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Starting today August 7th, 2024, in order to post in the Married Couples, Courting Couples, or Singles forums, you will not be allowed to post if you have your Marital status designated as private. Announcements will be made in the respective forums as well but please note that if yours is currently listed as Private, you will need to submit a ticket in the Support Area to have yours changed.
Putin ‘invokes Cuban Missile Crisis’ as he moves ‘nuclear-capable’ ships to Havana
- News & Current Events (Articles Required)
- 18 Replies
Ukraine-Russia war – live: Putin ‘invokes Cuban Missile Crisis’ as he moves ‘nuclear-capable’ ships to Havana
Four Russian vessels will make a port call to Havana between 12 and 17 June before sailing to Venezuela
Vladimir Putin is invoking the memory of the Cuban Missile Crisis by moving “nuclear-capable” warships to Cuba in a move intended to provoke the United States, a think tank warned.
Four Russian vessels will make a port call to Havana between 12 and 17 June before stopping off in Venezuela later in the month, according to Cuban and US officials.
The Admiral Gorshkov frigate, the Kazan nuclear-powered cruise missile submarine, the Academic Pashin replenishment oiler, and the Nikolai Chiker rescue tug will all be part of the visit, the US-based think tank Institute for the Study of War.
The Admiral Gorshkov is capable of carrying Zircon hypersonic missiles, which the Kremlin has touted as being able to carry a nuclear warhead. There is no suggestion the ship will be equipped with nuclear weapons during the visit.
In 1962, former Russian premier Nikita Khrushchev moved nuclear missiles to Havana which led to an intense stand off between Moscow and Washington.
Meanwhile, Putin has threatened to retaliate against Western countries that are allowing Ukraine to hit Russia with their long-range missiles.
Putin ‘invokes Cuban Missile Crisis’ as he moves ‘nuclear-capable’ ships to Havana
Four Russian vessels will make a port call to Havana between 12 and 17 June before sailing to Venezuela
www.independent.co.uk
Putin ‘invokes Cuban Missile Crisis’ as he moves ‘nuclear-capable’ ships to Havana
Four Russian vessels will make a port call to Havana between 12 and 17 June before sailing to Venezuela
www.independent.co.uk
Idaho bar celebrates ‘Heterosexual Awesomeness Month,’ gives free beer to straight people
- By Michie
- One Bread, One Body - Catholic
- 31 Replies
Old State Saloon reports record-breaking sales since it announced it is celebrating June as ‘Heterosexual Awesomeness Month,’ with discounts for straight couples and women and free beer for heterosexual men.
EAGLE, Idaho (LifeSiteNews) — An anti-woke bar in Eagle, Idaho, is pushing back against political correctness and LGBT ideology by celebrating June as “Heterosexual Awesomeness Month.”
Mark Fitzpatrick, a former police officer who calls himself a “Bible believing Christian,” is giving out free beer and discounts for straight patrons who visit his Old State Saloon just 10 miles west of Boise.
“It’s the expectation that you’re supposed to jump behind and support something,” Fitzpatrick toldlocal media outlet KTVB when asked why he is doing it.
“And people are just rejecting it. They’re standing up and saying, ‘enough is enough,’ we don’t want all this.”
Continued below.
www.lifesitenews.com
EAGLE, Idaho (LifeSiteNews) — An anti-woke bar in Eagle, Idaho, is pushing back against political correctness and LGBT ideology by celebrating June as “Heterosexual Awesomeness Month.”
Mark Fitzpatrick, a former police officer who calls himself a “Bible believing Christian,” is giving out free beer and discounts for straight patrons who visit his Old State Saloon just 10 miles west of Boise.
“It’s the expectation that you’re supposed to jump behind and support something,” Fitzpatrick toldlocal media outlet KTVB when asked why he is doing it.
“And people are just rejecting it. They’re standing up and saying, ‘enough is enough,’ we don’t want all this.”
Continued below.
