“Dear Congressman Kennedy:”

Dear Congressman Kennedy:

“The fact that I disagree with the hierarchy on some issues does not make me any less of a Catholic.” (Congressman Patrick Kennedy) Since our recent correspondence has been rather public, I hope you don’t mind if I share a few reflections about your practice of the faith in this public forum. I usually wouldn’t do that – that is speak about someone’s faith in a public setting – but in our well-documented exchange of letters about health care and abortion, it has emerged as an issue. I also share these words publicly with the thought that they might be instructive to other Catholics, including those in prominent positions of leadership.

For the moment I’d like to set aside the discussion of health care reform, as important and relevant as it is, and focus on one statement contained in your letter of October 29, 2009, in which you write, “The fact that I disagree with the hierarchy on some issues does not make me any less of a Catholic.” That sentence certainly caught my attention and deserves a public response, lest it go unchallenged and lead others to believe it’s true. And it raises an important question: What does it mean to be a Catholic?

“The fact that I disagree with the hierarchy on some issues does not make me any less of a Catholic.” Well, in fact, Congressman, in a way it does. Although I wouldn’t choose those particular words, when someone rejects the teachings of the Church, especially on a grave matter, a life-and-death issue like abortion, it certainly does diminish their ecclesial communion, their unity with the Church. This principle is based on the Sacred Scripture and Tradition of the Church and is made more explicit in recent documents.

For example, the “Code of Canon Law” says, “Lay persons are bound by an obligation and possess the right to acquire a knowledge of Christian doctrine adapted to their capacity and condition so that they can live in accord with that doctrine.” (Canon 229, #1)

The “Catechism of the Catholic Church” says this: “Mindful of Christ’s words to his apostles, ‘He who hears you, hears me,’ the faithful receive with docility the teaching and directives that their pastors give them in different forms.” (#87)

Or consider this statement of the Church: “It would be a mistake to confuse the proper autonomy exercised by Catholics in political life with the claim of a principle that prescinds from the moral and social teaching of the Church.” (Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, 2002)

There’s lots of canonical and theological verbiage there, Congressman, but what it means is that if you don’t accept the teachings of the Church your communion with the Church is flawed, or in your own words, makes you “less of a Catholic.”

But let’s get down to a more practical question; let’s approach it this way: What does it mean, really, to be a Catholic? After all, being a Catholic has to mean something, right?

Read all of BISHOP THOMAS J. TOBIN’S letter to Rep. Kennedy here

New site hopes to reform the CCHD (Catholic Campaign for Human Development)

Reforming the Catholic Campaign for Human Development

Every year on the Sunday before Thanksgiving , many Catholic parishes take up a second collection for the Catholic Campaign for Human Development (CCHD).

Recognize that organization? If you don’t, you should. Here’s why:

Until 2008, CCHD had been funding ACORN for several years, giving over $7 million to the corrupt organization. The same organization that is being investigated for voter fraud, embezzlement, and other wrongdoing was recently caught in undercover videos in recent months helping a pimp and prostitute set up a business and traffic underage girls for prostitution.

It doesn’t end there. CCHD has funded groups that openly oppose the Church’s teachings, including:

· Young Workers United – supports abortion rights, legalized prostitution and gay marriage.

· The Chinese Progressive Association (San Francisco) – supports abortion rights and gay marriage, actively urging its members to vote against Prop 8 in California, which would define marriage as between a man and a woman.

· People Improving Communities through Organizing (PICO) – currently campaigning for the a version of healthcare reform, which has government-funding of abortion and does not protect the conscience rights of medical professionals who decline to perform or refer for abortions.

Learn more from the Bellarmine Veritas Ministry’s exposition of CCHD-funded groups. For more information and for the CCHD’s response to these charges, click here.

The CCHD has not directly funded abortion, or any explicitly anti-Catholic project to our knowledge. It has also funded groups which legitimately serve and represent the poor and marginalized.

But it is hard to believe repeated assurances that the CCHD always carefully vets its grantees given both its history and its continued funding of groups which openly oppose the Catholic Church’s teachings on social justice, family and life issues. This must stop.

Do you want your money going to the CCHD on November 22^nd?

It’s time that we sent the CCHD a message.

Will you join us?

This year, instead of cash or a check, download and print out this coupon and put it in the November 22nd annual CCHD special collection at your parish. The coupon explains that your financial support will resume once the CCHD demonstrates that it will work only directly support groups that are in agreement with Catholic teaching on social, family and life issues.

