The Bovina Bloviator

Scenes from the Conversion of Mount Calvary Church in Baltimore

2012-02-03T14:18:00.001-05:00

There Goes the Neighborhood

2012-01-19T22:02:00.002-05:00

Roman and Anglo-Catholics in the Baltimore area may wish to attend Mass Sunday morning at Mount Calvary Church at 10:00 a.m. so they may, in addition to worshiping and receiving the sacraments--as well fulfill their obligation, pray for the clergy (rector above) and parishioners at that church as they are received into the Holy Catholic Church. The activities for the day are as follows.

Solemn High Mass on Sunday, January 22, 2012, at 10:00 am, the parishioners and clergymen of Mount Calvary Church will make their profession of faith and be confirmed as Roman Catholics and members of the Personal Ordinariate of the Chair of Saint Peter by the first Anglican Use Ordinary of the United States, Father Jeffrey Steenson.

Solemn Evensong at 4:30 pm, with Father Dwight Longenecker preaching.

Gala receptions will follow both liturgies.

Given that this is an Anglo-Catholic parish going over to Rome, we can only believe both liturgy and receptions to follow will be nothing short of spectacular. Come and pray, worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness and have a rollicking good time. Deo Gratias!

Wherever the Catholic sun doth shine,
There’s always laughter and good red wine.
At least I’ve always found it so.
Benedicamus Domino!
― Hilaire Belloc

h/t Daniel Page

Behaving Like Christians

2012-01-18T17:44:00.000-05:00

The Episcopal Diocese of Maryland has released a statement outlining the terms of agreement reached with the parishioners of Mount Calvary Church of Baltimore as they part from the Episcopal Church and join the Holy Catholic Church via Anglicanorum Coetibus. Given the rancor and litigation other parishes have suffered when attempting to leave the Episcopal Church, the parishioners of Mount Calvary could scarcely have done better. They will keep most of their property (paying an undisclosed sum) and the diocese will have right of first refusal should they wish to dispose of it in the future. Seems fair to me.

Most important, the statement is a model of grace and decorum and ought serve as a paradigm for the Episcopal Church in her future dealings with parishes that wish to depart. From the statement's closing paragraph:

The Rev. Canon Scott Slater, on the bishops’ staff and part of the mediation team representing the Episcopal diocese, said, "This has been a thoughtful, prayerful, and respectful process by all three entities, and I am pleased that we have reached a solution that meets the needs of all three groups."

Amen, Amen.

Thanks to Augustine.

Diary of a Papist Convert: the Anglican Way

2012-01-15T21:07:00.004-05:00

Thanks to Father Rutler for alerting me to this splendid (and brief) piece by George Weigel: Converts and the Symphony of Truth, in which the author celebrates the varieties of religious experiences of Catholic converts. It seems the experiences of those converting, not surprisingly, nearly equal their number. Coming as I did, however, from a quasi-WASPy Anglican background, I had most empathy with Evelyn Waugh, who, as Weigel relates, "became a Catholic with, by his own admission, 'little emotion but clear conviction': this was the truth; one ought to adhere to it." Quite so. While I will confess for years having a bit of envy for those who had some dramatic experience, an epiphany of sorts, that suddenly infused them with a true and lively faith, mine was undramatic: a years-long process of discernment consisting of questioning, reasoning, reading, consultation and prayer, eventually leading me to the Catholic Church, with no fireworks. So be it and thanks be to God.

Even more gratifying, though, in Weigel's essay is his description of a common thread running through the diverse tales of conversion:

that men and women of intellect, culture and accomplishment have found in Catholicism what Blessed John Paul II called the “symphony of truth.” That rich and complex symphony, and the harmonies it offers, is an attractive, compelling and persuasive alternative to the fragmentation of modern and post-modern intellectual and cultural life, where little fits together and much is cacophony.

There is no doubt of that. The times we live in are as corrupt, superficial and shallow as they were before my conversion but I find them now just a bit more bearable, armed as I am with the full Catholic faith and the promise of salvation to those who live by Church teachings (not always easy, of course).

Next weekend, I will have the great pleasure of witnessing the reception of an entire Episcopal parish, Mount Calvary Church in Baltimore, and its rector Fr. Catania, an old friend, into the Holy Catholic Church by the newly appointed American Anglican Ordinary, Msgr. Steenson. Priest and parishioners have gone through a period of discernment similar to mine, reasoned and deliberate (it's the Anglican way--I give you Cardinal Newman). Holy Church will be richer than she already is by this happy occurrence and I pray those good people will find themselves enriched as well.

They Must be Nuts--They Enlisted, Right?

2012-01-02T17:41:00.002-05:00

Interesting that so many in the media, when reporting on the recent fatal shooting of a Mount Ranier park ranger, find it newsworthy that the deranged suspect was (his body was found earlier today) an "Iraqi War Veteran." What is the relevance of his military past? Do you recall it being reported of crime suspects they were veterans of the Second World War or the Korean War? No, the military background of perps only began attaining relevance at the time the media turned against the military and, more pertinently, the draft, and has become a vital fact now that the nation's conflicts (especially those for which presidents named Bush may be blamed) are fought by an all-volunteer army. What a stunning coincidence.

Imagine That

2012-01-02T10:07:00.003-05:00

An entertainer by the name of Cee Lo Green, engaged by NBC to entertain the assembled throng in New York's Times Square this New Year's Eve, got himself into a bit of trouble for altering the lyric of one of the ditties he crooned, John Lennon's, "Imagine." It seems he changed a stanza in this treacly ode to atheism from "nothing to kill or die for / and no religion too" to "nothing to kill or die for / and all religion's true." Lennon fans are crying blasphemy.

I doubt, however, Mr. Lennon, who was a cynic but no dummy, would have been terribly ruffled over this controversy (certainly his estate receives a nice royalty check whatever the words sung). Lennon would have known, even if Mr. Green does not, the multi-culti substitution of "all religion" for "no religion" changes the meaning not one wit, as an idiot quoted in the Rolling Stone account (and are you as astonished as I to learn that tired old relic of the 'sixties is still extant?) nicely, if entirely inadvertently, confirms:

"The whole point of that lyric is that religion causes harm," tweeted someone with the handle @geekysteven. "If 'all religion's true' it would be a pretty bleak place.

Sing it, brother!

On the Other Hand...

2011-12-23T13:39:00.006-05:00

The estimable Fr. Dwight Longnecker (an Episcopalian convert himself) writes, concerning the Anglican Ordinariate:

The establishment of the Ordinariate has clarified matters between the two churches. Benedict XVI has, if you like, called the bluff of all those Anglicans who kept on saying, "We are Catholics too you know...just not Roman Catholics." Then they would go on in pious phrases, "We do long to become Catholics and to achieve unity, but we do not want to give up our distinct patrimony."

OK. It's all possible now. Anglicans can come into full communion with Rome. They can keep their distinct patrimony. They have their own hierarchy. Their married men may be ordained. They can have their own religious orders, their own seminary and their own churches and their own form of church government. What else do they want? The numbers who take up the Pope's offer will be small, because they will have to launch out in faith.

There is no question there are those in the Catholic Church, some of them well placed, who want no part of the Anglican Ordinariate and will seemingly do whatever they can to derail it. Curious, that, since it is obvious the will of the Holy Father is this thing be done; how do they reconcile their behavior with Catholic obedience?

On the other hand, as Fr. Longnecker points out, the time has come for those Anglicans who profess and practice "Catholicity" to put up or shut up. The Holy Catholic Church has extended an unprecedented and generous offer to them to become one with the one true Church while maintaining their worship practices, which in the case of Anglo-Catholics, is not only pre-Vatican II but pre-Pius XII as well: essentially 19th century Catholic worship while using the Book of Common Prayer (and no doubt at the root of the angst and nay-saying among liberal Catholic bishops and priests).

Anglicans, particularly those calling themselves Anglo-Catholic, who decline the invitation from Rome are, in effect, declaring their lot with the Protestants (one commenter on Longnecker's post proclaims he will not budge until the Vatican allows use of the 1662 Prayer book and the 39 Articles!--good luck with that, fella). With the establishment of the Anglican Ordinariate, Anglicans who insists on defining themselves as "Catholic" will, over time, appear increasingly anomalous and, as the Anglican Church (and the Episcopal Church, especially) march further and further from orthodoxy, downright ridiculous. As Fr. George Rutler once wrote: "It must also be remembered that the continued existence of Catholic forms within Anglicanism does a disservice by confusing many." Indeed.

The road to hell is paved with the skulls of erring priests, with bishops as their signposts.--St. John Chrysostom

2011-12-22T19:25:00.005-05:00

Among the many thoughtful comments (and thank you one and all) on my post concerning the soon-to-be announced ordinary of the American Anglican Ordinariate was this one from commenter Anthony:

One very telling comment which has stuck in my mind so clearly, was asked by a Catholic Bishop at the U.S. Bishops' Conference back in June. When speaking of future parish communities in the Ordinariate, he asked Cardinal Wuerl, "What if one of my people stumbles into one of these parishes, and likes it?" To which Cardinal Wuerl replied "It hasn't been a problem up until now." This sums up both the stupidity and non-pastoral nature of some of these characters with whom we have to do.

The establishment of the ordinariate will just be the beginning. Whoever the ordinary turns out to be, the estimable Fr. Steenson or one of the other worthy candidates, he will have his work cut out for him, as will all the brave souls planting Anglican Use churches within dioceses headed by the many deeply suspicious, sometimes downright hostile, bishops in the U.S.C.C.B. They might take at least some solace, however, knowing they will be having a better time of it than their counterparts in England.

Ordinariate Buzz

2011-12-20T05:41:00.002-05:00

It is being noised Jeffrey Steenson, the former Bishop of the Diocese of the Rio Grande in the Episcopal Church, who was received into the Catholic Church in 2007 and is now a priest, will be named Ordinary of the American Anglican Ordinariate on January 1, 2012.

Should the buzzings be true, Fr. Steenson would make an excellent choice; his credentials are solid.

The Death of Another Leader

2011-12-19T15:40:00.001-05:00

It's sad the death of the despotic Kim Jong-il generates headlines, think-pieces and thumbsuckers in media around the world while news of the contemporaneous death of a genuine hero, Vaclav Havel, is more or less buried. It was Havel (along with Lech Walesa and, of course, Pope John Paul II), who at considerable risk and cost to his own welfare, stood up to the lie that is communism and successfully urged his compatriots to do same, eventually leading to the collapse of the Soviet Bloc. I can't help wonder if many of those in today's media, upon hearing of Havel's death and Googling his name to learn about him, found those activities so disquieting they chose instead to lavish their attention on Kim, who though a murderous clown thug, was possessed at least of a more palatable ideology.

Vaclav Havel, 1936-2011.

At Long Last

2011-12-18T14:16:00.001-05:00

The Reverend Jason Catania, Rector of Mount Calvary Church (Episcopal) announced this morning at Mass that the parishioners of that church will be received into the Catholic Church and the U.S. Anglican Use Ordinariate on Sunday, January 22, 2012. This is most excellent news and a long time coming. Fr. Catania is a friend of your Bloviator going back nearly a decade, when he was stationed in another church. In fact it was he who virtually ordered me, after a period of slack attendance, to start attending Mass again regularly no matter what the state of the Episcopal Church. That was excellent counsel and the result of it was a few years later I up and left the Episcopal Church and embraced the full Catholic faith, waving to my priest friend from the opposite side of the Tiber. Now he will soon be joining me and the rest of us on this side of it and that is most pleasing indeed.

Welcome home, Father.

Thanks to Augustine.

Putting Allah into Christmas

2011-12-15T23:33:00.002-05:00

Earlier I bloviated the multi-cultis, in their efforts to ecumenize Christmas to death, had little to offer when it came to injecting Islam into the mix, i.e., "some sort of Islamic equivalent even though there is none..." Oh, how glibly wrong that was. Thanks are owed to a long-time blogging colleague of your Bloviator (one who has linked to this humble effort almost from its inception), Archbishop Cranmer, and his fairly astonishing report of an "inclusive" Lessons and Carols ceremony (one of the Anglican Church's great gifts to Christianity) celebrated recently at a chapel at the University of London, at which traditional scripture was dispensed with in favor of readings from the Qur'an, the part about Mary, as you might have expected. One of the celebrants was, not surprisingly, an Anglican priestess, the other a Catholic priest, also not surprisingly but sadly indicative of the state of Holy Church in England.

It behooves you to read His Grace's entire account of the debacle but this short excerpt from it will serve to close this posting.

When you compromise on the intellectual, political, and imaginative foundations of Western culture, you create a spiritual vacuum which needs to be filled. The people cry out for meat, and all they can get is the milk of dumbed-down Anglicanism followed by a mouthful of Islam.

Job Well Done

2011-12-15T17:12:00.010-05:00

I do believe the transformation is complete: so far this season I have not once heard the dreaded word "Christmas" in any radio or television commercial, nor seen it in any print ads. In fact, the only use of the word at all I have seen in media intended for mass distribution was this morning (and boy was I taken aback), in the monthly handout for commuters published by Metro North Railroad (a gummint institution, no less), wherein their Christmas Day schedule was announced (I guess there was no easy way to get around the word). Atheists will be relieved to know, however, Metro North atoned for that sin elsewhere in the bulletin where, in a list of suggested seasonal activities, a visit to the "Holiday Tree" in Rockefeller Center was recommended.

All in all, however, it's probably for the best this de-Christianization of Christmas, for in these times the moment anyone suggests some sort of public observance of the feast, self-appointed advocates of "fairness" will leap up and demand equal time for the other religions and so begins the trotting out of the menorahs (and since "Christmas" trees are no longer allowed shouldn't menorahs be called "Holiday candelabra" or some-such?), Kwanza decorations (how odd that a manufactured holiday celebrates the harvest at the onset of winter) and, of course, some sort of Islamic equivalent even though there is none (never mind that, we'll just put up a great big crescent, preferably right over the crèche the Catholics put up earlier, right next to the angels and Frosty the Snowman).

In a similar vein, your crabby old Bloviator vigorously eschews "ecumenism" of any sort, for in the end it is only a declaration of the tepidity of one's own faith. One will never find, and rightly so, any nod to or borrowings from Christianity in orthodox Jewish services, likewise for Islamic, Hindu, Zoroastrian and other faiths' observances. I will never forget a community service I attended years ago in the well-to-do Connecticut suburb in which I grew up, in an Episcopal church (naturally), that concluded with the soprano soloist, accompanied by large chorus and orchestra, recessing down the aisle bellowing Hava Nagila at the top of her lungs. In the audience was my childhood piano teacher and when I saw her later she was in high dudgeon: "They're apologizing for being Christian," she said angrily and loudly and she was absolutely right. This Christmas, don't apologize for being Christian. Atheists and non-believing members of other faiths are the only ones who might take offense and quite frankly, they need to be offended.

