(Mis)Adventures in Assembly Line Apologetics

Writing for the Catholic media has many benefits. Making a decent living at it isn’t necessarily one of them. Which is why, when I received the robocall from a local temporary employment agency about a second-shift job at a local electronics assembly plant, I jumped at the chance. It was supposed to last a month. That was on September 1^st. As of February 19^th, I was finally out of a job.

Since 1997, I have been working in the Church or at Church-related work and since 1999 have been living in the rural Midwest where it takes a half-hour or more to get to a town of any size. Let’s just say that my social contacts where I live have been limited.

Then I began at the plant and my vision of the world suddenly expanded. After our initial basic three-hour training session, we were brought out to the floor and introduced to Chad, our line leader. Chad is 34, about five-foot-seven and weighs no more than 145 pounds soaking wet. He has a thick but scruffy-looking reddish-brown goatee, a thin face, wears what looks like a horseshoe earring in one ear and chews his nails down as much as he can, as often as he can. But how he chews them is a mystery to me since he appears to be missing about a quarter of his teeth and those that are left look like they’re about ready to fall out.

Besides this obvious characteristic, he has another one – the ability to talk your ear off and be “honest” about his life. So in fairly short order we new temps all found out that he is a convicted felon (assault on a police officer), still on probation, wears an ankle bracelet for the police to track him, has numerous friends who are also small-time criminals, has had many girlfriends, and has a son through one of them. (Or was she actually his wife? It’s hard to tell since he uses the phrase “The mother of my son” to describe her. And Chad is not a person you want to question for fear of how long and labyrinthine the answer will be, an answer that will usually include the word “technically” even if there are no technical data involved – which is almost always the case.) As the week went on, we found out (among other various and sundry items) that, though he wants to travel to Canada, he really can’t do it because, being a convicted felon, that requires much more paperwork to get clearance along with an annual $200 fee, but he has a friend who does it every year. Or so he says. As he says a lot of other things.

The list of other characters at the plant is long. There’s Bryan, who's 6'7" and weighs in at around 420 or more, and has an ego and mouth to match. Boua is the exact opposite – an immigrant from Laos who is 4'7" and weighs maybe 95 pounds. But she can hold her own. Pat looks like she’s twice past retirement age and has worked there for nine years, but she worked at a woolen mill for many years before that. She’s one of those crusty old folks that you know is a dear underneath the seeming hard shell. Nick is Chad’s best friend at work. He’s 24 and has an underbite on his lower jaw that looks like a serious orthodontic malpractice case. He claims that he knows the most about religion of anyone he knows. And since he barely graduated from high school and usually ends up crawling the bars of the larger city near him every weekend, that isn’t saying a whole lot. David is also young, about 22, and has also had jail experience (as has Nick) and calls himself Catholic. “I’m even confirmed,” he boasted, just as he also boasted about driving home while he was drunk.

Then there’s Geoff. When you see the name “Geoffrey,” you generally think of someone with an aristocratic air, someone like Geoffrey Boisi, the multi-millionaire who heads up the National Leadership Roundtable on Church Management at Boston College and has the Boisi Center for Religion and American Public Life at the same college named after him. Or you might think of a stupid giraffe that serves as a mascot for a certain toy store. But you would not think of the Geoff with whom I worked at the plant. Lean of build and uncertain of character, he displayed behaviors that left you wondering if he was altogether there.

The conversation at this plant does not lean toward the intelligent, and some of them know that. Chris, who is Chad’s roommate, once told me, “The people here are either rednecks, racists or just plain stupid.” I didn’t have the heart to ask him into which of the three categories he placed himself.

One night, the conversation began at strip clubs and descended from there. If you’re not sure how far one can descend from strip clubs, just take my word that it can happen. It finally got so bad that I went to the supervisor and asked her to reassign me to another task. She asked why and I told her. This was the second time this kind of discussion happened, and Peggy had had it. She called a quick meeting and made it clear that the inappropriate talk was to cease and that if it happened again, “You’ll no longer be working here.”

We got back to the line and Bryan began to whistle and drum his fingers on the line – for two hours. The other guys, Geoff and David in particular, looked at one another asking, “What was inappropriate about what we were saying?”

What Chris said.

The next night, Bryan was moved to another position off the line and I was left there with Geoff, David, Nick and Tong, a 23-year-old of Hmong descent. Suddenly, Geoff started asking questions about Christianity. He had been raised in a rural Midwest town as an agnostic and he was truly ignorant of Christian belief. So ignorant, in fact, that he asked, “Well, Jesus wrote the Bible, didn’t He?” My attempts at answering the questions foundered, not because I didn’t know the answers, but because Geoff’s attention span is about as short as a TV commercial. David’s was no better and going from one to the other was interiorly frustrating. This conversation lasted for more than an hour and Tong tired of it. He’s a true pagan, retaining the Hmong pagan beliefs that were handed on to him. But he’s also secularized and not wanting to hear anything of religion at all. It finally did end without any kind of fruit that I could see.

Others would occasionally ask me faith-related questions. Mark, who’s originally from Chicago, also a convict and missing his two upper front teeth from who knows what fight, once asked me what Catholics believe, but I did not have time to even begin to tell him. Perhaps the most bizarre occurrence happened when Brent came on the line. He’s good at math and figured out a three- or four-part problem in less than five seconds. Geoff’s response was “(Take the Lord’s Name in vain), “you’re good at math” and then he turned to me and asked, “Was that taking the Lord’s Name in vain?”

A close friend of mine once described these people as “a bunch of yahoos.” To an extent he’s right. Or as Chris said... 

But they’re yahoos, rednecks and racists who need redemption as much as the next guy. And this is where it occurs to me that the Church is missing out on evangelizing a large segment of the population. There are many evangelical efforts aimed at the middle class or, as with Opus Dei’s Catholic Information Center in Washington, D.C., towards the elite. But we have been missing out on something like Catholic Action for many years. There are still remnants of that rather vast and influential late-19th to immediate post-World War II organization which worked in factories towards evangelization, but most of them have morphed into political groups. Most outreach that is currently done is attempted at the parish level towards people who are already at Mass. We have Theology on Tap, but we don’t have Theology on the Line.

A young St. Gianna Molla (center, back row) and her Catholic Action group

Yet this is where it is needed. Unfortunately, my efforts weren’t very successful -- at least that I'm aware of. Working with the Chads, Bryans, Tongs and Geoffs of the world is difficult. It doesn’t help that the atmosphere of an assembly line isn’t conducive to such conversation or even to thinking about that kind of issue, nor is the loud music that is blared in constantly and greatly influences people’s behavior. And you have the very real expectation that you’re there to work, not evangelize.

Yet such is the task of evangelization, bringing the Gospel into what would purport to be the gates of hell. How this is done, I’m not sure and I hope it’s not a totally lost art. But if we take up the challenge, we shall have our Lord’s promise behind us: “The gates of hell shall not prevail against it.”

Problems at The Courant

It's been a long time since I've posted anything here and I doubt that what I post now will get any attention. But I came across an article in the Hartford Courant that I had to respond to. I sent in a column, but they never published it -- probably because I wasn't local enough. But here's the full version of that column (I sent in a considerably reduced version to keep in their word count guideline):

The August 4th story, “Vatican's Decision Not To Remove Connecticut Priest May Play Role In Abuse Trial,” was another exercise in the game of “pin the tail on the Pope.” Whether the blindfold was completely over The Courant’s eyes or whether the reporter and editors were peeking, the result is the same – the tail wrongly ended up in the Pope’s eye.

There are numerous problems with this piece. First, there's no indication given by the reporter of when Father Thomas Shea’s last days of active ministry were. All we’re told is he was removed from ministry “years ago.” So readers have no clue what the timeline of the story actually is.

However, we get this quote from a letter written in 2005 to Bishop Michael Cote by the then-Secretary for the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Archbishop Angelo Amato: “This case falls into prescription as it involves incidents which, while serious in nature, occurred over 35 years ago...” Over 35 years ago? So was Father Shea’s last incident of abuse back in 1969 or 1970? The reporter doesn't tell us, which is confusing because there’s talk later in the story about him being reassigned in 1975.

Nor does the reporter tell us what “prescription” means. For the record, that’s the Catholic Church’s equivalent of a statute of limitations under the Code of Canon Law, though that’s something the reporter should have told the readers after consulting with a canon lawyer.

But then five paragraphs after that statement taken from the letter written by Archbishop Amato, we read, “Superior Court Judge Marshall Berger ruled against the church, and many of the documents including the letter from the Pope will become evidence at the upcoming trial, according to Reardon” (my emphasis). What letter from the Pope? The letter did not come from the Pope, but from Archbishop Amato. Were the reporter and editors blindfolded, or did they peek and hope the five paragraph distance would make readers not see them lifting it up?

But there’s even more blindfolding or peeking. The story states that Bishop Cote wrote to the CDF on April 8, 2005. That was six days after Pope John Paul II had died. Did no one at The Courant have the sense to contact any knowledgeable source about what happens inside the Vatican during the period between popes, called the interregnum? After a pope dies, all cardinals in charge of curial offices no longer operate in those functions until the next pope is elected and he reappoints them to their posts, if he chooses to do that. So at the time Bishop Cote’s letter was written, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was not the prefect of the CDF, even though the letter may have been addressed to him as such. Besides that, since Cardinal Ratzinger was the Dean of the College of Cardinals (which is not a curial office), he was, to say the least, rather busy helping to put a conclave together.

Everyone knows the result of that conclave: Cardinal Ratzinger was elected as Pope Benedict XVI. Thus, attorney Richard Reardon's assertion that “Amato was considered Ratzinger’s ‘right hand man’ at that time and would not have sent the letter without Ratzinger's approval,” is at least questionable, but The Courant takes it without question. Archbishop Amato’s letter was dated May 12, 2005, only a couple of weeks after Cardinal Ratzinger became pope. When he wrote it, Archbishop Amato was no more his “right hand man” than I was. That task fell to Cardinal Angelo Sodano, who was then the Holy See’s Secretary of State.

So the CDF was operating without a prefect from April 2, 2005 until August 17, 2005 when then-Archbishop William Levada assumed command of the office. That left Archbishop Amato in charge for that five-month period. And without going into the boring details of why, not laicizing Father Shea was a routine decision that did not require approval from a prefect, never mind the Pope.

Then there’s this paragraph: “Pope Benedict has come under criticism for similar actions in other cases.” Actions similar to what? To not being in charge of a case that was someone else’s responsibility? “Last year in Wisconsin, documents surfaced showing that a bishop sent him a letter seeking to have a priest accused of molesting deaf children defrocked. But a church trial never occurred after the accused priest wrote a letter to the Pope asking him not to go forward with the trial.” Wow, do you have that story wrong. Laurie Goodstein at The New York Times put that assassination piece together and it has been devastatingly critiqued in numerous places, especially by National Catholic Reporter’s John Allen.

Two more points of fact this story glosses over: 1) While Bishop Cote’s letter to the CDF was startlingly blunt, it came (apparently) some 35 years after the fact and it seems that Father Shea had been effectively removed from active ministry “years ago.” So what difference would it have made if he had been laicized? And what difference does it make to the present lawsuit if he had been laicized or not? Absolutely none. 2) Father Shea died in a nursing home the year after the letters in question were written. Like the horrendous case of Father Lawrence Murphy who died a mere two months after the Vatican’s decision not to laicize him, any action the Vatican would have taken would have had no practical effect on the case at all.

Finally, we only hear from the plaintiff’s attorney and David Clohessy of the Survivors’ Network of those Abused by Priests. So it’s apparent that The Courant made no attempt to contact anyone outside of the Diocese of Norwich, like a canon lawyer, who could explain what was going on inside the Vatican during the time between when Bishop Cote wrote his letter and when Archbishop Amato replied. Or what “prescription” means. Nor did anyone attempt to contact a supporter of Pope Benedict, someone like George Weigel or Philip Lawler, to get commentary, or even the diocese’s attorney. That’s bias, plain and simple.

With all of this, I can’t help but think that The Courant newsroom was playing the game of “pin the tail on the Pope” while peeking from underneath the blindfold.

Thomas A. Szyszkiewicz is a writer and radio producer in Catholic media living in southern Minnesota. He is not connected in any way to the Diocese of Norwich.

Defending Lila Rose

There are many, many people commenting on Live Action's video recordings and the claim that Lila Rose and her companions lied in order to get Planned Parenthood's employees to talk and that that lying was illicit. Robert George, Christopher Tollefson and the people at The New Theological Movement have all said that it was completely wrong, while Monica Miller, Joseph Bottum and Pia de Solenni have all made various claims giving it some defense.

I had posted a response on Joseph Bottum's piece and it got a little bit of attention, but I'm posting it here with some revisions because I hope it will get more (though I doubt it since I haven't posted anything for nearly two years). Here goes:


What few – if any – people are looking at are two things: the intent of the lie and the Scriptural precedent for what Live Action did.

In normal lying, a person is either trying to protect himself or gain something for himself. For example, Mother asks Junior, “Did you take a cookie from the cookie jar,” and Junior says, “No, I didn't, Mommy,” yet he has cookie crumbs plastered all around his mouth and on his hands. Junior is lying to cover up something he did wrong and protect himself from Mommy’s just anger.

There is also lying to obtain something, whether it is a material good (e.g., writing a bad check) or a relational good (e.g., telling the girl at the bar she's the prettiest thing you've ever seen even though she has a huge wart on her nose).

Whether it's protecting oneself or another from the justice that should be meted out when one is caught in wrongdoing, or illicitly obtaining something that does not belong to oneself, the ultimate purpose of the lie has a selfish motivation behind it.

