Your friendly neighborhood reminder

Don't forget - the kickoff rally for 40 Days for Life is tomorrow, Tues., Sept. 23 at 6:30 in front of the Planned Parenthood on Pennacook Street (off of Elm Street) in Manchester. It is only through prayer and our faithful witness that we can turn the tide of this war of evil and help to bring about a culture of life throughout New Hampshire, throughout this country, and throughout this world. I hope to see you there!

40 Days for Life comes to Manchester

In a word ... finally! I've been hoping someone at the right level would decide to get this Diocese involved in the 40 Days for Life movement and it appears that it has finally happened. There will be a kickoff rally outside the Manchester Planned Parenthood this coming Tuesday, Sept. 23 at 6:30 PM and then prayerful witness outside the building from 7AM to 7PM from Sept. 24 to Nov. 2.

How can you help? First, come to the kickoff meeting if you can. At least as important as that, however, is to sign up for a slot to spend an hour in prayerful witness in front of the Planned Parenthood abortuary. (If I'm not mistaken, this is another PP building where they lied on their zoning application and the local government eventually decided to let them get away with it. Evil has no shame.) If you can't manage any time in that schedule, and that happens, then I only ask you to do whatever you can to help out the cause of the most innocent of lives - pray, fast, do pennance, any or all of the above. Parishes in the area will have signup sheets available this weekend so we can sign up for both time slots for witness and to offer any other thing we can offer. There is also a signup form on the 40 Days for Life site here - how this will be coordinated with those forms collected at parishes I don't yet know but I'm sure that's been planned out.

More information is available at the 40 Days for Life site, at New Hampshire Right to Life and in this PDF that has been circulated in bulletins recently. Whatever you do, however you can help, please do it. This could be the beginning of the end for Planned Parenthood in New Hampshire and the beginning of a beautiful new era of life in this state.

Prayers for our Bishop

From the "wow, things move fast sometimes files":

Following some discomfort experienced while exercising, Bishop McCormack consulted with his physician, who recommended a cardiac evaluation. Bishop McCormack underwent a scheduled cardiac catheterization on Friday, August 29, 2008, performed by Dr. Louis I. Fink of the New England Heart Institute at Catholic Medical Center.

Based on the results of this procedure, and at the recommendation of his physicians, Bishop McCormack elected to have coronary artery bypass surgery. The surgery was performed by Dr. Benjamin M. Westbrook of Cardiothoracic Surgical Associates at Catholic Medical Center at 2:00 p.m. Friday.

Bishop McCormack is now recovering at Catholic Medical Center and is expected to be released from the hospital within the next few days.

I know many have had and continue to have issues with many things in Bishop McCormack's past, but it is the Catholic thing to do to pray for him now as he recovers from this surgery. At just over 73 I have to imagine, even with all the medical advances in this type of surgery in recent years, this is going to be quite a strain. May this experience help him grow closer to Christ and help him to become an even better shepherd. Mother Mary, pray for him!

Something weird going on up north

I've been trying to find more details on this before posting on it, but since I haven't found much I'll put out what there is. As first detailed here, there was a very suspicious fire at Sacred Heart church in Laconia back in May, the damage from which while not catastrophic was rather expensive.

One of Laconia's oldest Catholic churches was the victim of a hate crime.
...
Sacred candles were broken, crosses and crucifixes scattered on the ground, and pages were ripped right out of the Bible.

There was also, according to another report, significant damage to the main altar as well. Police have now made an arrest and are indeed charging the woman with arson. As bad as this sounds it's entirely possible the woman was quite simply either insane or possessed as she is said to have spoken of 'devils' in the Catholic Church. The Boston Globe has this:

In court documents, police say when her pastor, Hayes Judkin of St. James Episcopal Church, visited her after the apartment arson charge, she told him there was nothing he could do as long as there were devils in the Sacred Heart Church.

As things develop I'll be sure to post what we find. In the mean time, please pray for those affected by the fire and pray that what looks to be a very beautiful church is properly, beautifully and fully restored.

