Culture of death – Philadelphia abortionist kills babies born alive January 19, 2011
Posted by Tantumblogo in Abortion, Basics, disaster, General Catholic, sadness, sickness, Society.comments closed
It’s a short walk from killing babies in utero for some high sounding cause like “giving women control over their bodies,” to getting so inured to the butchery that murder seems OK:
A Philadelphia abortion doctor has been charged with eight counts of murder in the deaths of a woman patient and seven babies that prosecutors say were born alive and then killed with scissors…
District Attorney Seth Williams says state regulators ignored complaints and failed to visit the clinic since 1993.
Williams says the women were subjected to squalid and barbaric conditions at Gosnell’s Women’s Medical Society, which was shut down last year.
Gosnell has been named in at least 10 malpractice suits, including one over the death of a woman who died of sepsis and a perforated uterus.
Abortion is murder of a child. Most doctors do it not because they have some profound commitment to a twisted view of “women’s rights,” but because they like the huge money they can make for not much effort. Many abortion doctors can clear $20,000 working about 12 hours, and even more. When one becomes so inundated in this butchery, and so captive to the greed that drives it, it doesn’t take much for one to start crossing those illusory lines the law has drawn over what’s considered a “live baby” and what’s fair game in the uterus. This guy crossed it, and in the process killed a mom, probably inadvertantly. But I would tend to imagine this kind of illegal abortion operation, supposedly so “safe, legal and rare” (what a joke, most abortion mills are filthy, run down places), is far more common than we know. And I am certain that there are hundreds, possibly thousands of babies who survive the abortion procedure every year who are killed outside the womb. After all, it’s just a lump of cells at 8 months, right?
I agree totally with Fr. Z January 19, 2011
Posted by Tantumblogo in asshatery, disaster, foolishness, General Catholic, sickness, silliness, Society.comments closed
Denis Leary. What makes a person so angry, so full of hate, to do something like this? If he wants to be so “edgy” and “brave,” let’s see him give similar treatment to the followers of Mohammad. How about some ripping on marital rape in Islam, or female genital mutilation, or stoning? Instead, we get this:
On January 16, Comedy Central aired “Denis Leary & Friends Present Douchebags & Donuts.” On January 18, Comedy Central Home Entertainment and Paramount Home Entertainment released the DVD nationwide. The opening segment of this video is addressed by Bill Donohue today:The standup special opens with a clip of Pope Benedict XVI talking to a crowd. But there is a voice-over that is dubbed in to make it seem like he is discussing priestly sexual abuse.The clip of the pope has him screaming, “Heil Hitler,” proclaiming, “Oh yeah, I’m the f***ing pope, for Christ’s sake, the god**** Fuehrer.” The pope then introduces Leary as Father Denis Leary and he proceeds to mimic confession. Here are some of the lines:• “Bless me, Father, for I have sinned—yeah, pull down my pants and put your penis in”• “Thou shalt not kill and Thou shalt not lie, and don’t drop the soap when the pope is nearby. Cause they may hate gays but they do love the guys”• “Well, the nuns are goin’ down on other nuns, and the priests are chasin’ after altar boy buns, and the pope will move you when the damage is done”• “Jesus, Mary and Josephine, well this church is full of some giant queens, so break out the candles and the Vaseline”
Making time for God January 19, 2011
Posted by Tantumblogo in awesomeness, Basics, Dallas Diocese, General Catholic, North Deanery.comments closed
It’s a common refrain – you take time for the things you care about. Many Christians today, and Catholic in particular, tend to put God in a box that they take out on Sunday morning, and then put away when their weekly obligation is satisfied. And that’s the relatively ‘good’ crowd – a huge swath of Catholics can’t even be bothered to make their weekly obligation (which comes straight from the Ten Commandments) anymore. But for those who are trying to do a bit more, to live a more serious faith, the issue of time can become a big one as one tries to grow. We all have many obligations – spouse, kids, work, chores, community obligations, etc., that can cut the time we have, or think we have, for God, down to a minimum. It’s something I fight all the time – I’d like to spend time with the Blessed Sacrament, even reposed in the Tabernacle, far more than I do. In fact, I’m growing more and more to where what I’d like to do is to just spend all the time I can in prayer and contemplation, trying to draw closer to Him who is my all – or should be. When we were on pilgimage in Hanceville, that’s what I enjoyed most; just an intense period of focusing as much time and contemplation on God and His Church and the beauty of His Truth.