One non-Christian who never took offense at the celebration of Christmas was a former neighbor of mine, an observant orthodox Jew (he attended schul daily at 7:00 a.m.) and a Holocaust survivor. Every year, on Christmas day, he would bang on the door of my apartment, boom out a "Merry Christmas" and invite me over to his and his wife's apartment next door to sample some of his fine single-malt scotches. He was a godly man.

A Solution to a Common Nuisance

2011-11-26T10:36:00.002-05:00

Thanks to Mimi.

Heiliger Dankgesang

2011-11-24T22:31:00.012-05:00

For reasons I have never been able to fathom I always associate Thanksgiving with the music of Beethoven. I was therefore most pleased to hear on the car radio, while driving to the family Thanksgiving gathering, that the program director at radio station WQXR, New York's only(!) full-time classical station, had felt likewise and scheduled an all-Beethoven play-list. Particularly appropriate, I thought, was the airing of String Quartet No. 15, Op. 132, which Beethoven composed after recovering from a a serious illness. The ethereal (like so much of late Beethoven) third movement is entitled: "Heiliger Dankgesang eines Genesenen an die Gottheit, in der lydischen Tonart" ("A Convalescent's Holy Song of Thanksgiving to the Divinity, in the Lydian Mode"). More transcendent and eerily beautiful music simply does not exist; the master was surely hearing the voice of God as he penned his thanks to Him in music.

Now home from a most splendid repast, I thought it appropriate to cap off the day by listening to the grandest Beethoven work of them all, the Ninth Symphony, via an historic recording (Furtwängler, Philharmonia Orchestra, Lucerne, 1954, for you enthusiasts out there). Sitting here, sipping from a small glass of decent scotch (with a splash), I feel particularly cognizant of the rich blessings bestowed upon me by an ever-loving God. Your Bloviator has had his share of adversity over the years (the early to mid-nineties were particularly brutal) but always managed to land on his feet, thanks be to God. And while my life can hardly be described as all bliss all the time, I nonetheless have much to be thankful for: a nice place to live, family and friends, a job I actually enjoy and, most of all, since 2008, the joy of having embraced the full Catholic faith.

Whatever your faith, or even if you have none at all, I wish every one of you a happy Thanksgiving.

Good Multi-Culti

2011-11-23T08:05:00.001-05:00

From the Wall Street Journal:

An English Thanksgiving, 1942
American soldiers followed in the footsteps of 17th-century Pilgrims and sat in the pew of Miles Standish.

...In those dark days, Americans took special pleasure in displaying their homegrown holiday to the Mother Country. The English were dubious at first but slowly realized they were being invited to share in something very special.

U.S. Army Cpl. Heinz Arnold warms up the pipes in London's Westminster Abbey. Getty Images

Read it all, truly inspiring.

This is the Last Straw...

2011-11-18T12:36:00.006-05:00

Enough, I hope, to drive even the effete progressives from New York's credentialed class into the arms of the Libertarians. The New York Times (credit where credit is due!) reports on the latest outrage of the bloated public sector, directed at a venerable New York institution:

Inspector Visits Sardi’s. Free Cheese Ends.

By JAMES BARRON

Published: November 17, 2011

It was a tradition at bars like the ones in Sardi’s in the theater district: a communal cheese pot with a knife sticking out, and some crackers. First-nighters or late-nighters grabbed the knife and a cracker, spread the cheese — cheddar — and ate. Some called it dinner [all-too-true!--ed.].

Now, after a health department inspection that complained about “food not protected from potential source of contamination,” the communal pot is gone.

Other bar-food staples like peanuts and pretzels in little bowls? Sardi’s has taken them off the bar, too.

Anyone who wants cheese and crackers has to order them, and will be served his or her own pot of cheese and a couple of crackers wrapped in plastic. And now there is a price: Unlike the communal cheese pot, which was free, Sardi’s is charging $3 for a small pot of cheese and a couple of crackers and $5 for a large pot.

######

“It has to do with the health department,” said V. Max Klimavicius, the president of Sardi’s. “It’s gotten to the point that the way they’re applying the health code is so rigid, we can no longer have what we always had. The way it is now with the health department, as they say, a good inspector has to find violations. They come with flashlights and look in every corner.”

“It’s just mind-boggling,” he said. “Nobody’s happy.”

Of course nobody's happy, save for zealous and overpaid unionized government workers who relish the opportunity showing we-the-people who really is in charge. Those cheese pots were the perfect accompaniment to a gin martini (straight up with olives)...or two...or three; they really laid a nice base. The hope expressed above this egregious act might lessen New York elites' support of overwhelming and overweening government is, of course, in vain. What's more likely to occur is should they find themselves in Sardi's for a drink (one doesn't go there for the food, of course) and learn that the friendly earthenware pots stuffed with Wispride® have been banished by the germ police, they will shake their heads slightly, make a sad utterance how it must be for the best, followed by--more loudly so everyone will hear--a snarky comment how awful American cheese is, then flag down the waiter and order du fromage Selles-sur-cher (tres cher!) that is much more in keeping with people of their education and intellectual pretensions.

Really, this is so prole.

Breaking News on the Ordinariate

2011-11-15T16:34:00.008-05:00

Cardinal Wuerl: the Anglican Ordinariate in the United States will be established on New Year's Day, 2012; the Pope has approved.

Now that that has been settled, the next item up for speculation is who will be the ordinary? I received an interesting tip who that might be back in June but nothing has come of it, yet. We shall know soon enough now.

Also something to ponder here in New York City: which, if any, Episcopal parish here will join the ordinariate? I don't see any obvious candidates. It would be my and many others' fondest wish the parishioners of glorious St. Thomas Church on Fifth Avenue might embrace the full Catholic faith but the chances of that happy event occurring are just about nil (although there might be a small number of parishioners at St. Thomas who would be in favor). Friends have suggested a few smaller Anglo-Catholic parishes here as possibilities but their demographics (to put it as tactfully as possible) make it extremely unlikely they would elect to become Roman Catholics.

h/t Anglican Patrimony, by way of Augustine.

Out They Go

2011-11-15T08:45:00.006-05:00

The NYPD has cleared the protesters out of Zucotti Park, which is, sort of, the mecca of the "Occupiers." This will probably mean the end to this whole sorry business.

UPDATE: I spoke too soon! A judge has ordered the City to let 'em back in, tents and all, pending a hearing at 11:30 a.m.

UPDATE 2: The judge ordered they can go back but without their tents and stuff; rather like being told you can move into a house but not with no furniture. Also, this item:

After the camp in Zuccotti Park was cleared Tuesday, police and protesters again faced off across Lower Manhattan. Some demonstrators tried to set up a new campsite on land owned by an Episcopal church, but police ordered them to disperse and arrested those who didn't comply.

Goodness, that doesn't reflect well at all on the well-off liberals at Trinity Wall Street, which Episcopal church it surely must be; and since that parish owns a good portion of the real estate in the Financial District (courtesy a 19th century parishioner named John Jacob Astor), the Occupiers may have to roam a bit to find a new home. Perhaps the Methodists on nearby John Street will allow them to encamp on their stoop.

Nobody Said This was Going to be Easy

2011-11-14T17:21:00.006-05:00

Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory:

Bishop Thomas J. Olmsted of Phoenix has backed away from his ban on using consecrated wine for Communion at most Masses, a decision that was originally met with widespread outcry.

In an explanation of his decision in a letter to the priests of the diocese, Olmsted apologized for his own misunderstanding of church documents, including new guidelines and translations for the Catholic Mass, and for any confusion arising from his previous statement made at a priests' meeting in September.

Father Anthony Ruff, an expert on new translations for the Mass, who criticized the bishop's previous position as a "step backward," said he had never heard of a bishop "retracting so quickly."

"Anything I say could sound like gloating," Ruff said. "I think it's for local clergy and liturgical ministers to find the right way to express their goodwill and happiness with this.

Actually, it is gloating. When Fr. Ruff states he has never heard of a bishop "retracting so quickly," the word "gloating" fairly springs to one's mind. More important, however, than triumphalism from a fan of bad liturgical English is that the reporter for the the Arizona Republic (whence this story comes) missed the lede. The underlying cause for temper tantrums thrown by the innovators has less to do with the limiting of communion sub utraque specie (under both kinds) than the limiting of civilians, otherwise known as Eucharistic ministers, the opportunity to do so (I'll wager the squawking would have been just as loud had the bishop ruled only clergy celebrants could administer the chalice). Post-Vatican II reformers were hellbent in reshaping Holy Church to resemble that of the groovier and far cooler (not to mention the higher-up-the-social ladder) Anglicans and greater involvement in the mass by the laity, whether they wanted it or not, was essential to that end (ironically, the Anglicans never went so far as to allow civilians to administer the elements, at least no Anglican church I ever attended did).

Bishop Olmsted deserves credit attempting to contain one of the more egregious liturgical reforms of post-Vatican II, one for which there was no crying need other than that the protestants did it, and one deplored by our present Pope. The bishop has shown spine in the past. What a pity he felt it necessary to cave following the inevitable shrill complaints from innovators concerning the chalice (it is uncanny how fiercely Eucharistic ministers guard their turf--like lionesses watching over their cubs). Holy Church will never recover from her Procrustean protestantization in the1970s with feckless actions like this one from the Bishop of Arizona.

h/t Angelqueen.org

From One Oracle to Another

2011-11-07T19:11:00.006-05:00

The Christian Science Monitor (a fine newspaper indeed, even if I have certain difficulties with the rather peculiar theology of its owners) poses an interesting question:

The Reformed Broker
Berkshire Hathaway doubles stock purchases. Does Buffett see something big?
Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. invested $23.9 billion in the third-quarter, the most in at least 15 years. Is Berkshire Hathaway seeing something on the horizon?

I think I can answer that. I asked another oracle, which has never let me down, the following question: "Will Barack Obama be re-elected president?" and the answer was

Great minds think alike.

Showing Them How

2011-11-07T17:19:00.006-05:00

Another person has crawled out of the woodwork to allege Herman Cain made unwanted advances to her, this one represented by the notorious (and downright bizarre) lefty ambulance chaser, Gloria Allred. One of the three or four conservatives in Hollywood, screenwriter Andrew Klavan, explains why we should let this matter proceed, unfair as it may seem.

But there’s a reason it’s unfair—a reason it should be unfair. There’s a reason we right wingers vet our candidates while the left adulates theirs, a reason we condemn our miscreants while the left elevates theirs, a reason our news outlets cover stories that the left covers up.

The reason is: we’re the good guys. We have to do what’s right. The left doesn’t. Sorry, but that’s the way it works. It’s the price you pay for defending what’s true and good, the price of holding yourself to a high moral standard. Our politicians have to be better than their politicians. Our journalists have to be more honest. Even our protesters have to behave with decorum and decency—and still suffer being slandered—while theirs can act like animals and commit acts of violence and lawlessness and spew anti-semitic filth and still find themselves excused and glorified.

We really have no choice.

Attorney Allred introduces Exhibit A at a press conference.

If Buckley were Still Alive

2011-11-07T13:17:00.002-05:00

Neal B. Freeman speculates how the present republican candidates would fared with the late William F. Buckley, Jr.. Romney, for example:

First, he would have summoned the Republican stalwarts for catechismic instruction. Mitt Romney, invited to dinner at 73rd Street, would have been given a pass on gun control, abortion, immigration and universal health care. Bill believed that every human being is endowed by his Creator with the unalienable right to flip-flop, though Bill might have regretted, in Mr. Romney's case, that it had been exercised so vigorously.

Instead, Bill would have bored in on what he perceived to be a lacuna: namely, the widespread presumption that Mr. Romney can fix our broken economy with an economic plan that is manifestly inadequate to the challenge. Mr. Romney would have squirmed through the evening. Bill would have barely survived it. He hated to drink alone.

Read it all, an exemplar of drollity, as WFB, Jr. might have put it.

Social Justice in Zuccotti Park, One Tent at Time

2011-11-05T16:42:00.005-04:00

Randy male Occupy Wall Streeters in Zuccotti Park have made things so bad for their filly counterparts separate quarters have had to be erected for them. From the New York Post:

It’s a safe house from the sex fiends.

Zuccotti Park has become so overrun by sexual predators attacking women in the night that organizers felt compelled to set up a female-only sleeping tent yesterday to keep the sickos away.

The large, metal-framed “safety tent” -- which will be guarded by an all-female patrol -- can accommodate as many as 18 people and will be used during the day for women-only meetings, said Occupy Wall Street organizers.

Sadly, the menfolk are displaying a cynical and shocking insensitivity to the poor gals' plight.

Some of the male OWS protesters remained in denial over the growing number of sex attacks.

“Sexual harassment gets called rape, and it’s not,” one scoffed when told of the women’s tent.

This poor thing, however, insists she's a victim.

The grope victims include Kara Demetropoulos, who told The Post she was fondled in a tent last Saturday night after accepting a man’s offer of a place to sleep.

Has our society become so depraved a respectable gal can no longer bed down with a stranger in a tent for fear of being molested? Alas, chivalry is dead after all.

Yet here's a lass who isn't at all pleased about OWS management's enlightened decision to provide separate but equal quarters for the fair sex.

One woman was also against the structure, saying the protesters who put it up took her tent down without notice to make room.

“I’m pissed! I pretty much just got evicted,” fumed Angelina Isfreed, 32, after returning to find her tent taken down. “I won’t be staying there.”

Angelina? Kitten? I know you and your comrades believe property is theft but one essential principle of property ownership and the laws enforcing it is to make it difficult to be deprived of your space just because others think they know better what to do with it. Consider this a learning experience.

Of course, when one protected group is accommodated, others will demand same.

More people may have to move. The protest organizers plan to put up seven more large tents, including ones for gay and transgender people, co-ed tents and a medical tent.

Soon to be followed, no doubt, by tents for people of color (one tent per hue, we'll assume), the handicapped, differently-abled, physically challenged and, if there's any social justice at all in Zuccotti Park, a tent for the least understood and most discriminated against minority group, sex offenders. Then all will be swell in Zuccotti Park and the protesters can get back to doing what they're paid for.

Matthew 26:40

2011-11-04T18:55:00.000-04:00

Your Bloviator received an S.O.S. recently from a Catholic friend who was in a bit of a state because the local parish (where I don't attend Mass much these days),after having announced a 24-hour adoration, apparently fell down on the job rounding up volunteers to man the event, especially during the wee small hours. The upshot is I will be rising before the dawn tomorrow morning and trudging to a probably unheated church and attending our Lord a couple of hours.

While I will confess to feeling a smidgen put out initially when volunteering to stand in for those whose talk is more impressive than their action, on the other hand, if there is a worthier activity than spending time in the Divine Presence I don't know it. Besides, Jesus only asked for one hour from his disciples; I'll be giving him two. This is a good thing.

My Blind Item for the New York Times

2011-11-04T08:17:00.003-04:00

From the New York Times Caucus:

The Early Word: Flying on Another’s Dime
By EMMARIE HUETTEMAN
Today’s Times:
Gov. Rick Perry of Texas has accepted more than 200 free flights worth $1.3 million on private planes as governor, Mike McIntire reports, including some for trips that involved official duties of interest to the planes’ owners, For instance, the head of a Texas oil refinery paid to transport Mr. Perry to a meeting where he urged Mexican officials to consider more business with Texas oil companies. While his trips do not violate state ethics laws, Mr. Perry stands out for taking private flights to complete activities related to his job as governor.