Idaho bar celebrates 'Heterosexual Awesomeness Month,' gives free beer to straight people - LifeSite
Old State Saloon reports record-breaking sales since it announced it is celebrating June as ‘Heterosexual Awesomeness Month,’ with discounts for straight couples and women and free beer for heterosexual men.
www.lifesitenews.com
Vatican Arrests Ex-Employee for Attempted Extortion Using Allegedly Stolen Bernini Manuscript...
- By Michie
- One Bread, One Body - Catholic
- 3 Replies
The Vatican arrested a former employee in late May for attempted extortion after he sold an allegedly stolen 17th-century manuscript to the Vatican for hundreds of thousands of euros.
According to the Italian newspaper Domani, which broke the news June 6, the art historian and former Vatican employee was questioned and arrested by Vatican gendarmes on May 27 after being handed a check by Vatican Cardinal Mauro Gambetti for 120,000 euros (about $130,000) for the sale of the manuscript.
Alfio Maria Daniele Pergolizzi, who was head of communications for the Fabbrica di San Pietro from 1995–2011, is currently sitting in a Vatican jail after being charged with extortion, fraud, and possession of stolen goods.
The manuscript Pergolizzi attempted to sell to the Vatican dates to 1633 and was written by collaborators of the sculptor Gian Lorenzo Bernini. The document, which has 36 sheets and 49 drawings, details the amount of gold Bernini needed to decorate the baldachin of St. Peter’s Basilica, according to Domani.
Continued below.
www.catholicnewsagency.com
According to the Italian newspaper Domani, which broke the news June 6, the art historian and former Vatican employee was questioned and arrested by Vatican gendarmes on May 27 after being handed a check by Vatican Cardinal Mauro Gambetti for 120,000 euros (about $130,000) for the sale of the manuscript.
Alfio Maria Daniele Pergolizzi, who was head of communications for the Fabbrica di San Pietro from 1995–2011, is currently sitting in a Vatican jail after being charged with extortion, fraud, and possession of stolen goods.
The manuscript Pergolizzi attempted to sell to the Vatican dates to 1633 and was written by collaborators of the sculptor Gian Lorenzo Bernini. The document, which has 36 sheets and 49 drawings, details the amount of gold Bernini needed to decorate the baldachin of St. Peter’s Basilica, according to Domani.
Continued below.
Vatican arrests ex-employee for attempted extortion
The art historian and former Vatican employee was reportedly questioned and arrested by Vatican gendarmes on May 27.
www.catholicnewsagency.com
Report: Pope Benedict’s Former Secretary Archbishop Georg Gänswein to Be Appointed Papal Nuncio
- By Michie
- One Bread, One Body - Catholic
- 0 Replies
Appointment to Lithuania’s capital city of Vilnius is in the works, according to an Italian Catholic news outlet.
The long limbo of Pope Benedict XVI’s former longtime personal secretary may be ending soon.
Archbishop Georg Gänswein, who fell from influential papal aide to no assignment in the Catholic Church, will soon be appointed papal nuncio to the three Baltic countries, according to a report from an Italian Catholic news outlet.
The story, published by La Nuova Bussola Quotidiana and citing unnamed sources, said the archbishop will become papal nuncio to Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania — a position that also includes similar duties in neighboring Latvia and Estonia.
It’s not the first time the high-profile prelate has been linked to a far-flung foreign post, however. In March 2023, a Spanish religious news website reported that Archbishop Gänswein might become papal ambassador to Costa Rica, which has not so far come to pass. More recently, in April 2024, an Argentinian newspaper, La Nación, reported that Archbishop Gänswein would soon become a papal nuncio to a country not named in the story.
Continued below.
www.ncregister.com
The long limbo of Pope Benedict XVI’s former longtime personal secretary may be ending soon.
Archbishop Georg Gänswein, who fell from influential papal aide to no assignment in the Catholic Church, will soon be appointed papal nuncio to the three Baltic countries, according to a report from an Italian Catholic news outlet.
