Free Republic

More than 50 dissident Catholic groups from around the world have written an open letter asking Pope Benedict XVI to lift the church's ban on birth control. Taking a half-page ad in the Italian daily Corriere della Sera, the groups said Friday that the Church's ban on artificial birth control has had "catastrophic effects," particularly in the fight against AIDS. The Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, said the accusation was "clearly unfounded" and insisted the Church is active in combating AIDS. The groups published their appeal on the 40th anniversary of the 1968 encyclical "Humanae Vitae" ("On Human Life")...

Vatican spokesman Fr. Federico Lombardi Vatican City, Jul 25, 2008 / 12:09 pm (CNA).- It is “paid propaganda to promote the use of contraceptives” said Vatican spokesman Fr. Federico Lombardi today as he harshly criticized an "open letter to the Pope," which was run as a paid advertisement in the Italian newspaper "Corriere della Sera". The ad was signed by several "Catholic" organizations that are using the 40th anniversary of Humanae Vitae to criticize the Church’s teaching. “First and foremost,” said Fr. Lombardi, “the authors are a part of a number of groups that are well known for their...

For this I sadly tip my biretta to Ten Reasons  o{]:¬(I want you to read this in light of certain entries on this blog about the whole ghastly wymynpriest thing (except for what "that blonde" had to say, of course. Father Joan In June of this year, Bishop Matthew Clark of Rochester appointed the notorious dissenter Sister Joan Sobala as pastoral administrator, i.e., de facto priestess, over the tradition-friendly St. Anne Church. The Women’s Ordination Conference calls her a person "key to the survival and success of the movement for women’s ordination." A now former parishioner shares her account of...

...by Mary Eberstadt,  a research fellow at the Hoover Institution, is a great article in the August/September issue of First Things and is available online. I'll get you started: That Humanae Vitae and related Catholic teachings about sexual morality are laughingstocks in all the best places is not exactly news. Even in the benighted precincts of believers, where information from the outside world is known to travel exceedingly slowly, everybody grasps that this is one doctrine the world loves to hate. During Benedict XVI’s April visit to the United States, hardly a story in the secular press failed to mention...

Jimmy Akin Sez: P.Z. Myers Must Be Fired I agree. The man was free to say whatever demented stuff he liked on his blog. Solicitation for readers to steal and desecrate the Eucharist has crossed the line. Jimmy writes: Although he carried out his action. in his words, to support the idea that "Nothing must be held sacred" (also trashing a few pages of The God Delusion, a book with which he is in sympathy), he did not merely tell people that nothing must be held sacred. Nor did he argue for it. Claiming that nothing must be held...

Vatican City (Agenzia Fides) - How different is the Lord's way of looking at the earth and its inhabitants, compared with our way which rarely sees beyond appearances! Conversion of heart means learning from Jesus to see things His way which is totally different from the way of the world. To follow Him means to look where He looks, to focus on what comes from His love rather than what comes from our own self-love, which is 'short sighted' by nature. Learning day by day from the Gospel means looking further than our own selfish limits, looking in the same...

It is finished. I wonder how many of our Catholic friends have heard of the Fourth Lateran Council of 1215? This is the event where many of their important dogmas were codified, including the ideas of Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus, that the Eucharist was the sacrament that only properly ordained priests of the Catholic church could give, and that the Jews were a pariah people, who could hold no public office, had to pay a special Jew tax for their right to exist, and were required to wear special clothing to distinguish them from Christians. The yellow badge marking the...

University of Minnesota professor Paul Z. Myers made good on his pledge to desecrate the Eucharist today. According to his statement on the subject, “I pierced it [the Host] with a rusty nail (I hope Jesus’s tetanus shots are up to date). And then I simply threw it in the trash.” Saying he did not want to “single out just the cracker,” Myers also tore pages from the Koran along with a few pages from Richard Dawkins’ The God Delusion and nailed them to the Host. He then said, “They are just paper. Nothing must be held sacred. (His emphasis.)...

The Risk of Love July 23rd, 2008 by Mark Shea Recently a reader wrote me to say, “I read a story on the Internet about a Catholic couple whose new baby was diagnosed with spina bifida and anencephaly (no brain). They chose to abort it. How on earth would you deal pastorally with such a horrible situation?” Such questions involve several parts. What does God think? What would I do? What should I make of those people over there? We feel torn between obeying God’s commands “Don’t kill” and “Don’t judge.” And in our culture, “Don’t judge” has much the...

This all began a few days ago, when Jeff Miller at the Curt Jester blog posted this comment regarding RC women who seek to be ordained. I do enjoy it when my own humor sparks others to their own hilarity.  I jested the other day: "If women are being called to the priesthood then why is it only dissident women that are being called?  Where are the women being ordained that have a preference for the extraordinary form of the Mass?  Why do they always have a preference for Hippy stoles and not beautifully embroidered ones.  Where are the traditionalist...

Breaking, big, news: The St. Louis Archdiocese filed suit today against the St. Stanislaus Kostka church in an attempt to regain control of the former Polish parish. Six parishioners, including three recent board members, joined the archdiocese in the suit. They are asking a St. Louis judge to void any changes to the St. Stanislaus' bylaws since 2001 and give the archbishop the authority to appoint a pastor and board there. Last month, the St. Stanislaus board voted 4-3 to dissolve itself and allow parishioners to elect a new board at its annual meeting in August. Eight St. Stanislaus...

The Bishop of Rochester Dr Michael Nazir-Ali, one of just two bishops in the Church of England to boycott the Lambeth Conference entirely, insisted today that he is being true to biblical authority. Explaining a decision that he admits has been painful for a man who sought refuge in Britain from persecution, and who has been at the heart of the two previous convocations at Canterbury – first as Coordinator in 1988 and then as a Member of the Steering Committee in 1998 - he said it was a matter of ‘conscience and logic’. He said that ‘persistent false teaching’...

Canterbury: The Vatican’s top evangelism officer urged the bishops of the Anglican Communion to set their house in order so that they may fulfill the Gospel mandate of bringing the world to Christ. Vatican official in warning to Anglican bishops Cardinal Ivan Dias, the prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelisation of Peoples said internal dissention within the Christian world and external attacks were hindering the spread of the faith. However, “for a disciple of Jesus Christ” to “preach the Gospel is not an option, but a command of the Lord.” Speaking to bishops gathered for the 14th Lambeth Conference...

History's humongous wheel turns and turns and turns again. Over time, mud and sludge accumulate on even the sprucest institutions. Take the 500-year-old Anglican family of churches, Christianity's third-largest, after Rome and Eastern Orthodoxy. With Anglicanism's biggest family event under way - the every-10-years gathering of bishops and archbishops in England - what the world sees, accurately or not, is a family in moral and spiritual disarray. --snip--For all that, Anglicanism's public troubles proceed from the takeover of Western Anglicanism by theological activists whose purpose is the remolding of Christianity into something less like the old-time religion than like the...

We are not contending against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers, against the world rulers of this present darkness, against the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places” (Eph 6:12). “This combat rages fiercely even today, aided and abetted by well-known secret sects, Satanic groups and New Age movements, to mention but a few, and reveals many ugly heads of the hideous anti-God monster: among them are notoriously secularism, which seeks to build a Godless society; spiritual indifference, which is insensitive to transcendental values; and relativism, which is contrary to the permanent tenets of the Gospel. “All...

LAMBETH CONFERENCE 2008MISSION, SOCIAL JUSTICE AND EVANGELISATION Cardinal Ivan DiasPrefect of the Congregation for the Evangelisation of Peoples, Rome “This is indeed the day which the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it� (Ps 118:24). At the very outset, I want to thank His Grace the Archbishop of Canterbury for his kind invitation to address this august Conference. I sincerely appreciate your warm welcome, which echoes the words of the psalmist: “How good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity!� (Ps 133:1). CHRIST’S MANDATE TO EVANGELISE The theme of this...

Contraception and Cultural Chaos — Part 1 of 6 July 21st, 2008 by Christopher West This July 25th marks the 40th anniversary of one of the most controversial papal documents in history: Paul VI’s encyclical Humanae Vitae which reaffirmed the traditional Christian teaching on the immorality of contraception. If you have wrestled with this teaching, believe me, I can relate. Years ago I almost left the Church over it. Forty years of perspective provide an opportunity to take another look. That’s what I’ll be doing in [the next] several columns.You may have noticed above that I said “traditional Christian teaching”...

Does Contraception Foster Love? — Part 2 of 6 July 22nd, 2008 by Christopher West We continue a series of reflections on the issue of contraception in light of the 40th anniversary of Humanae Vitae. When Pope Paul VI issued this document on July 25, 1968, it fell like a bomb. Many people wished the issue would just go away. It hasn’t. And it won’t. In fact, it can’t “go away.” This encyclical takes us to the very foundations of human life (humanae vitae).In the last column, we looked at how contraception has played a key role in the cultural...

In Part 1 of this series, I wrote of the great elephants of India, who, although they have the physical capacity to uproot trees during the day, can be restrained all night long by a piece of twine and a twig. How is this possible? The elephant’s training begins when it is still young and considerably less powerful. Removed from its mother, the elephant is then shackled with an iron chain to a large tree. For days and weeks on end, the baby elephant strains against its restraints, only to find that all exertion is useless. Then slowly, over a...

July 2008 In view of the present tensions and divisions within the Anglican Communion, and out of deep concern for the unity of the Church, we consider it important to express clearly the position of the Episcopal Church of the Sudan (ECS) concerning human sexuality. We believe that God created humankind in his own image; male and female he created them for the continuation of humankind on earth. Women and men were created as God’s agents and stewards on earth We believe that human sexuality is God’s gift to human beings which is rightly ordered only when expressed within the...

It's about a hundred degrees and getting hotter in the Big Top at Lambeth but the £1 million black hole in the budget at the Lambeth Conference means they can't afford air conditioning. Expect fainting bishops to be ferried out by ambulances any moment now, if they don't start shooting each other first. The press conference this morning was a farce. Communications officers declined to comment on who is here for reasons of 'security' but declined to say what the 'security' issues were. Apparently there are some Nigerian bishops at the conference but we are not allowed to know who...

"Look at me I have been automatically excommunicated and it is reserved to the Holy See to lift it."The annoying thing about these faux ordinations is that they are hard to parody when they go to so much effort to parody themselves.Come on tie-dye stoles?  Plus exactly what part of the ordination ceremony calls for the above rubric?  The blankets are a pretty tacky detail.  Them seem more fitting to send with your kindergarten kid for nap time.  Seen plenty of pictures of priest being ordained and don't think I ever saw one with them prostrate on a blanket....

Dr. James Innell Packer, a noted Canadian theologian, author and a Board of Governors Professor of Theology at Regent College in Vancouver, as well as an executive editor of Christianity Today, recently addressed the contentious problem of homosexuality and same-sex unions in the Anglican church. The Anglican Church has come to a cross-roads because of the issue of same-sex "marriage," with a massive split in the Global Communion looking increasingly inevitable. Dr. Packer opened his remarks with a statement explaining why this issue is of such great importance in the Anglican Church today. "In brief," he said, "because it involves...

"For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body; and we were all given to drink of one Spirit" (I Cor 12:13) How many of you have heard people from your own generation or older say something like this: "I believe in Jesus, but I don't need the Church." Or: "I'm a spiritual person, but I'm not religious." Here's the problem with those statements: Without Jesus, there's no Church. It's that simple. And it's also true the other way around: Without the Church, there's no way we can have a lasting, personal relationship with the true Jesus...

It hasn’t taken that many days to realize that the once-every-ten-years Lambeth Conference is again abundant in elaborate rhetoric. Last night’s sermon by the Bishop of Colombo, the Rt. Rev. Duleep de Chickera is a good example. We heard from the bishop that the Anglican problem is very simple, "The church is called to be an inclusive communion,” de Chickera stated, “where there is space equally for everyone and anyone, regardless of color, gender, sexual orientation, ability. Unity in diversity is a cherished Anglican tradition, a spirituality which we must reinforce in all humility for the sake of Christ and...

I That Humanae Vitae and related Catholic teachings about sexual morality are laughingstocks in all the best places is not exactly news. Even in the benighted precincts of believers, where information from the outside world is known to travel exceedingly slowly, everybody grasps that this is one doctrine the world loves to hate. During Benedict XVI’s April visit to the United States, hardly a story in the secular press failed to mention the teachings of Humanae Vitae, usually alongside adjectives like “divisive” and “controversial” and “outdated.” In fact, if there’s anything on earth that unites the Church’s adversaries—all of...