Gee, that's a great scoop, NYT. Here's another one, my gift to you: there's another government executive who constantly flies all over the place in a jet plane much, much bigger than Governor Perry's, at a cost of about $100,000 an hour, also courtesy of the taxpayer and causing huge disruptions wherever he appears. Unlike Governor Perry, however, this government executive's administration is largely considered to be a failure and his expensive trips, rather than for the furtherance of the people's business, are nothing more than thinly-veiled campaign appearances for his re-election. The executive's name escapes me for the moment but I'm sure the Times, with its renown investigative prowess, can ferret it out in no time. It might even win you another Pulitzer. Run with it (and you're welcome)!

Ars Brevis

2011-11-03T23:07:00.000-04:00

From here (not the Onion):

BERLIN (AFP) - A cleaning woman at a German museum who mistook a sculpture for an unsightly mess has destroyed the valuable artwork beyond recognition, a spokeswoman for the western city of Dortmund said Thursday.

The cleaner at the city's Ostwall Museum went to work on the Martin Kippenberger installation titled When It Starts Dripping From the Ceiling, which was valued by insurers at 800,000 euros ($1.1 million), she said.

The late contemporary master had created a tower of wooden slats under which a rubber trough was placed with a thin beige layer of paint representing dried rain water.

Taking it for an actual stain, the cleaner scrubbed the surface until it gleamed.

No doubt the poor woman will be fired. She ought to be given a raise and a promotion.

You Just Can't Make this Stuff Up

2011-11-03T22:25:00.003-04:00

Surprisingly, the venue for the event below is not an Episcopal Church; the Jesuits have nothing to do with it either. No, this time it's the Lutherans but not surprisingly, it takes place in San Francisco. I do wonder, though, what the people responsible for entertainments like these will do when California goes bankrupt, there's no money left and they find themselves having to work for a living. What can they do and who in God's name would ever hire them?

UPDATE: One group has as a suggestion for these people. Personally, I don't think they're good enough for McDonalds.

A big h/t to Christopher Johnson at the MCJ. Be sure to read his take on it; you will not regret it.

2011 - 6th Annual Faith and Feminism, Womanist, Mujerista Conference

November 11 - 13, 2011

| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |

Nuesrta Senora Maestosa Inspired by La Virgen de G

© Shiloh McCloud

5^th Annual Faith and Feminism – Womanist – Mujerista Conference

Sponsored by herchurch San Francisco

November 11-13, 2011

at herchurch 678 Portola Dr. San Francisco

Theme: The Feminine Face of God/dess – Paradigm for justice and empowerment

REGISTRATION

Key Note Speakers:

Jeanette Rodriguez, Ph.D. – Institute for Theological Studies, Seattle University

Max Dashu – Suppressed Histories Archives, Oakland, CA

Mary Streufert, Ph. D. - Lutheran Feminist Scholar, ELCA Women and Justice, Chicago

Artist in Residence: Shiloh McCloud

Schedule and Workshops and leaders – see below

registration limited to 150 - so sign up ASAP

Childcare vailable during keynote presentations and workshops

Friday November 11

Friday morning options:

10:00 AM – 12:00 noon – Sacred Walks

11:00 – 12:00 Interplay

11:00 – 12:00 Kundalini Yoga

Chapel/Sacred Space available throughout conference

1:00 – 2:00 PM

Registration

Galleries Open

Altar Building

Individual Reiki Sessions Available

Labyrinth

2:00 – Conference Opening

2:30 Keynote: Dr. Jeanette Rodriguez

The Nahuatl Interpretation of Guadalupe

and its Implications for the Faith and Empowerment

3:30 Simple Group Interplay

3:40 Open Conversation (response to presentation)

4:30 – 6:00 PM

Workshops, Artist Reception, Drumming Circle

6:00 – 7:00 PM Soup and Salad Bar

7:15 PM Welcome, Sacred Drums, Sacred Dance, Chanting

8:00 PM Keynote speakers share their story/encounter with the Divine Feminine

10:00 PM (optional) Ananta performs "Elemental"

and guided Meditations with Lady Lorean of Isis Oasis

Saturday November 12

9:30 AM Welcome, Inclusive Hymns

10:00 AM Keynote: Max Dashu

Goddess of the Americas

11:30 InterPlay Full Group Movement

11:40 Open Conversation (response to presentation)

1:00 Lunch

2:30 Keynote: Dr. Jeanette Rodriguez

Guadalupe and the Feminine Face of God/dess

3:30 Simple Group Interplay

3:40 Open Conversation with Both Keynote Presenters

4:30 – 6:00 Workshops, Drumming Circle

6:00 – 7:15 Dinner

7:30 – 8:45 Mary Cassatt – the Musical Performance by Katie Ketchum

Sunday November 13

8:00 AM labyrinth

Yoga

9:00 AM Keynote: Mary Streufert, Ph.D.

9:45 Chanting/Jazz Choir with Katie Ketchum

10:30 herchurch worship - Liturgy of the Divine Feminine

12:00 Lunch

1:15 – 3:00 Workshops

3:15 - 3:30 Closing Ritual

Teas, Wine, Snacks available after conference in the Gallery Annex

Workshops Details clickhere

FRIDAY

Sacred Hiking with Kristen Hansen

Friday at 10 AM

Kundalini Yoga

Instructor Alison Newvine

Friday 11 AM, Sunday 1:00 – 3:00 PM

Interplay - Amy Shoemaker

Friday 11 AM, Friday 4:30 – 6:00 PM, Saturday 4:30 – 6:00 PM

Talking to Goddess, Powerful Voices from Many Traditions

Dr. D’vorah Grenn

Friday 4:30 – 6:00 PM

Women Body Modifications as spirituality? by Artist Sybil Erden

Friday 4:30 – 6:00 PM

Drumming Circle - Drumming Priestess Dionne Kohler

Friday 4:30 – 6:00 PM, Saturday 4:30 – 6:00 PM

Chanting with Musician and

Isis Priestess Katie Ketchum

Friday 4:30 - 6:00 PM

SATURDAY

Divine Feminine in Songs and Stories

by Dr. Jann Aldredge Clanton

Saturday 4:30 – 6:00 PM

Creative Writing - Lana Dalberg

Saturday 4:30 – 6:00 PM

Our Lady (hands on art) – Visionary Artist Shiloh McCloud

Saturday 4:30 – 6:00 PM, Sunday 1:00 – 3:00 PM

Hildegard Von Bingen -- Sister Elena Kelly

Saturday 4:30 – 6:00 PM

Drumming Circle

Drumming Priestess Dionne Kohler

Friday 4:30 – 6:00 PM, Saturday 4:30 – 6:00 PM

Interplay - Amy Shoemaker

Friday 11 AM, Friday 4:30 – 6:00 PM, Saturday 4:30 – 6:00 PM

SUNDAY

Hands on ART: Tree of Life – Visionary Artist Shiloh McCloud

Saturday 4:30 – 6:00 PM, Sunday 1:00 – 3:00 PM

Bring Guadalupe into your spiritual practices – Dr. Kimberly Rae Connor

Sunday 1:00 – 3:00 PM

Kundalini Yoga

Instructor Alison Newvine

Friday 11 AM, Sunday 1:00 – 3:00 PM

Church and State,

N.O.W -Mona Lisa Wallace

Sunday 1:00 – 3:00 PM

The Unconscious Mind by Design

by Priestess Shamana Cea Hearth

Sunday 1:00 – 3:00 PM


	Enter supporting content here Ebenezer/herchurch Lutheran 678 Portola Dr. San Francisco, CA 94127 Call 415-731-2953

This is not Something You See Every Day

2011-11-03T21:36:00.001-04:00

From the Baltimore Sun:

Archdiocese of Baltimore welcomes new order of nuns
All Saints' Sisters of the Poor left the Episcopal Church two years ago

By Mary Gail Hare, The Baltimore Sun

7:58 p.m. EDT, November 1, 2011
The Archdiocese of Baltimore added a new religious order of nuns Tuesday, its first in decades and one that began as an Anglican community.
The All Saints' Sisters of the Poor left the Episcopal Church for the Roman Catholic Church two years ago. By a decree from the Vatican, they are now an official diocesan priory, or order, the same designation carried by the School Sisters of Notre Dame or the Daughters of Charity.
"We feel we have broken ground," said Mother Christina Christie, leader of the community and a nun since 1966.
Yesterday, All Saints' Day, at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, all 10 members of the Catonsville convent individually professed perpetual vows of poverty, chastity and obedience "for the rest of my life in this world." Then each signed her profession at the altar before nearly a dozen priests and bishops.

The good sisters are getting along in years (thus giving additional, if unintended, significance to "for the rest of my life in this world") and it will behoove them to seek out more vocations. This should prove an easier task now that they are part of the Holy Catholic Church; religious orders of a traditionalist bent (which the All Saints Sisters of the Poor are, as one look at the pic below will tell you) are doing rather well these days recruiting new religious, even as those orders that bear-hugged the noxious post-Vatican II reforms seem to be in irreversible decline. While the outlook for Anglican orders, which resulted from the Oxford Movement and the Catholic Revival of the nineteenth century (and always struck this writer as as slightly incongruous, even as an Anglo-Catholic) is probably even bleaker than that for the Episcopal Church.

For the newest community, it will be business as usual in their lives of prayer and service, said Christie. Now that they are an official religious institute, they can re-open their novitiate and welcome new candidates to their community. Since their change of denomination, there have been several inquiries, she said.
"We are not expecting a mad rush to join us," she said. "But we will take those that God sends us."

May she be pleasantly surprised.

Proper nuns

Look Carefully

2011-11-03T12:17:00.000-04:00

H/t John Beeler.

What the Luftwaffe Couldn't Do...

2011-11-02T14:16:00.005-04:00

...a small bunch of malodorous inchoate commies could: close St. Paul's Cathedral. Douglas Murray writes in the Wall Street Journal:

On Oct. 15, a group emulating New York's Occupy Wall Street decided to set up in the City of London. They originally hit the stock exchange, but after police told them to move on, they've now settled at the steps of St. Paul's Cathedral.

Initially welcomed, the militant campers have spent the last fortnight claiming the area as their own. Dozens of tents litter the cathedral's courtyard; the outdoor walls of businesses surrounding St. Paul's are plastered with messages and posters—some coherent, others less so. Last week the church closed temporarily for the first time since World War II, and the toll of the protesters is sparking public concern for a building that survived the Luftwaffe.

Part of that toll has been the resignation of the Cathedral's chancellor and dean: the former, who is sympathetic to the miscreants and doesn't wish to be around when the police eventually clear them out (as they must) and the latter, who can't see them cleared out soon enough. Murray writes further:

There is no longer one culture in Britain. There are, broadly, two. One of them—remaining dominant at least in name—clings on to the country's traditional, respectable ways. But it is self-flagellating, permanently contrite and never misses an opportunity to abolish itself. The other is constituted of all sorts of narcissisms, special-interests groups and organizations actively devoted to the destruction of our society. Unless the older and finer culture becomes willing to reassert itself, then at some point it too will be completely pushed aside. The culture that wishes to take its place not only asserts itself unapologetically—as it did back in August when riots broke out around the country—but is also not held back by any knowledge, curiosity or pity for what went before.

The States have seen a parallel of this in the decay and disappearance of the once predominant Anglo-Saxon, i.e., WASP, hierarchy and culture. What a peculiar phenomenon it was, hegemons turning on themselves, with their own church, the Episcopal Church, leading the charge. It was inevitable, I suppose. When, in the 1960s, the Episcopal Church (like its forebear the Church of England) placed social change over its already insipid soteriological and moral teachings, the WASP culture lost whatever feeble underpinnings it might have had and would be washed away in the relativistic flood of the later decades.

Diary of a Papist Convert

2011-11-01T13:30:00.008-04:00

Note: this occasional series used to be titled Diary of a Newly Minted Papist. Three-and-a-half years have passed since that coin was struck and it is now somewhat tarnished and nicked. A slight revision of the title seemed to be in order.

******

I attended this event,

sponsored by the Catholic Artists Society, last night at this church,

Photo by Steve Kelly © 2009

St. Vincent Ferrer, on Manhattan's Upper East Side. Waiting for things to begin (why, oh why can't Catholics begin on time?) I looked about and took in the church. Its extraordinary beauty of course impressed me immediately; I had never been inside it before--or least so I thought. A little later, however, I felt a strong a sense of "Anglican déjà vu," that somehow, impossibly, I had been in the church before. After a time, though, I determined it was not the case but that I was simply reminded of not one but two other churches I did know well, St. Thomas Church Fifth Avenue and the Church of the Advent in Boston (both Episcopal, the latter where your Bloviator was confirmed an Episcopalian many years ago).

I suppose you can guess where all this is leading and sure enough, after getting home and doing some Googling, I learned all three of the churches had been designed by those godly Episcopalian architects Bertram Goodhue and Ralph Adams Cram. It was a delightful discovery; I am hardly an architectural scholar so it pleased me much to be able detect the signatures of those two in St. Vincent's. Expert or no, this I can aver this about about the churches of Goodhue and Cram: one experiences a sense of great comfort when inside them, rather like being at home, which is entirely appropriate for a house in which our Lord is present.

The Vespers and Benediction were equal to the surrounds: much plainchant and settings of Victoria and Josquin expertly sung, clouds of incense and countless servers; it was a treat for all senses, which is of course the intention. I must confess, though, to feelings of ambivalence when attending events like these, for while they fill me with gratitude and awe I also am mindful how rare they are, how they are the exception not the rule in the present Catholic Church. It is important to remember, however, as we were reminded in the lecture given by the estimable Fr. Uwe Michael Lang following, that the tide has turned for Holy Church and things are improving, however glacially. For that we must be, at once, grateful and patient.

Get Over It

2011-10-26T18:45:00.001-04:00

Declaration Of Independence Is Illegal, Say British Lawyers

During the American bicentenary in 1976, British Airways ran some very funny commercials in which the late comic actor Robert Morley would implore us Yanks: "Do come home, all is forgiven!"

Ah, Now I Understand

2011-10-23T21:55:00.000-04:00

Thanks to John Beeler.

Tell Me Once Again Why We Went Into Libya?

2011-10-23T18:54:00.000-04:00

From the New York Daily News: Libya declares 'liberation' after Khadafy's death, transitional leader says Sharia law will rule

From a fascist dictatorship to a fascist theocracy: nice work.

OMG, He's a Bullfighter!!!!!

2011-10-18T20:09:00.000-04:00

If Carmen were on Facebook, from the Seattle Opera Blog:

Stretching His Imagination

2011-10-18T17:17:00.003-04:00

From 1991, Herman Cain, then-chairman of Godfather's Pizza and probably not imagining at the time he'd be running for president twenty years later, imagines instead a world without pizza, courtesy of John Lennon. (Cain begins about two minutes in, after the commercial).