Ordained to service

This past weekend our Diocese had the delight of her Bishop ordaining three men to the diaconate as they continue to work towards the priesthood. Chris Martel, Matthew Mason and Jonathan White were all ordained to the service of Christ and His Church this past Saturday, May 31, the Feast of the Visitation, by Bishop John McCormack. All three will be continuing their seminary formation next year after their summer assignments, Deacon Martel at Mundelein Seminary, Mundelein IL; Deacon Mason at St. John's Seminary, Brighton MA; Deacon Jonathan White at Bl. John XXIII Seminary, Weston MA. (Deacon Mason, incidentally, assisted at my parish during the Christmas break. I suppose it would be too much to hope that he be assigned here for his first assignment? One can always hope.)

We all look forward in hope to their ordination to the priesthood next year. This would mark the largest priestly ordination class in some time, and at a time the Church sorely needs Her priests. Please pray for them, and indeed all seminarians - theirs is a calling made to many but these days heard only by a few. Ad multos annos!

A non-Papal post

Since it seems almost everyone else in the Catholic blogosphere is posting all the same bits about the Pope and I'm just so otherwise buried in varia this week I wanted to ask a simple question. A couple of weeks ago I stumbled across the newsletter the Diocese puts out for all our Deacons (and their wives). In the newsletter there was a question regarding the proper order for praying the Liturgy of the Hours.

Currently in these parts most everyone has learned that for the psalmody the antiphon is read by the leader, then repeated, then the psalm is read, then finally the antiphon is said again. However, the monks at St. Anselm Abbey do not repeat the antiphon after it is initially read (prior to the psalm being read) so there is question of how it should be done when training the next generation of deacons. So if there's anyone out there that can actually take five minutes from trying to keep up with the deluge of papalblogging, I'd much appreciate the input.

Yay. Or not.

Sometimes breaking a record just isn't worth it...

MANCHESTER, N.H. -- The calendar may say that it's spring, but that didn't stop Mother Nature from dumping more snow on the Granite State.

New Hampshire broke the record for most snowfall in one season in the last 100 years around 8 a.m. News 9 Meteorologist Josh Judge said even more snow is on the way.

Being a person who neither skis nor particularly enjoys being cold, I find no great joy in this record. My neighbor, on the other hand, is glad that he's finally not barely breaking even on his season lift passes as compared to recent years. Time to go remove the foot or so of snow at the end of my driveway... *sigh*

Change in St. Patrick's schedule

I wanted to make sure I posted this just on the off chance someone who is affected might come across this and not otherwise be aware - the next Extraordinary Form Mass at St. Patrick's Parish in Nashua will not be on Easter but rather the next Sunday, March 30th at 2:00 PM. Father Kelly writes:

Because requests for an afternoon celebration on Easter Sunday were not numerous there will be none that day. The celebration scheduled for Sunday, March 30, is n exception to the normal schedule both in regard to week and time. The normal schedule will resume in April.

I wanted to put up that clarification so no one got any misunderstandings about whether Father Kelly was willing to have an extra Mass during the Triduum. All of us in this Diocese are in his debt.

Some Catholic in New Hampshire tidbits

I just wanted to post a couple of things that might be of interest to any Catholics living in New Hampshire; since I had to go looking for them, you might not know about them. If you do, well, thanks for adding to my meager hit counts anyway - your charity is not unnoticed.

First, the Diocese has put together a list of resources for Lent here. Included is a pointer to the Bishop's Lenten Message. I particularly liked this graph:

Lent is also an Equalizer. It reminds us that no matter our station or status in life, we are all the same, namely, the bearer of foibles and failings as well as gifts and virtues. Lent calls attention to our failings. Lent is an Equalizer. As we all are imperfect, none of us is exempt from choosing to improve our effort to be Christ like in our service of God and one another.

That is truly one of the great wonders (and indeed great difficulties for some) of the Church - being "the Church of here comes everybody" as is said and all receiving the same sacraments in the same way has, or at least should have, a great equalizing effect. When we realize we're not all that far from the executive in the pew next to us, just maybe we'll realize we're also not that far from the homeless person on the streets.