Sign up to receive updates on this campaign on the form in the upper right corner of this page, get informed about the history of the CCHD scandal, find out about groups that are serving and representing the poor in an authentically Christian way, and spread the word to all faithful Catholics that we will no longer subsidize groups which do not support Catholic teaching on social justice, family and life issues.

Christians: Can a son be his own father?

Q: Christians: Can a son be his own father?

Jesus is son of God, and he is God. How can father and son be the same person?

A: God the Father is of an eternal, unique, uncreated, godly “essence”.

God the Son is eternally begotten of this same essence.

God the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son, and is also of the same godly essence.

Each person of the Godhead is a divine and distinct person, yet all three together constitute the one, true, God.

The Father is distinctive from the Son and the Son from the Father and the Holy Spirit, yet all are of the same godly essence, so all constitute the one God.

Mathematically: 1 X 1 X 1 = 1.

Jesus also took on flesh and became man, in order to redeem the world from sin. This merely added a human body and soul to his unique godly identity.

So … Jesus and the Father are NOT the same person. They (along with the Holy Spirit) are equally God, but are also distinctive,unique, rational persons, in their own right.

Catholic Bishops Played Key Role in Anti-Abortion Amendment

“We think that providing healthcare is itself a pro-life thing, and we think that, by and large, providing better health coverage to women could reduce abortions,” said Richard M. Doerflinger, a spokesman for the anti-abortion division of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.

“But we don’t make these decisions statistically, and to get to that good we cannot do something seriously evil.”

Read the article

More …

The Fifteen Promises Of Our Lady

+The Fifteen Promises Of Our Lady+

(Promises transmitted to Saint Dominic and to Blessed Alan)
Imprimatur Patrick J. Hayes D.D. Archbishop of New York

1 Those that faithfully serve me through praying the Holy Rosary will receive special graces.

2 I promise special protection and the most remarkable thanks, to all those that pray the Holy Rosary.

3 The Rosary will be the most powerful defense against the forces of the evil spirit. Vice will be destroyed; sin will be diminished; and all heresy will be defeated.

4 Through the prayer of the Holy Rosary, the virtues will blossom, and the good acts. The souls will obtain plenty of mercies. The hearts will keep apart from the wordly affairs and its vanities; and souls will be elevated to wish the eternal goods. Let´s hope that the souls will make the purpose of becoming closer to God through this way.

5 The soul that recommends to me through the prayer of the Holy Rosary, will never perish.

6 The soul that prays the Rosary with devotion trying hard to meditate the Holy Mysteries, will not be defeated by bad fortune. In His Holy judgement, God will not punish him. He will not suffer unexpected death. And if he is just, he will remain in the grace of God; and he will be worthy of eternal life.

7 The soul that keeps a true Devotion to the Rosary, won´t die without the Sacraments of the Church.

8 Those who pray the Holy Rosary faithfully, will have in life and death, the Light of God; and the plenitude of His grace. At the time of death, they will participate of the merits of the Holy in Paradise.

9 I will relieve from Purgatory all those who have had the habit of praying the Holy Rosary.

10 All those who remain as faithful sons of the Holy Rosary, will deserve a high grade of glory in Heaven.

11 You will obtain all you ask me through the praying of the Holy Rosary.

12 All those who propagate the Holy Rosary will receive my help in their needs.

13 For all the devotees of the Holy Rosary, I have obtained from my Holy Son, the intercession of all the celestial Court, through their lives and at the time of death.

14 All those who pray the Rosary are my children,and brothers of my unique son, Jesus Christ.

15 The devotion to the Holy Rosary is a sign of predestination.

http://www.ecatholic2000.com/index2.html

submitted by Don H.

Planned Parenthood Director Who Resigned Shares Story on National Television

On Saturday’s Huckabee show on FNC, host Mike Huckabee interviewed the former executive director of a Planned Parenthood clinic in Bryan Texas, Abby Johnson, who became a pro-life activist after witnessing an ultrasound of an abortion while she assisted in a procedure.

She charged that the abortion provider tries to “increase the number of abortions they do” for the purpose of making money, and described the emotional experience of watching an unborn baby at 13 weeks pregnancy “trying to get away” as its life was being ended. Video of the interview can be found here.

Johnson: “I saw the probe going into the woman’s uterus. And at that moment, I saw the baby moving and trying to get away from the probe. … And I thought, ‘It’s fighting for its life.’ And I thought, ‘It’s life, I mean, it’s alive.’”

Read the article

New age deception

Moira Noonan had been immersed in the New Age movement and its practices for 25 years before a remnant of truth from her Catholic school days made her take a second look at her life.