Bless my soul, a presidential candidate with a sense of humor; imagine that--and not a bad voice, either! I suspect a lot people, even those not totally sold on Cain, may give him serious consideration after seeing this; the ability to poke fun at yourself goes a long way with voters. I can't imagine Barack Obama, perhaps the most humor-challenged and thin-skinned president in the history of our republic, would relish running against this man.

Trying to Muster up the Tears...

2011-10-18T14:59:00.004-04:00

Really and truly, I am, I am. Promise! From the New York Post:

Thieves preying on fellow protesters

It’s a den of thieves!

Occupy Wall Street protesters said yesterday that packs of brazen crooks within their ranks have been robbing their fellow demonstrators blind, making off with pricey cameras, phones and laptops -- and even a hefty bundle of donated cash and food.

“Stealing is our biggest problem at the moment,” said Nan Terrie, 18, a kitchen and legal-team volunteer from Fort Lauderdale.

“I had my Mac stolen -- that was like $5,500. Every night, something else is gone. Last night, our entire [kitchen] budget for the day was stolen, so the first thing I had to do was . . . get the message out to our supporters that we needed food!”

Not to worry, missy, no doubt your Mac was covered under mommy and daddy's homeowner's policy, although $5500 seems awfully high for a Mac. You wouldn't be tempted to claim it was worth more than they paid for it, would you? That'd be theft, dontcha know.

Photo ~~stolen from~~ courtesy of Wall Street Journal

We Had Such Hopes.

2011-10-13T09:14:00.001-04:00

Disappointing news from Mickey Kaus: "If All Things Considered can’t kill hip hop, I guess nothing can.

All Hallows

2011-10-12T17:01:00.003-04:00

This October 31st, if you happen to be in the New York area and are weary of the bloated excesses of our city's Halloween celebrations, consider attending the following instead:

Vespers
We will celebrate the ancient and beautiful liturgy of Solemn First Vespers for All Saints, officiated by our special guest, Fr. Uwe Michael Lang, C.O. Father Bruno Shah, OP from St. Vincent Ferrer, and Father Michael Barone from the archdiocese of Newark, will assist in the liturgical celebration. Gregorian chant and polyphonic settings for vespers will be provided by the Schola Cantorum of St. Vincent Ferrer, under the direction of Dr. Mark Bani.

One of the many fond memories of my Anglo-Catholic days was the annual celebration of the Requiem Mass for All Souls (which the Holy Catholic Church seems to have abandoned but let us hope is on the way back). Particularly impressive, along with the Dies Irae Sequence was the catafalque that supported a black-draped coffin (representing the souls of the departed) at which the celebrant, in black vestments, would perform the absolution of the dead--most impressive and moving. I also recall the enormous and rather spooky candlesticks with yellowish-orange beeswax candles. I wonder now if the use of the color orange for Halloween decorations derives from the color of those candles rather then from pumpkins, which are native to North America after all. Anyone care to speculate?

Cain-Ryan in 2012?

2011-10-12T14:19:00.003-04:00

This was not entirely unexpected but the numbers are. From Mary Kate Carey in U.S. News & World Report:

Cain Jumps 20 Points Ahead of Romney in Poll

October 7. Today's Zogby poll of likely Republican primary voters is big news: Herman Cain has opened a 20-point lead over Mitt Romney and he now beats President Obama in a head-to-head matchup, 46 to 44 percent...

[snip]

First, he's an outsider, not a career politician, who has Main Street business experience. No one else in the race can say that, including the president.

Second, he's got a plan. His "9-9-9 Plan" would establish a flat business tax at 9 percent, individual taxes at 9 percent, and a national sales tax at 9 percent. Economist Stephen Moore wrote a great piece in the Wall Street Journal recently on the flat tax, saying that Cain's 9-9-9 plan "would be rocket fuel for the economy ... Cain has super-sized solutions to an economy with super-sized problems."

I would add that Cain is truly his own man, not beholden to any one or institution in the DC swamp. While he is, as he has admitted, not terribly knowledgeable on foreign affairs, he is bright and hard working; he'll learn. Being his own man might also, for once, give us a president who will remind the Department of State that it works for the president, not the other way around. I've always been astonished how so many of our presidents have allowed themselves to be cowed by the life-long bureaucrats embedded in that department.

Cain's nomination would also remove about the only tactic remaining for the democrats, playing the race card. Resorting, however, to insinuations of Cain being an Uncle Tom or the Republican's house-n***** , or not being "black enough" will backfire, big time.

My proposal to all the Republican movers and shakers who read this blog (there's bound to be someone somewhere who's stumbled across it, once by accident), as well as Mr. Cain, is in the he wins the nomination, he should pick Paul Ryan to be his running mate. His youth would be a nice counter to Cain's age and his deep knowledge of healthcare matters will prove invaluable. The fact Ryan is an observant Catholic doesn't hurt either.

Ha!

2011-09-28T19:07:00.000-04:00

Thanks to Fr. Trey Garland.

A Priest at the Front Line

2011-09-27T22:39:00.001-04:00

A Greek Orthodox priest attempts to stop a rioter hurling a Molotov cocktail at the police.

There are Still Old-Fashioned Protestants in Northern Ireland

2011-09-27T19:36:00.001-04:00

From the Independent:

A music video shoot proved too raunchy for a farmer, who called a halt to filming on his land over the singer's "inappropriate" attire.

The Bahamian pop star Rihanna stripped down to a red and white bikini top and jeans in a barley field near Bangor in Northern Ireland on Monday, prompting landowner Alan Graham to intervene.

"I realised things had got to a stage which were not acceptable to me," said the 61-year-old, who holds strong Christian beliefs. "Things became inappropriate and I asked the film crew to stop."

And they did, to their credit.

Mr Graham said he had not heard of Rihanna, 23, before her representatives requested the use of his 60-acre farm at Clandeboye.

"Someone explained she was as big as it gets as far as pop stars were concerned," said the father of four. "I am a bit illiterate about those issues."

You and me both, pal. Isn't she the one with a no-good-bum boyfriend who gets his jollies whacking her?

He hoped the singer understood where he was coming from.

"We had a conversation. We shook hands and parted company on good terms.

He seems like a decent chap.

"I wish no ill will against Rihanna and her friends. Perhaps they could acquaint themselves with a greater God."

'Twould be nice but I wouldn't hold your breath, sir.

Expunging the "C" Word

2011-09-09T22:38:00.003-04:00

Back in the 'sixties there was a game show called You Don't Say! (whose host, Tom Kennedy, may well have been toothiest game show host in history, though with much competition, especially from the legendary Wink Martindale). In any event, Mr. Kennedy would always open (or close, I don't remember) the program with the pithy adage: "Remember, it's not what you say that counts, it's what you don't say!" Said pithy adage came to mind today upon learning, via the Cardinal Newman Society, a recent study found that on the home pages of Catholic college websites, more that 60% of them don’t identify the institution as being Catholic. It's as if they're embarrassed by it, or ashamed of it, or annoyed by it or worry they may scare off the atheists and the Moslems. Whatever.

In the end, however, those reticent Catholic colleges provide a useful service by their coyness. Prospective applicants (or their parents) who consider themselves orthodox may pretty much learn all they need to know about a putatively Catholic college and the sort of education it might offer if it is too squeamish to give even a cursory nod to the institution responsible for its very existence. They may safely click away from that site and look elsewhere. Should save them a lot of time.

St. Omobono* Pray for Us

2011-09-08T16:58:00.008-04:00

In the opening scene of the moving and terribly sad Clint Eastwood picture, Gran Torino, the protagonist, Walt Kowalski, attending his wife's funeral, looks with utter disgust upon his grandchildren as they pile into the pews, all of them dressed atrociously (one of them wearing a Detroit Lions football jersey, if memory serves). I watched that picture shortly after I was received into the Catholic Church and I must say my heart went out to Walt Kawalski.

That too many Catholics dress horribly (and often behave likewise) at Mass is a painful fact. My least favorite way of fulfilling my obligation, when I can't make the Latin Mass at Holy Innocents in Manhattan, is at my local Bronx parish's 5 p.m. Sunday Mass. A Catholic friend once instructed me to avoid at all costs Saturday Vigil Masses because liturgy and deportment are usually at their nadir in them. Not so, at my local parish. While the Saturday Vigil is certainly dreadful enough, the men and women attending it at least seem to take pains to don their very best tank tops and short-shorts. Sunday evening, things are far more casual, anything goes.

Now, I am happy to report, a Catholic deacon has had enough and is striking back:

Deacon Greg Kandra was well aware that modern Americans were getting more casual and that these laid-back attitudes were filtering into Catholic pews.

Still, was that woman who was approaching the altar to receive Holy Communion really wearing a Hooters shirt?

Yes, she was.

When did Catholics, he thought to himself, start coming to Mass dressed for a Britney Spears concert? Had he missed a memo or something?

"Somewhere along the way, we went from neckties to tank tops, and from fasting to fast food. And it's getting worse," noted Kandra, a former CBS News writer with 26 years, two Emmys and two Peabody Awards to his credit. He is now a deacon assigned to Our Lady Queen of Martyrs, a 3,000-member parish in Forest Hills, just north of New York City...

After the Hooters incident, he decided it was time to stop whining about the rising tide of irreverence and immodesty and to start griping about it right out in the open. Thus, Kandra and the parish's other clergy have resorted to appealing — in the parish bulletin and in public remarks — for a hint of sanity or even some old-fashioned decorum.

One bulletin item proclaimed, with a gag headline: "PLANS FOR PARISH SWIMMING POOL SCRAPPED! After much study, our finance committee has determined it would not be feasible to construct an indoor swimming pool in our church. ... As a result, we can now announce with certainty that those who have been arriving for Mass as if dressed for the pool need not do so. Also, we hope to keep the air conditioning cranking all summer long. So you do not need to wear shorts, halter tops or bikinis to Mass."

While I wish the good Deacon Kandra well, I don't hope out much hope for his success. I suspect Catholics will only dress better for church when the liturgy reflects the gravity of what is being re-enacted. When our clergy treat the death and resurrection of Our Lord in the casual way found in most Catholic Churches these days, the people will dress and act the part. Too bad, because their dress and manner no doubt reflects their attitude.

Many years before my conversion, I invited another Catholic friend of mine to attend Ash Wednesday services with me at my then Episcopal parish. It was not a particularly "high" church but they did take great care (and still do) that the Anglican liturgy (using the old 1928 Prayer Book) was done to the letter and spirit of the rubrics. My Catholic friend was duly impressed, not only by the liturgy and music but also by dignified manner of the congregants, not everyone dressed to the nines, perhaps, but respectably at least, looking as if they gave a damn--which they did.

*Patron saint of tailors.

Back to the Future

2011-09-04T15:26:00.004-04:00

I have been regularly attending the Sunday 10 a.m. Missa Cantata at the Church of the Holy Innocents, in Manhattan's garment district, since the church started celebrating it late last year. Holy Innocents had already been celebrating a daily Latin Mass on weekdays for some time. With the addition of the Sunday Sung Mass, it could well be the only Catholic church in the country offering a Tridentine Mass every day. Let us pray that is infectious.

And it could be: the first few Sung Masses at H.I. one could count the number of worshipers on one hand--two hands, if the weather was fine--but the number seems to have risen with each passing week. Fr. Kallumady, the pastor, has certainly noticed that and today he made grateful mention of the increased numbers in his homily. It is all the more gratifying since H.I. is not located in a residential neighborhood and most people attending Mass there must go through at least some trouble to get to the church (including your Bloviator). Interestingly, young worshipers seem to outnumber oldsters like myself, some of those young being of a decidedly "hipster" bent. I wonder if their attending the Tridentine Mass is in at least partial reaction to being subjected to the excruciating post-Vatican II "reforms" when they were growing up? That works for me and the irony of seemingly trendy young people turning up their noses at stale contemporary worship practices, whose grayed-haired proponents insist to this day are essential to attracting them to Mass, is delicious indeed.

I Rekkin That's a Purdy Good 'Murkin Accent Ya Got Thar, Pardner.

2011-09-02T12:56:00.005-04:00

Go to the Telegraph and be amused at the photo essay: "When British Accents Go Bad," a compendium of movies set in in the UK with non-Brits, mostly Americans, cast as British characters, and whose mangling of Blighty patois is rightly described as "cringe-worthy." The Telegraph's picks are spot-on (you might say). There is, however, a crying need for the logical sequel to this piece: "When American Accents Go Bad," which gives us examples non-Americans having a go at American accents, with equally egregious results.

There are oh-so-many possible nominations for the dubious honor roll but I offer just one, the BBC's adaptation of Anthony Trollope's "The Way We Live Now," which nicely illustrates British cinema's propensity for assuming all Americans speak in laughably bad southern accents, regardless whence in America the characters may hale, which in this case is Kansas (Mrs. Hurtle) and California (Hamilton K. Fisker). Neither of the actors playing the parts are British; Miranda Otto is Australian, Michael Riley is Canadian (and should know better). The absurd and amateurish accents they effect must have been at the behest of the series' director, David Yates. Well, yippee ki-yay, old chap!

Readers on both sides of the pond are encouraged to offer their own pain-inducing examples of bad American accents in British flicks.

"This was the Moment when the Rise of the Oceans Began to Slow"

2011-08-28T09:27:00.004-04:00

From the Agence France-Presse:

Obama takes charge at hurricane command center

President Obama, just informed there are no more copies of the official NOAA coloring book.

(h/t Instapundit)

No Longer Clinging to Their Religion

2011-08-21T23:55:00.004-04:00

A study was presented Saturday at the annual convention of the American Sociological Association in Las Vegas that had a possibly surprising finding. It seems while church attendance has declined in this country since the 1970s (no surprise there), "the rate of decline has been more than twice as high for less educated, lower and lower-middle class whites compared to more educated and presumably more affluent whites..." (the study was limited only to whites because church attendance among other ethnic groups is fairly consistent regardless their socio-economic status).

In the last four decades, monthly (or more) participation in religious services dropped from 50 percent of moderately educated (high school and perhaps some college) whites to 37 percent, according to the study, “No Money, No Honey, No Church: The Deinstitutionalization of Religious Life Among the White Working Class.” Attendance by the least educated (high school dropouts) dropped from 38 percent to 23 percent, by sociologists Wilcox, of the University of Virginia and Andrew Cherlin of Johns Hopkins University found.

Church attendance by higher-income whites with at least a bachelor’s degree barely dipped, from 50 percent to 46 percent.

The study's two authors, one conservative, the other liberal, offer various explanations for this curious dichotomy but none seem terribly persuasive to me. I wonder if it might be something else: the insufferably smug liberalism that supplanted mainstream protestant theology over the past forty years (and came close doing similarly in the Catholic Church) being mostly owned by upper and upper-middle class elites, could it be the working stiffs in the in the pews, having had their fill of sneering condescension from their social betters and after enduring countless sermons on "economic justice" and the like, have decided it is not worth the bother rousing themselves on Sunday mornings to go to church and be scolded, better to simply stay at home instead?

