Month: March 2005

What To Do When You’re Incensed

(First, count to ten.)

A reader writes:

When the priest walks around the church incensing, do the people in the congregation make the Sign of the Cross when he gets to their area (they way they do when he sprinkles holy water)? I am unsure whether I should bow, make the Sign of the Cross, or what.

A check of the (current and previous) GIRM reveals little on this question. Here is the most significant discussion of what actually happens when things and people are incensed:

277. The priest, having put incense into the thurible, blesses it with the sign of the Cross, without saying anything.

Before and after an incensation, a profound bow is made to the person or object that is incensed, except for the incensation of the altar and the offerings for the Sacrifice of the Mass.

The following are incensed with three swings of the thurible: the Most Blessed Sacrament, a relic of the Holy Cross and images of the Lord exposed for public veneration, the offerings for the sacrifice of the Mass, the altar cross, the Book of the Gospels, the Paschal Candle, the priest, and the people.

The following are incensed with two swings of the thurible: relics and images of the Saints exposed for public veneration. This should be done, however, only at the beginning of the celebration, after the incensation of the altar.

The altar is incensed with single swings of the thurible in this way:

a. If the altar is freestanding with respect to the wall, the priest incenses walking around it;

b. If the altar is not freestanding, the priest incenses it while walking first to the righthand side, then to the left.

The cross, if situated on or near the altar, is incensed by the priest before he incenses the altar; otherwise, he incenses it when he passes in front of it.

The priest incenses the offerings with three swings of the thurible or by making the sign of the cross over the offerings with the thurible, then going on to incense the cross and the altar.

That’s it. It just says that the priest incenses the people with three swings of the censer. It doesn’t say for the people to do anything.

Neither does a check of the rubrics (so far as I could see) direct the people to do anything when they’re incensed. Checks of the BCL Newsletter and the Documents on the Liturgy (a standard collection) also turned up bupkis.

Thus, unless someone can show a binding document that says otherwise, it seems to me that the default option is for the people to do nothing.

That is definitely not the custom in some rites, however. In some Eastern rite services I’ve been to, it’s clearly the custom for folks to cross themselves.

Also, since the above text directs the incensor to make a profound bow (a bow of the body) before he incenses, it seems natural for folks to want to bow back to him. That’s a human politeness impulse, though. One might argue that in the act of incensing the people the incensor is being directed to show reverence to them on account of their sacredness to God (being made in the image of God). Since they are the recipient of this reverence and are not directed to reciprocate, one could argue that they ought not reciprocate at this point.

It seems to me that, although the default option seems to be to do nothing, Rome generally allows the laity a considerable amount of leeway in terms of their own gesture and posture (after all, we laity are peasants just in from slopping the pigs in the grand scheme of things; you can’t expect too much from us) and so (unless a binding document says otherwise) I don’t think Rome would mind if the faithful wanted to express their own piety by crossing themselves or bowing when they’re incensed.

It’s certainly better than forming a mob with pitchforks and torches.

Rebaptism & Conversion

A reader writes:

I was not raised as a Christian; I came to faith as a teenager and was baptized in an evangelical Presbyterian congregation. Recently, I began worshiping at an Orthodox mission church near me, and I have entered the catechumenate there. I have been told recently that to formally enter the Orthodox Church I may have to be baptized again, and this situation is the subject of my question.

The logic behind this (possible) requirement is that in many Protestant denominations these days the traditional Baptismal formula is often not followed and "Creator, Redeemer and Sustainer" (or some such wording) is used in place of "Father, Son and Holy Spirit." Apparently there is a list of denominations detailing which can be trusted to have administered valid baptisms and which not. I have not yet seen that document, but as the denomination I in which I was baptized was quite liberal, I’m very much afraid that it will be on the "black list."

The problem is that, since I was an adult when I was baptized, I know what was done and said and that the traditional formula was used. Furthermore, the minister who baptized me was very conservative and would never have gone in for that sort of thing.

