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Posted on 09/05/2008 10:51:57 AM PDT by kellynla
News from the Trenches
(Editor’s Note: We reprint the item below at the request of Jack Smith, editor of The Catholic Key, official newspaper of the Diocese of Kansas City. In his blog entry below, Mr. Smith points out that a group calling itself “Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good” is really a front organization sponsored by the Democratic National Committee. “This group has been treated as legitimate by CNS and other Catholic news sources,” noted Mr. Smith in an email to California Catholic Daily.)
WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 3, 2008 Cardinal George Slams 'Common Good' Fraud
Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good is an organization whose purpose is convincing Catholics to vote for pro-choice Democrats. The sleight of hand they employ in this task is to claim that such candidates align so well across the board with Catholic teaching on the common good, that their support for legalized abortion can be fairly overlooked. In fact, the group does not even call for the repeal of the Roe regime and is constantly critical of those who do, preferring to praise those pro-choice politicians who claim to reduce abortions by adjustments in social policy.
Cardinal George attacks that notion today in a letter posted to the Archdiocese of Chicago website (excerpt):
"The unborn child, who is alive and is a member of the human family, cannot defend himself or herself. Good law defends the defenseless. Our present laws permit unborn children to be privately killed. Laws that place unborn children outside the protection of law destroy both the children killed and the common good, which is the controlling principle of Catholic social teaching. One cannot favor the legal status quo on abortion and also be working for the common good."
(Excerpt) Read more at calcatholic.com ...
Please correct the typo.
Should read Heads Up Catholics!
Thanks
ping
Naahh, I kinda like “Cathoics” for folks like Pelosi, Biden et.al.
Uh oh, someone's gonna have some 'splainin' to do.
I guess “Catholics for a Free CHoice” is no longer subtle enough.
We already have a name for wannabe’s like Pelosi & Biden...CINO’s!
Have any other Catholics or people in RCIA experienced some odd behavior or remarks along this line? I can’t go into any detail but I haven’t been to RCIA for 2 weeks because of the feeling that I got there.
>>Naahh, I kinda like “Cathoics” for folks like Pelosi, Biden et.al.<<
Actually, they are Chaotics, for they worship chaos.
Office of the Cardinal
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
In the midst of a lengthy political campaign, matters of public policy that are also moral issues sometimes are misrepresented or are presented in a partial or manipulative fashion. While everyone could be expected to know the Church’s position on the immorality of abortion and the role of law in protecting unborn children, it seems some profess not to know it and others, even in the Church, dispute it. Since this teaching has recently been falsely presented, the following clarification may be helpful.
The Catholic Church, from its first days, condemned the aborting of unborn children as gravely sinful. Not only Scripture’s teaching about God’s protection of life in the womb (consider the prophets and the psalms and the Gospel stories about John the Baptist and Jesus himself in Mary’s womb) but also the first century catechism (the Didache or Teaching of the Twelve Apostles) said: “You shall not slay the child by abortions. You shall not kill what is generated.” The teaching of the Church was clear in a Roman Empire that permitted abortion. This same teaching has been constantly reiterated in every place and time up to Vatican II, which condemned abortion as a “heinous crime.” This is true today and will be so tomorrow. Any other comments, by politicians, professors, pundits or the occasional priest, are erroneous and cannot be proposed in good faith.
This teaching has consequences for those charged with caring for the common good, those who hold public office. The unborn child, who is alive and is a member of the human family, cannot defend himself or herself. Good law defends the defenseless. Our present laws permit unborn children to be privately killed. Laws that place unborn children outside the protection of law destroy both the children killed and the common good, which is the controlling principle of Catholic social teaching. One cannot favor the legal status quo on abortion and also be working for the common good.
This explains why the abortion issue will not disappear and why it is central to the Church’s teaching on a just social order. The Church does not endorse candidates for office, but she does teach the principles according to which Catholics should form their social consciences. The teaching, which covers intrinsic evils such as abortion and many other issues that are matters of prudential judgment, could not be clearer; the practice often falls short because we are all sinners. There is no room for self-righteousness in Catholic moral teaching.
The Conference of Bishops in this country and the Bishops of Illinois have issued statements about Catholic social teaching and political life. They are available in our parishes. All of us should keep our country and all the candidates for office in the next election in our prayers. God bless you and your families.
