Pope preaches against "cafeteria Catholicism"! Oh yeah!

From a CNS/EWTN news story released yesterday:

Rome, Italy, Mar 11, 2011 / 04:44 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Priests must not preach “Christianity 'a la carte'” and should be willing to approach even uncomfortable aspects of the Gospel, Pope Benedict said in a meeting with priests this week. ...

The Pope ... called on priests today not to shrink from proclaiming “the entire plan of God.”

“This is important,” said the Pope. “The Apostle does not preach Christianity 'a la carte,' according to his own tastes, he does not preach a Gospel according to his own preferred theological ideas; he does not take away from the commitment to announce the entire will of God, even when uncomfortable, nor the themes he may least like personally. 

“It is our mission to announce all the will of God, in its totality and ultimate simplicity. But the fact that we must instruct and preach is important — as St. Paul says — and really proposes the entire will of God.”

 Do I hear an "Amen"? OOH-RAH!

From the "sympathy from the Devil" file ....

I've maintained for some time that loudmouths like Christopher Hitchens, Richard Dawkins, P. Z. Myers and Philip Pullman aren't representative of all atheists. In fact, Dawkins isn't the atheist's C. S. Lewis so much as he is the atheist Jack Chick.

Today I found a couple of atheists who bear my point out. 

First, courtesy of Francis Phillips at Catholic Herald, we have Dr. David Starkey (hopefully no relation to Ringo Starr!), self-described as "atheist and gay", who opposed the fining of Peter and Hazel Mary Bull, a Christian couple who refused to let a room of their Cornwall B&B to a couple of men. “The way to do that is not to ban them, not to fine them. It is for them simply to put up what seems to me to be a quite proper notice in a small privately-run hotel which says we are Christians and this is what we believe,” Dr. Starkey told a BBC 1 audience on Question Time. Otherwise, “We are producing a new tyranny.”

The second example comes from a CNS story from last September, but which I stumbled across in a link from another story. In a story done by the Spanish journal ABC, French liberal atheist Bernard-Henri Lévy said, “The Pope’s voice is extremely important. And we are very unjust to this Pope. I am not Catholic, but I think there is prejudice and especially major anti-clericalism that is taking on enormous proportions in Europe. ... In France there is much talk about the desecrations of Jewish and Muslim cemeteries, but nobody knows that the tombs of Catholics are continually desecrated. ... There is a sort of anti-clericalism in France that is not healthy at all. We have the right to criticize religions, but the most attacked religion today is the Catholic religion.”

Unfortunately, two examples in six months hardly constitutes evidence of a groundswell of secularist support for Christianity. But perhaps it gives us a little light in the gloom.

Re-drawing the line

Back in November, I posted five things that will make me leave one church and search out another for Mass: 1) Liturgical puppets; 2) designer vestments; 3) artsy-craftsy liturgical decorations; 4) Clown Masses; and 5) liturgical dancers.

Now I've added a sixth, courtesy of Deacon Greg Kandra:

Do I really need to say this? Okay, I'll say it:
NO FREAKIN' FLASH MOBS AT MASS!

From the "I always wondered about that" file

Oddly enough, for all the Ash Wednesday Masses and distribution services I've attended in my life, I have no conscious memory of ever seeing a priest with ashes on his head ... probably because I wasn't looking for it. But, in case you were wondering, not even the Pope escapes this ritual:

"Remember, O man, that 'you are dust, and to dust you shall return'"(Gen 3:19). Even if you're the Pope.


Into the darkness of heart

There are people who confuse writing down a handful of numbers with deep thought. There are people who confuse bluntness and foul language with honesty. There are people who think that if they make enough jokes about an experience we'll believe they're all right, that "there nothing wrong with her!" There are people who believe that, if they make a big fuss about rights and proclaim their compassion for the downtrodden loud enough, we'll believe they really do possess a moral compass that's in fine working order.

Such a person is Dolores P., an LPN candidate who works with an abortion provider. Read her post in The Hairpin. (If you need to know what kind of site The Hairpin is, I should tell you that one of the articles I saw advertised was "How To Give Up Urinary Tract Infections For Lent".) Here's a sample of her ersatz-candid style:

Up until recently I’d come out of any closet I found myself in—queer, non-monogamous, I fucking love Tool [the heavy-metal rock band] still, whatever—not that I live to hear the drink-choking sound, but because, to me, coming out was just one of the ways I could pay back the privileges that had been arbitrarily bestowed upon me (educated! white-appearing! “normal!”). My responsibility to normalize as much as I could. But training as an abortion provider is the first thing in my life that I hold back on spilling about. At the core of it, there’s a huge gap between saying “I had one” and saying “I do them.” I don’t want to alienate people. And nothing else I’ve ever done or been has felt like a direct invitation to a motivated someone out there to kill me and get away with it.