I don’t know how those objections would be received in the event that my old denomination is on the "do not trust" list. I’m trying to work out to myself what my response should be in the event that I am required to undergo another baptism. As I know that my baptism at age 18 was valid, should I dig in my heels over this? Or would submitting myself to the Church’s judgment be the right thing to do?

I know that you cannot answer this question from the perspective of Orthodox Church law or tradition. I know also that the bottom line answer for you would most likely be "you should be becoming Catholic, not Orthodox," and that might make the whole question moot in your mind.

Well, yes, you should become Catholic rather than Orthodox, but no that does not make the question moot.

You know that the correct formula was used in your baptism your first baptism was valid, and it would be an insult to the work that the Holy Spirit did in your baptism to rebaptize you. If they insist on an unconditional rebaptism then you would be morally obliged to refuse on the grounds that it would be a sacrilege.

That being said, it seems to me that you could explore two options (besides becoming Catholic):

  1. Explain to them that you have a memory of the baptism and that you know the correct formula was used (possibly supplemented by a written statement from the pastor who did it or anothr eye-witness) and see if that will either nix the proposal or get it modified into the section option:
  2. Get them to administer a conditional baptism (for example, one using the formula "If you are not baptized, I baptize you . . . "). Conditional baptisms are not sacrilege because they are only baptisms if the person is not already baptized. They show the willingness of all involved to make sure that the person is validly baptized and they confess our own limitations in determining prior validity together with our will to do what God wants done.

Hope this helps!

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Rebaptism & Conversion

A reader writes:

I was not raised as a Christian; I came to faith as a teenager and was baptized in an evangelical Presbyterian congregation. Recently, I began worshiping at an Orthodox mission church near me, and I have entered the catechumenate there. I have been told recently that to formally enter the Orthodox Church I may have to be baptized again, and this situation is the subject of my question.

The logic behind this (possible) requirement is that in many Protestant denominations these days the traditional Baptismal formula is often not followed and "Creator, Redeemer and Sustainer" (or some such wording) is used in place of "Father, Son and Holy Spirit." Apparently there is a list of denominations detailing which can be trusted to have administered valid baptisms and which not. I have not yet seen that document, but as the denomination I in which I was baptized was quite liberal, I’m very much afraid that it will be on the "black list."

The problem is that, since I was an adult when I was baptized, I know what was done and said and that the traditional formula was used. Furthermore, the minister who baptized me was very conservative and would never have gone in for that sort of thing.

I don’t know how those objections would be received in the event that my old denomination is on the "do not trust" list. I’m trying to work out to myself what my response should be in the event that I am required to undergo another baptism. As I know that my baptism at age 18 was valid, should I dig in my heels over this? Or would submitting myself to the Church’s judgment be the right thing to do?

I know that you cannot answer this question from the perspective of Orthodox Church law or tradition. I know also that the bottom line answer for you would most likely be "you should be becoming Catholic, not Orthodox," and that might make the whole question moot in your mind.

Well, yes, you should become Catholic rather than Orthodox, but no that does not make the question moot.

You know that the correct formula was used in your baptism your first baptism was valid, and it would be an insult to the work that the Holy Spirit did in your baptism to rebaptize you. If they insist on an unconditional rebaptism then you would be morally obliged to refuse on the grounds that it would be a sacrilege.

That being said, it seems to me that you could explore two options (besides becoming Catholic):

  1. Explain to them that you have a memory of the baptism and that you know the correct formula was used (possibly supplemented by a written statement from the pastor who did it or anothr eye-witness) and see if that will either nix the proposal or get it modified into the section option:
  2. Get them to administer a conditional baptism (for example, one using the formula "If you are not baptized, I baptize you . . . "). Conditional baptisms are not sacrilege because they are only baptisms if the person is not already baptized. They show the willingness of all involved to make sure that the person is validly baptized and they confess our own limitations in determining prior validity together with our will to do what God wants done.

Hope this helps!

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KERRY: Americans Too Stupid To Have A First Amendment

P.J. O’Roarke suggests:

JOHN KERRY EFFECTIVELY ENDED HIS political career on February 28, 2005, during a little-noticed event at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library in Boston.

How’d he do that?