Marching for Truth and Just Intonation

2011-08-19T13:27:00.007-04:00

Meet the 21st Century equivalent of the folk song army: the radical harpsichordist! In Oakland, California, no less. In a venue called "Humanist Hall," no less.

La Revolution is a harpsichord recital and lecture that works to inspire the audience to take immediate action in dealing with our economic crisis and global disasters. Early music performer and political activist, Vibeka Lyman, has probed the concept of what it takes for people to act politically and after spending a year in France, she has returned with some convincing ideas. Experiencing the culture, where strikes are a regular occurrence, she came to realize that freedom to express ones emotions, including anger, is needed for people to hit the streets...

Ms. Lyman believes the theory that events that unleash emotion in society such as the grocer, Mohammed Bouazizi, in Tunisia who set himself on fire, that brought on the Egyptian revolution, are what it takes for a strike to take place. She hopes that her concert, a dynamic performance of composers: Couperin, Chambonnieres, Scarlatti, Froberger, and Johann Sebastian Bach, will create such an experience in her listeners. Vibeka has performed on the keyboard for over 30 years and has experience with learning with some of the best teachers in the Bay Area and in Paris. Baroque music has been scientifically proven to heighten creative thought in the brain, and this concert is an effort to enhance people's thinking as well as their enjoyment.

Comrades! After a well-deserved sentence to music re-education camp I now proclaim that equal temperament is the preferred, more progressive tuning system; not the regressive and counter-revolutionary just intonation system with its reactionary bourgeois pure intervals!

Thanks to the PJ Tatler.

Church Vandals in the Academy

2011-08-03T13:10:00.001-04:00

UPDATE: Reader Charles writes:

One correction: St. John's Seminary has not been closed. All the land and buildings were sold to Boston College, but the Seminary still operates in one of the main buildings on the site. The remains of the late Cardinal were removed from the chapel to another site on the same grounds apparently because Boston College wanted to develop the site of the chapel.

It is bad enough churches and cemeteries having to deal with the constant problem of thugs vandalizing their property. How, then, are we to react when an institution that is at least nominally Catholic, Boston College in this case, vandalizes its own property?

At the death of William Henry O'Connell, Cardinal Archbishop of Boston from 1907 to 1944, a man who, like the rest of us, was certainly not without his flaws but nevertheless a good and faithful servant to Holy Church, a chapel to house his remains was built at his behest on the grounds of St. Johns Seminary in the Brighton neighborhood of Boston. Vocations being what they are in the scandal-tarred Archdiocese of Boston, which is flat broke owing to massive payoffs to the victims of priestly rape and its cover-up, the seminary was closed and sold to to BC in 2007, with the hope, we must assume, it would be used in an appropriate manne

Apparently, BC could find nothing appropriate to do with Cardinal O'Connell's small chapel so they bulldozed it to the ground a few days ago (his remains had been removed earlier). Read the infuriating details, and see more photos, on the Boston Catholic Insider blog, then wonder, like I do, what kind of callous rogues are in charge of Boston College these days. It seems to me, though, it is hardly circumstantial an institution holding so little regard for Catholic teachings is also indifferent to the resting place of a deceased cardinal.

Thanks to Inigo Hicks.

Charity and Debt

2011-08-02T17:15:00.000-04:00

Timothy Dalyrimple on the recently passed Budget Control Act:

One of the great difficulties of this issue, for Christians, is that the morality of spending and debt has been so thoroughly demagogued that it’s impossible to advocate cuts in government spending without being accused of hatred for the poor and needy. A group calling itself the “Circle of Protection” recently promoted a statement on “Why We Need to Protect Programs for the Poor.” But we don’t need to protect the programs. We need to protect the poor. Indeed, sometimes we need to protect the poor from the programs. Too many anti-poverty programs are beneficial for the politicians that pass them, and veritable boondoggles for the government bureaucracy that administers them, but they actually serve to rob the poor of their dignity and their initiative, they undermine the family structures that help the poor build prosperous lives, and ultimately mire the poor in poverty for generations. Does anyone actually believe that the welfare state has served the poor well?

It would behoove every politico in Washington (at least those still in possession of a degree of rationality), no matter what his or her religion, to become familiar with the principle of subsidiarity, as found in the Catholic Catechism, to wit:

Socialization also presents dangers. Excessive intervention by the state can threaten personal freedom and initiative. The teaching of the Church has elaborated the principle of subsidiarity, according to which "a community of a higher order should not interfere in the internal life of a community of a lower order, depriving the latter of its functions, but rather should support it in case of need and help to co- ordinate its activity with the activities of the rest of society, always with a view to the common good..."

The principle of subsidiarity is opposed to all forms of collectivism. It sets limits for state intervention. It aims at harmonizing the relationships between individuals and societies. It tends toward the establishment of true international order.

Making people slaves of the state while dumping the bill for it on future generations is neither charitable nor Christian.

h/t Instapundit

Don't Know How to Thank You

2011-07-31T12:25:00.004-04:00

Watching the imbroglio over extending the federal debt limit has been morbidly fascinating, rather like watching a huge and extended auto wreck in slow motion or the Episcopal Church, as it slowly and permanently goes off the rails. At this writing it looks as if a deal between the House and the Senate is just about in place, which will permit our government to run up an additional $3 trillion dollars on the credit card, in exchange for some cuts now and more later (mind you, they are not really cuts, rather cutbacks in increased spending so as not to exceed the new debt limit).

While the agreement in itself may not strike debt hawks as all that substantial, something far more remarkable will have occurred upon its signing, something we have never seen before: the public fisc as a campaign issue. To that end, the terms of the deal, whatever they are, are almost immaterial. The recognition at last by some officers of the body politic and, even more important, the majority of the American public, that we are on the road to ruin, that drastic action (far greater than any deal made today) must be taken, a song sung in decades past by only a few lonely Cassandras and only to be ignored, should cause a collective sigh of relief, for it is doubtful now the song can be ignored any longer.

This would not have happened had John McCain been elected president. He and his fellow career Republican hacks, rightfully derided decades ago as "bookkeepers to the welfare state," would, of course, have continued the spending party but would have done so "cautiously," via nickels and dimes (i.e. mere hundreds of billions as opposed to trillions of dollars) so that our present indebtedness would not have appeared quite so ominous, thus making it easier to put off dealing with till another day. It took true visionaries like Barack Obama and his Democrat minions in Congress, with their visceral hatred and stupefying ignorance of free markets, to jack the national debt up into the stratosphere and thus, finally, get the country's attention. You could say we owe them a debt of gratitude for that.

Tell Us Something New or Birds of a Feather

2011-07-20T08:02:00.001-04:00

From the Chicago Sun Times comes word Tiger Wood's ex-wife Elin Nordegren was "stunned to learn [her] new man slept with Tiger Wood's mistress."

Which brings to mind the 1954 picture starring Michael Redgrave and Dirk Bogarde, The Sea Shall Not Have Them. Noel Coward, upon first seeing the title quipped, "I don't see why not. Everyone else has."

h/t Instapundit

Gather Us In Does Not Compute

2011-07-18T11:09:00.004-04:00

Two robots have it out over liturgical music. Happily, the right robot wins (it's proving a little more difficult in the analogue world).

h/t Augustine

Old Wine in Old Bottles

2011-07-17T01:22:00.007-04:00

(Back after vacation.)

Your Bloviator, still reeling after reading somewhere a reference to "fifty-year-old men dressed like Justin Timberlake" (in a piece depicting the horrors seen at a failing Midwestern mall), finally decided a shake-up in the wardrobe department was no longer to be put off. Being of the cheap sort, however, I determined the best way to effect the sartorial upgrade was via the best kept secret among those whose familys' money is so old there isn't any left, the charity thrift shop, some of the best of them being, happily, either near work, on the Upper East Side, or in the region of my upbringing, where family still lives and a shopping expedition is thus justifiable on the pretext of a making a visit.

Things got off to an auspicious start early last week with a stop at the Spence Chapin Thrift Shop, where a good looking fine-checked shirt was to be had for five dollars (down from ten, owing to a one-day half-off sale). That triumph was quickly trumped at the next stop, the Memorial Sloan Kettering Thrift Shop, just a block away (Charles Kettering, by the way, gave the world, among many other splendid things, the electric self-starter for autos, thus making it possible for anyone to drive a car, and became hugely and deservedly rich for it). At this most elegant of charity thrifts, I came across a B2 (Brooks Brothers) blazer, whose previous owner must have gone to his reward within days of its delivery for it looked virtually unworn. Even more pleasing, that presumably late owner must have been my body double, to the point of even having similarly stubby arms; in short, the jacket felt tailor made. I thought the $40 price tag eminently reasonable but was further pleased to learn from one of the cheerful volunteers at the register her shop, no doubt in fierce competition with Spence Chapin, was also having a half-off sale.

I enjoyed some lesser success at other shops on the Upper East Side later in the week and today ended what I imagine to be just the first of several required sorties in the Bloviator campaign to look respectable. I landed at the Greenwich (CT) Hospital Thrift Shop, where another fine looking shirt was gotten on the cheap. Two thoughts came to mind while prowling the aisles out thar in Greenwich.

It is perversely pleasurable to see that even mighty Brooks Brothers is capable of the occasional hideous mistake and
I wonder if the committee at the reasonably exclusive Greenwich Country Club that thought it would be ducky to have a bunch of polo shirts with the club's moniker embroidered on them, for sale to the membership presumably, ever considered some of those shirts would find their way to a thrift shop, where one could observe a "day laborer" (to put it tactfully) seriously eyeing one of them for purchase (I should gladly have bought it for him were it possible to have done so without appearing the patronizing a-hole).

Angels of Death from the Folk Song Army

2011-07-05T15:29:00.004-04:00

Instapundit links to Ann Althouse, who points to this piece in the New York Times about earnest folkies going about nursing homes to ply their trade to the terminally ill, who have but only one means of escape.

Every week, three music therapists from MJHS Hospice and Palliative Care crisscross the city and suburbs to sing songs to the dying. With guitars strapped to their backs, a flute or tambourine and a songbook jammed in their backpacks, they play music for more than 100 patients, in housing projects, in nursing homes and even in a lavish waterfront home. The time for chemotherapy and radiation is over.

One should think after all that ghastly chemo and radiation those poor souls had suffered enough; now they must endure "Michael Row the Boat Ashore" as they finally shuffle off this mortal coil: O death, where is thy sting--and look slippy about it! It all brings to mind Tom Lehrer, the 50s-60s singer-songwriter satirist and one of the last of the funny liberals, who nonetheless had no time for modern pop music (once referring to "rock and roll and other children's records") and positively detested folk music, putting that dislike into song.

I Had NO Idea It was Worth That Much...

2011-07-02T16:50:00.012-04:00

This is what the people who haul in all those clown paintings they find in the attic to Antiques Roadshow secretly pray for.

Lost Leonardo Da Vinci painting that cost £45 in 1958 is valued at £120million
by Adrian Shaw, Daily Mirror 2/07/2011
Decrease font size Increase font size
By ADRIAN SHAW A LOST painting by Leonardo Da Vinci, bought in a clearance sale, was yesterday valued at £120million.
Experts who flew to London last year to authenticate the work as the Italian master’s were sworn to secrecy about the small oil on wood panel painting from 1513.
But yesterday, Professor Pietro Marani, from Milan, said: “We could tell at once it was by Da Vinci. There are lots of copies but this is undoubtedly his own hand...

The Two Kings--lost Botticelli from the Bloviator Collection.

More Horrors from the Church in Austria

2011-07-02T15:03:00.001-04:00

Comes word from Fr. Z that over 250 priests the other day in Austria, apparently never having heard of Ordinatio Sacerdotalis, were able with good conscience to affix their signatures to a petition asking "women be admitted to the priesthood." Additionally, a poll of Austrian clergy from a year ago reveals "80 percent of pastors in the country declare themselves favorable to the abolition of ecclesiastical celibacy."

A reader recently upbraided me (albeit gently) for sharp words I posted about the state of the Church in Austria, with regard to the "Western Mass" debacle, and I thus altered my text somewhat. With this latest news, however, I am left wondering two things:

1. Is obedience to Church teachings taught in Austrian seminaries these days?
2. Is Cardinal Schoenborn moonlighting and thus not able to fully carry out his duties in his daytime job?

h/t William Tighe

And if they still don't come, we'll double down with felt banners and labyrinths!

2011-07-02T13:19:00.004-04:00

An Episcopalian parish, weary of the plummeting numbers, goes on emergency retreat and engages the matter head on.

"The first half-hour was devoted to coffee and meeting one another as the various parish groups assembled. A large circle was then formed, and individual statements were given about hopes for the day. Then the program, or rather the games, began. The stated purpose was to relax us, to get to know one another’s names, and to produce an atmosphere of teamwork. Paper bags covered heads, and people had to form a line or persuade a stony-faced person to smile, etc., for two hours [italics original]...

...Then one of the leaders got up and gave a brief history of Christian meditation, pointing out that after the Dalai Lama left Tibet and Pope John XXIII instituted reforms, meditation was revived in the West. A pair of shoe liners was placed in the center of our circle, and we were instructed to empty our minds and listen to God for ten minutes.

No doubt God did speak to them but having already emptied their minds, they couldn't understand Him, of course. Funny thing, though: one of the oft most repeated tropes of Episcopalian innovators is the smug assertion theirs is the church that doesn't require you leave your mind at the door. Only at retreats, apparently.

h/t the Lone Star Parson, whose most excellent blog may be found here.

At Her Best

2011-06-29T17:31:00.002-04:00

The Anchoress takes on reliably heinous Maureen Dowd of the New York Times for her piece on Governor Andrew Cuomo:

[Cuomo and his father] talk at least once a day, and he says he values his father’s advice on any issue the “always rational” Mario chooses to weigh in on.

It is a stark contrast to the Bush 43, who was still afraid of his dad’s shadow as president and avoided talking issues with 41.

Oh, you dishonest, hate-obsessed, sniping harpy, you know damn well that if Bush 43 had talked to his father every day, you’d have crucified him for it with a gem on the order of: “The boy-pwince needs to tawk to Poppy evewy day, or he can’t find the Owal Owwice!”

And for the finishing touch:

I disagree with Andrew Cuomo on many things, but do think he is smart, and that he was grown from his own “pugnacious” beginnings into a person who — having endured a few tumbles — tries to be reasonable and respectful. That he politely endured what had to be an interminable phone call with this sniggering perpetual 14-year-old speaks well of his mannerliness and his patience.

Too Smart for Socialism

2011-06-29T15:28:00.001-04:00

First Arlo Guthrie, now John Lennon! I wonder how many other '60s icons were secret conservatives? From the Toronto Sun:

Lennon was a closet Republican: Assistant

John Lennon was a closet Republican, who felt a little embarrassed by his former radicalism, at the time of his death - according to the tragic Beatles star's last personal assistant.
Fred Seaman worked alongside the music legend from 1979 to Lennon's death at the end of 1980 and he reveals the star was a Ronald Reagan fan who enjoyed arguing with left-wing radicals who reminded him of his former self.