That is EXACTLY the argument I was presented with when I said I could never vote for Senator Obama because I'm pro-Life, never mind the gazillion other things his party's platform supports. I'm against war, too (like who isn't???). I'm proud the country can nominate a serious racially-mixed candidate to this prestigious position. I cried as he gave his acceptance speech thinking, “I wish MLK could have lived to see this.” John McCain didn't make me cry, neither did Sarah Palin, but they will get my vote simply because I am pro-Life.
RCIA can be good or bad, depending on who’s doing it. If you are uneasy about that particular program (I guess it seems like they’re promoting this “common good” stuff?), perhaps you could see if it is better at another parish or if there is some other way of taking instruction. Sometimes an individual (conservative) priest will instruct converts, but often the diocese has a policy that forces everybody into RCIA.
People who don’t see that the Dem agenda is actually being promoted in some Catholic circles, usually under the pretext of “common good” or “social justice,” are blind. Congratulations to you on having the clarity of mind and knowledge of the faith to sense this and be wary of it. Let us know how things are going.
What diocese do you live in, if I may ask?
Folks should click on the link and read the whole article for all the details. This is dynamite. It is an organized effort by the Democratic Party to subvert the Catholic Church.
The Democrats do this every election. They keep trying to snow Catholic voters. Until 2000, they did a good job of it, but George W. Bush had a good group of advisors to reach Catholics, especially those in the traditionally blue collar Democrat states. This has driven the Democrats crazy, because they thought they’d always have those folks, no matter how crazy the party got.
Hitler solved the unemployment problem, let's overlook that whole genocide thing.
To what remarks are you referring? What were the remarks you heard?
I was chatting with someone this morning about Life-Chain. I remarked that the legalization was the jumping off point for killing anyone who is inconvenient. In the begining of RvW abortion was only in cases of rape or incest..... M’okay seems reasonable. Then the health of the mother... an adult’s life has more value than an unborn baby....
fast forward 35 years.... you can kill a baby up until it’s natural complete birth under any condition (esp in Kansas) you can kill gramma, gramps, mom, dad anyone who doesn’t measure up to your benchmark for “quality of life”. And you can make designer babies to replace whatever body part you need(that’s still a liberal fantasy).
Just remember... you shouldn’t be punished with a baby for a mistake. That brings up a WHOLE NOTHER issue....
The bottom line... if you have no regard for life in it’s earlies stages chances are you have no regard for ANY LIFE except your own.
Look at the websites and contributors to CFC and Catholic Alliance... They have the basically the same info., writers, articles,etc., but are trying to use social justice issues in a twisted hierarchical order to suit their agenda.
Be careful. Church leftists have been known to occasionally infiltrate RCIA.
That’s very true. And combined with the left-wing theory that all human life actually belongs to and is at the disposition of the state, we have a very dangerous situation.
Different people are teaching the class on different days. Some seem to be good instructors but one person seems to have an “agenda” and has been rude to me before. I think the person is making things up sometimes. There have been stories (urban myths) that I have never heard before and I am older than the person and certainly would have heard them. Also, I have checked on bits of doctrine online and in the Catechism book, all authorized sources, and accidently found little creative twists in what I was instructed on in class. None of these things were important at all but I felt some resentment when I brought them up. Oops. Maybe the person thought that they were all-knowing. I don’t know.
I think that I will graciously go away to another parish. I really hate to do it. I liked it there and felt safe and happy in the Church. I don’t want to be bullied or put down anymore, though. I’ve been trying wanting to convert for 20 years and this time I was actually on a roll to getting it done.
“I think that I will graciously go away to another parish. I really hate to do it. I liked it there and felt safe and happy in the Church. I don’t want to be bullied or put down anymore, though. I’ve been trying wanting to convert for 20 years and this time I was actually on a roll to getting it done.”
You might want to think about going to an eastern Catholic church for a spell. You’ll usually find at least one in a major city. The eastern Catholic churches are very traditional, usually small, and very personal. I haven’t heard of one that actually has an RCIA program. In most Parishes, we do Christian initiation the old fashioned way: Deacon (or Priest), catechism, and catechumen.
Like most things eastern, if it’s worked for 1,600 plus years, then we see no reason to change it now. FReepers NYer and redhead also attend eastern Catholic churches if you have questions.
We did some serious looking around, and we saw some loony things. Of course in Atlanta metro we have a lot of choices, and you may be in a place where Catholic parishes aren't so thick on the ground.
But if you feel uncomfortable with what's being taught in RCIA, I would look around (but don't give up).