The story, published by La Nuova Bussola Quotidiana and citing unnamed sources, said the archbishop will become papal nuncio to Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania — a position that also includes similar duties in neighboring Latvia and Estonia.
It’s not the first time the high-profile prelate has been linked to a far-flung foreign post, however. In March 2023, a Spanish religious news website reported that Archbishop Gänswein might become papal ambassador to Costa Rica, which has not so far come to pass. More recently, in April 2024, an Argentinian newspaper, La Nación, reported that Archbishop Gänswein would soon become a papal nuncio to a country not named in the story.
Continued below.
Report: Pope Benedict’s Former Secretary Archbishop Georg Gänswein to Be Appointed Papal Nuncio
Appointment to Lithuania’s capital city of Vilnius is in the works, according to an Italian Catholic news outlet.
GIVEN forum equips young women to pursue their unique callings
- By Michie
- One Bread, One Body - Catholic
- 0 Replies
(OSV News) — Young Catholic women face a lot of pressure today as they try to discern their vocations in life amid a secularized and polarized culture.
One group, originally founded by the Council of Major Superiors of Women Religious in 2018 after a successful 2016 event, is helping women find affirmation and guidance through a unique mentorship program that encourages them to discover and embrace their God-given gifts.
The GIVEN Art of Accompaniment Mentoring Program
Over 300 Catholic women from all walks of life will gather in Washington from June 8 to 12 to participate in the GIVEN Art of Accompaniment Mentoring Program and the Catholic Women’s Leadership Forum. It will be the fifth GIVEN forumsince the group’s founding; the previous forums were held in 2019, 2020 (online), 2021 and 2022.“Our mission is to help activate the gifts of young Catholic women for the church and the world,” GIVEN Executive Director Michelle Hillaert told OSV News just ahead of the gathering. “We do that by leadership development, faith formation, one-on-one mentoring with our art of accompaniment mentoring year.”
Continued below.
GIVEN forum equips young women to pursue their unique callings
Over 300 Catholic women from all walks of life will gather in Washington from June 8 to 12 to participate in the GIVEN Art of Accompaniment Mentoring Program and the Catholic Women's Leadership Forum.
www.oursundayvisitor.com
Locked up: Meet the elderly and infirm women now in prison for pro-life activism
- By Michie
- One Bread, One Body - Catholic
- 0 Replies
CNA Staff, Jun 6, 2024 / 15:45 pm (CNA).
Since she has been in prison, Jean Marshall, 74, a Catholic and pro-life nurse from Massachusetts, told CNA that she’s received over 150 letters of support, which have lifted her spirits.
Marshall and three other women with major health issues spoke with CNA about their imprisonment and their treatment by the justice system under the Biden administration.
Their crime? In an attempt to save the unborn on Oct. 22, 2020, they participated in a human chain, blockading the inside of a Washington, D.C., abortion clinic run by well-known late-term abortionist Dr. Cesare Santangelo.
The women are among 10 protesters who participated in the attempt to save the unborn at the clinic that day who were convicted on federal charges under the controversial Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act, which has largely been applied to the prosecution of pro-life activists. All of them, including Marshall, are now incarcerated.
Santangelo’s clinic made news in 2022 when the secular pro-life group Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising (PAAU) announced that it had obtained the remains of 115 aborted babies from the clinic by a driver for a medical waste company.
Five of those babies appeared to be of late-term gestation and have become the center of a public dispute between federal lawmakers, pro-life groups, and the D.C. medical examiner’s office — which possessed the remains — over the medical examiner’s refusal to conduct an autopsy to determine whether the babies were killed in an illegal partial-birth abortion.
Continued below.
Locked up: Meet the elderly and infirm women now in prison for pro-life activism
Joan Andrews Bell, Jean Marshall, Heather Idoni, and Paulette Harlow are four pro-life women serving time after being convicted on federal charges for for blockading the inside of an abortion clinic in 2020. / Credit: Chris Bell/Laura Gise/Heath...
www.catholicworldreport.com
The Sacred Heart of Jesus leads us from misery to mercy
- By Michie
- One Bread, One Body - Catholic
- 0 Replies
Our world needs to hear the message of mercy, perhaps as no other age before. A culture of violence, death, destruction and despair can be healed only by mercy.
Devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus is so central to a healthy biblical spirituality that we don’t acknowledge this divine love only once a year; thanks to the apparitions of Our Lord to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque in the seventeenth century, we commemorate and celebrate the love of Christ for us unto death on the First Friday of every month.
Indeed, one of my fondest memories of grammar school is that of Masses on the First Friday of the month for the entire student body. Since an important part of preparation for receiving Holy Communion in those days called for a three-hour fast from solid foods, that meant that most of us came to school actually fasting from the night before. Right after Mass, we proceeded to the school cafeteria, where our pastor treated us to crumb buns and hot chocolate. Thus, our celebration spilled over into a common meal.
Years later, I would relish the lyrics of the lovely hymn, “Draw Us in the Spirit’s Teather,” with the verse that prays, “May all our meals be sacraments of Thee!”
I share that recollection because of another experience I had many years later. I was seated on a plane, hoping that the seat next to me would go unoccupied. Just minutes before the plane door was shut, a man rushed in and, yes, took the empty seat next to me. While we were still taxiing on the runway, he turned toward me and asked, “Are you a Catholic priest?” “Yes, I am.” “I used to be Catholic.” “What are you now?” “I’m saved, I’m a Christian.” “You weren’t saved as a Catholic?” “No, it was just a lot of rituals. I never heard about the love and mercy of God.” “Did you go to Catholic school?” “Yeah, for a few years.”
“Were you,” I asked, “brought to Mass on the First Fridays?” “Yeah, I think so.” “Well, what were you told about that devotion?” “Oh, something about going nine times and going to Heaven.” “You mean you weren’t told about the love and mercy of Christ, so great that He died for you and that love is experienced every time we make a good confession and receive Holy Communion worthily?” “I guess I wasn’t listening too well.” I hope everyone here this evening has listened better than that poor fellow.
The heart is a symbol with a rich biblical lineage. In Hebrew, both the heart and the bowels represent the very depths of a person—where the cognitive and the affective meet in unity and harmony. Hence, we find passages in the Bible that speak thus: “My heart is overwhelmed, my pity is stirred” (Hos 11:8). Far more than an organ of the body, then, the heart suggests the source of compassion, tenderness, kindness—in short, what we call “mercy.”
An interesting piece of biblical trivia: A quick survey of a biblical concordance reveals that the word “mercy” is used more than 200 times in the Sacred Scriptures, while the word “heart” appears over 600 times! No surprise, then, that St. Augustine, playing with the origins of the Latin word for mercy (misericordia), tells us that God’s grace moves us “a miseria ad misericordiam” (from misery to mercy). “Misericordia,” you see, comes from two words which combine to mean “having a heart for the miserable.”
Continued below.
www.catholicworldreport.com
Devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus is so central to a healthy biblical spirituality that we don’t acknowledge this divine love only once a year; thanks to the apparitions of Our Lord to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque in the seventeenth century, we commemorate and celebrate the love of Christ for us unto death on the First Friday of every month.
Indeed, one of my fondest memories of grammar school is that of Masses on the First Friday of the month for the entire student body. Since an important part of preparation for receiving Holy Communion in those days called for a three-hour fast from solid foods, that meant that most of us came to school actually fasting from the night before. Right after Mass, we proceeded to the school cafeteria, where our pastor treated us to crumb buns and hot chocolate. Thus, our celebration spilled over into a common meal.
Years later, I would relish the lyrics of the lovely hymn, “Draw Us in the Spirit’s Teather,” with the verse that prays, “May all our meals be sacraments of Thee!”