What is different about the “lying” that Lila Rose and Live Action have done is that they are “lying” in order to save lives that are being unjustly taken and this has plenty of good precedent in Scripture (these three quotes are from the New American Bible):

“The king of Egypt told the Hebrew midwives...‘When you act as midwives for the Hebrew women...if it is a boy, kill him; but if it is a girl, she may live.’ The midwives, however, feared God; they did not do as the king of Egypt had ordered them, but let the boys live. So the king summoned the midwives and asked them, ‘Why have you acted thus, allowing the boys to live?’ The midwives answered Pharaoh, ‘The Hebrew women are not like the Egyptian women. They are robust and give birth before the midwife arrives.’ Therefore God dealt well with the midwives. The people, too, increased and grew strong. And because the midwives feared God, he built up families for them” (Exodus 1:15-21).

“So the king of Jericho sent Rahab the order, ‘Put out the visitors who have entered your house, for they have come to spy out the entire land.’ The woman had taken the two men and hidden them, so she said, ‘True, the men you speak of came to me, but I did not know where they came from. At dark, when it was time for the gate to be shut, they left, and I do not know where they went. You will have to pursue them immediately to overtake them.’ Now, she had led them to the roof, and hidden them among her stalks of flax spread out there” (Joshua 2).

“As Judith and her maid walked directly across the valley, they encountered the Assyrian outpost. The men took her in custody and asked her, ‘To what people do you belong? Where do you come from, and where are you going?’ She replied: ‘I am a daughter of the Hebrews, and I am fleeing from them, because they are about to be delivered up to you as prey. I have come to see Holofernes, the general in chief of your forces, to give him a trustworthy report; I will show him the route by which he can ascend and take possession of the whole mountain district without a single one of his men suffering injury or loss of life’” (Judith 10:11-13).

All of these women directly deceived in order to save lives. In fact, the Hebrew midwives and Rahab directly lied to those who had lawful authority over them. In all three cases, Scripture says the Lord blessed their efforts and personally blessed them later on – because of their deception to save lives from unjust action. The midwives were blessed with families themselves. Rahab and her family were saved from slaughter and, even more importantly, she is mentioned directly in Matthew's genealogy of Jesus as one of His human ancestors. Judith saved all of Jerusalem from certain slaughter by the Assyrians by her deception to get into the enemy's camp.

Pia de Solenni raises Thomas Aquinas’ argument on this in Summa Theologica II-II, q. 110:

The midwives were rewarded, not for their lie, but for their fear of God, and for their good-will, which latter led them to tell a lie. Hence it is expressly stated (Ex. 1:21): “And because the midwives feared God, He built them houses.” But the subsequent lie was not meritorious.

Let me say that I am certainly no Thomas Aquinas, and his equal – and definitely not his superior – has yet to be found since his death in 1274. But permit me the audacious liberty to disagree. Here's why – notice that immediately after the text says that the midwives lied, it then says, “Therefore God dealt well with the midwives.” They lied and therefore He dealt well with them. If Shiphrah and Puah had told Pharaoh the truth, what would have been the result? They most likely would have been put to death and Pharaoh would have assigned Egyptian women as midwives who would have carried out his orders, including on Moses himself. If that had happened, history would have been completely changed. Instead, they lied and we were given Moses and the rest of salvation history followed.

Deception and outright lying is exactly what Catholics and others did in World War II to save Jews from certain death - deception and lying that were practiced by members of the hierarchy, probably even at the direction of Pope Pius XII himself. False papers are false papers – lies meant to deceive someone. Whether it’s falsified birth certificates or fabricated baptismal certificates for people who were never baptized, showing those papers to the Nazi soldiers constituted hundreds, if not thousands, of outright lies. But the false papers were used to protect those who were unjustly condemned to death. Today, we honor those who printed the papers and those who did the lying, including making films about people like Oskar Schindler of Schindler’s List fame.

We Catholics cannot forget the various times of persecution aimed at our brothers and sisters as well. There were those in Elizabethan England who hid priests in priest holes to protect them from certain torture and death and who lied to the authorities to throw them off the trail of the priests. Blessed Miguel Pro disguised himself – deceived the lawful authorities – so he could carry out his ministry during the Mexican persecution. Other examples are plentiful.

Notice what seems to be the rule and pattern here. This isn’t “the ends justifies the means,” nor “doing evil that good may come of it.” It appears to me that in the very specific case of when innocent people are in danger of being put to death unjustly, it is perfectly justified – and indeed perhaps even necessary – to keep those who would do the killing ignorant of the truth in order to protect those lives.

Planned Parenthood is a corporation that is unjustly – yet legally – making millions of dollars from the slaughter of innocent, unborn children. Lila and her group deceived those who are carrying out this unjust slaughter (and who are adding other evils on top of it) in order to save the lives of unborn children who are doomed to die unjustly. They are not doing this to protect themselves or to get something that is not theirs. They are doing exactly what the Lord has blessed in the past and which, despite all of the nitpicking naysayers, He will continue to bless.

God bless Mary Ann Glendon

What more can you say than that Mary Ann Glendon has once again shown herself to be a worthy woman? "Give her of the fruit of her hands and let her works praise her in the city gates." (Prov. 31.31)

As I said in my previous post, Ambassador Glendon single-handedly held up the promotion of abortion through the United Nations at the 1995 Beijing Conference. Now she has rightly embarrassed the president of Notre Dame for his hypocrisy. She realized she was being used as justification for inviting Obama to speak there and she would have none of it. Thanks be to God for her courage and fortitude and may He reward her richly for her actions.

Notre Dame's invite to Obama will worsen abortion worldwide

One aspect that has been overlooked in this whole President Barack Hussein Obama and University of Notre Dame flap is that the school is also going to be honoring Mary Ann Glendon with the Laetare Medal. For some reason, this medal has been taken by many to be considered the highest award that the Church in the United States can confer on anyone. I suppose back in the time when N.D. could be considered a Catholic university that may have been true, but since the abdication of their Catholic identity in March of 1967, I don't think that's the case anymore.

Professor Glendon is the Learned Hand Professor of Law at Harvard University and has a long and distinguished career in that field. She was also the most recent ambassador of the U.S. to the Holy See, a post she relinquished on January 20th of this year.

But she may perhaps be best remembered for the fact that in 1995, she led the delegation of the Holy See to the United Nations Conference on Women in Beijing. That was the first time that a Holy See delegation to an international conference was led by a layperson, never mind a woman. But John Paul the Great made that decision because he knew it was going to be a tough fight.

Put the words "woman" and "United Nations" near each other and "abortion" -- or should I say, "reproductive rights" -- is not far behind. This conference had the potential to write into U.N. doctrine and documents the notion that abortion is a "right" that knows no boundaries and is to be given to all women around the world. That would have been devastating to the pro-life movement the world over and it would have vastly increased the pressure, especially on so-called Third World countries, to legalize it everywhere, for any reason, and at any time in the pregnancy.

This conference was held in 1995, during the years of the Clinton administration, which was pushing on the U.N. and other international bodies to further abortion overseas. And since the U.S. has a huge voice at the U.N., any opposition to this measure was going to come with consequences.

Enter Mary Ann Glendon. In my opinion, she single-handedly held back the overwhelming tide of abortion throughout the world. She and her staff worked throughout the conference to get an alliance together consisting of many Third World countries, which included most Muslim nations, in order to oppose this move. To the consternation of the International Planned Parenthood Federation, Maria Stopes International and other pro-abortion, feminist and homosexual groups around the world, she was able to lead this ragtag group of countries to oppose the much larger nations that wanted abortion and homosexuality imposed around the world. For this, she and the Holy See were excoriated in the press.

