What you cannot surrender

5th Sunday of Lent: Readings

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

SS. Domenico e Sisto, Roma

Being a faithful Christian is often a dangerous balancing act, one of those stage shows where a seemingly reckless juggler throws a knife, a flaming ball, and a revved-up chainsaw into the air and keeps them flying for the entertainment of the audience. Lose concentration, glance away for even a second, breath at the wrong time and all those sharp, burning, ripping objects come crashing into you with the weight of gravity! Not since the early days of the Maryland Colony, or the Know-Nothing Klansmen of the 19th century have faithful Catholics found themselves at the center of attention as we are right now. Juggling the competing demands of the public square, the Church, the individual conscience, the Body of Christ is on stage, under the spotlight, with an audience holding its breath just waiting for the edifice of our faith to come tumbling down in ruin. What is it that we are juggling? Global clerical sex scandals. Pro-abortion Catholic politicians, clergy, religious. Threats of being driven from the public square by anti-Christian secularists. Internal battles over the morality of torture and war. The death and decay of the Body of Christ in Europe and Canada. The encroachment of radical Islamists into the U.K., the Netherlands, France, and Italy. And global media attacks on the Holy Father himself. Look away, breath at the wrong moment, lose concentration for even a second and all these volatile elements crash into the Body, causing terrible wounds. How do we keep our balance, keep our concentration? How do we perform on stage without injuring ourselves? Jesus says to the crowd that accuses a woman of adultery, “Let the one among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” When no stone is thrown and no one condemns her, he says to the woman, “Neither do I condemn you. Go, and from now on do not sin any more.”

What does the adulterous woman and her accusers have to do with the Church and our current predicament? We might say that the woman is the Church and the crowd is the world clamoring of our condemnation. But we could also reverse these roles and say that the Church is the crowd lusting after the death of a sinner and the world is the accused woman. Who fits which role largely depends on what century, what decade we are trying to understand, what situation we are analyzing. Of course, if you've spent even an hour trying to follow Christ on his way to the cross in Jerusalem, you know that the Church can be both accuser and accused, self-righteous and condemned simultaneously. Essential to the life of the faithful Christian living in the world is the precarious balancing act of being at once a condemned sinner forever forgiven and a righteous critic of sin. It seems that the Church gets into these aggravating, public confrontations with the world precisely because we freely acknowledge our failures yet steadfastly refuse to stop calling a sin a sin. In other words, we do not excuse our sins and the sins of the world by defining away Sin nor do we cloister ourselves away from the world by claiming to be sinless. 

Jesus was the first juggler who taught us the dangerous balancing act of living in the world as faithful Christians: boldly challenge the integrity of our accusers; be the first to acknowledge our sins; forgive one another and our accusers in mercy; and sin no more. Leave any one of these out and the whole juggling act becomes a very messy, very public moral wreck. We see this wreck over and over again when bishops and priests cover for one another when rightly accused of sexual abuse. We see it when we fail to confront unrepentant dissent from basic Church teaching in our universities, seminaries, and houses of formation. We see it when our bishops refuse to call pubic figures to account for their anti-life, anti-marriage, anti-family votes in Congress and Parliament. We see it when those charged with defending and teaching the faith displace our faith with scientism, therapeutic models of human actualization, the false idols of New Age and neo-pagan mysticism, secular political ideology, and the murderous morality of utilitarian ethics. But we see it most acutely, feel it most intensely when we ourselves, each of us, sin and fail to forgive, or forgive and fail to call the sinner to repentance.

When Paul explains the righteous he shares through Christ, he is quick to add, “It is not that I have already taken hold of [righteous] or have already attained perfect maturity, but I continue my pursuit in hope that I may possess it. . .” Here Paul gives us the key to interpreting the Christian experience of living in the world but remaining apart from it. We must lay claim to the real possibility of being righteous and all the while readily confess our distance from it. We cannot achieve this balance if we refuse to call sin Sin. Nor can we achieve this essential balance if we see ourselves as sinless victims persecuted by the vengeful crowd. The adulterous woman committed adultery. She is guilty. Jesus did not challenge the crowd to prove her guilt nor did he lift the ancient prohibition against adultery when he forgives her. Rather than condemn the crowd for their sinfulness, he challenges their integrity as judges and executors. In effect, he said, “Yes, this woman is guilty of adultery. But you yourselves are guilty as well. Why should you be the righteous judges and executors of this sinful woman when you are as guilty as she.” Sin is still sin. For the woman, for her accusers. Sin is still sin. And yet, both are forgiven.