I share that recollection because of another experience I had many years later. I was seated on a plane, hoping that the seat next to me would go unoccupied. Just minutes before the plane door was shut, a man rushed in and, yes, took the empty seat next to me. While we were still taxiing on the runway, he turned toward me and asked, “Are you a Catholic priest?” “Yes, I am.” “I used to be Catholic.” “What are you now?” “I’m saved, I’m a Christian.” “You weren’t saved as a Catholic?” “No, it was just a lot of rituals. I never heard about the love and mercy of God.” “Did you go to Catholic school?” “Yeah, for a few years.”
“Were you,” I asked, “brought to Mass on the First Fridays?” “Yeah, I think so.” “Well, what were you told about that devotion?” “Oh, something about going nine times and going to Heaven.” “You mean you weren’t told about the love and mercy of Christ, so great that He died for you and that love is experienced every time we make a good confession and receive Holy Communion worthily?” “I guess I wasn’t listening too well.” I hope everyone here this evening has listened better than that poor fellow.
The heart is a symbol with a rich biblical lineage. In Hebrew, both the heart and the bowels represent the very depths of a person—where the cognitive and the affective meet in unity and harmony. Hence, we find passages in the Bible that speak thus: “My heart is overwhelmed, my pity is stirred” (Hos 11:8). Far more than an organ of the body, then, the heart suggests the source of compassion, tenderness, kindness—in short, what we call “mercy.”
An interesting piece of biblical trivia: A quick survey of a biblical concordance reveals that the word “mercy” is used more than 200 times in the Sacred Scriptures, while the word “heart” appears over 600 times! No surprise, then, that St. Augustine, playing with the origins of the Latin word for mercy (misericordia), tells us that God’s grace moves us “a miseria ad misericordiam” (from misery to mercy). “Misericordia,” you see, comes from two words which combine to mean “having a heart for the miserable.”
Continued below.
The Sacred Heart of Jesus leads us from misery to mercy
www.catholicworldreport.com
The Triumph of the Therapeutic Mentality
- By Michie
- One Bread, One Body - Catholic
- 0 Replies
The first of a two-part essay in response to James Martin, SJ, on experience, respect, morality, and authority.
In response to the question—by what standards are these experiences to be judged?—the therapeutic mentality presupposes that a person’s life experience is self-validating. Experience is granted an authority that sometimes even for Christians trumps the Bible’s own moral authority;3 indeed, an individual’s experience is taken to be “a final arbiter of truth and falsehood in the Church.”4 But I shall argue that this turn to individual experience as self-validating or authenticating is “no more acceptable that any of the other historically recurring attempts to make of private inspiration a supreme court for adjudicating the gospel.”5
In the epigraph to this article, Aidan Nichols correctly affirms, “It is not experience we should trust but the transmutation of experience by Scripture and Tradition.”A good example of the therapeutic mentality is found throughout the recent book by James Martin, SJ, titled Building a Bridge: How the Catholic Church and the LGBT Community can Enter into a Relationship of Respect, Compassion, and Sensitivity (hereafter, BB).6 Significantly, Fr. Martin does not argue for the authority of experience as self-justifying; rather, it is a presupposition of his work. There are two other presuppositions that play an important role in Fr. Martin’s work: his understandings of dialogue and of respect.