Addressing the audience of tame Democrats, Kerry explained his defeat. "There has been," he said, "a profound and negative change in the relationship of America’s media with the American people. . . . If 77 percent of the people who voted for George Bush on Election Day believed weapons of mass destruction had been found in Iraq–as they did–and 77 percent of the people who voted for him believed that Saddam Hussein was responsible for 9/11–as they did–then something has happened in the way in which we are talking to each other and who is arbitrating the truth in American politics. . . . When fear is dominating the discussion and when there are false choices presented and there is no arbitrator, we have a problem."

America is not doctrinaire. It’s hard for an American politician to come up with an ideological position that is permanently unforgivable. Henry Wallace never quite managed, or George Wallace either. But Kerry’s done it. American free speech needs to be submitted to arbitration because Americans aren’t smart enough to have a First Amendment, and you can tell this is so, because Americans weren’t smart enough to vote for John Kerry.

(NOTE FOR FOLKS OVERSEAS AND MOST GRADUATES OF THE AMERICAN PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM: The First Amendment protects freedom of the press and freedom of speech, among other things.)

"We learned," Kerry continued, "that the mainstream media, over the course of the last year, did a pretty good job of discerning. But there’s a subculture and a sub-media that talks and keeps things going for entertainment purposes rather than for the flow of information. And that has a profound impact and undermines what we call the mainstream media of the country. And so the decision-making ability of the American electorate has been profoundly impacted as a consequence of that. The question is, what are we going to do about it?"

READ MORE.

Coming Soon To A TV Near You!

Over yonder, Jim Geraghty has a great analysis of the forumulaic bias of MSM nightly news:

The network evening news has become a half-hour analgesic, chopped into snippets divided by commercials for over-the-counter cold medication, prescription drugs, or cure-alls for gastrointestinal distress, for those who want a cranky 73-year-old [i.e., Dan Rather] to tell them what to think.

The evening news is designed for the attention span of an overcaffeinated ferret, with the standard story hitting a predictable rhythm: B-roll footage of an “ordinary American” doing something ordinary — getting her kids ready for school or cooking dinner. Then the inevitable “but.” “BUT — like millions of Americans, Mrs. Smith says her health insurance isn’t covering enough of her expenses.”

Cut to correspondent standing in front of Capitol dome. “Congress is considering legislation about this issue, but Republicans and Democrats disagree.” A one-sentence sound bite of a Democrat saying, “We need this program.” A several-word sound bite of a Republican saying, “But how are we going to pay for it?” Cut to Heritage Foundation type, identified as “spokesman for conservative activist group,” saying some massive new government program isn’t necessary. Cut to some left-of-center type identified as “Harvard professor and health policy expert,” saying, yes, this massive new government program is necessary.

Cut to Mrs. Smith, saying how hard it is to make ends meet, and how she thinks the program would help her a lot. Then the closer: “Whether Mrs. Smith gets what she needs, or whether her children Brittney and Skyler have to go without those benefits, only time will tell. Firstname Lastname, Network Evening News, Washington.” Elapsed time: Just over two minutes. Repeat another ten times. Close with “Courage.”

Meanwhile back at the ranch, one of Geraghty’s correpondents suggests that he needed to tweak one element of this:

Your stereotype of the need-government-please story is great, except it’s atypical that Heritage gets to speak! The conservative side is usually [White House press secretary] Scott McClellan saying something nervous and defensive, like "we have always felt old people deserve the right to live beyond 65."

In his main story, Geraghty adds:

Anyone who actually wants to know more about the news is reading a newspaper, reading magazines, reading blogs, and watching the cable networks. For all the mockery that cable-news debate shows get from established news folks, it’s worth noting that they have at least two people of differing opinions talk about the same subject for five or six minute segments. And instead of trying to encapsulate a four or five-minute interview in one or two sentences, the talking heads get to speak (and sometimes shout) in strings of sentences. They get to make points and challenge each other’s arguments. And the viewers get it straight from the source, instead of summarized by a correspondent.

Preach it, Brother Geraghty! Preach it!