As the Body of Christ, living as sinners among sinners, we are charged with being those who—despite our sin—acknowledge the reality of righteousness, the goodness of its pursuit, and the possibility of achieving it. Despite the scandals, despite the dissenters, despite the false idols, we must work against the temptation to relieve ourselves and others of the burden of calling our failures Sin. We must also resist the equally appealing temptation of lightening our load by believing ourselves to be without sin, without flaw. In the frenzy of juggling the elements of living day to day as sinners in pursuit of righteousness, we have no other refuge for respite than Christ himself. Paul writes, “I consider everything as a loss because of the supreme good of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have accepted the loss of all things and I consider them so much rubbish. . .” What lost things are we clinging to? What rubbish do we hoard and call treasures? As a Church, are we worried about our reputation? Our assets? Our numbers in the pews? Do any of these better condition us for the marathon that leads to righteousness in Christ? Are we worried about the loss of influence? The reduction of political power? The grief of persecution and trial? We've always known that following Christ means that we must walk the Sorrowful Way with him to the Cross. Why mourn the dangers of a path we ourselves have chosen to follow? Where's the integrity in that?

Leading our march toward Jerusalem this last week of Lent is the question that will lead us on through Holy Week and to the Cross: what are we most afraid of losing? As a Church, what is it that we simply cannot see ourselves giving up? As individual members of the Body, what is it that we will not relinquish? If we can name this idol, if you can name your idol, watch and know that we will all, you yourself, will be called upon to sacrifice whatever it is, to make it holy by surrendering it for the love of Christ. If we cannot or will not sacrifice, count all as loss for Christ, then our balancing act is rigged from the beginning. The knife is dull. The chain saw has no blade. The fire is bright but does not burn. If there is no risk, there is no reward. No danger, no possibility of victory. Those in the audience who eagerly await our failure heckle our performance b/c they believe that we would never truly put ourselves at risk, never truly court defeat for the sake of Christ. We can either prove them right or prove them wrong. We can either follow Christ as we have vowed to do, or we can follow the cynical expectations of the world and give them a show. If we truly count all things as loss in Christ, then our choice is crystal clear.

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Homily: 4th Sun of Lent (repost)

4th Sunday of Lent: Joshua 5.9, 10-12; 2 Cor 5.17-21; Luke 15.1-3, 11-32

Fr. Philip N. Powell, OP

St. Paul’s Hospital, Dallas, TX

Can you smell the wood of the cross from here? It’s still too far to see…just the smell of it is closer. Just about eighteen days more in this desert and we will be there to see him nailed to the wood. Then it will be the scent of wood and blood. Maybe vinegar and sweat as well. And some stinging smoke from the trash fires. And more caking dust. Will you run with the disciplines from Gethsemane? Will you walk with him along the sorrowful way and jeer with the other invisible bodies, adding your cowardly squeak to all the other taunts and cries from those he loved and fed and healed? Will you deny him to protect your safety, to conceal your once-professed love? Will you betray him? Of course you will. And so will I. It is what we do when given the choice to die for a friend or live for a cause. These moments of truth-telling make prudence easy and courage foolish. Praise God then that He does not wait for us to come to Him but rather comes to us first. His memory is holy and ours in need of sanctification.

Paul teaches the contentious Corinthians that “…God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting their trespasses against them and entrusting to them the message of reconciliation.” So, we are forgiven and then given the ministry of forgiveness to spread in the world, the work of bringing together those split apart, broken under, distant and made alien. The first reconciliation is with God. No other bond of friendship or love makes the least bit of sense outside the bond of love that our Father has for us. That we love is His doing. We cannot love without Him. And without love we can know nothing of Him or His creation—nothing about ourselves, others, or the things of this world. Just beyond the moment of creation itself, to be reconciled to God through Christ Jesus is the primitive move of love. Nothing stands before His love and remains broken, sick, injured, lonely, or distant…nothing, that is, but the stubborn refusal to be loved.