There is also a new feature from the Diocesan site - a periodic email newsletter filled with various resources. The current one is up at the link - I'd like to hope that most families will sign up so they can be sure to not be left out or caught by surprise by anything. The more ways we can get information to people the better!

Finally, via Corpus et Sanguis, (and yeah, I'm way late on this) there is an online petition to ask for the Extraordinary Form of the Latin Rite to be held in the Cathedral in Manchester. For many of us this would be significantly more accessible than trips to either Nashua or Portsmouth. I certainly expect, or at least I hope, that there are more than the current 39 of you out there who have signed the petition who would like to see this happen.

Conscience and Your Vote

That's the title of the booklet that was in every bulletin in every (as far as I know) Catholic church this weekend in the Diocese of Manchester. I've been meaning to write about it all week but, well, my Advent hasn't been as restful as it should be. With AmP picking it up though, I decided it was high time to give my "on the ground" assessment. You can read the document here and Bishop McCormack's introductory letter is here.

The first thing everyone noticed was that their bulletin was much heavier and stiffer than usual. This was particularly so for those who prefer to read the bulletin before Mass rather than pray or read the Scripture readings for the day and thus before the announcements. The document isn't your usual "make five hundred copies of this" bulletin insert, it's a tri-fold full-color document printed on what I'll call card stock. Just the weight of it, let alone the fact that it's in full color, lends to the intent of the document. This was not a low-cost production by any means, which hopefully translates into people actually reading and praying about the contents of the document.

It does not break any new theological or Catholic social teaching ground, but what it does do is put in clear terms the proper hierarchy of values. It is also quite explicit that it is not a "voter guide" and I think it does a very good job of not pointing fingers at any campaign which is, as a non-profit organization, a requirement.

What it does do, however, is lay out in simple but direct terms a correct explanation of conscience and how a conscience is properly formed. I'd like to wish that this section was more explicit in how serious the issue of "primacy of conscience" is and how spiritually dangerous it is to turn away from the Church's teachings. That said, I'm not sure they could have done a sufficient job of that in the limited space and attention span they had to work with and if they tried to go deeper and failed it would have been a spectacular failure. I am left to hope that this statement catches peoples' attention and moves them to think:

A Catholic should never perform or support an intrinsically evil act and rely on conscience to justify it. In such instances, either one's conscience is not fully informed in light of the Gospel and Church teaching (and one is obliged to have an informed conscience) or one acts against what one's conscience knows to be true.

Before you ask, yes a list of some of the intrinsically evil acts is provided so people can not excuse themselves for not knowing that abortion is an intrinsically evil act.

I hope most (I would pray all) readers got to the section regarding basic guidelines where a good yet simple ordered list is given (the fact that it is ordered is critical here). Note in particular the second and third items:

First, recall the sacredness of all human life and the dignity of the human person. All moral decision-making must be informed and guided by these fundamental values.

Second, acknowledge that not all issues are of equal importance or urgency. A commitment to basic human values - rather that self-interest or past political loyalties - should always guide one's vote.

Third, remember that we believe in absolute moral norms that can never be violated for any reason. The most relevant of these absolute norms is the prohibition against the deliberate destructino of innocent human life.

Fourth, all people are called to live holy and upright lives. Our conscientious political decisions contribute to - or impede - our movement toward genuine holiness of life and the good of our society.

Again, yes, this could be sharper but the goal here is to get the person's attention, not to scare them away. Properly actualized morality is not undirected blind obedience but a participatory action even when the only motivating factor is trust and faith in another without full personal understanding.


I should also mention, since it caught my attention, that the document quotes not only Forming Consciences but also Pope Benedict's Deus caritas est and Pope John Paul II's Evangelium vitae. That they are quoting both of the last two Popes warms the cockles of my heart - that they are two of my favorite Papal documents of recent times is but an adder.

