Obama administration restored funding for forced abortions in China, elsewhere.

We are helping finance the infrastructure used in coercive family planning in China. The international community funds UNFPA (United Nations Family Planning Fund), as well as IPPF (International Planned Parenthood Federation), and Marie Stopes International. These organizations are operative “abortion providers” in China.

In 2001, the US cut funding to UNFPA because an investigation, headed by then Secretary of State Colin Powell, found that UNFPA was complicit in the coercive implementation of China’s One Child Policy. In 2008, the US State Department reaffirmed that determination, and yet we restored funding in 2009. UNFPA is also funded by many other nations.

In addition, the IPPF and Marie Stopes are working hand in hand with the Chinese Communist population control machine, which has been notorious in its excesses. The IPPF website openly declares, “The China Family Planning Association (CFPA) plays a very important role in China’s family planning programme. It supports the present family planning policy of the government.” Meanwhile, the website for Marie Stopes International, lists as “major partners” the Family Planning Commissions of several provinces in China.

Just last week, US citizens voted to cut UNFPA funding under the new YOUCUT program (majorityleader.gov/YouCut/P2_W1.htm). Because of this vote, Rep. Renee Ellmers will introduce legislation to cut UNFPA, saving $400 million over the next ten years. The bill still needs to pass through committee and be passed by the House to become effective, so you still have time to contact your representative about it. 

Read more

Tom Roeser Funeral Details

Visitation will be Friday, 4 to 9 p.m. at Nelson Funeral Home, 820 Talcott Road, Park Ridge. A funeral will be at 11 a.m. on Saturday at St. John Cantius Church, 825 N. Carpenter St. in Chicago followed by burial at Interment All Saints Cemetery, 700 N. River Road in Des Plaines.

Link

Abortion is almost always elective surgery, so why would anyone expect it to be covered under medical plans?

As for regulations with states who are suspending private insurers from abortion, again, I have to point out that private insurance limits many types of elective surgery.

A prime example is surgery some undergo for obesity. Although obesity is a health risk, many policies will not cover this type of surgery or, if they do, there have to be certain defined parameters met. Just anyone who wants to lose a significant amount of weight cannot run in and get obesity surgery. That’s normal medicine that the abortion industry has somehow managed to evade.

Abortion is elective surgery.

So is a face lift, collagen injection, and a whole lot of other things private insurance restricts. I don’t want to pay more money for my insurance so you can have stuff you don’t need. Are you kidding me? Have you seen insurance rates in this nation lately? They more they cover the more we all pay. Even people who don’t embrace pro-life standards complain about paying what they do for health care.

Read more

Big abortion shake up in UK as Helpers of God’s Precious Infants and 40 Days for Life begin European operations.

In Maidstone, police arrived to tell the group to remain on the other side of the street from the clinic. While two of the protesters engaged in an animated conversation with the officers, denying they were obstructing or harassing clients, a car with two women who had left the clinic accelerated at high speed and veered precariously close to the protest before driving on.

Reilly appeared unmoved by the suggestion he and his supporters were upsetting women already in the midst of a difficult personal experience.

“If you are upset because you are about to kill your child, because someone is outside praying, well thanks be to God that they are upset because maybe they will change their mind, keep their child and thank us later,” he told the Guardian.

Backing him are three bishops from the British Catholic hierarchy who have endorsed the vigils carried out by the Helpers of God’s Previous Infants, including Thomas McMahon, the bishop of Brentwood.

Read more

Editor’s note: God bless these guys. They have guts.

Cause of Schism: “those who assert that Vatican II founded a new Church with a new theology and new sacraments.”

Rorate Caeli has posted an English translation of a Die Welt interview by Paul Badde with Martin Mosebach, author of the seminal lay apology for the traditional Mass, The Heresy of Formlessness.  Mosebach, with his usual insight and ability to get to the crux of an issue quickly, discusses the new instruction on the Extraordinary Form, Universae Ecclesiae.

Link

Beneath Jerusalem, an underground city takes shape

Archaeological digs under the disputed Old City are a matter of immense sensitivity. For Israel, the tunnels are proof of the depth of Jewish roots here, and this has made the tunnels one of Jerusalem’s main tourist draws: The number of visitors, mostly Jews and Christians, has risen dramatically in recent years to more than a million visitors in 2010.

But many Palestinians, who reject Israel’s sovereignty in the city, see them as a threat to their own claims to Jerusalem. And some critics say they put an exaggerated focus on Jewish history.

Read more

Sanchez: There is nothing wrong with God, with the presence of faith. It is humans, including some of the highest authority figures, who are failing the Catholic Church.

Re: Recent events in Kansas City

The diocese can make any number of new policies and procedures. It probably will, with the best of intentions. But unless the attitudes of the people expected to abide by such policies are altered, nothing will truly change.