And why would anyone refuse to be loved by Love Himself? To be loved by God is to be changed forever. Clenched fists, an obstinately set jaw, a cold-heart do not easily release control to airy promises of safety and bliss. Even divine promises of safety and bliss. This an anxiety so profound that the Legions of Hell are frightened for us—even they believe! But we are capable of choosing still whether or not we will be changed forever by our desire for God or left squalling helplessly in our mulish refusal at the door to eternal darkness. There are worse choices than betrayal. There is the decision against love. And then crippling despair.

Though reconciliation with God is first, it is not the only reconciliation required of us. To love God is something too easily left in the world of forms, the merely abstract gesture of good will toward divine being. Something more concrete, more worldly is required of our love. We must be reconciled to one another in Christ. The Prodigal Son returns to a party thrown in this name. His father welcomes him home without reservation because he is the father’s son. Despite the son’s gross irresponsibility and near criminal immorality, the father opens his arms to receive the wretch, drapes him in his finest robes, slaughters a fat calf, and celebrates the feckless life of this reprobate. Sorry. I’m with the obedient brother on this one. Why the celebration? The natural consequences of the son’s irresponsibility are absolutely just. He wasted his inheritance, scattering it like seed on sand, and reaped the bitter harvest. He deserves his fate. Yes, exactly, he deserves his fate and his father’s harsh judgment! But he receives mercy, forgiveness, and a welcome home party. He is reconciled in love b/c he was dead and now lives. B/c he was lost and now he is found. Our faith is about excess and waste, overflowing love and beautifully squandered gifts. There is nothing pretty or genteel about the cross. Nothing efficient about the empty tomb. Love reconciles like a thunderstorm soaks dry earth.

We will betray Christ before he reaches the cross. Despite our fervent fasting and pristine prayers, despite our honest intent and good will, despite everything we did, do, and will do during Lent, we will come to the decision that it is best to live for the cause than to die for our friend. And we will go on…to be reconciled to God, to one another, and to become the ambassadors for Christ that Paul urges us to be. We will remember our betrayal as a sign of weakness, anxiety, sin. We will recall again and again the exact moment we did not speak up for Christ, the exact moment we let some insult to his faith slide by, the exact moment we chose to be his enemy dressed as his friend. We will remember when we choose to blend in with the crowd, to throw a stone or two on the sorrowful way, to shout a curse at his stripped and bleeding back. We will remember our betrayal. But he won’t.

Can you smell the wood of the cross? There are many more steps between here and now and the foot of the tree. The hot sand blows stinging hard and everything and everyone you’ve left behind calls to you out of friendship to come back. What’s ahead after all? Blood, bits of flesh, spit, gall, deception, cruelty, violence…your betrayal of a friend. You can turn back now. Do it. Just for a second. Look back to Ash Wednesday. What do you see? Hot promises? Eager intentions? A hunger for holiness? I’m going to do it this time!? Sure. And will you? Not likely. You’ll make it to the cross alright. But you won’t make it there any holier than when you left on Ash Wednesday. Do you think the purpose of Lent is to make you holy? Holier? The purpose of Lent is to show you your need for God. You will make it to the cross b/c God wants you at the cross. Holy or not. Your dieting and fasting and fussing about prayer and alms are at best distractions if they don’t serve to clear up God’s will for you: smell the wood, then see the wood, then taste it. Then feel it against your skin, your hands, your back and feet, feel it—burning, wet, raw, sharp. You are Christ. Lent is not your time to flee from weakness and temptation. Run to them! Lent is your time to pray like the Prodigal Son, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and you, I no longer deserve to be called your son…” And then wait for God the Father to forget your sins and drape you in His finest robes and slaughter the fattest calf to welcome you home again.

Sniff the air. The cross is coming closer. The cup is full. Will you drink from it? Or will you pour it into the desert sand?

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Homily: 3rd Sun of Lent (incomplete)

[Holy Week is almost upon us, so I'm posting this homily even though it is incomplete.  I hope someone out there benefits from it!]