Experience, Dialogue, and Respect
Against the background of the presupposition of the therapeutic mentality that grants such authority to experience that it renders it self-justifying, we can understand why Fr. Martin does not argue but implicitly presupposes that “same-sex” attraction is good from the order of creation and even finds justification for this in scripture. That is, a homosexual qua homosexual is “wonderfully made” (Psalm 139), as Martin suggests in asking a same-sex attracted person to reflect on himself and his experience in light of that psalm (BB, 134-137). In this connection, it follows that Martin holds it to be legitimate to ground human identity in so-called homosexual orientation, which encompasses an individual’s personal and social identity. How does Fr. Martin justify the legitimacy of the self-description of a person’s identity, indeed, insisting on it? The only criterion that he suggests legitimizes it is individual experience. Individual experience becomes a supreme court for adjudicating the gospel, the teachings of the Church. This leads him to the conclusion that a person’s homosexuality is a creational given rather than being in itself inherently disordered, a sign of brokenness, an expression of man’s fallen condition. For example, Fr. Martin portrays the fact that persons with same-sex attraction find happiness in their same-sex attracted relationships, and can be caring and loving to each other as self-justifying experiences; that is, because they find their same-sex sexual relationships satisfying in many ways, they must be good. But since God is the source and end of all blessings, the anthropological question regarding the particularity of God’s will and purpose in creating man as male and female arises here (Gen 1:27; 2:24), regarding the question whether individual experience legitimizes same-sex attraction.
No, it doesn’t. The creation of male and female receives the judgment of goodness by God, which is his blessing. The Church has always understood same-sex intercourse to be inconsistent with Scripture, tradition, natural law reasoning – and, in particular, with Christian anthropology, which teaches sexual morality and hence marriage to be an intrinsically male-female union. Martin holds that there are “goods” in same-sex relationships – “love,” “commitment,” “fidelity,” “mutuality.” But we must not treat them as neutral goods abstracted from particular sexual behavior, which the Church unequivocally rejects, and from the larger culture of homosexuality – to say nothing of the worldview (the sexual revolution!) underpinning the interpretation of these goods.
Continued below.
www.catholicworldreport.com
“By the triumph of the therapeutic mentality, indeed therapeutic way of life, I mean a gospel of personal happiness in which happiness rests on the justification of self-authenticating experiences. This therapeutic way of life is pervasive throughout the domain of, for example, homosexual sexual experiences in which “no criteria of validity [for those experiences is offered] other than the therapeutic experience of conviction.”2
In response to the question—by what standards are these experiences to be judged?—the therapeutic mentality presupposes that a person’s life experience is self-validating. Experience is granted an authority that sometimes even for Christians trumps the Bible’s own moral authority;3 indeed, an individual’s experience is taken to be “a final arbiter of truth and falsehood in the Church.”4 But I shall argue that this turn to individual experience as self-validating or authenticating is “no more acceptable that any of the other historically recurring attempts to make of private inspiration a supreme court for adjudicating the gospel.”5
In the epigraph to this article, Aidan Nichols correctly affirms, “It is not experience we should trust but the transmutation of experience by Scripture and Tradition.”A good example of the therapeutic mentality is found throughout the recent book by James Martin, SJ, titled Building a Bridge: How the Catholic Church and the LGBT Community can Enter into a Relationship of Respect, Compassion, and Sensitivity (hereafter, BB).6 Significantly, Fr. Martin does not argue for the authority of experience as self-justifying; rather, it is a presupposition of his work. There are two other presuppositions that play an important role in Fr. Martin’s work: his understandings of dialogue and of respect.
Experience, Dialogue, and Respect
Against the background of the presupposition of the therapeutic mentality that grants such authority to experience that it renders it self-justifying, we can understand why Fr. Martin does not argue but implicitly presupposes that “same-sex” attraction is good from the order of creation and even finds justification for this in scripture. That is, a homosexual qua homosexual is “wonderfully made” (Psalm 139), as Martin suggests in asking a same-sex attracted person to reflect on himself and his experience in light of that psalm (BB, 134-137). In this connection, it follows that Martin holds it to be legitimate to ground human identity in so-called homosexual orientation, which encompasses an individual’s personal and social identity. How does Fr. Martin justify the legitimacy of the self-description of a person’s identity, indeed, insisting on it? The only criterion that he suggests legitimizes it is individual experience. Individual experience becomes a supreme court for adjudicating the gospel, the teachings of the Church. This leads him to the conclusion that a person’s homosexuality is a creational given rather than being in itself inherently disordered, a sign of brokenness, an expression of man’s fallen condition. For example, Fr. Martin portrays the fact that persons with same-sex attraction find happiness in their same-sex attracted relationships, and can be caring and loving to each other as self-justifying experiences; that is, because they find their same-sex sexual relationships satisfying in many ways, they must be good. But since God is the source and end of all blessings, the anthropological question regarding the particularity of God’s will and purpose in creating man as male and female arises here (Gen 1:27; 2:24), regarding the question whether individual experience legitimizes same-sex attraction.
