5-8-07

Greetings!

 

It's 1st Holy Communion time at most Catholic parishes.  The innocence of the little ones along with their natural awe at what is transpiring , makes this an especially beautiful event.  It was beautiful to see one of 1st Communicants at Church this morning with her Mom.   Another Mom related to me her daughter saying "I wish every day could be 1st Communion Day."   (And no it wasn't because of the cake and gifts either….)   Instead it is a reminder of Jesus' admonition to have "faith as a child." 

 

Two particular homilies stand out…one I was present for, the other I heard about.  

 

The first----the priest starts his homily by asking the 2nd Grade 1st Communicants, "How many of you have driver's licenses?"   The kids giggle and no one raises their hand.  Meanwhile, the parents wonder where Father is going with this one.   Father then looks up beyond the children and asks the parents…"You see how many of these children have driver's licenses?"  They nod their heads.   Then Father looks at them…."Since they don't have driver's licenses, who is responsible for getting them to Church each week?"  And the point is made…..

 

The second, took a more evangelical tone.  Since 1st Communion brings in lots of guests and perhaps many who don't normally come to Church, it's a good opportunity to address the bigger issues.  Father started his homily by asking the children, "at the end of life, there are only 2 destinations, what are they?"   The one little girl raised her hand and then pointed saying "down there"  and another child mentioned Heaven.   Father then proceeded to elaborate on the two destinations…and how the way we live our lives now determines where we spend eternity.  And he did it all with a gentle smile!   How many 1st Communions do you go to where you hear hell discussed?  I'd guess not many.  And yet, for many in attendance, that may be just what they needed to hear….stark, but true….there are only 2 destinations----heaven or hell.   One is love of others / one is love of self.  Which one are you headed too? 

 

Phil's Tidbits:

Dr. Francis Beckwith, President of the Evangelical Theological Society has become Catholic.   Dr. Beckwith, known for his intellect and honesty, stated that his reading of the Church Fathers, and seeing "how Catholic" the early Church was, lead him to return to Rome .  It's a familiar refrain as this was how myself and many, many others found their way (back) to the Roman Catholic Church. Welcome home Dr. Beckwith!

Dr. Francis Beckwith, the president of the Evangelical Theological Society, has become Catholic. Dr. Beckwith was raised Catholic but became an Evangelical Protestant in youth. After a review of Catholic theology and its basis, however, he has been reconciled with the Church. -Source:  http://jimmyakin.typepad.com/defensor_fidei/2007/05/dr_francis_beck.html

Dr. Beckwith's own comments: http://googlemail.com/attachment?attid=0.1&disp=safe&view=att&th=11267e5f5930bb37&saduie=1egnamn3mrook1a30pefniyn23sx0li&sadet=1178564479490&sads=8738e41d8ec599f02e58b2e7243b853e

 

Here are some interesting statistics on the priests ordained this year. 

Third of '07 U.S. Ordinands Are Foreign Born
Average Age of Those Scheduled for Priesthood Is 35

WASHINGTON D.C., MAY 2, 2007 ( Zenit.org ).- U.S. bishops' data on those to be ordained this year shows that their average age is 35 and one in three were born outside the United States.

Researchers gathered information from 282 seminarians (including 221 future diocesan priests and 60 religious), approximately 60% of the estimated 475 men who are expected to be ordained.

Statistics

-- Seven in 10 report their primary race as Caucasian, European American, or white.

-- Of the 33% of ordinands born outside the United States, the largest numbers come from Vietnam, Mexico , Poland and the Philippines.

-- Some 6% are converts to the Catholic faith.

-- More than six in 10 ordinands have a college degree from before entering the seminary.

-- Half of responding ordinands attended a Catholic elementary school.

-- About two-thirds of the group had full-time jobs before going to the seminary.

-- The average age at which they began considering a vocation was 17.

The Georgetown University-based Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate compiled the information. The organization conducts the survey each year for the U.S. bishops' Secretariat for Vocations and Priestly Formation.
ZE07050211

 

While the world, overall, continues in unprecedented prosperity, many still suffer want.