3rd Sunday of Lent

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

SS. Domenico e Sisto, Roma

If you listen to female stand-up comics long enough you will eventually hear one or more of them ridicule men for being irrationally incapable of asking for directions. Husbands, fathers, brothers would rather wander lost in the wilds than stop at a 7-11 and ask the clerk how to get to where they are going. According to the comics, it all has to do with a fear of showing weakness during the hunt, a fear of admitting that their testosterone-enhanced ability to sense true north is defective. Given enough time, the Man assures his Woman, the Right Way will be revealed, and he will follow it to the promised destination. For her to nag him about stopping for directions, he insists, is a sign of mistrust, an admission of faithlessness. He knows where they are going. How they get there and when is irrelevant. But even scarier than the prospect of asking for directions is the possibility of having to turn around and start over. Turning around means that his inability to find the way has been compounded by a mistake, a mistake that can only be made right with a new beginning. As sensible as this sounds, you must remember that turning around and starting over raises the chances that the worst possible outcome might come to pass: he gets lost again. Isn't it better to wander lost, endure a little embarrassment, and eventually find the way than it is to start over and risk losing the path all over again? Jesus answers, “No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will perish.” Turn around and start over. If you are lost, it is better to go home and set out again.

What is the hardest part of repentance? Most of us would say that actually giving up our favorite sin is the most difficult part. But before we can give up our favored sin, we have to admit that this sin is a sin, a deliberate act of disobedience against God—otherwise, there is no compelling reason to give it up! At some level we know that lying, stealing, cheating on a spouse is wrong but we are usually eager to judge the degree of wrongness against the harm it causes. It was small lie to help a friend. I stole from a greedy insurance company. My spouse really doesn't care if I cheat. If the harm caused by our sin is less than the imagined good that results from it, we might consider it wrong but not Wrong. This sort of moral reasoning makes sense in a world where we measure good and bad as a delicate balance between pleasure and pain, harm and help. If more people are helped than harmed then we judge an act good. If not, we say our actions were bad. In this world, our goal is to cause more pleasure than pain. Starting over makes no sense because any pain we might cause is easily balanced by causing an equal amount of pleasure. Steal from the insurance company and give the money to a charity. Cheat on a spouse and then volunteer to cook dinner for a month. The idea of true repentance never enters the equation because there is no Right Way from which we might stray.

In a world where there are no objective moral standards, no gods to offend, no eternal consequences for good or a bad behavior, weighing harm against help is undoubtedly an excellent method of moral reasoning. For Christians, no such world exists. Our world, the world created by a loving Father, redeemed by His Son, and infused with the Holy Spirit, is a world of objective moral law and eternal consequences. And there is most certainly a god to offend. For us, the reality of sin and necessity of repentance is as real as trees, rocks, and the air we breath. There is no escaping the possibility, if not the probability, that we will get lost on the Way, that we will falter in the work we have vowed to complete. If sin looms large in the Christian heart so does the opportunity for repentance and the assurance of forgiveness. There is no shame in admitting defeat, turning around, doing penance, and making a fresh start. Even so, we are sometimes inclined to resist the call to repentance and persist in failure. Like the husband, brother, father who will not admit that he is lost and refuses to ask for directions, we stubbornly hold out hope that we will find the Way on our own. This is a lonely, frustrating, and ultimately futile means of finding our way Home. . .

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B.O., dissent, and the ObamaCare Sisters

Is B.O. promoting dissent within the Church?  Hey, if it helps him force all American taxpayers to pay for elective abortions, why not?

WASHINGTON, DC, March 18, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) - White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs revealed to reporters today that President Barack Obama actively promoted the Catholic Health Association's public break with the American Catholic bishops to support his health care legislation.

Gibbs also suggested that the CHA and the Leadership Conference of Women Religious' (LCWR) break with the U.S. Bishops has provided legitimate political cover for pro-life Democrats to switch their votes from "no" to "yes."

"I think over the past twenty four hours we have seen strong indications from those in the Catholic Church that support our belief that the legislation is about health care reform, and that it shouldn't and doesn't change the existing federal law [on abortion]. The Catholic Health Association and the order of nun's support is very important," Gibbs told reporters on the White House lawn for Thursday's press conference. 

Read the whole article.