Arch Diocese Says Women Are 'Excommunicating Themselves' BOSTON -- Three Catholic women were ordained as priests in a Back Bay neighborhood church this weekend, despite the Vatican's admonition that the trio would be excommunicated if they did so.VIDEO: Women Priests Ordained In Boston“The women being ordained today have been called and they are following God’s guidance and direction for their lives,” said Dana Reynolds, a woman from California who became a Catholic bishop in a ceremony in Germany three months ago. “They have said ‘yes’ to God.”NewsCenter 5's Rondella Richardson reported that a congregation of Catholic worshippers, both male and...

WASHINGTON, July 21 /PRNewswire/ -- - July 25th Marks 40th Anniversary of Vatican's Devastating Decision Forty years ago, a decision was announced that has had a catastrophic impact on the poor and powerless around the world. On July 25, 1968, Pope Paul VI slammed the door on the hopes of the vast majority of Catholics and confirmed a complete prohibition on modern methods of contraception. The papal encyclical Humanae Vitae was a defining moment in modern church history and continues to be a source of great conflict and division in the church. It is a little-known fact that before Humanae...

SYDNEY, Australia, JULY 17, 2008 (Zenit.org).- Just as there are environmental wounds in nature, there are also wounds in society that threaten the purpose for which humanity was created, says Benedict XVI. The Pope said this today at the World Youth Day welcoming celebration at Barangaroo in Sydney on Thursday afternoon local time. The youth day celebrations will culminate Sunday with a closing Mass at Randwick Racecourse. The Holy Father began with a reflection of the natural beauty of Australia, which "evokes a profound sense of awe." "It is as though one catches glimpses of the Genesis creation story --...

Father, we come before You thanking You for every time You use us, another being, an event or occurance to stop even one child from being aborted. Father we praise Your name and rejoice when the TRUTH is told and Your LIGHT shines forth in the darkness! Lord, thank You for bringing the voices of the post-abortives forth to speak Your TRUTH. Bless Dan and Julie Zanoza for sharing their story and their truth with those who will listen or read it. Give them and others the courage to stand up and be heard. May those words go forth to...

SYDNEY, Australia, JULY 19, 2008 (Zenit.org).- Benedict XVI expressed his deep sorrow for the suffering of sexual abuse victims during his homily at Mass with Australian clergy. Departing from his prepared homily during the Saturday liturgy at St. Mary's Cathedral, the Pope said, "Indeed, I am deeply sorry for the pain and suffering the victims have endured, and I assure them that as their pastor, I too share in their suffering." The Pontiff's prepared speech addressed acknowledge "the shame which we have all felt as a result of the sexual abuse of minors by some clergy and religious in this...

Jesus Christ's epic Sermon on the Mount, with its calls for peacemaking, helping the poor and working for justice, could well be compared to a modern political campaign speech in front of the multitudes in a modern stadium. Now a Gilbert church is launching a Jesus for President campaign and will conduct a two-month effort starting in August - parallel to the U.S. presidential campaign - that emphasizes a familiar issue in the 2008 campaign: change. "Advocating for Change Since 33 A.D." is the secondary theme of the campaign that Pastor Mark Connelly is launching this weekend at Superstition Springs...

Contact: Rev. Fr. John Trigilio, Confraternity of Catholic Clergy, 717-957-2662 BALTIMORE, Maryland, July 19 /Christian Newswire/ -- The Confraternity of Catholic Clergy celebrated the 40th anniversary of Humanae Vitae, the encyclical from Paul VI, by asking every deacon, priest and bishop to reread and re-educate their flock with this prophetic document. The organization also pledged support for all bishops who confront and deny Holy Communion to unrepentant Catholic politicians that support abortion, if prior attempts to enlighten their consciences fail. A national association of 600 priests and deacons, the CCC met in Baltimore, MD, July 14-17 for its 33rd annual convocation....

On Thursday 17 July 2008, the Holy Father was formally welcomed to Australia by the Governor General, the Prime Minister and other officials. He delivered the following address. Your Excellencies, Dear Australian Friends, It is with great joy that I greet you today. I would like to thank the Governor-General, Major-General Michael Jeffery and Prime Minister Rudd for honouring me by their presence at this ceremony and for welcoming me so graciously. As you know, I have been able to enjoy some quiet days since my arrival in Australia last Sunday. I am most grateful for the hospitality that has...