In new documentary Beatles Stories, Seaman tells filmmaker Seth Swirsky Lennon wasn't the peace-loving militant fans thought he was while he was his assistant.

He says, "John, basically, made it very clear that if he were an American he would vote for Reagan because he was really sour on (Democrat) Jimmy Carter.

My father, whom I cannot say disliked popular music because I don't believe he listened to it ever in his entire life, nevertheless owned that John Lennon had superior intelligence and ability but sadly misused it, particularly regarding his drug use and his influence on the youth culture. I think this bit of news about Lennon would have pleased him. I, actually, am not terribly surprised, nor should anyone familiar with the lyric to his song Revolution. And it's hard to believe the rest of the Beatles would agree to George Harrison's Taxman going on the Revolver album, let alone leading it off, without harboring at least some sympathy for the message contained in it.

I Guess There'll be a Lot More Boys Named Sue

2011-06-28T17:19:00.000-04:00

Back in 1971 country music great Lester Flatt, commenting on the cultural upheavals of the times, sang a classic called: "I Can't Tell the Boys from the Girls." Now, forty years later, in Sweden (where else?), those words have now become mandatory.

Preschool Bans Use of Words 'Him' and 'Her'

STOCKHOLM (AP) — At the "Egalia" preschool, staff avoid using words like "him" or "her" and address the 33 kids as "friends" rather than girls and boys.

From the color and placement of toys to the choice of books, every detail has been carefully planned to make sure the children don't fall into gender stereotypes.

"Society expects girls to be girlie, nice and pretty and boys to be manly, rough and outgoing," says Jenny Johnsson, a 31-year-old teacher. "Egalia gives them a fantastic opportunity to be whoever they want to be."

The taxpayer-funded preschool which opened last year in the liberal Sodermalm district of Stockholm for kids aged 1 to 6 is among the most radical examples of Sweden's efforts to engineer equality between the sexes from childhood onward.

Thanks to William Tighe.

Where Did They All Go?

2011-06-28T14:29:00.008-04:00

A friend writes:

Did you ever meet this guy?... He was one of the kindest souls I ever met. Your old church used to turn out men like this the way Ford made cars. What a sad change!

Obituary from the (Lewiston, Maine) Sun Journal:

Rev. John L. Scott, Jr.
Feb 02, 2010 12:01 am

Rev. John L. Scott
John L. Scott Jr.
1923 - 2010
PLANTATION, Fla. — The Rev. John L. Scott Jr., 86, of Auburn and Davie, Fla., died peacefully on Tuesday, Jan. 26, at Westside Regional Medical Center after a long illness.
He was born in Lewiston, March 27, 1923, son of John L. Scott Sr. and Alice Beaumont Scott. He enlisted and served with the U.S. Navy in the South Pacific during World War II. In 1945, he graduated from Bates College and continued his studies at Seabury Western Theological Seminary in Evanston, Ill., graduating in 1949.
He was ordained priest on March 25, 1950, at the Cathedral Church of St. Luke in Portland. During his 59-year ministry, he touched countless lives in the communities and congregations of St. James Church, Old Town, All Saints Church, Springfield, Mass., Grace Church, Amherst, Mass., St. Paul's Church, Norwalk, Conn., the Church of St. Mary the Virgin, New York, N.Y., Trinity Church, Lewiston, St. Michael's Parish, Auburn and, for the past 17 years, he served as a retired assistant priest at St. Benedict's Church in Plantation, Fla.
Active in the 1960s civil rights movement, he was honored to march with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in Selma, Ala. He also served as chaplain and professor of religious studies at St. Hilda's and St. Hugh's Independent School in New York, N.Y., from 1974 to 1983.
A man who lived in constant awe and wonder of the Lord's divine creation, ‘Father John' will also fondly be remembered enjoying the simplicities of more ‘earthly' pleasures: breakfast with the ‘regulars' at Roy's Hamburgers, a burger and hot chocolate at Taber's on a cool summer evening and companionable conversation overlooking another ‘most memorable' sunset from the porch at Taylor Pond. One phrase guided his life from beginning to end: "Our Father who art in Heaven..." Indeed!

He married his beloved wife, Barbara S. Grant in September 1954; she predeceased him in August 1994...

In answer to the question no, I never met Fr. Scott (at least I don't recall it), which is somewhat surprising given he ministered in locales near where your Bovina Bloviator was calved, raised and educated and summered as a youth. But in a way, I did know the late Fr. Scott, or at least many his sort. Once upon a time the Episcopal Church (and Anglicanism), for all her myriad flaws, managed to produce bevies of splendid priests like Fr. Scott. Yes, their theology might have been a little week; yes, they might have been reluctant to take firm stands on moral matters and heterdoxies that were already rearing their ugly heads when I was but a lad, but there was also a genuine decency and goodness--godliness, you might even call it--among them, which substantially made up for whatever their theological deficiencies.

Unfortunately, without magisterium, decency and goodness were no match for the innovators, who in the 1960s began picking away at the chinks in the Episcopal Church's facade, their task no doubt made easier by the liberal leanings of church patricians like Bishop Paul Moore, John Shelby Spong and possibly (if he were liberal, which he probably was) even priests like the late Fr. Scott, albeit unwittingly. Beginning, perhaps, with the unprosecuted heresies promulgated by Bishop Pike (a divorced and re-married Catholic who washed up on the shores the Episcopal Church, like so many of her gadflies), by the late 1970s the innovators had accrued sufficient power to effect the spoliation of the Prayer Book and ordination of women. The destruction has continued to the present day, to the point where the Episcopal Church must have seemed barely recognizable to Fr. Scott at the time of his death. He, similarly to so many other clergy I have known, most likely put on the blinders, did his level best to mind his flock and ensure that services were conducted with a modicum of decency (whichever Prayer Book was used), paying as little attention as humanly possible to the astounding goings on in the church at the national level.

So what has happened to all the righteous Episcopal priests like Fr. Scott? They are still around (these two, for example) though in far fewer numbers. With most of them getting along in years, when they eventually retire they will be difficult to replace (younger sound Episcopal priests, we must pray, will accept the invitation from the Pope via Anglicanorum Coetibus to embrace the full Catholic faith). Additionally, Management of the Episcopal Church is hell-bent on getting as many women into the pulpits as they can, by whatever means, particularly in those few remaining parishes still insisting men alone may stand in the place of Christ and act in His Person.

William Thomas Manning (1866-1949), Bishop of New York, when asked if salvation could be found outside the Episcopal Church, replied (possibly with tongue in cheek): "Perhaps so, but no gentleman would care to avail himself of it." Having traveled so far down the road to perdition, today no gentleman would care to avail himself of the Episcopal Church, especially as clergy. Say a prayer, however, for those splendid and godly gentlemen clergy of her past. They were truly grand.

Now Here's a Fine Idea for a Blog!

2011-06-21T11:18:00.002-04:00

CATHOLIC BEER REVIEW

DE GUSTIBUS NON EST DISPUTANDUM

The Perils of Drunkblogging

2011-06-21T10:52:00.005-04:00

From the Huffington Post:

My President Palin would lead us through a national cleansing, like Chairman Mao's Cultural Revolution. Nothing as violent, however, not at first. Maybe she might let school kids scribble with crayons on the paintings in the Museum of Modern Art. I've never met a soccer mom who wanted a Picasso refrigerator magnet. Or she might close all the high-brow music schools and inaugurate the kind of music that gosh darn real Americans like: harmonica, the musical saw, and tapping your foot to the radio while driving a pickup. What more do we really need?

Andrew Jackson's inauguration in 1828 was disrupted when a mob burst into the White House, tracking in mud, breaking the china, and eventually turning the lawn into a drinking bout. Sarah has the style to make this an official event. The Jackson mob dropped so much cheese on the floor that it ruined the White House carpets, so my advice is for Sarah to skip the buffalo wings and hand out beer bongs.

--New-Age self-help guru Mr. Deepak Chopra, apparently after knocking back his seventh Bacardi Breezer. A lithium tab with a Gatorade chaser, he'll be his old self in no time!

Plan B for Fr. Corapi

2011-06-18T14:44:00.005-04:00

I had never heard of Fr. John Corapi until just a few days ago when I read of him on pal Inigo Hicks blog. A man who had had a wild time of it in his life, Corapi later found religion, was ordained a Catholic priest (by Pope John Paul II, no less) and attracted a large and devoted following (always dangerous for a priest) via the media and his website. Fr. Corapi got into hot water recently over accusations he had violated his vows by engaging in improper relations with a female employee. His bishop thus suspended him from priestly duties pending results of an investigation. Apparently the investigation was not going favorably for him and on June 17 Fr. Corapi announced, on blog and YouTube, he was quitting the priesthood.

At this point only God, Fr. Corapi and, we hope, his confessor know the truth in this affair. Fr. Corapi might have, however, better served his interests by issuing a short statement along the lines of: "I am withdrawing from the priesthood and public life until charges against me have been resolved. I ask your prayers." By instead posting a bitter, recriminating and rancor-filled diatribe against accusers and bishop, Corapi obviously has not learned from the recent tawdry example of Rep. Anthony Weiner that noisily going after one's accusers neither makes them, nor their accusations, go away. Furthermore, by quitting the priesthood the investigation of Fr. Corapi will cease immediately, I should think, and we may thus never know the validity of the charges against him.

Should the charges against Fr. Corapi turn out to be true, and I truly hope they are not, I hope he will not follow the example of another popular, and now former, Catholic priest and media star, also with a large, mostly female following, Fr. Alberto Cutié. After flagrantly carrying on an affair with a divorced woman, Fr. Cutie, also noisily (and without required permission from his bishop), resigned his orders. Shortly afterward, with great fanfare and media hoopla, he was received and later priested into the Episcopal Church. Despite the media circus over Cutié's conversion, however, by coming into a declining church whose dioceses' souls frequently number fewer than that of the typical Catholic parish, Cutié has, unsurprisingly, quickly faded into obscurity, which, given his loud and angry departure from the priesthood, might be the best thing for Fr. Corapi, too.

UPDATE: After further thought I have altered the last paragraph in this post to make it a bit less snarky. Fr. Corapi is obviously going through a horribly difficult time, whatever the circumstances; we must pray he has the strength and faith to get through it intact.

Evensong at the Dominican Priory Church of the Holy Spirit (Blackfriars) in Oxford

2011-06-17T13:31:00.004-04:00

From New Liturgical Movement:

On 15 June 2011, six months after the Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham was established in England and Wales, their first Ordinariate liturgical celebration was held in the Dominican priory church of the Holy Spirit (Blackfriars) in Oxford. The celebrant and preacher was Mgr Andrew Burnham, assisted by the deacons James Bradley and David Elliott. The Precentor was the Ordinariate deacon local to Oxford, Daniel Lloyd.

My goodness, awfully Catholic, isn't it? I must say it may take this ex-Episcopalian a little while to get used to red copes and monstrances at this most Anglican of rituals but on the other hand, that is what Anglicanorum Coetibus is all about: Catholic worship incorporating elements of the Anglican provenance.

Getting used to the following in Catholic churches, however, will be absolutely effortless.

Music, of course, is an important part of Evensong, and the choir directed by Alistair Reid, with Richard Moore on the organ, offered a musical feast drawn from the Anglican patrimony. In his homily, which will be available on the Ordinariate's website soon, Mgr Burnham spoke again of the distinctive contribution which the Ordinariate could bring to the Catholic Church, particularly in the liturgy, and the music we heard last evening was evidence of this. The beauty of yesterday's Evensong and Benediction, which was almost entirely sung in the vernacular, and executed with precise and reverent but unfussy ceremonial was most encouraging, and seemed to me to lead the way in a reform of the Reform.

I suppose it's possible some misguided idiot might slip in a Haugen/Haas atrocity at a Catholic Evensong observance but I suspect the people that enjoy the glop of the former will eschew the glory of the latter thus will keep their mitts off of it. Oremus.

The Catholic Church in Austria: Defining Deviancy Downward

2011-06-15T14:34:00.012-04:00

Watch the abomination as reported below, a putative celebration of the Mass, and savor the spectacular horror. Then wonder to learn it has been perpetrated three times this past year and will be yet again this coming June 26th: the so-called "Western" (as in cowboy) Mass, with the imprimatur of the ineffably bewildering Cardinal Schönborn of Austria. It is tempting to rattle off a list of the atrocities to be seen (e.g. ashtrays for smokers, take-out food and the Confederate flag) but far better to watch the video in its entirety--you don't want to miss a thing. If it is not yet exhausted, stretch your capacity for wonder one more time and ask yourself why, oh why, will the Holy Father and the Vatican not drive a stake into the heart of these monstrosities.

It's a well-worn trope on this ol' blog but worth trotting out once again: however deplorable the state of Catholic worship in America, it is far, far worse in Europe and with its continued celebration of the "Western Mass," the Church in Austria may well be comfortably ahead in the race to the bottom.

UPDATE: a warm welcome to fellow afficianados of liturgical grotesquery at Bad Vestments.

h/t New Advent.

Save Your Breath, Your Grace

2011-06-14T15:14:00.008-04:00

His Grace, Archbishop Cranmer (whose blog, despite my poping, is essential reading and one of my favorites) is in high dudgeon over old news: Katherine Jefferts Schori, 'Sidin' Elder of the Episcopal Church, applied some voluptuous padding to her wafer-thin resume before she was ~~hand-picked~~ elected five years ago to her present position: it seems she made herself the dean of a non-existent school of theology. What Archbishop Cranmer does not realize is many of us appalled by Ms. Schori's elevation knew all about the scandal at the time. Many bloggers (though not this one, alas) screamed bloody murder but Management at the Episcopal Church was hardly ruffled; it mattered not in the slightest. The only thing that did was Ms. Schori's furthering their innovative agenda and by that standard she has proved a superb choice and a spectacular success.

His Grace Cranmer posits the possibility of Ms. Schori being dismissed over this matter, breach of contract or somesuch. Not a chance. To Episcopal Church management, as with all those on the left, truth is infinitely malleable, to be bent, shaped and formed in whatever manner necessary to serve a greater good, in this instance innovation. Church hierarchy is delighted with Ms. Schori and with her mission of badgering and harassing the few remaining orthodox clergy and parishioners who demur out of the church, we can be confident Ms. Schori will serve out her term unmolested. Trust me on this, Your Grace.

It Looked Promising...

2011-06-14T08:02:00.001-04:00

But Hollywood never fails to disappoint. The Tree of Life: Pantheistic twaddle.

Fr. Al Swims the Bosphorus

2011-06-13T08:27:00.005-04:00

Fr. Al Kimel, once a priest at the Church of the Holy Communion (Episcopal) in Charleston, SC and author of the scholarly and thoughtful (if occasionally opaque to these eyes) blog Pontifications, found himself unhappy with the Episcopal Church (for plenty of good reasons), which he wrote elegantly of in his blog. He left the Episcopal Church, embraced the full Catholic faith, and later was ordained into the Holy Catholic Church. He did not have a happy time of it ( for plenty of good reasons), also writing elegantly of it in his blog.