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U.S. Bishops & Faithful Sisters on ObamaCare

Below is the text of the U.S. bishops' response to ScaryCare:

As long-time advocates of health care reform, the U.S. Catholic bishops continue to make the moral case that genuine health care reform must protect the life, dignity, consciences and health of all, especially the poor and vulnerable. Health care reform should provide access to affordable and quality health care for all, and not advance a pro-abortion agenda in our country. Genuine health care reform is being blocked by those who insist on reversing widely supported policies against federal funding of abortion and plans which include abortion, not by those working simply to preserve these longstanding protections.

On November 7, the U.S. House of Representatives passed major health care reform that reaffirms the essential, longstanding and widely supported policy against using federal funds for elective abortions and includes positive measures on affordability and immigrants.

On December 24, the U.S. Senate rejected this policy and passed health care reform that requires federal funds to help subsidize and promote health plans that cover elective abortions. All purchasers of such plans will be required to pay for other people’s abortions through a separate payment solely to pay for abortion. And the affordability credits for very low income families purchasing private plans in a Health Insurance Exchange are inadequate and would leave families financially vulnerable.

Outside the abortion context, neither bill has adequate conscience protection for health care providers, plans or employers.

Congressional leaders are now trying to figure out how the rules of the House and Senate could allow the final passage of a modified bill that would satisfy disagreements between House and Senate versions.

Mother Mary Quentin Sheridan, RSM, President of the Council for Major Superiors of Religious Women, representing U.S. religious women faithful to the Church magisterium, responds to ScaryCare, :

In a March 15th statement, Cardinal Francis George, OMI, of Chicago, president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, spoke on behalf of the United States Bishops in opposition to the Senate’s version of the health care legislation under consideration because of its expansion of abortion funding and its lack of adequate provision for conscience protection. Recent statements from groups like Network, the Catholic Health Association and the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR) directly oppose the Catholic Church’s position on critical issues of health care reform. The Council of Major Superiors of Women Religious, the second conference of Major Superiors of Women Religious in the United States, finds the provision of the bill to include expansion of abortion funding and fails to include conscience protection. We believe the bill needs to include the Hyde Amendment as passed by the House in November. Protection of life and freedom of conscience are central to morally responsible judgment. We join the bishops in seeking ethically sound legislation.

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Scuba Becky Update

Mama Becky (a.k.a. "Scuba Becky") underwent a lung biopsy yesterday.  Her docs are trying to figure out what sort of infection she has now that the pneumonia is gone.  The anti-biotic that are using is most often used intravenously to treat Swine Flu and Staph.  She's had both of these before.  

Please continue your prayers.

St Bernadine of Siena, intercede for my mother before the throne of God that she may be completely healed!

Amen.

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Naive, predictable, ironic: dissenting sisters support ObamaCare

 Recently, a coalition of American sisters and nuns issued a statement urging member congregations to support ObamaCare.  A few observations on this statement:

1).  It is stunningly naive.  To believe the claim that this bill is "pro-life" we have to believe that the most radically pro-abortion President and Speaker of the House in this country's history are telling us the truth when they say that the bill excludes federal funding for abortion.  No such language exists in the bill.  In fact, Pelosi and her minions have repeatedly rejected efforts by pro-life Dems and the GOP to include such language.  If the bill forbids federal funding for abortion, what's the problem with including an amendment that says so explicitly?  Answer: abortion funding will be made available through the backdoor via administrative rulings.

2).  It is entirely predictable.  The generation of sisters represented by groups like the LCWR long ago fell ill with the Utilitarian Virus of Moral Reasoning.  In their minds, federally funded abortion is OK b/c it is balanced by federally funded health clinics, prenatal care, etc.  In other words, it is morally acceptable to ignore the deaths of 1.7 million children every year so long as 30 million get some sort of basic health care.  That this care is purchased with the lives of the next generation is inconvenient but hardly worth getting worked up about.  This statement is also predicable b/c it flies in the face of the bishops' opposition to the bill.  The LCWR has made a habit of dissenting from basic Catholic teachings and setting itself and its constitutive congregations against Church leadership.  Fortunately, the predictability of the sisters' left-liberal political views and their history of dissent from basic Church teaching on fundamental issues renders their moral authority all but nil.  In other words, faithful Catholics will not be duped by this statement.