Michael Voris has some thoughts on that today, and how said it is that most Catholics don’t even spend an hour a week with the Lord. Do they not know that the Mass is the greatest miracle in the history of the world, where Heaven literally opens a bit and comes down and we receive the literal Body and Blood of our Lord? Repetition and familiarity, I guess, breed complacency, but it shouldn’t be. I pray that more priests, and we laity, will exhort our neighbors to spend more time in humble prayer and contemplation of what so many Saints called “My God and my all!”
Can one spend too much time on serving God directly in prayer, or Adoration, or reading, or just meditation? I suppose, for those of us with marital or other worldly vocations, but I find myself with desires to retreat like St. Catherine of Siena into a cell, or St. Anthony into the desert.
That’s why I’m so attracted to this idea of a little inner cell to retreat to throughout the day, where God resides inside us and we can commune with him at anytime. I thank Blessed Elizabeth of the Trinity for that insight.
New, major CCHD scandal January 19, 2011
Posted by Tantumblogo in Abortion, Basics, Dallas Diocese, General Catholic, North Deanery, sadness, scandals, sickness, Society.comments closed
Creative Minority Report and the National Catholic Register are reporting that Ralph McLoud, the head of the bishops troubling, Alinskyite social justice arm, the Catholic Campaign for Human Development, served as a campaign chair for a prominent pro-abort politician. So, while simultaneously leading the CCHD, which purports to help the poor through the “underpants gnome” theory (Step 1.left wing community organizing Step 2. Uhh……Step 3. Massive political power with the overthrowing of the running dog patriarchal capitalist oppressors!), he was also working to elect a candidate with views antithetical to the Doctrine of the Faith:
As you likely know, CCHD is the bishops’ anti-poverty program which funds community organizing and economic development projects and has been at the center of a number of controversies. Ralph McCloud was named head of the CCHD in November 2007. In his first year as head of the CCHD, according to public records, McCloud also worked as the Treasurer for Planned Parenthood endorsed Democrat Wendy Davis.
Why would the director of the CCHD, during his tenure as head of an ostensibly Catholic institution act as champion and treasurer of a campaign for a pro-abortion politician seeking to oust a pro-life politician? This is the textbook definition of scandal.
According to the United States Conference of Catholic Bishop’s website, “the CCHD fully upholds the Church’s teaching on the sanctity of human life from conception through natural death.” But acting as Treasurer for a pro-choice politician means that every single yard sign, every press release, every brochure or pamphlet of the Davis campaign had Ralph McCloud’s name on it. So in short, while heading up the CCHD, McCloud was very publicly working against the stated goals of the organization he oversaw.
Isn’t that a bit confusing to Catholics? Isn’t that in itself a scandal to the faithful?
The campaign he worked for (Wendy Davis, a democrat State Senator from Ft. Worth), defeated a pro-life politician and recieved hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations from such pro-abort groups as Annie’s List, Planned Parenthood, and ACORN. Planned Parenthood of North Texas was fined by the Texas Ethics Commission for illegal contributions to Davis’ campaign, of which CCHD’s own Ralph McLoud was treasurer. Shameful.
So, CCHD, that organization which claims to constantly uphold Catholic doctrine, but which seems in practice to have a very hard time doing so, had as its leader, its head man, the big guy, a man who played a top role in electing a very pro-abort democrat. I find it incredible that Bishop Morin, who oversees CCHD for the USCCB, and others in the conference can, with a straight face, intone about the evils of the Catholic blogosphere and how wrong groups like Ameican Life League and others (like me) are for calling CCHD to account for its repeated actions counter to the plain dogmas of the Church. Suffice it to say, it is apparent from the actions of the very leadership of CCHD that this is an organization that operates in a manner that is, at best, very difficult to reconcile with Catholic doctrine.
But none of this should come as a surprise. CCHD was created to be an institution that does nothing but “community organizing” (read as left wing agitation) on the Alinskyite model. It has been infused with leftist rhetoric from its inception, and it funds almost uniformly left wing (far, far FAR left) groups. To some in the Church, including the hierarchy, this is not a bug, it’s a feature, but, unfortunately, this feature is bound by design to run counter to the constant teaching of the Church. The Church’s moral doctrine, and the preferred politics of the left, are diametrically opposed, on issues ranging from abortion to contraception to gay marriage and, of course, including the great dream of the CCHD crowd, turning this country into a top down driven command economy of the socialist mode (I believe Rerum Novarum still holds a place in the Church’s Magisterial doctrine).