By the way, she says elsewhere that she's engaged to the father of the child she aborted, so when she says she came out of the "queer" and "non-monogamous" closets, I can't tell if she's decided she's bisexual, or if she somehow avoided getting labeled "queer", or even if she has a clue what the hell she was trying to say. (She could be just one more victim of that particularly bad piece of advice, "Write the way you talk.")

The whole post is filled with hysterical fears about being killed by some wild-eyed pro-lifer (girlfriend, you're more likely to die in an airplane crash!), dubious stats (65% of women getting abortions are mothers already? Really? That rates a 7.2 on the b.s. meter) and a link of contraceptive sabotage to spousal abuse that hints at the old "at home, barefoot and pregnant" trope. But worst—and most incoherent—of her writing sins is her explanation of what kind of woman feels regret, in what appears to be an attempt to minimize the actual rate of occurence; she has apparently never heard of PAS (Post-Abortion Syndrome), and isn't aware that it can take 5-10 years for it to fully manifest. As it appears to showing up in her writing.

Please pray for the conversion of her soul.

Ask Tony: Where did Mardi Gras come from?

Q: I know “Mardi Gras” is French for “Fat Tuesday”, and that it’s the day before Ash Wednesday. But many places start celebrating it so early, even weeks in advance! How did Mardi Gras start?

A: Mardi Gras, “Fat Tuesday”, is simply the last day of the long festival season called Carnival. Traditionally, Carnival starts on Septuagesima Sunday, the third Sunday before Lent. In Germany, the festival season (Fasching) begins on November 11 at 11:11 am, but the actual Karneval period begins the Thursday before Ash Wednesday, peaking on “Rose Monday”. In some areas, the season can begin as early as Epiphany (or Twelfth Night, January 6).

The origin of the festival name is disputed. Usually, it’s explained as derived from carne vale, “farewell to meat”, but many scholars believe that’s folk etymology. However, the festival is called Apokriés in Greek, which also means “farewell to meat”. Since there were Greek colonies founded throughout the Mediterranean basin, and some of the customs appear to have been carried over from pre-Christian times, it’s not unlikely that carne vale was translated from Greek.

It’s also probably due to the Mediterranean influence that the customs associated with Carnival never took hold further north in the British isles or the Nordic countries. In the United Kingdom, the day is known as Shrove Tuesday, the last day of Shrovetide (the week before Ash Wednesday), during which the lay people were expected to go to Confession prior to the start of Lent; the only known customs to have survived in any form since the Reformation are football games and pancake races.

 Although, as I said, some of the Greek customs appear to predate Christianity, we don’t really know when Carnival got started. We do know the earliest recorded celebrations in the West were in Venice in 1268, and in Nice in 1294. However, pre-Lenten festivals sprang up in different forms throughout Europe, including Russia (where the festival is called Maslenitsa, after an old Slavic pagan celebration).

Ash Wednesday is the start of the penitential season of Lent. Originally, meat was forbidden throughout the whole forty days, as were dairy products, fats and sugar; the Eastern Orthodox still practice this Great Fast, forbidding even eggs. Festivals were forbidden, except by indult of the local bishop; in Germany, alcohol could not be sold.

When Europe was still a predominantly agricultural society, food wasn’t wasted, so anything that couldn’t be eaten during Lent had to be used up before Ash Wednesday. The need to empty out the pantry and wine barrels provided an excellent excuse to party! During this time, old folk customs that had languished in the rise of Christianity were effectively “baptized”, much like Easter eggs and Christmas trees—given Christian rationales that were eventually lost after the old pagan meanings had been forgotten.

The English, especially Oliver Cromwell and the Puritans, were effective in stamping out such papist nonsense in the British Isles. However, wherever French, Spanish and Portuguese explorers, settlers and soldiers went, Carnival eventually followed. Although the celebration in certain areas can get pretty decadent, still, it’s gotta be said: Mardi Gras proves that Catholics know how to party down.

Laissez le bon temps rouler!

Ask Tony: What’s the big deal about the new missal?