3).  It is incredibly ironic.  This same generation of dissenters among the LCWR sisters has sought a restructuring of the Church "from below" since the conclusion of the Second Vatican Council.  One of the themes of ecclesial revolution that rings out from their self-appointed prophetic calls for justice is the localization of the Church and the destruction of the Church Universal in the form of the clerical hierarchy.  So, the sisters who would see the Church destroyed b/c it is hierarchical ("from above") eagerly embrace the hierarchical rule of government from above.  ObamaCare is not about providing health care to 30 million uninsured Americans. . .it is about nothing more than the expansion of federal control over the lives and liberties of all American citizens.  

The statement and some fisking:

Dear Representative,

We write to urge you to cast a life-affirming "yes" vote when the Senate health care bill (H.R. 3590) comes to the floor of the House for a vote as early as this week.  [First, anyone who believes that B.O. and Pelosi hold "life-affirming" views on the morality of abortion is delusional.  Second, the unconstitutional procedure that Pelosi is proposing to "deem and pass" the Senate bill is not a vote on the Senate bill.]

We join the Catholic Health Association of the United States (CHA), which represents 1,200 Catholic sponsors, systems, facilities and related organizations, in saying: the time is now for health reform AND the Senate bill is a good way forward. [It may be time for health care reform but the Senate bill is not The Way Forward.  Pro-ScaryCare rhetoric has consistently portrayed our choices in an "either/or" fashion:  either we pass this monster of a bill or we do nothing.  We are supposed to believe that this massive, unconstitutional government takeover is the Only Viable Reform available.  Nonsense.]

As the heads of major Catholic women’s religious order in the United States, we represent 59,000 Catholic Sisters in the United States who respond to needs of people in many ways. Among our other ministries we are responsible for running many of our nation’s hospital systems as well as free clinics throughout the country. ["Catholic" in what sense?  This entirely predictable endorsement of a pro-abortion from the sisters is an example of the hand trying to do its work apart from the Body.  There are can reasonable, prudential disagreement about most elements of this bill.  But to believe that the bill will not lead to federally-funded abortions and medical rationing is naive at best and mendacious at worst.  Also, we have to wonder how the sisters are responding to the needs of the 1.7 million people who are aborted every year in this country.  Their public statements on "social justice" issues consistently ignore the injustice of abortion.]

We have witnessed firsthand the impact of our national health care crisis, particularly its impact on women, children and people who are poor.  We see the toll on families who have delayed seeking care due to a lack of health insurance coverage or lack of funds with which to pay high deductibles and co-pays. We have counseled and prayed with men, women and children who have been denied health care coverage by insurance companies. We have witnessed early and avoidable deaths because of delayed medical treatment. [Have they witnessed the impact of abortion on this nation's conscience?  Do they see the emotional and spiritual toll abortion takes on the women who believe the lie that abortion is a simple medical procedure not unlike a pap-smear?  Have they prayed for the 45 million children killed legally since 1973?  Are the early deaths caused by abortion "avoidable"?]

The health care bill that has been passed by the Senate and that will be voted on by the House will expand coverage to over 30 million uninsured Americans. [NB.  The House is NOT set to vote on the Senate bill as the U.S. Constitution requires.  The House will vote on a rule that amends the Senate bill and deems the bill passed.] While it is an imperfect measure, it is a crucial next step in realizing health care for all [Except for the 1.7 million children whose deaths the taxpayer will fund]. It will invest in preventative care. It will bar insurers from denying coverage based on pre-existing conditions. It will make crucial investments in community health centers that largely serve poor women and children. And despite false claims to the contrary, the Senate bill will not provide taxpayer funding for elective abortions [If this claim is true, then why is pro-abort Pelosi and her hard-leftist caucus pushing the bill so hard?  Abortion coverage will be put in place by administrative fiat when this monster is up and running.  Nothing in the bill explicitly prevents federal-funding for abortion].  It will uphold longstanding conscience protections and it will make historic new investments – $250 million – in support of pregnant women. This is the REAL pro-life stance, and we as Catholics are all for it [Again, "Catholic" in what sense?  Preventative care, community health centers, money for pregnant women are all perfectly good Catholic responses, but you can't poison just half the cake batter and believe that the cake will be OK to eat.  The sisters have fallen for the utilitarian compromise.]