With New Hampshire being at the head of the primary season and so many candidates doing such a fine job of skirting around their positions on issues critical to Catholics I am very heartened to see the Diocese put together a strong reminder for us all that we do not leave our Catholicism outside the voting booth, that it rather must be at the very core of our being, shaping our every action. It is at times like this that we need to hear the voice of our Shepherd, and that it be clear and strong.

I find it only proper that with the Catholic Kennedy from Massachusetts first broaching the issue of Catholic faith by distancing himself from it that another New England institution might finally respond in such a way by calling us all to "draw near to God" (James 4:8). Or, perhaps in a slightly more full context: "Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Draw near to God and he will draw near to you." (James 4:8-9a)

Some good news for the Lakes Region

Via Corpus et Sanguis:

Good news, if you haven't already heard.

Fr. Adrien, pastor at Sacred Heart, Laconia, has scheduled Mass with the 1962 Missal for Sunday, Nov. 4, at 3:00 PM. He plans to use the 1962 Missal for Mass every First Sunday of the month.

(The time of day for the Mass is somewhat flexible for future months after Nov., depending on feedback from parishioners.)

An announcement has been requested to be printed in the parish bulletin for this weekend.Questions may be directed to Fr. Adrien at the parish: (603) 524-9609.

Sacred Heart Church is at 291 Union Ave., Laconia.

Between time, travel (Mapquest calls it an hour drive from here) and other family obligations I may not be able to make it, but be sure to spread the word around so that there is a good turn out. And if you do go, be sure to let me know your thoughts in the combox!

Tags: Catholic, Liturgy, New Hampshire, Motu Proprio, Summorum Pontificum

Extraordinary Form in NH updates

Two updates on the state of the Extraordinary Form Mass in the Diocese of Manchester. First, commenter pazdziernik tells us the next EF Mass at St. Patrick's in Nashua will be this coming Sunday at 2PM.

Second, over at Corpus et Sanguis, commenter Dianne-Marie tells us Fr. Kelly's current schedule is for High Mass on the 2nd Sunday of each month at 4PM and Low Mass on the Fourth Sunday of each month at 2PM provided other parish-related issues do not intervene. This is certainly a most generous response. When you look at Fr. Kelly's sacramental schedule, however, you're not entirely surprised: he has regularly scheduled confessions seven days a week - weekdays before the 12:05 Mass, Saturday before the 4:00 Mass and before each Mass on Sunday. There are many parishes that could learn a lesson from that schedule.

If anyone has heard of any other Extraordinary Form Masses in NH other than those at St. Patrick's in Nashua and Immaculate Conception in Portsmouth, please let me know in the combox. If there is enough support perhaps the Bishop will be encouraged to search out even more ways to accommodate this tradition. Maybe even a Mass in the Cathedral some day. Hope springs eternal.

Tags: Catholic, Liturgy, New Hampshire, Motu Proprio, Summorum Pontificum

Some happenings in the area

When good and profitable things are happening in this Diocese, I think it's only good to broadcast that fact. Three in particular have caught my eye as important happenings in the near future.

First, St. Pius X parish in Manchester will be honoring the 90th anniversary of our Blessed Mother's apparitions at Fatima, Portugal on Monday, October 1 at 7 PM. There will be an outdoor procession (yes, a real procession!) and indoors there will be a special blessing with the Monstrance by Fr. Bob Gorski, the rosary, the Divine Mercy chaplet and Benediction as well as refreshments. One could, of course, say the former are refreshment in and of themselves! It is indeed good to see truly Catholic activities like Marian processions becoming more common in this Diocese.

Second, Fr. Marc Montminy (the twin brother of my pastor, former Director of Vocations for the Diocese and all-around tremendous priest) will be the next speaker for the Theology on Tap series. His lecture will be at Fratello's Restaurant on Dow Street in Manchester with the title of "The Naked Truth: That they may be one". I may be wrong, but it certainly sounds like a talk on the Theology of the Body which can only be a good thing in this day and age. And while you're there, you can have some of the best Italian food in the city which is also, only a good thing! (I usually go for their Northender and have never walked out with a significant doggy bag, another good thing.)