Q: Over the last few months, a few groups in the US, the UK, Australia and Ireland have been complaining about the new translation of the Mass coming out at the end of November this year. What’s the big deal about it? Why is this such a problem?

A: First, we have to understand that the Mass being retranslated is the Ordinary Form, also known as the Novus Ordo (New Order, or NO) or Mass of Paul VI. One of the few changes actually called for by Vatican II was to the Tridentine Latin Mass (TLM):

The rite of the Mass is to be revised in such a way that the intrinsic nature and purpose of its several parts, as also the connection between them, may be more clearly manifested, and that devout and active participation by the faithful may be more easily achieved.

For this purpose the rites are to be simplified, due care being taken to preserve their substance; elements which, with the passage of time, came to be duplicated, or were added with but little advantage, are now to be discarded; other elements which have suffered injury through accidents of history are now to be restored to the vigor which they had in the days of the holy Fathers, as may seem useful or necessary (Sacrosanctum Concilium [1963], §50; emphasis added).

Talk about mixed feelings ...!

Yesterday, the Supreme Court handed down its decision in re Snyder v. Phelps (09-751), 8-1 in favor of the vile Fred Phelps and his loony pack of family members/disciples, Westboro Baptist.

Here's what I said back in October:

... [T]here is significant pressure on the courts and legislatures to remove “hate speech” from the shelter of the First Amendment. And it’s precisely nutjobs like the Phelps family who make such an action appear reasonable and desirable. And it’s precisely because we Christians include homophobes within our ranks that gay activists feel justified in cleping even the most charitably-phrased opposition “hate speech”. While a public-safety argument could be made for placing restrictions on “hate speech”, the problem remains: who would be in control of the definition?

On the one hand, I suppose I should be grateful that discussions of matters such as same-sex marriage can't be shut down on grounds of "hate speech". But a part of me can't help but wish that others besides A.J. Samuel Alito, the lone dissenter, had paid more attention to the "captive audience" part of the plaintiff's argument. No matter what Westboro Baptist believes, that they inflicted it on a family suffering grief and at a Christian religious service is not merely cruel—it's blasphemous.

This isn't a Pyrrhic victory. But it feels just as unsatisfying.

Please pray for the repose of Lcpl. Matthew Snyder, USMC, and the comfort and healing of his family. Semper Fi, Marine.

Just when you thought it was safe to go downtown ....

I have seen the report this news story is based on:

“Researchers studying the human papillomavirus say that in the United States HPV causes 64 percent of oropharynxl cancers,” said a Feb. 22 NPR report by Peggy Girshmann. “In the rest of the world, tobacco remains the leading cause of oral cancer, Dr. Maura Gillison of Ohio State University told a meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science this past weekend.”

 

“And the more oral sex someone has had -- and the more partners they've had -- the greater their risk of getting these cancers, which grow in the middle part of the throat,” said Girshmann’s NPR story. "‘An individual who has six or more lifetime partners -- on whom they've performed oral sex -- has an eightfold increase in risk compared to someone who has never performed oral sex,’ [Gillison] said.”

 

“Close to 37,000 Americans will be diagnosed with oral or pharyngeal cancer this year,” says the Oral Cancer Foundation website. “It will cause over 8,000 deaths, killing roughly 1 person per hour, 24 hours per day. Of those 36,000 newly diagnosed individuals, only slightly more than half will be alive in 5 years. This is a number which has not significantly improved in decades. The death rate for oral cancer is higher than that of cancers which we hear about routinely such as cervical cancer, Hodgkin's lymphoma, laryngeal cancer, cancer of the testes, and endocrine system cancers such as thyroid, or skin cancer (malignant melanoma). If you expand the definition of oral cancers to include cancer of the larynx, for which the risk factors are the same, the numbers of diagnosed cases grow to approximately 50,000 individuals, and 13,500 deaths per year in the US alone.”

Just another reason to keep it in your pants until you're married.

Not really back yet ...

Another reason I took a day off of blogging (this doesn't count): Desperately in need of an attitude adjustment. Unfortunately, my favorite place for adjusting my attitude is Pat & Mike's at 90th and Bedford in Omaha ... about 653 miles away. But my posts on Outside the Asylum have been turning from this:

... into this:

Since I was becoming precisely the kind of talking head I dislike, I needed to back off a bit and recover my optimism and good cheer ... though hopefully retaining my deadly use of sarcasm.