Dear Young People,   What a delight it is to greet you here at Barangaroo, on the shores of the magnificent Sydney harbour, with its famous bridge and Opera House. Many of you are local, from the outback or the dynamic multicultural communities of Australian cities. Others of you have come from the scattered islands of Oceania, and others still from Asia, the Middle East, Africa and the Americas. Some of you, indeed, have come from as far as I have, Europe! Wherever we are from, we are here at last in Sydney. And together we stand in our world...

On Friday 18 July 2008 the Holy Father met with representatives of the Christian churches and ecclesial communions present in Australia and gave the following address. Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,I give heartfelt thanks to God for this opportunity to meet and pray with all of you who have come here representing various Christian communities in Australia. Grateful for Bishop Forsyth’s and Cardinal Pell’s words of welcome, I joyfully greet you in the name of the Lord Jesus, the "cornerstone" of the "household of God" (Eph 2:19-20). I would like to offer a particular greeting to Cardinal Edward Cassidy,...

On Friday 18 July 2008, Pope Benedict met with and addressed the representatives of the non-Christian  religions present in Australia. Dear Friends, I extend cordial greetings of peace and goodwill to all of you who are here representing various religious traditions in Australia. Grateful for this encounter, I thank Rabbi Jeremy Lawrence and Sheikh Shardy for the words of welcome which they expressed in their own name and on behalf of your respective communities.Australia is renowned for the congeniality of its people towards neighbour and visitor alike. It is a nation that holds freedom of religion in high regard. Your...

On 18 July 2008 in the Church of the Sacred Heart at the University of Notre Dame in Darlinghurst,  the Holy Father delivered the following discourse to the youth and staff involved in the 'Alive' program. Dear Young Friends,I am pleased to be with you at Darlinghurst today, and I warmly greet all those taking part in the "Alive" programme, as well as the staff who run it. I pray that you will all benefit from the assistance offered by the Archdiocese of Sydney’s Social Services Agency, and that the good work being done here will continue long into the...

Where to begin? Delving into this particularly sordid bit of Failed Academic Dementia is difficult, both because one hardly wants to start the day wading through a sewer, and because there are so many angles and implications to the story that it makes for large and unwieldy blogposts. For those who have been in a cave since last week, PZ Myers, a washed-up academic at a third tier school who takes out his bitterness on Christians, claimed that some human toothache named Webster Cook had received death threats for stealing a Eucharist and threatening to desecrate it. Reader John Farrell...

New York, Jul 18, 2008 / 02:50 pm (CNA).- A group of Catholic dissenters plans to publish an open letter to Pope Benedict XVI in a major U.S. and a major Italian newspaper criticizing Pope Paul VI’s 1968 encyclical Humanae Vitae on the fortieth anniversary of its promulgation, July 25. The group Catholics for Choice (CFC) claims that the encyclical’s teaching against contraception has been an “utter failure” that endangers women’s lives and leaves millions at risk of HIV. However, a major pro-life leader said the group’s accusations were hard to take seriously.According to the version of the open letter...

James Tramel went from convicted murderer to priest while in prison, a transformation that the Episcopal Church used to successfully lobby for his parole and celebrate him before politicians and the press. But the church is now grappling with the sexual abuse of a parishioner under his care. Tramel has been suspended for sexual misconduct, temporarily stripped of his priestly authority and left searching for a new job. The San Francisco-based Episcopal Diocese of California now faces questions of whether, in its haste to proclaim Tramel's story, it redeemed and promoted him too quickly. Convicted of second-degree murder in a...

Though this story was written nearly 2 years ago, Bishop Su's whereabouts are still unknown. The search continues. Perhaps you or someone you knows, can help solve this mystery. Searching for Bishop Su: Persecuted Chinese bishop gone but not forgottenTheresa Marie Moreau  (TMMoreau@yahoo.com)From the back seat of the gypsy cab, Ming-Chuan “Joseph” Kung watched Beijing blur by. Everything had been pre-arranged. Everything. As the hired driver steered through the streets of the capital city of the People’s Republic of China, the seven passengers – a small delegation of Americans in town for a human rights conference – rode mostly in...