In my opinion (subject to correction by Catholics of longer standing than myself, which is almost everybody) you ought to let the rector know why you're leaving. Obviously he can't fix it if he doesn't know it's going on . . . especially if it's just one instructor in the class.
Of course, it's hard to find teachers for Sunday School, let alone RCIA, so he may have to put up with what he can get.
Yes, both my RCIA classes were awful. The first took place back in the 80's during JP II's pontificate. Once we were having a discussion about sexual morality and the priest who was leading the class said, "I think the Pope is very sensible about anything from the waist up" (meaning that from the waist down, ie sexual morality, JP II wasn't to be trusted and you should "follow your own conscience"). But this was at the Neuman Center in Berkeley, CA, and so was par for the course in "Berzerkley." I put off converting for many years because of the many odd things I heard there.
The second RCIA course was led by a Call to Action type from Detroit who would stab our marvelous Polish priest in the back every time he could. The man (a deacon actually) was appalling. At any rate, I was sure that I wanted to become Catholic and so I gutted it out. I also came to think that God was using me to make the comments of the crazy Deacon less toxic to others in the RCIA group. I hope that I lessened the scandal his foolishness caused.
If you're sure you want to become Catholic, hang in there! Maybe God wants to use you for something there in the RCIA group. If it's too awful to continue, see if you can't find another parish and enter the Church there.
We didn't go to RCIA (we were Nosebleed Anglicans, it would have been a waste of time) but I am a natural contrarian and I'm afraid I made our Sunday School class VERY interesting . . . it would have been very much more so if our teaching team had been anything other than orthodox (our parish in general is very straight up), but I confined myself to pointing out any omissions in the Why Catholic textbook or any substantive variation between the NAB and the Douay-Rheims . . . .
This should be sent to Our Lady’s Warriors so they can log it into the dissent database.
http://www.ourladyswarriors.org/
"People who don’t see that the Dem agenda is actually being promoted in some Catholic circles, usually under the pretext of “common good” or “social justice,” are blind.
Sorry, but this IS the Roman Catholic Church's fault, precisely because its teachings about the "common good" and "social justice" cannot, and do not, help the average Catholic distinguish ANY moral distinction between the ends ("common good" and "social justice") and the means they are being asked to support to achieve those ends - big government socialism, as opposed to their own personal and free-and-independent-organizational Christian witness. In fact, scratch a Catholic in Europe, most any Catholic in Europe and you'll find a very committed big government socialist. This is not an accident, and the political alliance in Europe between Catholics and socialists - over "social justice" issues, has certified political majorities for abortion advocates, and emptied local parishes across the continent, as the "morality" of the "church" and "the state" (socialism) on most issues, besides abortion and "gay" issues is indistinguishable. Since the atheists, and every shade of Marxist is touting the same "common good" and "social justice" line, then why go to Church, and they don't. American Catholic intellectuals are trying to build the same "common good" and "social justice" political alliances here, and pro-life Catholics, liberty without big-brother and the nation as whole will all suffer with their success.
American Catholics, out of love for their Church (understandable), have their heads in the sand, defending the socialist result of their own intellectuals application of their Church's "common good" and "social justice" teaching. It needs to be re-written for American Catholics from an AMERICAN perspective.
I’ve noticed several Catholics who have become very agitated over the elections and conventions. I mentioned Obama was for killing babies and raising taxes, while Palin was for raising babies and killing taxes, and it evoked a hostile reaction from the RCC crowd insisting Obama wasn’t for killing babies but was rather pro-choice, and expressed ina rather frustrated manner.
I don’t know what nerve I struck, but it was sensitive.
I fully expect to have that discussion with one of my sisters soon. Her life is a very good Catholic testimony (I believe better than mine - and hers has given the church two children with religious vocations) but she has this one blind spot. I hope I can somehow say it in a way that the blindness is finally lifted. Perhaps, the way the bishops and Vatican have been really publicly hammering on this for the last year or so, I won’t need to.
I realize that this is considered an unpopular position but, we need a Constitutional Amendment to correct this evil of abortion. This is an unpopular position because it is so difficult to get an amendment and because few people realize that we abandoned the constitution and a Federal Government for a national one. A good book to read for starters is Who Killed the Constitution. It will be a real eye opener! You can find it at amazon or your local library. If they don’t have it ask them to order it. My library did!
Ya don’t even have to go into that much detail...
“It’s not a ‘choice’; it’s a baby.”
‘Nuff said!
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