Fast forward 16 years and this May in South Bend, Indiana, Ambassador Glendon will march in an academic procession with President Barack Hussein Obama at what Cardinal Francis George recently called the "flagship Catholic university" in our country. She will join him on the dais as she is awarded the Laetare Medal and he is granted an honorary Doctor of Laws degree.

(And, yes, I will insist on using his middle name. Saddam Hussein killed many Iraqis. B Hussein O is authorizing the deaths of unborn infants overseas and, if he has his way, will soon add more to the regular total here in the U.S.)

Catholic commentators of all kinds -- lay (Bill McGurn's is the most penetrating analysis I've seen yet), priestly (see Fathers Schall's and Rutler's comments here) and episcopal -- have already listed B Hussein O's sins regarding abortion, so I will not detail those again. What I will point out is that the U.S. embassy to the United Nations will no longer try to stop the "reproductive rights" language. In fact, the official stance of our country will be to encourage it and see that it gets into the documents, as the Clinton administration had done when it was in power.

Lots of folks have been focused on the Freedom of Choice Act, and rightly so. But most are overlooking the fact that the State Department will one day soon bring the U.N. Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) to the floor of the U.S. Senate for ratification. That document, along with the Convention on the Rights of the Child, will undermine U.S. federal and local laws on abortion and parental rights. Once they are ratified, according to the U.S. Constitution, they will override all other laws of this country.

The efforts and pressure that the Committee on CEDAW is putting on countries that have signed the document into liberalizing, if not eliminating, their abortion laws are well-known. Few have held out. Most have buckled and will continue to do so.

I do not doubt that B Hussein O will find encouragement for his agenda in this recognition. Why shouldn't he? After all Notre Dame is the "flagship Catholic university," and the order that oversees it and the school are recognizing him and his accomplishments (whatever they are).

The fact that Bishop John D'Arcy, the Bishop of Fort Wayne-South Bend, encouraged Ambassador Glendon to accept the award because of the "opportunity such an award gives her to teach" is indicative that she had serious qualms about being on the same stage as the president, for obvious reasons.

So on that day in May, we will have on stage to be honored at the University of Notre Dame -- the University of Our Lady -- the woman who stopped abortion from taking over the world and the man who will be responsible for reversing her actions. Good show, ND.

From whence shrines come

The La Crosse Tribune's coverage of the Our Lady of Guadalupe Shrine church dedication included this interesting bit:

Corinne Dempsey, an associate professor of religious studies at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point, said that for a church leader like Burke to initiate the building of a shrine is backwards.

Shrines come from the people, she said, not authorities.

“Pilgrimage sites do not start from the top down, but from the bottom up,” said Dempsey, who has taught a course on popular Catholicism and studied pilgrimages.

Other sites of pilgrimage, like the site where Our Lady of Fatima is said to have appeared in Portugal, grew from a groundswell of popular interest, and the official church later becomes aware of it, Dempsey said.

“Pilgrimage shrines historically have been places that began based on miracles that happen to people, not to popes,” she said. “I don’t know how well central Wisconsin is set up for that kind of thing either. These kinds of pilgrimage sites are not typically a mainstream American phenomenon.”

I beg to differ. Notwithstanding Bob Moynihan's excellent rejoinder that people like Dempsey “represent the pointy-headed intellectuals who have lost contact with the base,” there's a lot more to be considered.

First, there are the opposing statements about 'the people' and those in authority. “Pilgrimage shrines historically have been places that began based on miracles that happen to people, not to popes.” Funny, I thought popes were people, too. And miracles have happened to popes just as much as 'to people.' Consider, for instance, the miracle of the August snow which brought about the building of St. Mary Major. But Dempsey's thinking is typically Marxist -- those in authority aren't real people. In their minds, those who have power will necessarily abuse it, therefore, they aren't 'real' people because 'real' people would never abuse power.

Second, the shrines at Fatima, Lourdes, Tepayac, La Sallette, Knock and so many other places of Marian devotion, actually did begin from the top down. They came because the Mother of God herself requested them. If that isn't authority, I don't know what is.

Third, she's wrong about the relationship between those who have the visions and Church officials. These are private revelations subject to the authority of the local bishop. It is he who must give approval for any devotion at the alleged apparition site and the approval for any church that might be built there, as with any church built within his diocese. Indeed, in the Diocese of La Crosse itself there is a "shrine" in Necedah that has been in the process of building since the 1950's. The reason it's taking so long -- it has never had the approval of the local bishop because they were false apparitions. In fact, one of the reasons Archbishop Burke started the Shrine in La Crosse was to provide an authentic place of pilgrimage within the Diocese.

Fourth, she's wrong about all pilgrimage shrines starting with apparitions. While Marian shrines have started with them, there are plenty of other shrines that didn't. For instance, the second most important pilgrimage site in the world after the Holy Land itself is Santiago Compestela. That was founded by a bishop who had obtained the bones of St. James. There is a Shrine to the Divine Savior in Las Vegas. That was begun by the bishop of Sin City in order to help tourists, travelers and the immigrant population of the area.

Too bad for the readers of the La Crosse Tribune who were subjected to such glib and false analysis. All Dempsey did was to give more ammunition to those who already hold this false 'people/leader' dichotomy.

Hispanics against themselves

Eduardo Verástegui, the star of Bella, has a video on YouTube called Hard Reality. In it, he asks a pointed question and makes a pointed statement: "Most abortion centers are found in Hispanic neighborhoods -- why?" and "Abortion is not only a lucrative industry, it is also used by people who are racists as a means to eliminate our people since they consider us to be a threat to democracy in this country."

Unfortunately, Eduardo may also have to look to some of his own people for that threat. From 1999-2003, as part of my position as editor of the Catholic Times in the Diocese of La Crosse, I was a member of the Catholic Press Association. I went to three annual CPA conventions - Chicago, Dallas and St. Paul.

Unfortunately, I don't recall some significant details of the Dallas convention -- the year or who the speakers were. However, I do remember that there was a demographer of Hispanic origin who gave a talk on Latino demographics in the U.S. In fact, it was one of the main talks and was heavily attended because writers and editors wanted to find out what was happening with the Latino population around the country so we could try to address it and help bring the Good News to them.

However, it was clear that the speaker had no faith; he was simply a man of statistics. This became more evident during the question and answer session. He had earlier given a comparison of the birth rate for white women vs. Latino women. I don't recall the specifics, but I do know that whites were below the replacement level of 2.1 children per woman of child-bearing age (still are), and Latinos were well above that level (still are as well, though that rate is slowing down. In Mexico, it's down to about 2.4).

That statistic got me to thinking, so during the Q&A I asked him something along the lines of, "Given the fact that Hispanics have such a high birth rate and given the fact that Planned Parenthood targets minorities for abortion, are you at all concerned that they are going to be putting clinics into more Hispanic neighborhoods and targeting the Latino population for abortion?"