Finally, the Institute for Catholic Thought and Culture will begin its fall lecture series on "Foundations of Ancient Catholic Thought" on October 6th at Joseph House in Manchester. As far as I can tell, and Google says so too, this group does not as yet have a web site for linking, but I certainly will not complain one iota about a lecture series about the Church Fathers. The series will be presented by Cheryl Geary, one of the five founders of the Institute. I must find out more about this organization.

Good things are starting to happen in this Diocese. If it please God may this be only the beginning.

Tags: Catholic, New Hampshire

News coverage of yesterday's Mass

As just a quick hit before life gets any busier today, the Extraordinary Form Mass at St. Patrick's yesterday made the newspapers before it even happened. I only hope they are good enough to cover how well it went after the fact, and how well attended it was. The Nashua Telegraph coverage is here, and the (Manchester) Union Leader coverage is here.

If you read the comments in the Union Leader piece, you will see how little people still understand what is going on, from little details like whether Bishop McCormack "allowed" the Mass to whether it is a sign of a "regression" or "progression" in the Church. One person even took the opportunity to take a whack at the Bishop and call for his resignation (again). Funny, but I didn't think doing what the Pope calls for was a firing offense. Silly me. Thankfully they left their politics and, apparently, themselves at home and allowed several hundred of us to worship God in the form of the ages. It is now up to the rest of us to take up the Great Commission and respond to the call of ite missa est with the only answer appropriate: Deo gratias!

Tags: Catholic, Liturgy, Motu Proprio, Summorum Pontificum, New Hampshire

French invasion

Sorry, it's not a Catholic thing but rather a New Hampshire thing. It's Monday and I haven't had any coffee, so you'll have to be gentle. My question - why can't people do any research before writing pieces even as fluffy as Brit Hume's daily tidbits on the FoxNews site? Friday's edition ended with this little bit:

New French President Nicolas Sarkozy is planning for his first summer vacation in office. So where does the leader of a European power go to relax? How about Wolfeboro, New Hampshire?

The pro-American Sarkozy will get his R&R on the shores of Lake Winnipesaukee, a popular vacation destination with Bostonians — including Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, who owns a house there.

No word on why Sarkozy would spend August in a place with more French fries than French restaurants.

Hmmm... Maybe because there is a huge French-Canadian population in New Hampshire? The further north you go in NH the more French you hear. We're probably, in fact, one of the few states whose signs are frequently bi-lingual, but not English and Spanish, we're English and French around here. Needless to say, those four years of high school Spanish aren't doing me any good yet. Although, yes, we are also seeing a slight bump in Latin American immigration even up here as well. Who'd ever have thought of New Hampshire as such a melting pot?

Tags: New Hampshire, France, Canada

A word from our Bishop

Bishop John B. McCormack of the Diocese of Manchester has issued a statement regarding Summorum Pontificum. I might say the note is very positive in tone and does not dismiss the issue as did Cardinal O'Malley recently (and possibly accidentally). As if the letter itself was not positive enough, it includes this tidbit which I hadn't expected to see:

Pope Benedict XVI reminds us that the Roman Rite is a “rich treasure” that binds each local Church with the universal Church. It is in this spirit that Bishop Christian and I, along with the pastors of our parishes in New Hampshire, intend to prepare to address the accommodations envisioned by Our Holy Father later this year. Our goal is to make room for all Catholics around the Lord’s Table.

The provisions of Summorum Pontificum take effect September 14, 2007. Between now and then, Bishop Christian and I will consult with the Deans and Pastors, as well as with the consultation bodies of our Diocese, regarding how we can best carry out the objectives of Our Holy Father in the watchful spirit which he commends to us — one of “peace and serenity.”