Some advocate for the ‘reform’ of CCHD. I say this reform is impossible, since the group’s entire purpose has been oriented towards far left activism from its inception. Unless by reform, they mean its total destruction and re-creation upon a totally different model. It was widely reported that CCHD narrowly escaped either being disbanded, or being totally re-created, at the last meeting of the USCCB. CCHD escaped this fate by promising, again, to completely change. We shall see, but this latest bit of recent history does not bode well for that very troubling organization.
A novel idea – help gays live celibate lives…. January 19, 2011
Posted by Tantumblogo in Basics, Dallas Diocese, General Catholic, North Deanery, Society.comments closed
……instead of embracing and confirming their sin. I wrote some time back about the problematic materials used at St. Elizabeth Seton in Plano in their “gay ministry.” Those materials stridently endorsed the gay lifestyle and gave tacit approval not only to gay sexual relations but even to gay co-habitation and marriage. This is not the way to help someone in a manner in consonance with the Faith, by confirming them in their sin. However, the Diocese of Colorado Springs has launched a program associated with Courage to help gays follow Church doctrine and lead celibate lives. This is a beautiful thing, and something I pray may take hold our own diocese:
The Catholic Diocese of Colorado Springs is borrowing a page from Alcoholics Anonymous by launching a 12-step program that offers pastoral care and support for homosexuals.“It’s not about therapy and not about activism,” said the Rev. Larry Brennan, diocese director of priest formation. “It’s about support.”
The Catholic Church views homosexual relations as a sin, but not homosexual thoughts. It expects those with same-sex attraction to be celibate.
… The [Courage] program has 110 chapters worldwide, including one in Denver, according to its website.
Dear Lord – the further decline of the Anglican Church January 19, 2011
Posted by Tantumblogo in Basics, Ecumenism, General Catholic, sadness, scandals, Society.comments closed
How sad. Via Acts of the Apostasy, the Daily Mail is reporting that the Church of England is planning to re-write their baptismal ceremonies to decrease the references to Christ and Christian content in general:
Church of England baptism services may be re-written to remove some references to Christianity.
The plan for a new ‘baptism lite’ service designed to make christenings more interesting to non-churchgoers will be considered next month by the Church’s parliament, the General Synod.Supporters say the baptism service should be ‘expressed in culturally appropriate and accessible language’ that is readily understood by ‘non-theologically versed Britons’.
But traditionalist clergy said the idea amounted to ‘dumbing down’……….Complaints centre on three sections of the baptism service from the Church’s latest prayer book, Common Worship, authorised for use in 1997.
In one, parents, godparents or an adult being baptised are asked to ‘reject the devil and all rebellion against God’ and to renounce ‘the deceit and corruption of evil’. They are asked to ‘submit to Christ as Lord’.
The Reverend Dr Tim Stratford, from Liverpool, who is putting the plans before the synod, said in a paper that ‘there remains some unhappiness about the language not being earthed enough’.
“not being earthed enough” – yes, they need to replace all that stuffy old Christianist stuff and replace it with more pagan Gaia earth goddess worship. Larry D. at Acts of the Apostasy nails the intention perfectly, I think:
…language not being earthed enough’ means the words currently being used are too religious. Baptism, a religious ceremony, in order to be more ‘interesting’, ought to have earthier, less-religious language. Somehow that’s supposed to make sense. So don’t reference Christ, or the devil, or sin, or evil – just sing a few verses of the Beatles’ “All You Need Is Love”, or John Lennon’s “Imagine” while pouring water on the baby’s head, and you’re all good.
Quite. Christ is the very Font of our Faith. Referencing Him, and the Holy Trinity, are absolutely essential for a valid baptism, and all the baptismal vows that are made either by the baptized or their parents/sponsors, are an essential re-affirmation of basic, core Christian Truth. To replace those with “inclusive language” and earthy cultural references is not only to dumb down the ‘sacrament,’ it is to bring its validity into question. Anglicans, including Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williamson were offended when the Church, at a recent ecumenical synod, did not include Anglicans in the ranks of separated churches, like the schismatic Orthodox, but in the ranks of various “ecclesial communities” – a certain snub. But what should the Vatican do, when not even this more basic, this most fundamental Rite, is sacrosanct to the Anglicans?
I fear we shall witness in the Anglicans the first true transmogrification of a formerly Christian church into a modernist, neo-pagan cult.
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