Now comes word Fr. Kimel has left the Catholic Church and was to be ordained into the Russian Church Abroad on Pentecost. I wish Fr. Kimel well and pray he finds himself happier in the east than the west. I also pray he will not find the distress, which seems to have followed him from the Episcopal Church into the Catholic Church, has followed him along into Orthodoxy.

The Ordinariate in the United States

2011-06-12T15:35:00.002-04:00

The view from Rome:

Only two Episcopal parishes thus far, we may not see that many more. As I have written before, most orthodox Anglo-Catholic parishes and individuals within the Episcopal Church (which are proportionately fewer than those in the Church of England) have already left, aligning themselves with various "alphabet-soup" breakaway Anglican organizations. With the Ordinariate, I imagine we will see the few remaining Orthodox A-C parishes still in the Episcopal Church taking the swim.

Idle speculation: I wonder if any orthodox "medium-high" parishes (e.g. St. Thomas Church Fifth Avenue), seeing their A-C high-church brethren safely climbing aboard Peter's Barque, will be tempted to do the same. It seems to me as long as they faithfully observed the order and rubrics in the Book of Divine Worship, they could effect a "lower" celebration of ~~the Mass~~ Holy Communion: leaving off extreme smells and bells and bowing and scraping, thus preserving some their good protestant integrity, but at the same time being united with a Church whose apostolic succession and sacraments are unquestioned, unlike (and increasingly so) those of the Episcopal Church.

(Readers of a more scholarly bent than I should feel free to rip this speculative exercise to shreds.)

(Via the Ordinariate Portal, with thanks to Augustine).

Too Little, Too Late

2011-06-11T12:37:00.007-04:00

Forward in Faith links to a short and, I think, rather sad address from Fr. Jonathan Baker, the Secretary of Forward in Faith and Bishop-designate of Ebbsfleet, wherein he greets and wishes well catholic worshipers remaining in the Church of England. After expressing thanks to the Archbishop of Canterbury for his concern for Anglo-Catholics he asks prayers for, among other things, "a renewal of the catholic faith in the Church of England" and vocations.

We must wish His Grace well, of course, he is godly man but he is also on a fool's errand. For all their warm gooey words on being inclusive and tolerant of differing points of view, the forces in the C of E opposed to orthodoxy, just like their Episcopalian counterparts, are anything but; their actions have proved it. The late Fr. John Neuhaus (himself a Lutheran convert to Catholicism) memorably stated some years ago: "Where orthodoxy is optional, orthodoxy will sooner or later be proscribed." The corollary of that is, every optional innovation will sooner or later become mandatory. That, too, has been proved, over and over again.

Orthodox Anglo-Catholics in the U.S. recognized this years ago and began to leave; in a few years there will be none left in the Episcopal Church. Many Orthodox Anglo-Catholics in England, however, seem to hang on, hoping against hope for deliverance from their lot (which, one could argue, has already occurred in the shape of Anglicanorum Coetibus, if they would but recognize it as that). Alas, the appointments of Fr. Baker, as well Fr. Norman Banks, as the Anglo-Catholics' episcopal protectors will not accomplish their survival. The best the flocks of those two bishops may hope for is a few more years maintaining their orthodox practices and beliefs relatively unscathed. Eventually, however, the daemons of innovation will, for the final time, turn their attention to the remaining orthodox Anglo-Catholics in the Church of England, thus ensuring their inclusion as Anglicanism founders on the shoals of secular humanism.

Why I Love the New York Post (a continuing series)

2011-06-10T20:20:00.001-04:00

Front page headline in today's print edition:

WEINER: I'LL STICK IT OUT

Mystery Solved

2011-06-10T19:56:00.001-04:00

Did you ever wonder why the Dalai Lama is such a darling among our credentialed class and causes Hollywood movie stars to swoon in his presence? This despite a moral outlook more or less in accord with the teachings of the Catholic Church, that the western elite find so appalling? Here's why: he's one of them.

DALAI LAMA TO CHINESE STUDENTS: ‘I’M A MARXIST’

In speaking to a group of students in Minnesota last week, the Dalai Lama cleared up any uncertainty regarding his political views. “…As far as socio-political beliefs are concerned, I consider myself a Marxist,” he told the audience.

According to Religion Dispatches, one student questioned this statement, asking if this view of the world contradict the Dalai Lama’s philosophy:

The Tibetan leader answered that the Marx was not against religion or religious philosophy per se but against religious institutions that were allied, during Marx’s time, with the European ruling class.

For in the end, you see, to the elite, as long as you espouse the confiscation of property and redistribution of wealth, all your are sins forgiven.

Criticism is Not Disloyalty

2011-06-09T09:10:00.002-04:00

Fr. Hunwicke, a Church of England clergyman on his way to Rome, has announced his ordination into the Holy Catholic Church has been "deferred," apparently over "misunderstanding" concerning his blog, a must-read for thoughtful traditionalists on both sides of the Tiber. He announces he is closing the blog down "with immediate effect" and is deleting "comments on it (or emails sent to me) which are in any way whatsoever critical of the Catholic Church."

Hunwicke has been critical, often sharply, of many of the post-Vatican II reforms that caused so much damage to the Church. He may have touched a nerve of someone in the English Church's hierarchy, someone for whom criticism of contemporary liturgical practices is tantamount to disloyalty. Most certainly that is not the case for this good and pious cleric. Let us pray the matter is quickly resolved. The Church could use a priest of Hunwicke's intelligence, thoughtfulness and wit.

Worthiest Art Thou at All Times to Be Sung

2011-06-08T17:27:00.005-04:00

Comes word of welcome early fruits of Anglicanorum Coetibus:

Solemn Evensong & Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament will be celebrated by the Oxford Ordinariate Group at Blackfriars, Oxford, at 7.30pm on Wednesday 15 June, by kind permission of the Prior and Community.

For those not aware Evensong is an Anglican institution, an amalgam of Compline and Vespers, that dates back over 500 years and is perhaps the loveliest service in the Anglican provenance. It may now be celebrated in the Catholic Church and that is happy news. If you are fortunate enough to have taken in Evensong at St. Thomas Church Fifth Avenue (Episcopal) in Manhattan you surely understand why. If you not, you may do so at the church's website (click here to hear a recent celebration). The Anglican musical tradition is unlike any other; "ascetic opulence" might best describe it, glorious and soaring but without a trace of sentimentality or excess (some might even say it's chilly), unlike that heard all too frequently (though less so these days) in St. Peter's Basilica.

Couldn't possibly happen, of course, but how pleasant to imagine St. Thomas Church Fifth Avenue becoming an Anglican Use parish.

h/t Inigo Hicks

Anodyne Atrocities

2011-06-07T16:30:00.005-04:00

Tony Woodlief, writing in Image, about Bad Christian Art:

I’m convinced that bad art derives, like bad literary theory, from bad theology. To know God falsely is to write and paint and sculpt and cook and dance Him falsely. Perhaps it’s not poor artistic skill that yields bad Christian art, in other words, but poor Christianity.

[snip]

Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s warning against cheap grace comes to mind, a recognition that our redemption was bought with a price, as redemption always is. The writer who gives us sentimentality is akin to the painter Thomas Kinkade, who explicitly aims to paint the world without the Fall, which is not really the world at all, but a cheap, maudlin, knock-off of the world, a world without suffering and desperate faith and Christ Himself, which is not really a world worth painting, or writing about, or redeeming.

Read it all. Extending Woodlief's analogy, is there any doubt the music-product perpetrated against worshipers in most Catholic churches these days is the sonic equivalent of Thomas Kinkade paintings?

h/t Conservative Blog for Peace

Don't be Too Quick to Answer

2011-06-06T17:30:00.004-04:00

Read the following, which I found on the website of St. Luke's (Episcopal) Parish, Bladensburg, MD, soon to be departing for Rome.

Our Liturgy

"The Eucharist is above all else a sacrifice' (Dominicae Cenae, 9). It is one and the same sacrifice as that of Calvary; each day the priest stands on Golgotha as he offers the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass (cf. John Paul II, Holy Thursday Letter to Priests, 1988, passim). This sacrifice of Calvary, which is permanent and definitive, the eternal source of man's Redemption, is perennially re-presented through the ministry of priests in a sacramental unbloody manner at the Mass. Thus Christ's definitive act of self-donation as Victim for our sins is made present to the faithful that they may offer themselves ever more perfectly in union with Christ the Mediator between God and man." -Rev. Augustine Mary Hedderman M.V.A.

Therefore, we can truly say with St. Thomas Aquinas, "The celebration of Holy Mass is as valuable as the death of Jesus on the cross."

I wish every Catholic pastor would read that declaration then ask himself the following:

1) Do I agree with it?

2) If the answer is yes, do the Masses celebrated in my parish live up to it?

"We are Ordinariate Bound!"

2011-06-06T11:28:00.002-04:00

St Luke's Parish, Bladensburg, Maryland is taking the swim.

It is with great joy St. Luke's announces its intention to join the Personal Ordinariate of the Roman Catholic Church. We have been discerning the leading of the Holy Spirit since the Holy Father's announcement of Anglicanorum coetibus in October of 2009. Since that time we have been in close dialogue with both the Episcopal Diocese of Washington and the Archdiocese Washington.

This is a case of letting the cat out of the cellophane bag; St. Luke's Bladensburg is a long-time stalwart of orthodox Anglo-Catholicism. Given the state of the Episcopal Church these days, it would have been astonishing if the parish had elected not to encamp for Rome. Still, it is good news indeed for liturgy loving Catholics in the Archdiocese of Washington.

UPDATE: I misspelled "Bladensburg." Who knew it wasn't spelled with an "h" at the end? I've corrected it.

UPDATE 2: Kudos to the Rt. Reverend John Bryson Chane of the Episcopal Diocese of Washington, who has shown uncommon grace handling the departure of this parish from his flock. Not only is he not suing them over their property, he has reached an agreement with them that they may lease it with an option to purchase. Whether or not one believes, as Episcopal Church does, parish properties belong to their dioceses (I think they do not), Bishop Chane has handled this matter in a gentlemanly and Christian manner and deserves great credit for it.

Blind Item

2011-06-05T16:19:00.004-04:00

Which popular and erudite Catholic priest, a convert from the Episcopal Church, is rumored to be near or at the top of the Vatican's short list of ordinaries for the first personal ordinariate in the United States? His bishop is said to be leaning on him to accept.

We could know by the end of the month.

A Very Good Question

2011-06-05T15:24:00.001-04:00

The ever-wise Inigo Hicks, countering the suggestion by the Anchoress that the entertainment industry is so powerful Christians cannot ignore it but should engage it somehow, asks: "Isn't boycott a mode of engagement?"

Yes it is, without question. Still, I'm with the Anchoress on this one: my preferred mode of engagement with the entertainment industry is to grind their wretched product under my heels or smash it to bits with a sledge hammer; it's more tactile.

The Falcon Cannot Hear the Falconer

2011-06-05T00:40:00.009-04:00

The Rt. Rev. Brian Marsh, Presiding Bishop of the Anglican Church in America, has decided the ACA cannot accept Pope Benedict's offer, via Anglicanorum Coetibus, of an ordinariate wherein Anglicans may be received into the Catholic Church but still preserve much of their worship tradition. The reason for rejection of this remarkable offer from the Pope, it seems, is His Grace's horrifying discovery that when one is received into the Catholic Church one becomes (brace yourself) Catholic. Nobody told him, I guess.

Bishop Marsh is also chagrined when one joins the Catholic Church one must subscribe to, in entirety, the Catechism of the Catholic Church; the Book of Common Prayer will not obtain in the ordinariate. I can empathize with His Grace: the BCP (the good one, from 1928, or 1662) is not only prayerful (naturally) but also contain some of the most beautiful English ever written; to this day I keep an old and battered 1928 BCP, presented to me at my confirmation, at hand. Bishop Marsh, however, ought to have another look at a key component found in the BCP, the Articles of Religion, then ask himself if it is really that great a mystery or injustice that the Prayer Book is unacceptable to the Holy Catholic Church. Article X on free-will or Article XXII on purgatory should by themselves be sufficient to that purpose.

I find myself increasingly dismayed by Anglicans who call themselves catholics yet nevertheless find numerous objections to their becoming Catholics, despite there now being a generous provision encouraging them to do so. Organizations like the Anglican Church in America, and its nearly countless alphabet soup counterparts, are where they are today because the Episcopal Church whence they come lacked magisterium to fend off the corrupting influence of our contemporary culture. They can fight the good fight on their own, of course, and I wish them well, but it seems unlikely, regardless their fervent espousal of Prayer Book and Branch Theory, they can prevail against an enemy even the mighty Catholic Church must struggle valiantly against. Things fall apart; the center cannot hold.

Change of Pace

2011-06-01T17:25:00.000-04:00

Vespers-Divine Liturgy (Mass) in celebration of the Ascension of the Lord, celebrated at St Michael's Chapel (Russian Catholic of the Byzantine Rite). St Michaels is situated in a building on the grounds of the Old St Patrick's Cathedral on Mulberry Street in lower Manhattan, in a former nunnery, I believe. I assume I will fulfill my obligation by attending this service but will consult with Professor William Tighe (with whom I am attending) about it. I understand he is rather knowledgeable on matters like these.

I have attended Russian rites before (both Orthodox and Catholic) and my experience was like those who first experienced it centuries ago: "we knew not whether we were in heaven or on earth."

You Would Swear There was a Certain Fascination to It

2011-05-25T11:05:00.001-04:00

Another person smarter than I has taken up this silly blogging business. A warm razzing, if you please, for Bonaventura, the exclusive proprietor of Breviloquia.

Smoke Around the Altar in the Diocese of Rochester

2011-05-24T14:49:00.005-04:00

What's going down in the Diocese of Rochester (NY) you ask? (Okay, you probably don't but you should.) Well, the number of priests is way down; from 1995 to 2005 the diocese lost 45% of them. Mass attendance is also down, 25% since 2002. The reason for the depressing numbers is an old and familiar one to this ex-Episcopalian: an out-of-control bishop, heedless of the consequences, pushing through an innovative agenda, in this instance attempting to transform Holy Church into a typically modern liberal protestant denomination with ageing feminists, both lay and religious, calling the shots. Alas, the bishop has been largely successful in his efforts, to the point where in his diocese, similarly to most mainstream protestant denominations, parishioners and priests stay away in droves.

In the Diocese of Rochester, for example, six women, calling themselves "lay administrators," are in charge of twelve parishes. Elsewhere in the diocese there are five women religious in charge of 11 churches. The administrators answer to the bishop while the priests answer to the administrators--only they are not called priests, rather "sacramental ministers" or in the much more colorful words of a critic, "sacramental Pez machines." One can only imagine the ghastly state of the liturgy in this 'seventies era nightmare. Read all the sordid details here.

In the Diocese of Rochester, as well the Diocese of Albany (my how things have come to a sorry pass for Holy Mother Church in upstate New York!), traditional Catholics count the days till these dreadful liberal bishops mercifully retire.