Whether that means we will see a dedicated Mass somewhere in this Diocese using the 1962 Missal or some other arrangement remains to be seen. Regardless, I now have hope that those who attend the SSPX chapel in Salem just might come home. And just maybe some of our priests who have lost touch with the sanctity, vivacity and efficaciousness of a well- and properly-prayed Mass without innovation will come to see that liturgy is not, as one priest put it to me, boring. Maybe, just maybe, we'll see a rebirth, a reform-of-the-reform of liturgy in this Diocese that can only help restore the Church and faith in God itself to the rightful place in the our world. Save the Liturgy, Save the World as Fr. Z would say.

Tags: Catholic, Benedict, Liturgy, motu proprio, New Hampshire

New publication for New Hampshire

The Diocese of New Hampshire has announced the launch of a new publication, slated to hit mailboxes in late June / early July. In Parable Magazine, the Diocese hopes to "bring[] the Good News of Jesus Christ to all in New Hampshire" and to "look at contemporary issues from a faith perspective." Despite those rather opaque and non-committal goal statements, it is my fervent hope that this publication helps to bridge the communication gap in this Diocese I have frequently lamented. It is often not that there are not good things being done, but simply that no one seems to know about them. Whether that has something to do with the New England reputation for insularity, I don't know, but just getting this kind of information in front of people and educating them can only help.

As one blogger pointed out in noting the need for an RSS/Atom feed for any news site, if you don't push it they won't come. I find that to be an indictment of the intellectual laziness prevalent in our culture, but it is a stream against which it is perhaps impertinent to try to swim at this time. I say only congratulations to the Diocese and I pray the publication helps to provide the clear, honest orthodox truth to all of us who so desperately need it. You can poke around on Parable's web site, including previewing the first edition right here.

Tags: Catholic, New Hampshire, Magazines

About that meeting...

I should have posted about the Deanery cluster task force meeting on Tuesday by now. Unfortunately, as usual, life jumped in the way, including a tee-ball game and a bookshelf building project (yes, I'm building it from scratch, not from a box). So... the result of all this? In the end, not much really.

The facilitator, whose name I insanely forgot to write down, started by telling us the factors they used in their decision-making, including:

• geography and distance of travel for people in the affected region
• workload on priests
• size of each parish (# of parishioners) and capacities of each church building
• physical plant status as well as financial status for each current parish
• the need to work for greater vocational response
• plan for the future and not undo hard work in the past
• input from previous listening session
  

After all that, there were a few seconds of squirming in the pews as people waited for the proverbial hammer to drop. Instead, there was no hammer at all. The recommendation to go forward is to have no immediate change: St. Catherine will stay a stand-alone parish; St. John the Baptist and Holy Rosary will remain twinned. A review of the situation in 2010 will be called for to review: physical condition of the churches, their financial status and the strength of the housing market.

There was some consternation by some in the audience regarding the phrase "strength of the housing market" which, in fact, simply meant determining whether the population was growing at, above or below the projected rate. In effect, those who were very much convinced a decision to close at a minimum Holy Rosary had already been made were shown to have jumped far too far in thinking the worst of others. Interestingly, given that this decision was the best anyone could hope for (assuming the priests can, in fact, handle this heavy workload) there were still some who seemed to have wound themselves up for a fight which simply was not there to have. After a brief time of swatting at air, the discussion closed with a stern reminder, from a parishioner, that the only way to get out of this situation is the way Catholics have always survived trying times - prayer and living according to the Gospel. If we want more priests, we must "pray the Lord of the harvest" and encourage our children, our grandchildren, our friends' children to listen to the call.

There was one very interesting sub-discussion which does need to be addressed. One man suggested that if we do not have enough priests to say Mass that they should allow deacons to say Mass. He was reminded, by a deacon, that deacons cannot say Mass and that it is the sole purview of priests. Towards the end, he again suggested that his wife, originally not from the US, suggested in her home country deacons could say Mass. Another person suggested that maybe it was time they (yes, the proverbial "they") should allow deacons to say Mass.

Ahem. Let's set this straight right now, folks. First, of course, we start with relevant Canons:

• Can. 900 §1. The minister who is able to confect the sacrament of the Eucharist in the person of Christ is a validly ordained priest alone.
• Can. 907 In the eucharistic celebration deacons and lay persons are not permitted to offer prayers, especially the eucharistic prayer, or to perform actions which are proper to the celebrating priest.

Lest we need to be reminded, these Canons are universal in the Latin Church and not particular to any country or Bishops' Council. So, unless this man's wife had some very heterodox priests and deacons where she lived, she most likely was mistaking a deacon-led Communion service with a Mass. The fact such a mistake can be made shows the inherent danger in frequent Communion services - over time they can easily be seen to hold equivalent stature to the Mass itself, which can never be the case.

Further, let us re-focus on Can. 900 §1 again - "a validly ordained priest alone." There simply is no substitute. Why can't the deacon pray Mass (yes, that was another minor bone of contention - one should never "say" Mass, one should only "pray" Mass)? Simply, aside from the fact he has not been given that faculty from the successor of the Apostles, his Bishop, he has not had that indelible mark set on his soul that comes with ordination to the priesthood. Just as a transitional deacon has no right to pray Mass even though he is "going to be" a priest, a permanent deacon has no right even though he is "almost" a priest in the eyes of some. And almost all of the permanent deacons around would tell you they wouldn't even try to have it any other way.

The fact, however, that we have people who are interested in the future of the Church and of their parish enough to take time out in the middle of the week to come to a listening session and still not understand the ontological difference between a priest and a deacon is very troubling. I must suggest to either our pastor or our deacon that this seems to be a more than opportune time to explicate the role of the priesthood in the life of the Church in a homily. We pray every Sunday for an increase in vocations; perhaps it would help as well to remind people both what it is they are actually praying for and from where it must come.

Tags: Catholic, New Hampshire, Priests, Vocations

Prayers for tonight

Tonight there will be a second listening session (the first I wrote about here) where the task force's recommendation regarding the future plans for the three churches in our Deanery cluster will be presented and discussed. Pray for those on the task force, for those attending the meeting, and for those who cannot or do not attend and are affected. I can only hope this session contains more positive commentary and constructive criticism and less short-term and sometimes even scandalous commentary. I may just lose my temper if someone decides it's an appropriate time to launch an ad hominem attack on the Bishop.

For all those that want to lay it at his feet, I ask you only these few questions. When is the last time you voluntarily fasted for a day as a sacrifice? When did you last spend an hour in front of the Blessed Sacrament praying for the vocations that may have helped avert this problem? How have you helped make your family the ecclesia domestica it is called to be? And when did you perform some sacrificial act in reparation for the sins of others as well as yourself? Be very, very careful what you lay at the feet of others, for you may unknowingly be laying it at your own feet.

Tags: Catholic, Vocations, New Hampshire, Prayer

When did Moloch get a job in the school system?

What. The. Heck. Were. They. Thinking?!?! Oh, that's right, Planned Parenthood is a counseling service. Yeah, that's it. So let's take a group of at-risk kids and send them on a "field trip" to Planned Parenthood. Because, you know, they'll get good unbiased information there. Like how to lie on a form so they don't have to report statutory rape.

You know your city and state has gone to the dogs of Moloch when the local YMCA (yeah, that C - yeah, it's supposed to stand for Christian, doncha know?) thinks of sending kids to a Planned Parenthood as a field trip. How about while they're at it, sending them to a local landfill and having them look for the body parts of aborted babies? Ah, that might be stressful, never mind. Because, you know, I'm sure the folks at Planned Parenthood just showed them how to put a condom on a banana.

One can tell a great deal more about a community, nee a civilization, by the things it doesn't believe even warrant concern than by those it vigorously debates. Someone, somewhere thought this was a perfectly fine idea no one but those troglodyte theocon far-right-wingers would even worry about, but they're moonbatty anyway so they can be ignored. It is indeed a sign that we have not done our job when people don't even think something might be questionable. It is time to redouble, and redouble again, our efforts.

Lest we forget:

Tags: Catholic, Abortion, Pro-Life, New Hampshire, Planned Parenthood