I will never forget the first part of his reply: "They already are, and they should." After that, I blanked out. The rest of the audience was somewhat stunned as well. I was in total amazement that this man could say that his own people should be marked for death. I don' remember the reasons he gave at all. It could have been a global population thing, maybe even global warming -- who knows. All I know was that here was this well-off man, middle- to upper-middle-class, saying that his own people -- the majority of whom are in gut-wrenching poverty -- should be gotten rid of.

So Eduardo, while you're right about the racist intentions of many people in the abortion industry, unfortunately there are Latinos who are just as intent on getting rid of themselves as non-Latinos are.

The soon-to-be Cardinal Raymond Burke

There are loads of stories out in cyberspace about Archbishop Raymond Burke being named as Prefect of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura and all kinds of reactions. I'm late to the game, but it was a little difficult sorting out what I was going to say.

First, it was not unexpected, at least by me, that he was going to Rome. My last post on this blog was about his appointments to the Pontifical Council on Legislative Texts and the Congregation for the Clergy. He had already been appointed as a judge at the Signatura last year. He was the only American non-cardinal archbishop with three assignments in Rome. In fact, he may have been the only non-cardinal archbishop with any assignments in Rome since those are usually reserved for cardinals.

Second, he didn't want the appointment and wasn't looking for it. The comments sections in the La Crosse Tribune and St. Louis Post-Dispatch have been filled with venom with many people accusing him of seeking this appointment. That is an outright lie. He was in La Crosse last month for the annual May Crowning at the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe. I semi-congratulated him on his appointments, but told him that while I know the Holy Father appreciates his abilities, I hope the Pope won't tax them too much. He turned his head down and looked away as though he was worried and gave me this very brief reply -- "I hope so, too." It's obvious that he was hearing the rumors that Cardinal Ruini was going to retire and that Cardinal Vallini would take his place, which would leave the Signatura post vacant. He told Jennifer Brinker at the St. LouisReview that the two previous curial appointments "...made me a bit concerned. I was honored by the trust, but I was becoming concerned that it might be an indication of (the Vatican) wanting me more full time." This is an understatement. His manner of speaking with me betrayed much more than concern.

He teared up today in his press conference in St. Louis. He did the same when he left La Crosse. These were not Hillary tears. These were the tears of a man who dearly loves those people for whom he cares, even if he was in conflict with some of them.

Third, this is a loss for the Church in the United States. For all his lack of media savvy, Archbishop Burke forced a conversation that has been needed in this country and the wider Church for a while and is still needed -- the need for absolute fidelity to the teachings and discipline of the Catholic Church. Besides Bishop Leo Maher, late of San Diego, denying Communion to a pro-abortion pol back in 1989, no one had pushed this as hard as Archbishop Burke did. His slap-in-the-face statement about Kerry (which unfortunately became the defining statement of him in the American imagination) woke people up to the reality that Holy Communion in the Catholic Church isn't a 1968 love fest to which everyone is invited. There are rules around It, rules that come, not from old celibate men sitting in ivory towers in Rome, but from the very nature of the Eucharist. Cardinal (oops!) Burke has the courage, but more importantly, the clear-mindedness to see that those rules must be enforced, otherwise they are mere sentimental statements. Let's hope that some of his actions have rubbed off on his brethren.

How he will effect the rest of the Church in this new position remains to be seen. Assuredly, whatever influence he has will be behind-the-scenes. Starting in late August, we'll most likely not be seeing anymore headlines about Burke and Catholic politicians. I'm sure he'll be glad of that. That omnipresent Jesuit voice in the media (can they never find anyone else to comment?), Father Tom Reese told AP, "Every pro-choice Catholic Democrat politician should be very nervous. He made his name in the U.S. by denying Communion to pro-choice politicians. If he gets that view articulated strongly in Rome, he could become the voice for having that position for the universal church." Well, Father Tom, then that means more than Catholic Democrats need to be nervous. So do Catholic Republicans and Labour and Social Democrats and every other politician of whatever political stripe who might support abortion. And that would be a very good thing.

It's funny. With all the hoopla surrounding his appointment, the press missed something big in St. Louis. His last major act as archbishop there was issuing a decree of interdict against a Sister of Charity for participation last November in the pretend ordination of a woman in a synagogue. Why they didn't leap at this chance to get one last dig in on his pastoral style is beyond me.

Archbishop Burke's new appointments

Archbishop Burke has been appointed by the Holy Father to two important dicasteries at the Vatican: the Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts and the Congregation for Clergy. The former is clearly a recognition of his great talent in canon law. Note that this comes after his brilliant exegesis of Canon 915 in Canonica, as well as his two decrees of excommunication for the women who play-acted at becoming priests and the two members of St. Stanislaus Corporation who joined the board of that former parish, and after his decree banning canon lawyer Father Thomas Doyle, O.P., from his archdiocese because Father Doyle was incompetent in his duties towards his clients, who happened to be members of St. Stanislaus Corporation.

The latter appointment, however, may seem a little less obvious. The Congregation for Clergy, as the news sources have pointed out, oversees the seminaries and other priestly formation. It's also the congregation that hears complaints about priestly behavior. But it's also the congregation that is concerned with catechesis (its origin lies in bringing a correct interpretation of the norms of the Council of Trent). And this is probably where Archbishop Burke fits in.

As is probably not very well-known, he is the National Director of the Marian Catechists, the group founded by the late Father John Hardon, SJ. Father Hardon basically anointed then-Bishop Burke to take over the group after his death. And what isn't known at all outside of people in La Crosse who took his class, is that when then-Father Burke was teaching at Aquinas High School in La Crosse, he was developing his own text on moral theology. It actually went over very well with his students. (In fact, it was going so well that when Bishop Frederick Freking of La Crosse called Father Burke to tell him that he was sending him to Rome to study canon law, Father Burke, then only ordained three years, replied by saying that he was doing really well at Aquinas and he would like to continue doing that work. There was, then-Bishop Burke related to me, a long pause on the other end of the phone and then Bishop Freking said, "I didn't think I was asking you.")

Yet, I pity the poor man. It's not like he doesn't have enough to do already. Still, I will make a prediction -- a red hat at the next consistory.

Why are saints considered luxurious?

I've often wondered this: why do we associate saints' names with luxury? I was just looking at an advertisement in the NY Times for the St. Regis Hotel and they are offering timeshare opportunities. The place, of course, is extraordinarily luxurious. Along with the timeshare, you get your own butler and all the service money can buy.

But who was St. Regis? Actually, the closest I came to finding a St. Regis was St. John Francis Regis, a French Jesuit of the 17th century. He was a zealous priest who especially went in search of women of the night. He was, of course, not looking for his own pleasure, but working to bring them back to the Lord. He successfully converted many of them (oftentimes at his own peril as jealous johns and pernicious pimps threatened his life on more than one occasion) and even established centers where they could have honest employment.

He was zealous in his own mortification. He always slept on the bare floor and his consistent supper was a bowl of milk and some fruit. That certainly doesn't go along with my idea of luxury.

