The Weekly Francis – 29 September 2013

pope_francis_mass_20130314124558_640_480This version of The Weekly Francis covers material released in the last week from 5 August to 29 September 2013.

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The Weekly Francis – 22 September 2013

pope_francis_mass_20130314124558_640_480This version of The Weekly Francis covers material released in the last week from 11 August to 21 September 2013.

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  • “There are many people in need in today’s world. Am I self-absorbed in my own concerns or am I aware of those who need help?” @pontifex, 17 September 2013
  • “We are all sinners, but we experience the joy of God’s forgiveness and we walk forward trusting in his mercy.” @pontifex, 19 September 2013
  • “Christ is always faithful. Let us pray to be always faithful to him.” @pontifex, 20 September 2013
  • “True charity requires courage: let us overcome the fear of getting our hands dirty so as to help those in need.” @pontifex, 21 September 2013

Darn. Beaten to Another Great Idea.

bio-suitI keep having really cool ideas that someone else has had before.

When I was five, I was talking with a girl I knew whose father was an atheist, and I thought of the cosmological argument.

Unfortunately, Plato had thought of it first.

When I was in fifth grade, I realized that there was a relationship between the length of the sides and angels in a triangle, which is the key insight of trigonometry.

Unfortunately, Hipparchus thought of it first.

I also thought, before such things were made, of combining an ATM with a gas pump so that you could pay at the pump.

But I was a kid and had no way of acting on it, and someone else undoubtedly made a lot of money patenting that.

Well, it happened again this morning.

While getting ready to go to work, I was listening to an old science fiction novel on audiobook, and there was discussion in the book of a freefall gymnasium.

These are staples in certain kinds of science fiction, because if you are spending a great deal of time in zero or low gravity, your bones and muscles will atrophy, so you’d need to do freefall exercises to fight that.

And I thought: Wait a minute . . . couldn’t you at least blunt that muscle and bone deterioration by building a suit which resisted your movements so that you’d simulate the resistance that gravity provides?

The suit could be built with springs, rods, or fibers embedded in it to make it stiff at strategic points so that you’d exercise by resisting the suit instead of resisting gravity.

It might not completely eliminate the need for freefall exercises, but it would help.

Then I googled “free fall resistance suit” to see if anyone had already thought of this.

They had.

Oh, well.

The Weekly Francis – 15 September 2013

pope-francis2This version of The Weekly Francis covers material released in the last week from 22 August to 15 September 2013.

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Is Pope Francis about to eliminate celibacy? (9 things to know and share)

Do recent remarks by Pope Francis's new secretary of state mean that the Church is about to eliminate celibacy?
Do recent remarks by Pope Francis’s new secretary of state mean that the Church is about to eliminate celibacy?

The mainstream media is all atwitter made by Pope Francis’s incoming secretary of state about the possibility of eliminating clerical celibacy.

Is this a sign of things to come?

Is this yet another indication of Pope Francis “breaking with tradition”?

Is this an indication the mind of Pope Francis himself?

Is it a major new development?

Or is it just the press hyperventilating because they have no idea what they’re talking about?

Here are 9 things to know and share . . .

 

1) Who made the remarks?

That would be Archbishop Pietro Parolin, who is set to replace Cardinal Tarciscio Berone as the head of the Vatican’s Secretariat of State.

He currently lives in Caracas, Venezuela, where he has been serving as papal nuncio (ambassador) to Venezuela.

More info on him here.

 

2) Where did he make his remarks?

He make his comments in an interview with the Venezuelan paper El Universal.

Apparently, it was an interview in anticipation of his leaving his role as the apostolic nuncio and going back to Rome to become Secretary of State.

Here’s a link to the full interview on video, in Spanish.

 

3) What did he actually say?

Apparently, in his discussion with the interviewer, the following exchange occurred:

Aren’t there two types of dogmas? Aren’t there unmovable dogmas that were instituted by Jesus and then there are those that came afterwards, during the course of the church’s history, created by men and therefore susceptible to change?

Certainly. There are dogmas that are defined and untouchable.

Celibacy is not —

It is not a church dogma and it can be discussed because it is a church tradition.

That’s what set the secular media off into paroxysms—the statement that the discipline “can be discussed.”

 

4) Did he say anything else on the question?

KEEP READING.

The Weekly Francis – 8 September 2013

pope-francis2This version of The Weekly Francis covers material released in the last week from 24 July to 7 September 2013.

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The Weekly Francis – 2 September 2013

popefrancisThis version of The Weekly Francis covers material released in the last week from 21 August to 2 September 2013.

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Note: Due to problems with using copyrighted material from the Vatican the eBook version of The Weekly Francis has been suspended. For users of the previous ebook volume I have some suggestions for alternatives on how to best read these documents especially on mobile platforms.