Knife crime is at epidemic proportions in Britain's inner cities, with an attack of some kind taking place every four minutes. In London alone 21 young people have been stabbed to death this year. A church group has come up with a new solution. It's reported here. The suggestion is that church leaders should move into crime ridden inner city areas to work with the youths and become role models since most of the boys who stab each other don't have Dads. Whoops! problem is, since women's ordination the Anglican Church has been turned into a matriarchy remember? Nearly half...

Roman Catholic Womynpriests are up to their play-acting again. This time in Boston. Roman Catholic Womenpriests, who are neither Roman Catholic or Womanpriests, claim to be "ordaining" three additional women. In fact, it is actually an excommunication ceremony. [Boston] Three aspiring Catholic priests will be anointed and prayed over this weekend in an ordination liturgy that will resemble the traditional in most ways but one: The three being ordained are women. The ordination ceremony Sunday, at a historic Protestant church in the Back Bay, is the first such event to take place in Boston, one of the most Catholic cities...

In 1986, Brother Don Fleischhacker of Notre Dame University wrote a letter to Playboy protesting that magazine’s fragmented view of human sexuality. Citing Humanae Vitae, this intrepid Holy Cross religious reasoned that once “the contraceptive mentality is accepted, there can be no coherent objective ground for opposition to homosexual activity.” If the unitive aspect of sex becomes an end in itself, he went on to explain, “There is no essential reason why sex should be restricted to couples of different sexes.” Recent events have proven that Brother Don was as prophetic as was Pope Paul VI when he penned Humane...

Is Pope Benedict a “rock star”? The question came up recently in Tim Drake’s coverage of World Youth Day in Sydney, Australia, at the Register’s weblog, Pope2008.com, where we are following World Youth Day activities. He found two stories in the the Sydney media comparing World Youth Day to a rock concert and calling Pope Benedict XVI the concert’s “headliner.” It’s a good question to ask, because there are so many superficial similarities between the weeklong World Youth Day and rock-’n’-roll festivals that have attracted young people since Woodstock. But we can think of at least 10 ways World Youth...

Melbourne: Catholic priests should watch porn – in a bid to prevent sexual abuse, claims a US porn star. Actress Belladonna – who has starred in 250 x-rated films with both men and women – is in Australia to push her career in the same week the Pope is visiting for World Youth Day. The married mum is on her fifth visit Down Under for the Sydney Sexpo event, which starts next week. And she had some advice for Pope Benedict XVI. "The Pope has indicated he might apologise to victims of sexual abuse and that is a positive thing...

A local priest was charged with assault yesterday after he allegedly fondled a 16-year-old girl on an airplane. The Rev. Tomasz Adam Zielinski, 31, was removed from his position at Christ the King Church in Manville as a result of the federal charges, according to church officials. Zielinski, a Polish citizen, served as an associate pastor at the Somerset County parish since April and is staying in the United States on a religious visa. The incident occurred aboard a July 5 flight from Poland on which Zielinski was returning from a vacation. He allegedly groped the girl and attempted to...

Gabriel DeJesus Back At Work At Sacred Heart School For The Arts On Monday; N.Y. Archdiocese Investigating. GREENBURGH, N.Y. (CBS) ― A Westchester County Catholic school principal is in serious trouble after he was arrested for allegedly going on a naked sexual romp with two other men in the backyard of a vacant home in the Orchard Hill section of town on Sunday. Gabriel De Jesus, 41, of Ossining told police he was the principal of Sacred Heart School for the Arts, a Catholic elementary school at 71 Sharpe Blvd. in Mount Vernon. DeJesus was still running the elementary school...

The treasurer of the Roman Catholic shrine of Lourdes was yesterday at the centre of a major fraud inquiry. Father Raymond Zambelli, 65, rector of the site of 66 recognised miracles, has been asked to explain how at least £350,000 raised for the sick and dying ended up in his account. More than six million pilgrims visit the town in south-west France every year, many of them donating huge amounts of money to its upkeep. Police confirmed that an inquiry into the ' misappropriation of funds' had been launched, looking at several individuals including a priest. Much of the money...