Caritas Tells Tale of World's Poor
General Assembly to Parallel G-8 Summit

VATICAN CITY, APRIL 29, 2007 (Zenit.org).- A Caritas Internationalis meeting in Rome this June will parallel the annual Group of Eight summit in Germany, but will tell a different tale, said the Catholic aid organization's secretary-general.
Duncan MacLaren made this statement Friday in a press release to announce the organization's 18th general assembly, to be held June 3-9.
Meanwhile, the leaders of major industrial countries will meet at the G-8 summit in Heiligendamm, June 6-8.
The secretary-general said: "The Caritas General Assembly and the G-8 will be more than a tale of two summits, they will be a tale of two worlds.
"On one hand, you have the leaders representing the interests of the world's rich countries with a combined gross domestic product of over $30 trillion.
"On the other hand, you have representatives of civil society working for the world's 3 billion people living on less than $1 a day."
MacLaren said that "G-8 leaders must live up to their promises on aid." He added that "there is backsliding with the commitments made" two years ago at the summit held in Gleneagles, Scotland.
"Caritas wants G-8 countries to deliver on promises to increase aid to 0.7% of national income, and to ensure that aid is used effectively to end poverty. Millions of the poor will suffer as a consequence of these broken promises," he added.
Keynote speakers for the Caritas meeting will include Nobel Peace Prize laureate Wangari Maathai and president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, Cardinal Renato Martino.
ZE07042902

 

Here is a fascinating and hopeful analysis of the latest Supreme Court abortion decision.   It's not an easy read.  The language, which actually appears in the court's opinion, is graphic.  How anyone could write that and not have a change of heart is beyond me.   The article strikes a hopeful tone in the end and for this we pray!

The Weakest Link

by Steven Mosher and Colin Mason

Justice Anthony Kennedy has not been a bastion of strict constructivist thinking, nor is has he compiled a pro-life or pro-family record on the court.  So it comes as a pleasant surprise to find his name among the five justices who voted to uphold the ban on partial birth abortion.  But an even bigger surprise is in store for those who actually read the Gonzales v. Carhart decision handed down on April 18.  The opinion for the majority was written by none other than Justice Kennedy, who is by far the weakest link in an otherwise solid chain of pro-life justices stretching from Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia to Samuel Alito and John Roberts.

Opinions are assigned by Chief Justice Roberts, and giving this one to Kennedy may be regarded as a brilliant tactical move.  What better way to stiffen Kennedy's spine than to have him research and write about this barbaric practice?

Passages such as the following must have been even more difficult for him to write than they are for us to read:  The abortionist (his assistant reported) "delivered the baby's body and arms -- everything but the head." At that point, "The baby's little fingers were clasping and unclasping, and his little feet were kicking. Then the doctor stuck the scissors in the back of his head, and the baby's arms jerked out. ... The doctor opened up the scissors, stuck a high-powered suction tube into the opening, and sucked the baby's brains out."

Yet the full opinion is so narrowly drawn that it is impossible to assess whether Kennedy's views on abortion have changed in any other respect.  The ban will not serve as a check on the 1.1 million abortions performed in this country--nor even necessarily stop all partial-birth abortions.  In fact, the Partial Birth Abortion Ban forbids only the "intact D&E procedure," which it defines as the act of partially delivering the baby with the intent of killing him or her.  If the abortionist does not deliver a certain minimum extent of the baby's body before killing it, the ban does not even apply.  If this does not seem like much of a restriction on abortion, that is because it isn't.

Yet how could Kennedy's previous views on abortion have survived a close encounter with this barbaric procedure?  It would seem impossible to confront the reality of partial birth abortions, and not be unmoved by the plight of millions of babies who have been dismembered while still in utero. 
Certainly the partisans of abortion were quick to make this connection, that's why Dr. Carhart of Nebraska, along with the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, brought suit in the first place.  They understood that the principle that it planted--that unborn children could not simply be torn apart at will, in whatever fashion was most convenient to the abortionist--posed a threat to abortion-on-demand.