Thanks to Inigo Hicks.

Lux et Veritas

2011-05-22T01:08:00.000-04:00

It seems the newest member of the University of Notre Dame's Board of Directors, Roxanne M. Martino, has been an even more generous supporter of the vehemently pro-abortion group Emily's List than earlier reported. The chairman of the Notre Dame's board, Dick Notabaert, however, insists, Ms Martino, busy, busy, busy as she is, had no idea Emily's List might somehow be connected with the abortion business and simply mistook it for one of a slew of organizations she supports offering "important services and support to women." Ms Martino, Chairman Notabaert assures us, is "fully supportive of church teaching of the sanctity of life."

Click here to see the home page of Emily's List. See how long it takes you to peer through its opacity and learn their true agenda. Perhaps Ms Martino and Mr Notabaert need to get their eyes examined.

What They Left Out

2011-05-19T13:45:00.003-04:00

The University of Notre Dame has announced the appointment of a new member to its Board of Trustees, Roxanne M. Martino. From the press release:

Martino joined Aurora Investment Management in 1990 and now leads the Chicago firm, which manages more than $8 billion in funds of hedge funds designed to meet various investment mandates, including multi-strategy formats. She previously worked for seven years as a senior manager with Coopers & Lybrand and for more than six years at Grosvenor Capital Management, where she was a general partner.

Martino earned a bachelor’s degree in business from Notre Dame and a master’s of business administration degree from the University of Chicago. She has served as a member and chair of the advisory council for Notre Dame’s Mendoza College of Business, is a member of the Executive Education advisory board at Notre Dame, and serves on the investment subcommittee of the board of directors of Catholic Relief Services.

Most impressive resume, wouldn't you say? Funny thing, though: despite the seemingly thorough enumeration of Ms. Martino's accomplishments in the release, the Notre Dame Board did manage to leave out one teensy-weensy detail that could possibly be of concern to Catholics: Ms. Martino's generous support, to the tune of $16,150, for the heinous feminist organization called Emily's List, which proudly proclaims its mission as "electing pro-choice Democratic women to office" (and no doubt considers Ms. Martino's appointment to the Notre Dame Board a triumph).

How much longer will the Church put up with travesties like this? And how can she reasonably expect Catholics in this country, especially those already wavering, to obey her teachings when a prestigious Catholic university rewards an enthusiastic proponent of one of the gravest violations of those teachings with a seat on its board?

Thanks to the Sycamore Trust.

The Only Inconsistency is in the License Plate

2011-05-17T17:24:00.000-04:00

Ratcheting Up the Millennium Development Goals

2011-05-17T11:57:00.002-04:00

Katherine Jefferts Schori, Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church, aware, perhaps, of the looming demise of that formerly grand institution, takes on her and her Constructed Faith System's greatest challenge yet: original sin.

One of the ways we Episcopalians do both is to raise awareness of and help fight human diseases that attack and ravage all those made in God’s image. For example, the Episcopal Church has led the way in the fight against AIDS and is currently working hard to provide people with the means to reduce or eradicate the scourge of malaria.

But I want to talk to you about a far deadlier health risk, a far greater medical disaster than any previously known in human history. This disease kills an estimated 60,000,000 people every year and no part of the world is safe from it, including our own. And this disease has a name.

Death.

Read it all (WARNING: satire-rich content).

Thanks to the MCJ.

Let Them In!

2011-05-14T10:46:00.000-04:00

Archbishop Hepworth of the Traditional Anglican Communion (TAC), a break-away Anglo-Catholic group hoping to be received into the Holy Catholic Church en masse, via the creation of an ordinariate under terms of Anglicanorum Coetibus, has written a letter to a Catholic colleague in Australia expressing his distress over the "deteriorating" situation in Canada for TAC members there who hope to do the same. Archbishop Thomas Collins of the Catholic Church in Canada is responsible for the creation of the ordinariate into which Canadian TAC member may be received into the Catholic Church and to that end has appointed various priests to TAC parishes in Canada who will visit and assist them in the process. Archbishop Hepworth is livid about how they will do it and expresses his anger in an absolutely splendid run-on sentence that bristles with rage.

These priests are to announce, on behalf of Archbishop Collins, that the parishes will close forthwith, that the laity and clergy will attend a Catholic parish for from four to six months, that they will not receive the sacraments during this time, that they will be catechised adequately during this time since any catechesis from the Catechism of the Catholic Church done by the Traditional Anglican Communion is inadequate because only Catholics understand the Catechism, that the dossiers submitted by Traditional Anglican Communion clergy show an inadequate training since they have not attended Anglican Communion Theological Colleges, and therefore those selected by the Ordinary and approved by the CDF will have to attend a Catholic Seminary for an as yet unspecified time, at the end of this process, new parishes for Anglicans along the lines of the Anglican Use in the United States may be established, but not necessarily in the former Traditional Anglican Communion churches, and that during this process the Traditional Anglican Communion must cede its property to the Ordinariate.

Now breathe. In truth, I have great sympathy for Hepworth and members of the TAC. My immediate thought upon first learning of Anglicanorum Coetibus was that many in the Church would resist the wholesale admission of Anglicans, particularly the bishops for the ironic reason that because they are older they are more likely to be products of the horrid post-Vatican II reforms. Anglo-Catholics, on the other hand (real ones, not so-called "Affirming Catholics," secular humanists in vestments who play church and pretty music), want no part of the what passes for liturgy and music found in most Catholic churches these days. In fact, at the same time the post-Vatican II reformers were busying themselves despoiling Catholic worship, the Anglo-Catholics carefully preserved theirs, offering, then as now, beautifully and meticulously celebrated masses in concert with the glorious music for which Anglicans are justly renown. As a result, many of the old Catholic bishops have no truck with the Anglo-Catholics; they regard them as a threat.

I do not know in the case of the TAC of Canada whether or not the difficulties being imposed on them by Archbishop Collins are warranted but I do hope, as should all traditional Catholics, if they are, the Catholic Church, in Canada as well the United States and everywhere else, will be as accommodating as possible to them and other traditional Anglican parishes (within the bounds of canon law, of course). Their reception into Holy Church should prove a rich blessing, for the fact is the post-Vatican II reforms have run their course; the tide has turned against them (albeit seemingly glacially) and our Church could well use an influx of enthusiastic Anglicans who are more than willing to share their rich heritage with us, i.e. to show us how. Deo Volente.

A tip o' the hat to Inigo Hicks.

Show Us the Death Certificate--the Long Form!

2011-05-11T14:07:00.000-04:00

It should be fun seeing how President Obama administration reacts to this story in Russia Today (RT). Ignoring it, of course, would be the wisest thing but since we have a president, an increasingly small man, who was recently cowed by a buffoon like Donald Trump into releasing his birth certificate, who knows what he will do?

Iran can prove Bin Laden was dead long before US raid – Iranian minister
permalink email story to a friend print version
Published: 10 May, 2011, 17:07
Osama Bin Laden (AFP Photo / HO / DoD)
TRENDS:Global terrorism Osama Bin Laden killed
TAGS: Scandal, Politics, Terrorism, USA

Iranian Intelligence Minister Heydar Moslehi claims that Osama Bin Laden died from an illness before the US raid on his compound in Abbottabad. Iran has documents to prove it, he said.
"We have credible information that Bin Laden died some time ago of a disease," Moslehi said on the sidelines of a cabinet meeting on Sunday, as quoted by ISNA news agency.

"If the US military and intelligence apparatus have really arrested or killed Bin Laden, why don't they show him [his body]? Why have they thrown his corpse into the sea?" ISNA reports Moslehi asked rhetorically, FARS news agency reports.

Moslehi labeled the US raid in Abbottabad as a “PR campaign”, created to divert the attention of its citizens from domestic problems, such as the “fragile” state of the US economy.

Thanks to MJR.

"Otherwise Devout" and Other Myths

2011-05-10T14:39:00.003-04:00

I find it intensely annoying when non-Catholics, no doubt owing to the selfless generosity of their souls, feel compelled to offer remedies to the myriad ailments they see in Holy Church [your sarcasm seems inconsistent with your never ending barbs aimed at the Episcopalians, doesn't it?--ed. Yeah, but I used to be one so I get a pass.]. A fine example of this is found in the person of one Edward Flatteau, who in his capacity as "environmental reporter" for the Huffington Post, recently urged upon the Catholic Church the canonization of Pope John XXIII.

Poor Pope John: a strong and vibrant personality, the liberals have been claiming him ever since he died unexpectedly and the radical reformers were able to hijack the recommendations of his Second Vatican Council, running roughshod over his considerably weaker and duller successor, Paul VI, eviscerating the music and liturgy of the Church and forcing her sharply to the left politically. All the while the "reformers" cited the "spirit of Vatican II" and, by implication, John XXIII, only to be stopped when they ran up against Paul VI's successor, another vibrant and strong personality, John Paul II.

Flatteau's angle is that John XXIII was a proto-environmentalist and would thus have supported the modern Green movement and its socialist prescriptions (despite socialism's dismal environmental record) for the putative ecological catastrophes the world faces. I doubt it. John XXIII was certainly well familiar with Rerum Novarum, the encyclical by his predecessor Leo XIII, wherein he defends the rights of workers but also strongly supports the right of people to own property. Since encyclicals are simply clarification of Church doctrine John XXIII would hardly oppose or overturn it.

Christopher Johnson (also a non-Catholic!) in his Midwest Conservative Journal, ably sets afire the rest of Flatteau's flatulences, so I will only point out the one I find particularly egregious:

Would John, the "liberal" Pope (who is already beatified) have closed the environmental circle for the Church if he had not died five years into his reign? Perhaps. He never lived to see the commission that he appointed issue a recommendation by a vote of 57 to four to discontinue the Vatican's absolute ban on the use of birth control pills. Pope John's successor, Pope Paul VI, sided with the tiny minority and retained the controversial total artificial contraception prohibition that many otherwise devout Catholics have always felt free to ignore [emphasis added].

Dream on, pal. Catholics are required to obey Church teachings. When they do not, they are, depending on the nature of the violation, in a state of mortal sin and must confess and be absolved by a priest. Catholics who flout Church teachings are no more "otherwise devout" than meat eaters are "otherwise vegetarian."

A further point: when Pope Paul VI, weak as he was, by the grace of God managed to summon the courage to write Humanae Vitae, he spared the Catholic Church the fate of the mainline protestant denominations, that by their slavish adherence to contemporary trends (and warned "they would die" if they did not), now find themselves fiercely competing in a race to oblivion. While he is not likely be canonized anytime soon Catholics everywhere should pray for the repose of Paul VI's soul. It is not overstating it, in my opinion, that he saved the Holy Catholic Church.

Lie Back and Think of England

2011-04-28T13:56:00.000-04:00

Never Thought I'd Live to See the Day

2011-04-25T11:01:00.004-04:00

Mark Rudd is peeing in his pants.

April 22, 2011
Columbia to Officially Recognize Naval ROTC

Columbia University President Lee C. Bollinger and Navy Secretary Ray Mabus today announced that Columbia and the U.S. Navy have agreed to officially reinstate Naval Reserve Officers Training Corps (NROTC) Program enrollment opportunities at the University.

Columbia student military veterans and ROTC members marked Veterans Day 2010 with a flag raising on campus.

Pulling the Beeswax from His Ears

2011-04-23T11:29:00.003-04:00

A warm welcome, if you please, to Inigo Hicks, who after valiantly resisting the seductive ditties emanating from the sirens of the blogosphere, has triumphantly succumbed.

So Much for Parochialism

2011-04-21T18:34:00.006-04:00

After considerable debate I have decided I can no longer attend mass (except in a pinch to fulfill my obligation) at my local parish church. The liturgy and music are so dreadful that despite my best efforts to concentrate on what is (it goes without saying) the most important aspect of the mass, the Eucharist, I find that concentration continually upended by priests who apparently see it their duty to give the dubious Novus Ordo mass their own personal stamp. Attempts by other parishioners (far younger than myself, I might add) and myself to rein in some of the more egregious liturgical abuses have proved unavailing, met with indifference at best from the pastor on down. I have thrown in the towel.

I regret having have to make this decision. Not only will I will miss the five-minute walk to church but I also feel strongly the need for the strong parochial presence of Holy Church in urban and suburban neighborhoods; in many ways it is the glue that holds them together. Nonetheless, owing to favorable circumstances, I have a car these days (a rare and lovely luxury in New York City) and thus can easily get myself to the Church of the Holy Innocents in mid-town Manhattan, where the mass in the Extraordinary Form is now celebrated seven days a week, with Missae Cantatae offered on Sundays and major feasts days, along with a superb choir performing chant and Renaissance polyphony.

I doubt there are more than a handful of Catholic churches in the whole country with such a generous offering of traditional masses and it seems to me that not only should I avail myself of them, it behooves me to, for Holy Innocents could use more souls in the pews (although the numbers are steadily and gratifyingly rising), it being smack in the middle of the garment district, which is not exactly residential (I also hope my relatively modest offering in the pledge envelope will not go unappreciated). I have passed the point where I believe it merely desirable that traditional liturgy be restored to the Holy Church; I now believe it is absolutely essential for her survival, lest she follow the mainstream protestant denominations into the morass and oblivion of our wretched contemporary culture.

Beginning this evening I will begin to experience, for the first time, the entire Triduum the way it should be done: using the Tridentine Rite with music worthy for use in the praise of our Lord. I am very much looking forward to it. A joyous Easter to you all.

Ecclesiastical Karaoke

2011-04-15T17:28:00.000-04:00

From the Catholic News Agency:

London, England, Apr 14, 2011 / 05:46 am (CNA).- A Grammy winning music director has delivered a stinging attack upon modern Church music. Joseph Cullen, choral director at the London Symphony Orchestra, says that since the 1960s there has been a “glaring lack of sympathy” for “worthy sacred music.”

[snip]

He also criticized the practice of a lone cantor leading the singing in parishes. “The misuse of one booming voice behind a microphone, an ecclesiastical karaoke, seems to have killed off unified congregational singing.”

Thomas Day pointed this out years ago in his tour de force Why Catholics Can't Sing. The explanation is simple: when someone blasts out a tune using a heavily amplified microphone, those of us not so well armed are not inclined to compete--even if the tune is good one, which is seldom the case in modern Catholic worship. What is particularly frustrating about this phenomenon is, it is readily apparent and has been for decades. Yet the practice continues and unlike Karaoke, you can't sidle up to the bar and order a palliative.

Perhaps his most stinging attack, though, is aimed at official diocesan musicians who both commission and promote their own music. “The elected church music committees of the bishops' conferences cannot have vested interests in promoting their own music, or type of music. This would be regarded as corrupt in any other field.”

Amen. Amen. Musical simony, you might call it. It has long annoyed me, when leafing through those pulpy "missalettes," to see copyright notices affixed near the insipid little ditties that comprise service music and hymns in the Novus Ordo mass. The fact that putative composers actually make money off that crap is appalling indeed. Bravo to you, Mr. Cullen