In St. Paul, Minnesota, the most luxurious hotel is The St. Paul. While it's not quite the St. Regis, it would certainly pass as a high-class place.

But who was St. Paul? Well, we know him as one zealous for the Gospel, one who was beaten, whipped, run out of town on more than one occasion, shipwrecked, spending a day and a night adrift on the open sea, left for dead, constantly on the move until he was imprisoned, etc. Being that the City of St. Paul was at one time named Pig's Eye, it's easy to see why a hotel would prefer a saint's name over the porker moniker.

But I ask my question again -- why do we associate saints with luxury? Besides the royal saints, no saint that I know of was a person of luxury. And even the royals did penance on a regular basis and provided for the poor out of their own means. For instance, after St. Elizabeth of Hungary's husband died, she donned the simple garments of a Franciscan tertiary and gave away her own money to care for the poor in hospitals and to give them food.

In other words, being a saint doesn't entail luxury. "The birds have nests, the foxes have lairs, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head," Jesus told someone who wanted to follow Him. He also said, "Take up your cross and follow in My footsteps." The last I checked, the cross wasn't exactly a place of sumptuous recreation.

It's hard to see the St. Regis offering their customers bare wooden floors with barely heated rooms as an option. And I don't think they or The St. Paul will open their doors to the poor and homeless who, no doubt, wander the streets just outside their doors. In fact, The St. Paul is across the street from Rice Park, where many homeless congregate during the day and night. It would require a direct intervention from God for the owner to even think about opening its doors to one of them.

I wonder if this is a Catholic doing? Could it be that since our great cathedrals are named after saints and the world considers them to be places of luxury, that they then feel free to name luxury hotels after them? Or perhaps it comes from innkeepers in old Catholic countries naming inns after saints?

Whatever the way it happened, in my mind it makes for a confusing situation. Any thoughts?

I want to sue Al Gore

One Dr. David Suzuki, apparently a well-known scientist in Canada, has proposed twice now that politicians who do not work on legislation to curb global warming should be arrested and jailed for "an intergenerational crime in the face of all the knowledge and science from over 20 years."

His spokesman claims it was a joke, a statement of frustration, but it's the second time he's made it, according to the National Post.

As a joke, I want to sue Al Gore and his ilk, including Dr. Suzuki. You see, they keep promising global warming. But I live in Minnesota, and so far, I haven't seen a whole lot of evidence for global warming, especially this winter. We've had a whole lot of snow and a whole lot of cold. I've never seen as much hoarfrost as I have this winter. We're about to get another blast of Arctic air that is going to plunge temperatures down below zero again. After all, we've been enjoying the relative balm of the 20's this last week-and-a-half after the blizzard we got at the end of January.

But I say once again, Gore and Suzuki have been promising global warming. Well, where is it? If the earth is supposed to be warming up, why aren't there palm trees in my front yard?! I want palm trees! I want to plant my garden in February, not April or May!I want a winter when I don't have to worry about how much propane is in my tank, or if I can get my car out of the driveway or if the car is going to slide off the side of a hill because of ice!

But that's not happening, so can I sue them?

Why I will never vote for a Mormon as president

I know that very soon after I post this, those who have "Mormon" for a Google search term will find this posting and try to start in on me. But I'm blocking comments on this posting. I don't have the time to deal with replies, but I have been wanting to say this for some time now. However, what I say is not said with any personal animosity toward anyone at all (except, perhaps, Joseph Smith and Brigham Young), least of all Mitt Romney whom I have never met and have only the most remote connections to.

That said, if I can help it, I will never vote for a Mormon as president. Now there are probably Catholics out there who will pounce on me and tell me that the Constitution says we can't have a religious test for anyone who holds public office. Amen to that. But that's a governmental regulation for those who hold official posts. It isn't meant for individuals like myself who are using their best judgments to choose the best candidate possible.

So without further ado, here are some reasons why I will not vote for a Mormon:

1) Mormon theology is (to be blunt) screwy.

The reason this is important is because how a person believes guides how a person behaves. Now I know that many people will throw the "Catholic" politicians like Ted Kennedy and John Kerry at me. And still I say, yes, as a person believes, so a person behaves. Kennedy, Kerry, et al, do not believe that what the Catholic Church teaches really binds their consciences, so they are free to do as they wish. And they do as they wish.

Mitt Romney, on the other hand, is by all accounts a faithful Mormon. That is, of course, better than being one who claims to be Mormon but does not live the faith or who claims to be Catholic but says the Pope can go to hell. But that he is a faithful Mormon should give us pause because Mormonism's doctrines are strange.

• They believe that God the Father - who is the god of this planet, not the God who created the universe and who has no beginning and no end, as Christianity has always taught - had sexual intercourse with Mary in order to beget Jesus.
• They believe that men who are faithful Mormons will, after death, get to have their own planets over which they are gods and that they will each have a bunch of spirit wives with whom they will generate spirit children, and then the created people on that planet will be expected to have sex in order to incarnate those spirit children as happens here on Earth.
• They believe that "as we are now, God once was. As God is now, so we will become."
• When a couple are married in a temple ritual, the woman is given a secret name. After death, the only way that she can make it into the highest heavens, the highest happiness, is if her husband calls her by this secret name.

I could go further, but this should demonstrate perfectly well that Mormonism not only isn't a Christian belief, but the strangeness of their beliefs can lead to some strange behaviors.

I for one don't want a president in office who believes that a woman's highest happiness depends entirely on her getting married and her husband calling on her secret name after death.

Or who believes that he will someday be the god of his own planet.

2) Mormonism is part business, part religion

Joseph Smith and Brigham Young were Americans through and through. The religion which they developed is an American religion. Their connections are all American.

That may seem obvious and pointless, but consider this: the Mormon church owns many huge businesses and it has many faithful members who either own or are chairmen/CEO's of huge businesses. To name a few: Ryder, La Quinta, Franklin/Covey, Iomega, American Express, SkyWest, Tropical Sportswear, Sports Capital Partners, Cadence Design, Five Star Quality Care (based in Newton, Mass., of which state Mr. Romney was once governor), Headwaters, Central Pacific Bank, Black and Decker. Others hold influential positions like CFO or are presidents of key operations of major corporations. Oh, and did I mention Marriott and JetBlue?

This doesn't include the rather lengthy list of businesses owned directly by the church itself, businesses like Beneficial Life, Bonneville Broadcasting, and just about everything with the name "Deseret" in it. The Mormon church actually owns the largest ranch in the country, which isn't in the mountain West somewhere, but outside of Orlando. Their agribusiness companies are huge. In fact, TIME magazine said that if Mormonism would be considered a business, it would fall in the middle of the Fortune 500, somewhere between Nike and Union Carbide.

Along with this, one must take into consideration that all faithful Mormons are required by their religion to tithe 10 percent of their incomes to the church. If they don't do that, they find themselves on the outs with their local leaders. So all these corporate leaders who are making loads of money are giving 10 percent of their personal income to the church. And who's to say they're not doing that with their corporations' money as well?

In other words, Mormonism isn't like other religions. It's part business, part religion. When the church itself owns at least 23 major companies, one must seriously question what the primary purpose of its existence is.

3) Influence doesn't only come from Salt Lake

When JFK ran for president, we all know what happened and what the accusation was. Many were expecting that he would be taking orders from Rome and from the bishops in the U.S. Of course his speech Houston cleared that up -- he wasn't going to take orders from anyone except himself.

Some people say that Romney's recent speech did the same thing. But there's a huge difference between Catholicism and Mormonism. (Well, there are actually dozens of huge differences between the two, but we'll stick to discussing politics right now.) With Catholicism, you have a very clearly defined hierarchy that is separated from the laity. The clergy are celibate, and they are supported by donations from the faithful, donations which are voluntarily given.

With Mormonism, however, there is no separate hierarchy. All "bishops" and "elders" are laypeople. They may work for the church itself, but most work at regular jobs. That means that the president of Franklin/Covey, for instance, could just as easily be the president of his local stake or the bishop of his ward. In fact, he could even be on the highest levels of the church, acting as counselor to the president, Gordon B. Hinkley, who is the so-called prophet, seer and revelator.

In other words, it is not inconceivable that a President Romney or one of his staff would consult with a so-called apostle of the Mormon church, for whatever reason.

In fact, the Salt Lake Tribune reported on 30 December that former Utah Gov. Mike Leavitt, who is now the U.S. Secretary for Health and Human Services, held meetings with his staff to figure out how they could get Mormon doctrines implemented into Utah state policy. (Personally, I'm not sure why that was needed. The state legislature is around 97 percent Mormon and they vote on their beliefs.) Leavitt says he hasn't done that on the federal level, but there's really nothing to prevent him from doing so.

Nor is there anything to prevent a Mormon president from doing the same thing.

This story from AP also shows that Mormon business owner can have an influence over Mr. Romney. (Let's not forget that he is the one who saved the Salt Lake Olympics when they were under the cloud of a corruption scandal.) These business owners live Mormon theology daily and they themselves work to see their faith grow in influence. And since these guys have the money and the connections, their influence is very strong. That it would extend to the president of the United States is a scary thought.

4) Race

Jason Riley at the Wall Street Journal wrote a superb column about the problem of race in the Mormon church. It is well-known that in their scriptures (i.e., The Book of Mormon, Doctrines and Covenants and The Pearl of Great Price), Mormons look upon dark-skinned people as inferior to whites. This is written in their documents as well and was enforced until a lawsuit that went to the U.S. Supreme Court in 1978 suddenly prompted a "revelation" that blacks could be part of the church hierarchy.

That racism persists to this day, Riley says, and I wouldn't doubt it a bit. For just as Mormons still cling to polygamy (just try to criticize that practice in front of someone who descends from a polygamous line) as the pure way to go despite the ban that was placed on it so that Utah could enter the Union, so racism is not easily eradicated after being told for more than a century that whites are the superior race and non-whites are cursed by God Himself.

5) The Mormon church is not 100 percent pro-life.

Despite the image to the contrary, Mormons are not pro-life people. I got a lesson in this back in 1997 when I went to the Roe v Wade rally at the Utah state capitol on January 22. I was expecting the nearly 5,000 people that I see annually at the Minnesota state capitol and was stunned when I got there and there was no one around. I went inside and all I saw was, at most, a couple hundred people gathered under the rotunda, most of them Catholic. Someone explained to me that Mormon theology actually does allow for abortions. In fact, I found out that at that time, Utah had the highest rate of abortions among married women in the country (I don't know if that still holds true.) The reasons for the abortion have to be serious, but they still do allow for the taking of innocent human life.

Conclusion
These are but a few of my reasons for not voting for a Mormon as president. If I had to choose between two Mormons for a legislative race, I wouldn't have too much difficulty with that because legislators aren't executives who have things like executive privilege within their grasp; they can be held in check by fellow legislators. But because of his executive powers, a president is a different story and requires far more consideration than legislators.

Is Romney better than Hillary? Certainly. And in that kind of contest, I'm not sure what I would do. But while we're in the primary season, I am not going to give any kind of consideration to Mitt Romney at all.

Kiera Knightly raps

My wife is part of a chat group that discusses teaching history for home schoolers. They were talking about using films to teach history and someone brought up the 2005 Pride & Prejudice with Kiera Knightly playing Lizzie. It's a lousy film in many respects, most of all in fidelity to the book, but also in execution.

Here's what one lady in the group said about it, though: "The 2005 Pride & Prejudice has grown on me--I remember making all sorts of grrr comments to my dh when we attended it in the theaters, but we do like it now."

And here's the response of Maria Rioux, the group's moderator (slightly edited):

That's called desensitization. Entertain something long enough, and you'll start to find it acceptable, regardless of objective merit or the lack thereof.

Next thing we know, you'll be telling us about this great new rap song that seems a little jarring at first, but is, in fact, musically as complex and beautiful as Mozart's 40th. You just have to train your ear by rapping on it. This happens naturally because, when first forced to listen to any rap music, people have a tendency to bang their heads against the closest wall...which, happily, is the very thing that adapts the ear to relentless pounding.

The data are not yet complete on whether the concomitant mental trauma affects the ability to make a judgement. Study subjects seem to be having trouble expressing themselves coherently in English.

Touché, Maria!

Happily eating crow

Back in June, I made the prediction that Bishop Samuel Aquila of the Diocese of Fargo was to be named coadjutor of the Archdiocese of St. Paul-Minneapolis within short order. I was wrong and I apologize.

But though my prediction was wrong, both in person and in time, I am quite happy to say that I really don't care that I'm wrong. Today, the Holy See announced that Bishop John Nienstedt of New Ulm has been appointed as coadjutor. This is great news.

In October of 2005, I had the pleasure of having dinner with the new archbishop at the Catholic Medical Association Conference in Portland, Ore. (see his talk here). I also had a chance to meet Bishop Thomas Olmsted of Phoenix at that same conference.

In an elevator ride, I told Bishop Olmsted how impressed I was with what he was doing with all the obstacles he had to overcome. But he would hear none of it. The difficulties he encountered, he said, were nowhere near as tough as what other bishops had. That surprised me given the fact that his immediate successor had been arrested, charged and convicted of a felony, that the former vicar general (who, by the way, had established a very popular youth program) had been arrested for sexual misconduct, and that the bishop had open rebellion on his hands involving a sizable number of priests.

But no, he said, those problems were nothing. He had priests and seminarians and the diocese had a fair amount of money. Compare that to someone like Bishop Nienstedt, he said, who had no money, no seminarians, hardly any priests (42 priests for 82 parishes), and where respect for the priesthood had gone out the window in favor or laywomen or nuns running the parishes (my words, not his). Now that, he said, was someone to look up to.

Archbishop Nienstedt has not had it very easy given the way his diocese was left in shambles by his predecessor, Bishop Raymond Lucker. But in the six years he's been there, he has begun to change it without much open rancor. Of course, the National Catholic Reporter went after him since Bishop Lucker was one of NCR's patron saints. But other than that, he's been able to carry out his ministry with a fair amount of calm.

Moving from the most rural diocese in the country to one with somewhere between 646,000 and 830,000 Catholics (depending on who you talk to -- the new coadjutor says the former, the StarTribune says the latter and the Pioneer Press says 750,000) and being made the Metropolitan of the province is quite a change in responsibility. May God give him the strength and courage he's going to need to handle all of his duties and the opposition he will necessarily face when he carries them out.

In defense of the CMA

Over on the Whispers in the Loggia blog, Rocco Palmo noted an article in Newsday (scroll down to the one entitled "More from the Fall Classic") about a Long Island pastor who pulled a brochure from his parish church's rack. Why Newsday thought it was worthy of a story is beyond me.

Oh, wait a minute. The brochure is entitled "Homosexuality and Hope" and was authored and published by the Catholic Medical Association. That's why a pastor removing it is so important (though he did it after only two people complained about it). Apparently, he also had the support of the Bishop, William Murphy.

The Newsday article claims that the priest and diocese thought the content of brochure contained a lot of speculation and that its theories on the development of same-sex attraction were outdated.

Interesting.

The people who wrote that brochure are all professionals working in the field of psychiatry and psychology and have many years of experience of dealing with people who struggle with same-sex attraction. They have studied, from a Catholic perspective, what the causes of that attraction are. Their conclusions, based on their lived experience and success in treating these patients, indicate that these unwanted attractions are not genetic, but lie in various other sources, including difficult parent-child relationships, sexual abuse, and/or difficult relations with same-sex peers while growing up.

Simply because two people complained about the brochure doesn't mean it doesn't belong in the rack nor that it was in error. Either the brochure presents the truth or it doesn't. So rather than saying its theories were outdated, they should have said (if this is what they are claiming) that it was untrue.

However, I don't think that's what they were claiming. I think they're like too many priests and bishops who lack backbone and were afraid of a couple of people's reactions, who would then turn to the media who would write the pastor and bishop up as the ultimate intolerants, and they would, in turn, experience a lot of grief. (Something about "Do not be afraid to suffer hardship for the sake of the Gospel" comes to mind at this point.) So rather than saying "it's untrue," they make themselves more media friendly by stating, "it's outdated."

But the last time I checked, truth is timeless. If it isn't, then the bishop and pastor are wearing some pretty old-fashioned clothing and leading people in an ancient ritual that has absolutely no relevance for today.

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Out of the mouths of babes

A conversation between son number 3 (4-years-old) and daughter number 1 (17):

S-3: Will we still be here [in our house] when we go to heaven?

D-1: No, we'll be in heaven.

S-3: You mean with Jesus?

D-1: Yes.

S-3: [Emits gasp of great excitement] Can we bring our light sabres?

Reuterville's misleading again

Reuters today published a story about Pope Benedict's speech at the Lateran opening the academic year. Here's a quote from the story as it appeared in the Khaleej Times Online:

Like his predecessor Pope John Paul II, Benedict is against stem cell technology, which researchers say could help cure serious illnesses but the Church opposes it because it often relies on cells from embryo tissue.

This, of course, is nonsense. Benedict doesn't oppose all stem cell technology, only that which comes from embryonic stem cells. Notice the set-up -- bad pope ("Benedict is against stem cell technology") vs. good scientists ("which researchers say could help cure serious illnesses").

And then comes this zinger:

The Vatican teaches that human life begins at conception.

As if the Vatican made that up all by themselves. They totally discount the fact that human embryologists, those scientists whose study is solely the human embryo, have established their own scientific nomenclature and teach "that human life begins at conception," i.e. fertilization, when the sperm penetrates the egg. (It strikes me, though, that the reason they probably discount it is that they most likely don't know it because they haven't taken the time to ask human embryologists about it.)

Whoever wrote this is being deliberately misleading. How like Reuters.

Home Is the Soldier From War

Here's another one from my daughter's collection. She wrote this last year when my father died and then gave it to my wife's family when my father-in-law died.

Home Is the Soldier From War

Home is the soldier, home from war.
Hard was his fight, now it is o’er
Well was it fought, now he is resting.
Now at peace, God he is praising.
He will suffer no more.
Home is the soldier from war.

Home is the soldier, home from war.
Happier than ever before,
buried with honor and our love,
he is resting with God above.
Sorrow he knows no more.
Home is the soldier from war.

Home is the soldier, home from war.
The flag of his country flies o’er,
o’er the grave where he is sleeping.
He served that flag without resting.
Now his fighting is o’er
Home is the soldier from war.

He has fought the good fight.
He has finished the race.
Now in eternal light,
he sees God face to face.
His exile is o’er.
Home is the soldier from war.

By: Regina M. Szyszkiewicz

Daddy the wasp killer

This was written by my daughter for my birthday a couple of years ago. I've been meaning to post it and am only now getting around to it.

It originated from an incident in a bathroom. A wasp appeared there and I was called to take care of it. As I got the swatter, I said to my daughter, "Daddy, the wasp killer, huh?" Well, that was all her poet's mind needed to get her going...

Daddy the Wasp Killer

Armed for the deadly combat,
Daddy firmly grasped the swatter.
Under his breath he muttered, “drat,”
Daddy, the deadly wasp killer.

From behind the bathroom door,
came a “buzz” from the buzzing fighter.
Daddy looked fiercer than before.
Daddy, the dreaded wasp killer.

He swung that door open wide,
(louder buzzed the buzzing fighter)
and crossed the floor with one stride.
Daddy, the fearsome wasp killer.

Then with a “crash,” “bang,” “wack,” “swat,”
Daddy wielded the swatter.
Daddy’s fury was boiling hot.
Daddy, the awful wasp killer.

Then, victory for Daddy!
He had killed the buzzing fighter!
From the bathroom, triumphantly,
came Daddy the wasp killer.

By: Regina M. Szyszkiewicz

Clinton and bin Laden

Actually, what the folks at ABC presented in "The Path to 9/11" probably isn't too far off the mark. What was supposed to be in the broadcast version and what got cut was the sequence where Clinton decides not to go after Osama bin Laden, and then there was an immediate cut to Clinton in the witness stand saying, "I did not have sex with that woman."

Critics have decried this as overblown, but anyone who has had any kind of addiction can tell you that it's not far off at all; in fact, it's quite logical. Clinton was having an affair with Monica. His mind wasn't on the protection of the country but on the pleasures he could have with the intern.

That this is what happens in these situations is borne out by the fact that this kind of thing occurs all the time -- people become obsessed with sex, porn, drugs, alcohol, gambling or whatever and everything else in life goes by the wayside. The stories are too numerous to recount, so I don't think that's necessary. There's plenty of evidence that this happens on a regular basis.

That it could also happen to the former White House occupant is, for some reason, an idea that's repugnant for some people to think about. So what if he was a Rhodes scholar or a Yale graduate or had any other number of accolades and privileges? All of that doesn't matter when it comes down to the raw desire of seeking the next pleasurable tryst. All of those things go by the wayside as do considerations about propriety and decency or about what other priorities are more important than getting his zipper down while he's in the room with her.