutheran sentiment of one's unbending stand gets in the way.

In the end, lazy as it seems to be, I am inclined these days to simply lift my arm and point to the Church Magisterium: there she is, the city on a hilltop. Don't take my word for it, take hers. In any other Christian denomination, my interpretation of the Bible is the sure foundation of my arguments. In the Catholic Church, the interpretation of Scripture and Tradition that is offered by the Magisterium of the Catholic Church is the sure foundation. I have had the Iglesia ni Kristo or the Jehovah's Witnesses thrown at my face before, as an answer to this assertion of mine. Let me be clear then that I refer to Christian denominations who share the Nicene Creed and the pronouncements of the councils up to about the first millennium at least. Those who hold to the inerrancy of Scripture, the closing of revelation with the death of the Apostles, the Trinity, the hypostatic union of Christ's nature.

In predicting the demise of Jerusalem, the Lord told his disciples to scatter away. Going against prevailing practice at that time, they were to depart from Jerusalem, rather than to hide within and wait out a siege. No such warning is recorded about the Church that he built on the rock of Peter. He declares a promise that asserts the opposite: "the gates of hell shall not prevail against it." St. Paul confirms this when he calls the Church the pillar and foundation of Truth.

If you pose a difficult dogma to me, I'll point to that city on the hilltop. I may not understand everything she tells me, I may fail to uphold my avowed obedience to her judgments, but I trust my Lord, who told me to trust that city. Even if I don't feel like it, even when I don't understand it -- even when I feel like dissenting. You see, at the end of the day, I just don't feel comfortable with the idea that I know better than all those popes, bishops, clergy, scholars, doctors and ordinary Catholics down through the centuries. Even if I were to consider that many of those popes, bishops, clergy, scholars, doctors and ordinary Catholics were individually sinful, and perhaps often individually wrong in word and deed, I'd be loathe to dissent. The Lord has already warned of what fate awaits those false teachers and leaders. I shall observe whatsoever the Magisterium teaches, but there will be times when I shall not do as they (of the Magisterium) do. God have mercy on them if they cause scandal, but I shall not make of myself a rebel. Some hats are simply too big for my head.