Read more

Tom Roeser, Catholic, dead at 82

by Doug Lawrence

I never met Tom Roeser, but through his extensive writings and his long, Chicago broadcast radio career, I felt like I did.

Tom was a Catholic, a Republican, a conservative, a media personality, a family man, a scholar, and many other things.

I read all his daily blog posts and also listened to his radio show, whenever possible.

Tom Roeser 1928-2011

Tom contended with the rich and the powerful on his own terms, suitably enlightened by the traditional Catholic beliefs and practices that he learned and perfected, way back when, with the help of his beloved Rev. Fr. Ernie. Because of this, and his extensive business and government experience, Tom was a hard guy to fool.

Much like the late Archbishop Fulton Sheen, Tom always managed to deliver his insightful messages with style and grace … coupled with an appropriate dose of humor.

Tom was a great guy. We’ll miss him … a lot. I would also like to extend my sincere condolences to the entire Roeser family.

Eternal rest grant unto him, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon him. May Tom’s soul and all the souls of the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen. 

Chicago Tribune on the life and times of Thomas Roeser

The Chicago Sun-Times on the life and times of Thomas Roeser

Tom Roeser Funeral Details

Read some of Tom’s daily blog posts

The meaning of Memorial Day

Officially, Memorial Day, observed on the last Monday of May (this year it’s May 30), honors the war dead. Unofficially, the day honors the start of summer. (More on that in a moment.)

The upcoming three-day weekend has prompted searches on Yahoo! for “when is memorial day,” “what is memorial day,” and “memorial day history.” The day was originally known as “Decoration Day” because the day was dedicated to the Civil War dead, when mourners would decorate gravesites as a remembrance.

The holiday was first widely observed on May 30, 1868, when 5,000 people helped decorate the gravesites of 20,000 Union and Confederate soldiers buried at Arlington National Cemetery. (Some parts of the South still remember members of the Confederate Army with Confederate Memorial Day.)

After World War I, the observances were widened to honor the fallen from all American wars–and in 1971, Congress declared Memorial Day a national holiday.

Read more

Smith: “President Obama is the abortion president. If he gets in for four more years he’ll be untethered.”

“Look at the stand Obama took on the threat to withdraw funding for the International Planned Parenthood Federation from the U.S. budget,” Smith remarked. “He said, ‘I’ll shut down the government before I don’t fund Planned Parenthood.’ So his priorities couldn’t have been clearer. His priority will be to fund all pro-abortion, non-governmental organizations to the max.”

Read more

Malta: No more “Until death do us part.”

Largely Catholic nation was last EU member to not allow divorce but country votes for change in law through referendum.

Link

Editor’s note: See the Guardian’s reader comments for a sampling of rampant UK anti-Catholicism.

A Prayer Before A Test

Editor’s note: One of my sons recently completed a comprehensive (and exhaustive) series of tests in order to become a professional SCUBA instructor. I have no doubt that he was successful … at least in part … due to prayer.

Here’s one of the prayers I found at
The Catholic Community at Ithaca College

Prayer Before a Test

My God, enable me to trust in the good outcome
of the test I am about to take;
help me to contribute my own share
of optimism and confidence.
With your grace, my God,
I hope to crown my efforts with success.
Keep far from me at this moment
any presumption that it all depends
exclusively on me.
You are next to me, my God,
the necessary and welcome presence
in all the moments of my life.
I will take this test, my God,
because it is important
for my personal development.
My God, be the source of my inspiration
in my doubts and uncertainties,
supporting me with your blessing.

Amen.

(Some may prefer to insert “Lord Jesus”
in place of “My God”)

The True Presence of Jesus Christ in the Holy Eucharist – Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity.

The Council of Trent…
Convened on December 4, 1545 and closed on December 4, 1563.

About 25 years after the Protestant reformation, the Catholic Church convened the Council of Trent as a counter to the reformation, and for the refutation of the heresies created by it. Here are the decrees of this council regarding the True Presence of Jesus Christ in the Holy Eucharist…

The Thirteenth Session: Decreed on March 8, 1547.
ON THE MOST HOLY SACRAMENT OF THE EUCHARIST…
CANON I.-If any one denieth, that, in the sacrament of the most holy Eucharist, are contained truly, really, and substantially, the body and blood together with the soul and divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ, and consequently the whole Christ; but saith that He is only therein as in a sign, or in figure, or virtue; let him be anathema*.

* Anathema means, accursed, (let him be) cursed, excluded from the Kingdom of GOD, banned, or excommunicated. The phrase “Let him be Anathema”, is used many times in Church Council decrees, and in so doing, makes that statement in which it is contained an “Infallible Statement”.
See 1Chron 2:7, Judith 16:23, Isa 65:20, Rom 9:3, 1Cor 12:3,16:22, and especially Gal 1:8-9.