“I said, ‘Thank you, Sacred Heart nuns from second grade,’” recalled Noonan, author of Ransomed from Darkness: The New Age, Christian Faith and the Battle for Souls. “I had some shred of faith left after being completely brainwashed by the New Age mindset.”

Spiritual fraud

Noonan’s foray into the New Age began in earnest when she sought treatment at a hypnosis clinic after an auto accident. It ended when she was told that the Blessed Virgin Mary was the “heaven goddess” who had come down to meet the “mother earth goddess.”

“My reaction was: There’s no way,” Noonan said, adding that she knew Mary was not a goddess. If this was a lie, she thought, “What else have I been taught that’s a lie?”

She started questioning everything she had embraced — religious science, hypnotherapy, clairvoyance, spiritual channeling, Reiki, crystals and more — and soon rejected it all before returning to the Catholic faith.

Since then, Noonan has been on a mission to warn Catholics about the dangers of dabbling in the New Age. Even a little New Age practice mixed with Catholicism can affect one’s attitude toward the faith, she said, leading to a superstitious rather than a sacramental life.

Others similarly concerned about the impact of the New Age agree that Catholics need to be wary, especially in today’s culture.

Read the article

Vatican Issues Official Press Release and Apostolic Constitution on New Anglican Initiative

“On October 20, 2009, Cardinal William Levada, Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, announced a new provision responding to the many requests that have been submitted to the Holy See from groups of Anglican clergy and faithful in different parts of the world who wish to enter into full visible communion with the Catholic Church.

“The Apostolic Constitution Anglicanorum coetibus which is published today introduces a canonical structure that provides for such corporate reunion by establishing Personal Ordinariates, which will allow the above mentioned groups to enter full communion with the Catholic Church while preserving elements of the distinctive Anglican spiritual and liturgical patrimony. At the same time, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith is publishing a set of Complementary Norms which will guide the implementation of this provision.

“This Apostolic Constitution opens a new avenue for the promotion of Christian unity while, at the same time, granting legitimate diversity in the expression of our common faith. It represents not an initiative on the part of the Holy See, but a generous response from the Holy Father to the legitimate aspirations of these Anglican groups. The provision of this new structure is consistent with the commitment to ecumenical dialogue, which continues to be a priority for the Catholic Church.

The possibility envisioned by the Apostolic Constitution for some married clergy within the Personal Ordinariates does not signify any change in the Church’s discipline of clerical celibacy. According to the Second Vatican Council, priestly celibacy is a sign and a stimulus for pastoral charity and radiantly proclaims the reign of God (Cf. Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1579).

Here is a link to the Holy See’s official complete text of the Constitution, which is also included here below: http://212.77.1.245/news_services/bulletin/news/24626.php?index=24626〈=en#APOSTOLIC%20CONSTITUTION%20ANGLICANORUM%20COETIBUS

If the bible didn’t exist, would Christians have a hard time finding an answer every time we asked why?

Q: If the bible didn’t exist, would Christians have a hard time finding an answer every time we asked why?

A: The Catholic Church existed and thrived for some 400 years before the Bible was first published, existing solely on what was faithfully handed down by the apostles and their duly ordained successors, according to the Great Commission that was received personally, from Jesus Christ, and according to the continuing inspiration of the Holy Spirit.

There would be no Bible if it wasn’t for the Catholic Church.

Today, we have three witnesses that serve to determine the divine truths of the authentic Christian faith:

1) The teachings of the Catholic Church, which have been faithfully handed down, illuminated by the bishops, who are the successors of the original apostles, and who constitute the authentic teaching office of the Church, known as the Magisterium.

http://www.scborromeo.org/ccc.htm

2) The Bible

http://www.usccb.org/nab/bible/index.shtml

3) Tradition … the means by which the Holy Spirit guides the authentic Church, from age to age.

http://www.vatican.va/phome_en.htm

All three of the above must agree. One or two are simply not enough. And once an article of faith has been clearly defined in this way, it can never be denied or set aside.

Is everyone who submits to God’s will a Muslim?

Q:  If Muslims are called to be submissive to God’s will, does that mean that everyone who willingly submits to God’s will is actually a Muslim?

A: The key question should be: By what means can one actually discover and correctly discern the authentic will of God?

Muslims claim that God revealed himself to Mohamed. Hence, Muslims base their understanding of God’s will essentially on their particular interpretations of Mohamed’s Quran.

Jews claim that God revealed himself to them through Abraham, Moses, and other prophets, many of whom the Jews and Muslims revere in common, so the Jewish understanding of God’s will isn’t very far removed from that of the Muslims.

Muslim fundamental beliefs are codified in Sharia Law, which is very similar to what the Jews know as their own Mosaic Law (the Ten Commandments) along with several hundred related statutes and ordinances.

On the other hand, Christians take what was first basically revealed to the Jews and then build upon it, using the authentic teachings and personal revelations of Jesus Christ.

Jesus claimed to be the fulfillment of all the original scriptures … the Messiah … the promised savior of the world … making possible the reconciliation of mankind with God … just as God had originally promised … and Jesus died and rose again from the dead to prove that what he claimed was true.

While the Jews and Muslims know only the Old Testament God of wrath, Christians know a God of tender love and gracious forgiveness … resulting exclusively from the atoning work of Jesus Christ.

Anyone who adamantly remains mired in the past fails to get the complete message, and is likely to remain in fear and relative darkness, forever. That is hardly a position from which to properly discern the authentic will of God.

But thanks to Jesus Christ, who is (among other things) the light of the world, Christians know without a doubt that God loves us, that he wants us to know him, to love him, and to serve him, in this world and in the next, and that he (God) will provide everything necessary to make that possible … simply because he loves us … and that he’ll accomplish his will primarily through the good offices and sacraments of the only Church that Jesus Christ ever founded, for the purpose of our salvation.

So … since Muslims and Jews accept only the early, relatively obscure, and essentially incomplete portions of God’s divine revelation, they miss the most important and most fulfilling part of the message … redemption, peace, rest, and gracious pardon from God’s justifiable wrath.

Their world view remains skewed, and their discernment of God’s authentic will, fatally flawed.

Alternatively, faith in Jesus Christ, his teachings, and his Church, provides Christians with all the missing pieces of the puzzle, resulting in grace, rest, freedom from inordinate concerns about divine judgment and wrath, personal peace, and eternal life.

All of this should permit Christians (ideally, at least) to love God and to love their neighbor … which is indeed the express will of God, according to Jesus Christ … who ought to know, because he IS God … and he told us as much, as he went about preaching in first century Palestine … fulfilling all that had been written in the books of the Law, the Psalms, and the Prophets.

Pro Life Victory: Stupak-Pitts Amendment Passes 240 to 194

The U.S. House of Representatives approved the Stupak-Pitts Amendment to H.R. 3962, by a vote of 240 to 194, with 64 Democratic members voting in favor of the amendment to ban federal funding of abortion in the health care bill.

Related link

Abortion doctor admits on video that he kills babies for a living.

Watch the video

Catholic Priest/Chaplain describes chaos and grace in aftermath of Fort Hood shootings

By Mark Pattison Catholic News Service

WASHINGTON (CNS) — Two months into his new posting as an on-call chaplain at the United States’ largest Army base, Father Ed McCabe had the longest day of his military chaplaincy.

Father McCabe was 10 minutes into a weekly chaplain staff meeting at Fort Hood when the clergy got word of the shooting spree taking place at the base.

“We ended the staff meeting and came to the hospital and that’s where we stayed,” Father McCabe said, “because that’s where the wounded were. And then I went over to the crime scene to comfort the people who were there.”

Of the 13 who died in the shooting, Father McCabe said he anointed 11.

Read the article

Priest’s new book challenges men to learn ‘true manhood’ by following Christ

San Francisco, Calif., Nov 6, 2009 / 06:17 am, excerpt, (CNA)

“Jesus Christ Himself reveals to us what it is to be a man,” Fr. Richards said. “It is about taking the one life that God has given us and give it away. When men are invited to die for others, they put others’ needs above their own. To be like Christ, and like all great men, will cost men their very lives.”

“There is a difference in the way men and women were created,” he remarked. “Men are not called to be women and vice versa. We are different – not better, but different – and men are called to be fully men. This needs to be dealt with up front because it’s a problem – in the Catholic Church and in the world itself.”

Link: “Be A Man: Become the Man God Created You to Be.”

Tom Roeser on the Dan McCormack priestly abuse case

There was entirely too much rush from civil and moral judgment to protect those archdiocesan and seminary officials from their responsibility for McCormack in my view.

The whole thing was outrageous. Everyone… everyone… associated with this scandal has been promoted in one way or another-including the seminary rector who told the Sun-Times after the scandals rocked the Church that he, the rector, would ordain McCormack again. AGAIN!

Outrageous! The entire case wreaks with purposeful ineptitude… the seminary records of McCormack having “disappeared”… the rector being promoted auxiliary bishop of Chicago, promoted again to bishop of Tucson, promoted yet again to number two in the leadership of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.

If that isn’t rewarding a person who… having expressed little remorse for his culpable toleration of clerical perversity isn’t disgusting… serving as a gift for malfeasance of duty… I don’t know what is.

Read more at TomRoeser.com

Three indications of Satan’s presence in the world: money, lies and war.

Jesus ultimately defeated Satan through his death and Resurrection and then sent the power of the Holy Spirit to his Apostles at Pentecost.

“When God looks down, he sees Jesus in you,” Mgr Esseff said. “You have that power as baptised, confirmed Christians. And so when he [Satan] sees you, he hates what you would discover about that power that is within you.”

He suggested that each audience member had been tempted that day because temptation was the ordinary activity of the devil.

“Your soul is a battlefield because there is also someone who hates you,” he said. “That one is the devil. The devil knows who you are and what you have. God passed him by. God did not choose to become one of the angels. God chose to be one like us.”

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Musings of an Episcopal Convert to Catholicism

Katherine Jefferts Schorri, leader of the Episcopal Church in America, has called the concept of personal salvation a “western heresy.” Staying in such an ecclesial body is outside my comfort zone.

So, it was worth living through a little bad taste. Even at its tackiest, the Catholic Church has not rejected the Founder. It’s good I found a new home, because my old one no longer exists. It brings me great joy that Pope Benedict XVI is welcoming Anglicans into the Church. Think of it as outreach to the homeless.

Read the whole article

George Weigel on Nancy Pelosi and conscience

The period between Halloween and Christmas will likely tell the tale on health-care reform. The moment to act is now. It will be a dark day in the history of Catholicism in America if the Speaker of the House of Representatives, an “ardently” Catholic woman formed by 16 years of Catholic education, willfully blocks an open vote by the people’s duly elected representatives on federal funding of abortion. Write your member of Congress, urging him or her to support a rule allowing an open, clean, up-or-down vote on the Stupak-Pitts amendment. Write Speaker Pelosi, urging her to let her House colleagues vote their consciences on this grave matter.

Read the article

Victory for traditional marriage in Maine

By a 53%-47% margin, Maine voters have repealed a measure that would have legalized homosexual marriage in the state– even though, in the words of the Associated Press, “the stars seemed aligned for supporters of gay marriage. They had Maine’s governor, legislative leaders and major newspapers on their side, plus a huge edge in campaign funding.”

Bishop Richard Malone of Portland has been an active supporter of traditional marriage, ordering a collection in all parishes on behalf of the effort. The shepherd of the state’s sole diocese noted in a recent referendum alert:

Please let your conscience be formed by these clear and authoritative words of Pope Benedict XVI (Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger): “In those situations where homosexual unions … have been given the legal status and rights belonging to marriage, clear and emphatic opposition is a duty.”

A Catholic whose conscience has been properly formed by Scripture and the teachings of the Catholic Church cannot support same sex marriage. Please vote YES on question 1.

Link to CatholicCulture.org

Pope Benedict XVI on faith, error

“Faith itself is endowed with inner certainty, strengthened by the testimony of the saints and the inspiration of the Holy Spirit in the hearts of believers, and in case of doubt, by the exercise of the Magisterium of the Church.”

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Editor’s note: Let’s not forget that faith is a virtue … and without God’s grace … which comes from God the Father, through the power of the Holy Spirit, according to the salvific work of Jesus Christ, because God loves us … faith in the one, true God … would be absolutely impossible.

Matthew 11:27 All things are delivered to me by my Father. And no one knoweth the Son but the Father: neither doth any one know the Father, but the Son, and he to whom it shall please the Son to reveal him.

John 6:44 No man can come to me, except the Father, who hath sent me, draw him. And I will raise him up in the last day.

John 6:65 And he said: Therefore did I say to you that no man can come to me, unless it be given him by my Father.

Acts 11:17 If then God gave them the same grace as to us also who believed in the Lord Jesus Christ: who was I, that could withstand God?

European court rules against crucifixes in Italian school rooms

Rome – Italians reacted with outrage on Tuesday after a European court ruled that displaying crucifixes in the country’s schools violated the principle of secular education.

Italy’s education minister condemned the judgment by the European Court of Human Rights, saying that the Christian cross was a symbol of the country’s Roman Catholic religion and cultural identity.

Mariastella Gelmini, a member of the conservative government of Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, argued that “no one, and certainly not an ideological European court, will succeed in erasing our identity,” said

Other ministers said they were appalled by the ruling, calling it “absurd,” “shameful” and “offensive.”

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