No, it doesn’t. The creation of male and female receives the judgment of goodness by God, which is his blessing. The Church has always understood same-sex intercourse to be inconsistent with Scripture, tradition, natural law reasoning – and, in particular, with Christian anthropology, which teaches sexual morality and hence marriage to be an intrinsically male-female union. Martin holds that there are “goods” in same-sex relationships – “love,” “commitment,” “fidelity,” “mutuality.” But we must not treat them as neutral goods abstracted from particular sexual behavior, which the Church unequivocally rejects, and from the larger culture of homosexuality – to say nothing of the worldview (the sexual revolution!) underpinning the interpretation of these goods.
Continued below.
The Triumph of the Therapeutic Mentality
www.catholicworldreport.com
On culture wars and the hypocrisy of the Catholic Left
- By Michie
- One Bread, One Body - Catholic
- 0 Replies
Many Catholic liberals, not content to criticize the politics of pro-life Catholics, are now moving the goalposts even further.
Continued below.
www.catholicworldreport.com
Continued below.
On culture wars and the hypocrisy of the Catholic Left
www.catholicworldreport.com
The USCCB Synodal Synthesis: Testimony to a Counterfeit Christianity
- By Michie
- One Bread, One Body - Catholic
- 5 Replies
The recently-released and synodal-inspired "National Synthesis" by the USCCB has nothing to do with the Catholic Faith as traditionally received, understood, professed, and practiced.
To little fanfare, the USCCB released its latest contribution to the interminable Synodal process in the form of a document called The National Synthesis of the People of God in the United States of America for the Interim Stage of the 2021-2024 Synod (the “Synthesis”). As its title suggests, the document is a flavorless and textureless work of committee-craft, heavy with the awkward formulations beloved by ecclesial bureaucrats. Although utterly bereft of literary and devotional merit, the Synthesisis worth surveying insofar as it illustrates the extent to which a counterfeit Christianity has displaced the authentic apostolic faith within the ambit of mainstream American Catholicism.
By way of overview, the Synthesisarticulates “two basic hopes for the Church”: first, to be a “Safe Harbor of certainty and openness,” since the Church “is at its best when it’s warm, welcoming, and focuses on community building and doing more for other people”; second, to cultivate the “prophetic mystery at the heart of our Fiery Communion,” which entails creatively reconciling the concerns of “marginalized people” with traditional doctrine and practice.
The document briskly develops these major themes, hitting the expected notes: involving lay people (especially women and other “marginalized groups”) in evangelization and mission; improving clarity and consistency of communication; overcoming “polarization and conflict” around the Church’s “social magisterium”; assuaging the pain of those who have “experienced systematic rejection”; encouraging “adaptability and innovation in how the Church evangelizes, welcomes, and reaches out to people”; addressing structural sins like racism; prioritizing “encounter and reflection”; and fostering “mutual understanding” among the bishops.
Continued below.
crisismagazine.com
To little fanfare, the USCCB released its latest contribution to the interminable Synodal process in the form of a document called The National Synthesis of the People of God in the United States of America for the Interim Stage of the 2021-2024 Synod (the “Synthesis”). As its title suggests, the document is a flavorless and textureless work of committee-craft, heavy with the awkward formulations beloved by ecclesial bureaucrats. Although utterly bereft of literary and devotional merit, the Synthesisis worth surveying insofar as it illustrates the extent to which a counterfeit Christianity has displaced the authentic apostolic faith within the ambit of mainstream American Catholicism.
By way of overview, the Synthesisarticulates “two basic hopes for the Church”: first, to be a “Safe Harbor of certainty and openness,” since the Church “is at its best when it’s warm, welcoming, and focuses on community building and doing more for other people”; second, to cultivate the “prophetic mystery at the heart of our Fiery Communion,” which entails creatively reconciling the concerns of “marginalized people” with traditional doctrine and practice.
The document briskly develops these major themes, hitting the expected notes: involving lay people (especially women and other “marginalized groups”) in evangelization and mission; improving clarity and consistency of communication; overcoming “polarization and conflict” around the Church’s “social magisterium”; assuaging the pain of those who have “experienced systematic rejection”; encouraging “adaptability and innovation in how the Church evangelizes, welcomes, and reaches out to people”; addressing structural sins like racism; prioritizing “encounter and reflection”; and fostering “mutual understanding” among the bishops.
Continued below.
The USCCB Synodal Synthesis: Testimony to a Counterfeit Christianity
The recently-released and synodal-inspired “National Synthesis” by the USCCB has nothing to do with the Catholic Faith as traditionally received, understood, professed, and practiced.
crisismagazine.com
Diocesan hermit-theologian warned bishop ‘transgender hermit’ proposal would ‘misuse’ church law
- By Michie
- One Bread, One Body - Catholic
- 3 Replies
OSV News) — A Kentucky bishop’s decision to endorse a hermit who publicly identified as transgender has raised a number of questions and concerns — particularly from another diocesan hermit and theologian, who had counseled the bishop in writing nearly two years before that approving the individual as a hermit would “misuse” canon law governing that vocation, and set a precedent that could endanger the future of eremitical life itself.
Sister Laurel M. O’Neal, a systematic theologian, Camaldolese Oblate and professed hermit for the Diocese of Oakland, California, told OSV News she was among those stunned to learn Bishop John E. Stowe of Lexington had received “Brother Christian Matson,” formerly known as Cole Matson, as a hermit — and not only because of Matson’s May 19 public disclosure, made just under a year after profession, of being transgender.
OSV News communicated extensively with both Sister Laurel and Matson over the course of several phone conversations and email exchanges (as well as other experts and those with knowledge of Matson’s vocational pursuit) and is using pronouns referring to Matson as quoted.
Along with writing about eremitical life and its riches on her blog, Sister Laurel has worked with dioceses in discernment and formation for candidates seeking eremitical life, which — although tracing its roots to the third century — was only formally recognized by the universal church’s canon law in 1983.
Continued below.
www.oursundayvisitor.com
Sister Laurel M. O’Neal, a systematic theologian, Camaldolese Oblate and professed hermit for the Diocese of Oakland, California, told OSV News she was among those stunned to learn Bishop John E. Stowe of Lexington had received “Brother Christian Matson,” formerly known as Cole Matson, as a hermit — and not only because of Matson’s May 19 public disclosure, made just under a year after profession, of being transgender.
Potential damage to the vocation of eremitical life
“I don’t think that Cole knows the damage he has done to an authentic and fragile vocation that has been struggling just for 41 years to be understood and to be known by Catholics,” said Sister Laurel, who undertook eremitical life in 1985 and made her perpetual profession in 2007.OSV News communicated extensively with both Sister Laurel and Matson over the course of several phone conversations and email exchanges (as well as other experts and those with knowledge of Matson’s vocational pursuit) and is using pronouns referring to Matson as quoted.
Along with writing about eremitical life and its riches on her blog, Sister Laurel has worked with dioceses in discernment and formation for candidates seeking eremitical life, which — although tracing its roots to the third century — was only formally recognized by the universal church’s canon law in 1983.
Matson’s conversion and love for the creative arts
Continued below.
Diocesan hermit-theologian warned bishop 'transgender hermit' proposal would 'misuse' church law
Sister Laurel M. O'Neal, a systematic theologian, was stunned to learn Bishop John E. Stowe of Lexington had received "Brother Christian Matson," formerly known as Cole Matson.
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