CANON II.-If any one saith, that, in the sacred and holy sacrament of the Eucharist, the substance of the bread and wine remains conjointly with the body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, and denieth that wonderful and singular conversion of the whole substance of the bread into the Body, and of the whole substance of the wine into the Blood-the species Only of the bread and wine remaining-which conversion indeed the Catholic Church most aptly calls Transubstantiation; let him be anathema.

CANON III.-If any one denieth, that, in the venerable sacrament of the Eucharist, the whole Christ is contained under each species, and under every part of each species, when separated; let him be anathema.

CANON IV.-If any one saith, that, after the consecration is completed, the body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ are not in the admirable sacrament of the Eucharist, but (are there) only during the use, whilst it is being taken, and not either before or after; and that, in the hosts, or consecrated particles, which are reserved or which remain after communion, the true Body of the Lord remaineth not; let him be anathema.

CANON V.-If any one saith, either that the principal fruit of the most holy Eucharist is the remission of sins, or, that other effects do not result therefrom; let him be anathema.

CANON VI.-If any one saith, that, in the holy sacrament of the Eucharist, Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, is not to be adored with the worship, even external of latria; and is, consequently, neither to be venerated with a special festive solemnity, nor to be solemnly borne about in processions, according to the laudable and universal rite and custom of holy church; or, is not to be proposed publicly to the people to be adored, and that the adorers thereof are idolators; let him be anathema.

CANON VII.-If any one saith, that it is not lawful for the sacred Eucharist to be reserved in the sacrarium, but that, immediately after consecration, it must necessarily be distributed amongst those present; or, that it is not lawful that it be carried with honour to the sick; let him be anathema.

CANON VIII.-If any one saith, that Christ, given in the Eucharist, is eaten spiritually only, and not also sacramentally and really; let him be anathema.

CANON IX.-If any one denieth, that all and each of Christ’s faithful of both sexes are bound, when they have attained to years of discretion, to communicate every year, at least at Easter, in accordance with the precept of holy Mother Church; let him be anathema.

CANON X.-If any one saith, that it is not lawful for the celebrating priest to communicate himself; let him be anathema.

CANON XI.-lf any one saith, that faith alone is a sufficient preparation for receiving the sacrament of the most holy Eucharist; let him be anathema. And for fear lest so great a sacrament may be received unworthily, and so unto death and condemnation, this holy Synod ordains and declares, that sacramental confession, when a confessor may be had, is of necessity to be made beforehand, by those whose conscience is burthened with mortal sin, how contrite even soever they may think themselves. But if any one shall presume to teach, preach, or obstinately to assert, or even in public disputation to defend the contrary, he shall be thereupon excommunicated.

Read more at The Catholic Treasure Chest

Cardinal George on God in Action

Chicago’s archbishop reflects on religion’s place in an increasingly secular society.

Link

Catholic clergy clash over home schooling

Although I wasn’t home-schooled, I fully support parents who are in a position to do so. Thus, I’m perplexed and disappointed in remarks made by Catholic author Father Peter M.J. Stravinskas in a recently-posted article on the website of Our Sunday Visitor.

Read more

Chilling, true story: The Night I Forgave My Daughter’s Killer.

We hoped this would be a once-in-a-lifetime family vacation — camping for a whole month in Montana. One night, at our first stop, our 7-year-old daughter Susie was kidnapped out of our tent. The tent was cut next to where her head had lain; she was pulled out and carried away.

Read more

“Your (Bible) hermeneutic has destroyed the faith of many and decimated the Church.”

Traditional Catholic apologist Robert Sungenis contends with a modernist priest on the best way to understand the true meaning of sacred scripture.

Link (PDF)

What … no Obamawicz?

During the president’s visit to Poland earlier today, I couldn’t help wondering if he would be sharing a kielbasa with some of his heretofore unknown, Polish relatives.

Alas, it was not to be. Maybe next trip!

Chicago’s Riccardo Muti: “When I go to church and I hear four strums of a guitar or choruses of senseless, insipid words, I think it’s an insult.”

ANSA) – Vatican City – Italian conductor Riccardo Muti is backing Pope Benedict XVI’s drive to discourage guitar ”sing-songs” from Catholic masses.

”I can’t work out how come once upon a time there were Mozart and Bach and now we have little sing-songs. This is a lack of respect for people’s intelligence”.

Read more

Alleged kiddie porn case in Kansas City. Priest attempts suicide. Bishop apologizes.

For the second time in a week, Bishop Robert Finn said Friday that he regretted not responding to warnings about a priest now accused of possessing child pornography.

Read more