This also explains why Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote such a furious dissent.  "The law saves not a single fetus from destruction," she noted scathingly, while "put(ting) a woman's health at greater risk."  Clearly Kennedy disagrees with this assessment, since he cites empirical evidence that the procedure is dangerous, traumatic to the mother, and medically unnecessary.  From his graphic descriptions of the procedure itself, he now realizes that it also kills babies.

Here, then, is the reason that someone as philosophically adrift as Kennedy might craft such a ruling.  His opinion involved research into the history of the partial-birth abortion debate, as well as research into the procedure itself, and the resulting text suggests a strong visceral reaction.  Kennedy speaks of a doctor "pierc[ing] the skull and vacuum[ing] he fast-developing brain of [the] unborn child, a child assuming the human form."  Elsewhere he quotes Congress's language, saying that "Congress determined that the abortion methods [the Ban] proscribed had a 'disturbing similarity to the killing of a newborn infant.'"  Again, he insists: "Where it has a rational basis to act, and it does not impose an undue burden, the State may use its regulatory power to bar certain procedures and substitute others, all in furtherance of its legitimate interests in regulating the medical profession in order to promote respect for life, including life of the unborn" (emphasis added).

Now I don't want to read too much into one phrase, but if Kennedy has begun to reflect on the need "to promote respect for life, including the life of the unborn," then his thinking on this issue has already begun to change.  He cannot help but have noted the gruesome resemblance between partial birth abortion and infanticide.  And how can he wish to promote respect for unborn human life, as he writes, and yet continue to countenance the daily dismemberment of 4,000 unborn Americans, on the other.  He surely knows now, if he did not before, that unborn babies "assume … the human form" within a few weeks of conception.

The major media, which has never seen an abortion it didn't like, has warned that this Supreme Court decision signals the end of Roe v. Wade.  This is wild exaggeration.  But if Kennedy thinks through the logic of his arguments, they may be more right than they realize.  And he will surely be encouraged in his rethinking by the four staunchly pro-life members of the Supreme Court. 

If Kennedy does begin coming down more firmly on the side of Life, then this would indeed be something to rejoice about.  The Partial Birth Abortion Ban may have begun to put Roe v. Wade on a path to absolute extinction.

 

 

Steven Mosher is the President of PRI
Colin Mason is the Media Director at PRI.

 

 

 

 

PRI
P.O. Box 1559
Front Royal, VA 22630
USA

Phone: (540) 622-5240 Fax: (540) 622-2728

Email: colin@pop.org
Media Contact: Colin Mason
(540) 622-5240, ext. 209
_________
(c) 2005 Population Research Institute. Permission to reprint granted.
Redistribute widely. Credit required.

 

 

 

Many of you no-doubt will see yourselves in these!

You might be hardcore Catholic if...

-you've accidentally genuflected at a place other than church ex. the movie theatre, school auditorium

-you're sick of being asked why priests can't be married

-you have a "favorite" religious order

-you say the meal prayer no matter where you are

-you have a nativity set at your house during Christmas, and have also played with it.

-you've accidentally made the sign of the cross when leaving regular buildings

-whenever anyone says "JPII" in your head you think "We love you"

-you know that Father Stan could take on Eminem any day

-You know at least five people named Mary

-You want to name one of your sons John Paul

-you have a Mary statue in your front yard.

-You can name off all the Joyful, Glorious, Sorrowful, and Luminous mysteries.

-you consider your rosary to be your spiritual weapon

-You've memorized the St. Michael the Archangel prayer and recite it when you feel tempted by sin

-one or more of your friends entered the seminary or the convent

God bless you!                                                                                                                                       Phil Lawson                                                                                                            For the latest info on St. Peter's, check out the parish website:   www.saintpetercatholic.com                                                                                 (You can also find old editions of the Areopagus here)

The Areopagus is a regular email for adults that includes various reflections, tidbits, news and events.  Hope you find it fruitful!

 If you would like to be added to this list, send an email to lawsphil@gmail.com

On the other hand, if you would like to be removed, send an email to the same address indicating that.

SUBSCRIBE TO THE AREOPAGUS!

Email Address: