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Does consecrated life trump marriage? Can the married change their minds?
By Dr. Jeff Mirus ( bio – articles – email ) | Feb 11, 2020 In the wake of unusual vocations of married persons to the consecrated life, there is always speculation about the superiority of a consecrated single vocation, as compared with marriage, or of virginity over marriage generally. Some have gone so far as to argue that the “higher” calling to a form of consecrated life justifies breaking up a sacramental marriage to accommodate a “new vocation” of either the husband or the wife. This question was raised again last month after I explored the strange vocation of the Servant of God Rose Hawthorne, who set aside her husband’s will, with ecclesiastical permission, in order to undertake a special service to the poor who were suffering from cancer (Ecclesiastical judgment: Sain...
Abortionist Ulrich Klopfer’s 2,411 murdered babies buried in Indiana…
(Pixabay) Yesterday in South Bend, Ind., the state interred the remains of 2,411 fetuses whose bodies were found in the Illinois home of former abortionist Ulrich George Klopfer after he died last fall. “Today, we finally memorialize the 2,411 unborn babies whose remains were senselessly hoarded by Dr. Ulrich Klopfer after he performed the abortions from 2000 to 2003,” said Indiana attorney general Curtis Hill at the gravesite in Southlawn Cemetery. “These babies deserved better than a cold, dark garage or the trunk of a car.” Advertisement Advertisement Klopfer had performed abortions for nearly four decades in northern Indiana, primarily in South Bend, Ind., but also in nearby Fort Wayne and Gary. In 2016, his medical license was suspended after he was found to have broken laws requiring...
An amusing look at familial love in a TV commercial…
The commercial below shows a glimpse of the special kind of love that we call familial love. The Greeks called it storge (στοργή), and the Romans called it pietas. Both words refer to familial love, the natural or instinctual affection between parent and child. Michelangelo’s “Pieta,” depicting Mary cradling the dead body of Jesus with tenderness and sorrow, demonstrates beautifully the meaning of pietas. Familial love has some unique qualities. For example, we don’t choose our family; we are born into it. We can choose friends, and for the most part we select them because they are agreeable to us. Not always so within the family! And when couples marry, although they establish their own nuclear family, each brings to the marriage his or her own family and extended family. Because we ...
In this Sunday’s readings, Our Lord tells us to face up to the full demands of God’s moral law — no excuses…
The “Hippie” Jesus is one of the common misunderstandings of Christ that are circulating in popular culture. People think of Jesus as a laid back guru who traveled around Israel in this Volkswagen Vanagon, accompanied by twelve dudes in tie-died T-shirts. Jesus taught that all we need is Love, and not to be so uptight, like all those rule-bound priests and scribes. Of course, that view of Jesus is wrong. People adopt it, however, because they misunderstand the nature of Jesus’ conflict with the priests, scribes, and Pharisees that dominated Jewish religious practice in his day. Because Jesus criticizes them for the way they practice the law, people get the impression that Jesus was against law in general. But that’s sadly wrong. Jesus’ criticisms were le...
Pope Francis speaks about financial reforms to Vatican tribunal…
Vatican City, Feb 15, 2020 / 05:24 am (CNA).- As the Holy See awaits the results of a scheduled financial inspection, Pope Francis spoke about ongoing financial reform and investigations at the opening of the judicial year of the Vatican City State’s court, which he attended for the first time. He said Feb. 15 the Holy See is trying to conform to international law and has put in place processes to combat “illegality in the international finance sector.” To do this, the Vatican has put in place internal surveillance and intervention systems, which “have recently brought to light suspicious financial situations,” he stated. Situations, which, he continued, “beyond any possible illegality, are difficult to reconcile with the nature and purposes of the Church, and which have generated disorien...
This Sunday, a love you can’t fake…
By Tom Hoopes, February 13, 2020 In This Sunday’s Gospel, the Sixth Sunday of Ordinary Time Year A, Jesus continues the Sermon on the Mount and demands that his followers not just behave well, but change who we are on the inside, as well. There is a big difference. We are used to being able to fake our life. We know what we need to do to get by in nearly every situation: at work, at home, with our friends, with our enemies, in church and at prayer. We are not so good at interior change. Given what Jesus sets as a standard, we Christians have a huge problem on our hands. “You have heard that it was said to your ancestors, You shall not kill,” he says. “But I say to you, whoever is angry with his brother will be liable to judgement.” He adds: “and whoever says, ‘You fool,’ will be liabl...
A leak from the Medjugorje study commission…
David Murgia, a religion journalist who has produced a number of projects for national television networks in Italy, and who is also a supporter of the alleged apparitions at Medjugorje, writes on his blog Il Segno di Giona (“The Sign of Jonah”) that he has come into the possession of a copy of the Ruini commission report. In this post I’ll present a draft English translation of his excerpts from the report. This study group was launched under Pope Benedict XVI in 2010 and led by Camillo Cardinal Ruini, the former head of the vicariate of Rome. It spent four years gathering information on the case and forwarded its result, a thirty-page document, to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Pope Francis praised the group for its work and some leaks appeared about its conclusions, but...
Australian High Court sets March 11-12 date for Cardinal Pell’s final appeal…
A date has been set for the final appeal of disgraced cardinal George Pell, who remains behind bars for historical child sex abuse offences committed in the 1990s. The High Court has listed a two-day hearing before the full bench on March 11 and 12. In the video above, George Pell’s request for special leave to the High Court explained Lawyers for Pell, 78, sought special leave to the High Court late last year, after Australia’s most senior Catholic was convicted on five charges relating to the sexual assault of two choirboys in St Patrick’s Cathedral while he was Archbishop of Melbourne in 1996. He is serving a six-year jail term with a non-parole period of three years and eight months. Cardinal George Pell leaves the Supreme Court of Victoria in June 2019, during the hearing of his appea...
Cardinal Zen: Chinese Communists want Rome’s “complete surrender,” and Cardinal Parolin is prepared to give it …
Emeritus Hong Kong Cardinal Joseph Zen Ke-kiun, 88, has taken his battle with the Vatican over its controversial September 2018 deal with the Chinese Communist Party on the appointment of bishops to the US Congress, declaring that Beijing wants “total surrender” from the Holy See over the running of the Catholic Church in China. The surprise move comes amid continued unrest in Hong Kong over the city’s pro-Beijing government, with critics seeing its slow response and poor management of the coronavirus epidemic, now given the official name COVID-19, coming on the back of eight months of street protests over the encroachment of Chinese authorities on the special administrative region. Born and raised in Shanghai, Cardinal Zen has been a central figure in all levels of protests against Beijin...
8 questions (and answers) about the Pope’s new document…
Pope Francis celebrated the closing Mass of the Synod of Bishops for the Pan-Amazon region, in St. Peter’s Basilica, Oct. 27, 2019. (Daniel Ibáñez/CNA) This would have been the most likely time of his pontificate for Pope Francis to endorse viri probati, women deacons or an Amazonian rite — yet he declined to do so. On Feb. 12, Pope Francis released a document responding to the October 2019 Synod of Bishops on the Amazon. The document has been expected for several months and has been the subject of intense speculation on several controversial topics. These included proposals to ordain married men to the priesthood, to ordain women to the permanent diaconate, and to create a special Amazonian rite with its own form of liturgy. Pope Francis did not accept any of these proposals. Here a...
The man who knew his faith: The Catholicism of Alfred Hitchcock…
British film director Alfred Hitchcock stands next to an old cinematograph (film camera) at the Cinémathèque Française in Paris, France, on May 28, 1960. (AFP via Getty Images) Alfred Hitchcock Hitchcock was born and raised a Catholic and remained a practicing Catholic all his life. Alfred Hitchcock died 40 years ago on April 29, 1980. It is also 100 years since he started working in the film industry in 1920. Hitchcock’s career and life had began in the reign of Queen Victoria and ended in the presidency of Jimmy Carter, moving from London to Hollywood, from a title designer on silent movies to becoming one of the world’s most famous directors. The first movie he directed was the silent Number 13 (1922); his last was the much noisier Family Plot (1976). After his death, the portrait paint...
Francis’ silence, Ratzinger’s tears, and that never-published statement of his…
> Italiano> English> Español> Français > All the articles of Settimo Cielo in English * What is most striking in the post-synodal apostolic exhortation “Querida Amazonia,” made public today, February 12 2020, is its total silence on the most anticipated and controversial issue: the ordination of married men. Not even the word “celibacy” appears in it. Pope Francis desires “to configure ministry in such a way that it is at the service of a more frequent celebration of the Eucharist, even in the remotest and most isolated communities” (no. 86). But he reiterates (no. 88) that only the ordained priest can celebrate the Eucharist, absolve from sins and administer the anointing of the sick (because it too is “intimately linked to the forgiveness of sins,” footnote 129). And it sa...