Congress must act [Yes, it must; but it doesn't have to act in such a way that destroys the economy, bloats the federal bureaucracy, raises taxes, increases governmental control, makes insurance more expense for the 86% of Americans who are satisified with their current insurance., and rations medical care for us all]. We are asking every member of our community to contact their congressional representatives this week. In this Lenten time, we have launched nationwide prayer vigils for health care reform. We are praying for those who currently lack health care. We are praying for the nearly 45,000 who will lose their lives this year if Congress fails to act. [But not the 1.7 million who will die b/c abortion remains legal?] We are also praying for you and your fellow Members of Congress as you complete your work in the coming days. For us, this health care reform is a faith mandate for life and dignity of all of our people [except those who will be killed by their mothers using taxpayer dollars].

We urge you to vote "yes" for life by voting yes for health care reform in H.R. 3590. [And the Church urges you to vote "yes" for life and liberty by voting no on this unconstitutional, power-grabbing boondoggle that will inevitably force all Americans to pay for abortion.]

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Pelosi's Monstrosity

Wow. . .just WOW!  The Anchoress spanks. . .no, make that beats. . .pro-abort Dem leader, Nancy Pelosi:

[. . .] 

In her upside-down world, Pelosi may think that this monstrosity she is laboring so mightily to deliver is “life-affirming;” that is because she is -like so many of her generation- unable to imagine life after her own. It takes a “my life right now is more important than any future life” mentality to be this committed to abortion, and to insuring that every means of preventing or ending life, at every stage, is introduced into the public mind as a Godly and enviable thing. It takes a mind that willfully misunderstand the nature of both light and life, as taught by the Church she professes to love, to stand there with a smug, “unicorns and rainbows” demeanor and spout these deceitful platitudes that are not grounded in any sort of reality.

[. . .]

Read the whole thing.

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Coffee Bowl Browsing

The once Grand Dame of American ecclesial communities, The Episcopal Church, continues its suicidal experimentation with the Zeitgeist.  TEC has always been something of a boutique religion, but now it is barely a sub-culture of a niche market.  Chris Johnson, Fisker of All Things Episcopagan, fisks.

What do you think of Catholic preaching?  Though I have never been a pastor (and probably never will be), my guess is that pastors often allow anxieties about negative congregational reactions and overreactions to dictate the content and tone of their homilies.  Over time, these anxieties grind the pastor down into a Hallmark Card preacher:  say little of substance, offend no one's delicate prejudices, be sweet.  

Fr. Tim Finigan has a round-up of reports on the recent court victory  in the U.K. for Catholic Care against the culture of death. 

Yet another reason to avoid Chicago-O'Hare when traveling.

Japanese game shows are notoriously weird. 

Will the MSM notice that another group of Catholic sisters/nuns oppose B.O.'s ScaryCare?

Fudging the numbers of women religious who support ScaryCare.  This is a typical Alinsky-style leftist tactic.

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Update on Mama Becky (UPDATED)

Looks like Mama Becky will be discharged from the hospital today.  She is not cured, but she is recovering.

She reports that she will likely have to be on O2 24/7 in order to prevent her lung capacity from diminishing any further.  I suggested an O2 back-pack for work and Wal-Mart trips.

Her new nickname will be "Scuba Becky."

UPDATE:  no hospital discharge for mom today. . .

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Coffee Bowl Browsing (Mini Edition)

A whole site dedicated to collecting stories about Shadow People.  I've been "seeing" these guys since I was a kid.  Never knew they had their own website! (h/t:  Spirit Daily)

B.O. orders relief workers and military personnel not to fly Old Glory in Haiti.  Good to see he's finally showing his true colors.

The Most Transparent Administration Evar!  B.O. invoking secrecy protections more often than W. ever did.

Former U.S. Appeals Court judge explains why the Slaughter Solution, if used to pass ScaryCare, slaughters the Constitution.

Delicta graviora, millstones, and the Church's chief prosecutor.

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Doctor's orders

4th Week of Lent: Readings

Fr. Philip Neri Powell, OP

SS. Domenico e Sisto, Roma

Jesus asks the man who has been sick for 38 years if he wants to be well. The man doesn't answer yes, no, or maybe. Instead, he tells Jesus that he has no one to put him into the healing pool when the water is ready to heal. We can infer from his response that he wants to be healed but cannot do on his own what is required to be healed. He needs help. We might expect, at this point, that Jesus would pick the man up and put him in the pool. But following the man's enigmatic example, Jesus responds in a way that no one expects. He says to the man, “Rise, take up your mat, and walk.” Just like that, he does. John writes, “Immediately the man became well, took up his mat, and walked.” He is completely healed. We could read this passage as a story of miraculous physical healing and surely it is. But we could also read it as a story about how illness—physical and spiritual—cripples our courage and undermines our faith by leaving us to the fickle mercies of others. The man has no one to help him. What he needs is someone to come along and strengthen his spirit. Jesus does just that. But he helps in way that heals all the man's sicknesses not just his body. Finding the newly healed man later that day, Jesus says to him, “Look, you are well; do not sin any more, so that nothing worse may happen to you.” The fundamental ministry that Christ gives to his Church is the ministry of reconciliation with the Father through grace. If Christ's healing grace is to work in bringing us back to the Father, we must do what the Doctor has ordered us to do.

Rise, take up your mat, and walk. These are the three orders that the divine physician gives to his long-suffering patient. Are we surprised that these orders do not include instructions on prayer, fasting, sacrifice, or alms-giving? Are we surprised that the man is not ordered to recite scripture or wash himself clean with fresh water? Jesus doesn't even require the man to answer his simple question, “Do you want to be well?” John is very clear on the sequence of events: Jesus issues his orders and immediately the man does as he is ordered to do. At no time in the gospel story does the man ask to be healed nor does he explicitly consent to the healing he receives. Jesus speaks, and it is done. What are we to make of this sequence of events given that Christ's healing grace requires our cooperation in order to do its work? Unless we are willing to admit that the man was healed against his will, we must wrestle with exactly how he came back to physical and spiritual health.

First, notice that the Jews who want to persecute Jesus consider healing the sick a form of work, a job that gets done. Next, note that the man is hanging around the healing pool waiting, hoping to be helped. Now, remember both the natural condition of the human soul and its supernatural end. Putting these three elements together we get a man who should be well seeking out someone to do the work of healing in order that he might be well again. In other words, he longs to be reconciled to the Father as a matter of who he is as a fallen creature. He yearns to be made whole because who he is most perfectly is a child of God. That desire is his consent, that need is the work he contributes to his healing. To be fully healed—body and spirit—is his goal, his end. Jesus orders him to see himself as he should be and to act accordingly. He does. Nothing more is required.

And nothing more is required of us. The saints and doctors of the Church teach us that sin is a slave master. We are chained to disobedience. The irony is that we remain chained by choice. We hired our master and we employ him. All we need to do is see our perfected end in Christ and fire our unruly master. If we do as the Doctor orders, we too can rise and walk away from sickness. And in rising and walking away, give witness to the healing graces of our Lord.

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Coffee Bowl Browsing

More orchestral Obama worship from children.  Shudder.

What if you threw a political party and most of the people who showed up were white males?  Well, if you call your gathering a "tea party," you are labeled a racist.  However, if you change the name to "coffee party," you are labeled as mainstream.

Oklahoma stands up to the Nanny State by refusing to cooperate in federal investigations into so-called hate crimes.  Apparently, this OK law was passed to prevent enforcement of the recently passed federal law criminalizing non-groupthink thinking about sexual orientation.

Should homilies exceed eight minutes?  The Sunday homilies preached here at the priory usually run between 20-25 minutes!  Maybe I should post this article?  :-)

The tyranny of tolerance:  the case for excluding the children of same-sex couples from Catholic schools. 

Muslims to conquer Rome?  If they do, it will likely happen to the cheers of Europe's lefty elite.

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Prayers, please!

Just got off the phone with Mama Becky. . .she's in the hospital again with pneumonia!

Please, offer those prayers. . .

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Piracetam, anyone?

Anyone out there have any experience using piracetam?  I'm told by reliable sources that this nutritional supplement is very useful for improving concentration and helps with restoring a healthy sleep cycle.  It is also supposed to be good for dyslexia. 

It's available here in Italy, but I am deeply suspicious of all the hyped advertising on the internet.

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