An Interesting And Disturbing Article

WaPo EDITORIALIST E. J. DIONNE JR. OFFERS THIS DISTURBING BUT INTRIGUING PIECE ON PRO-LIFE STRATEGY.

His thesis seems to be that by ruthlessly backing the strongest Republican candidates, even if they are not pro-life, Republicans have gotten themselves in a position to appoint more anti-Roe judges and justices, while by being inflexible on the subject of abortion, Democrats have weakened their ability to resist such appointments.

The basic idea is thus that the Republicans have been able to construct a "big tent" by keeping the overall direction of the party controlled by pro-lifers while also allowing anti-lifers to participate on the fringes.

Now some Democrats are trying to do the same thing by promoting stronger Democratic candidates even if they are pro-life, with the result again that there are likely to be more votes for anti-Roe judges.

He concludes:

Karl Rove must be grinning about all this. By managing the abortion issue with considerable cunning, Republicans are winning the power to stack the courts with the very sorts of conservative judges the pro-choice movement fears. You have to wonder why it is so hard for so many Democrats to learn that a little open-mindedness on a very difficult question is not only a virtue but also a necessity.

GET THE STORY.

The Constitutional Option

Y’know how those rascals in Washington are all twisted around whether or not judicial nominees should be rendered filibuster-proof in a move called "the nuclear option" in an attempt to make it sound more extreme than it is?

I’m all for that.

The use of filibusters to thwart judicial nominees is a new thing in American politics, and I see nothing wrong with using the tactic to prevent it from happening.

In fact, I’m rather cool towards filibusters as a whole: The idea is not in the U.S. Constitution. In fact, the Senate didn’t originally have filibusters. The institution was created when the Senate accidentally deleted a measure from its rules that allowed the closing of debates that had gotten out of hand. It was years before folks got around to applying the loophole to thwart the passage of legislation supported by the majority and, by extension, the will of the people.

Consequently, I’m quite open to the idea of getting rid of the filibuster altogether. U.S. law already has lots of safeguards built into it to protect the interests of groups in the minority (the Bill of Rights being a notable example), and the use of cheap parliamentary tactics to further thwart the will of the majority doesn’t seem quite cricket to me. If there need to be more measures to protect the interests of those whose legislators are not a majority, let straightforward measures be enacted to protect them. Let’s not rely on unworthy phony debates that aren’t real debates at all but simply obstructionism (and which, these days, don’t even literally go on all night).

Thing is: While it may (under current rules) take 60 votes to end a filibuster, the filibuster rule itself can be scrapped by only a simple majority.

The Constitution provides only a single method – the constitutional amendment process – to entrench a rule against repeal by a majority. If Democrats were correct that rules can be insulated from majority amendment, a bare majority in each House could have passed the Bill of Rights and made it our fundamental law by declaring that only unanimous votes by both Houses could pass legislation violating its principles. The Democratic view also conflicts with a principle known since before the framing of the Constitution that one legislature cannot bind subsequent legislatures.

The . . . constitutionally correct view is that the Senate can choose to retain the filibuster rule, but that a majority must be able to change it. The Senate can thereby exercise its full constitutional authority to fashion rules of procedure but past majorities of the Senate cannot put current majorities in a procedural straitjacket. Thus, a change in the filibuster rule by a majority is not a "nuclear" option but instead the constitutional option – the route contemplated by our founding document.

That’s a quotation from

THIS INTERESTING STORY ON "THE CONSTITUTIONAL OPTION."

Or you can go into

FASCINATING MIND-NUMBING DETAIL ON THE HISTORY OF THE FILIBUSTER AND THE CONSTITUTIONAL OPTION. (WARNING! Evil file format [.pdf]!)

Sorry, But This Is A Non-Starter–For Now

Condi2 Hillary is the likely Democratic nominee for 2008.

Condi is a plausible Republican who may run as well. She recently refused to rule out running.

GET THE STORY.

The trouble is that, as things presently stand, Condi will either not get the Republican nomination or, if she does get it, she will lose.

Why?

Because she describes hereself as "mildly pro-choice" (see the linked article).

Don’t get me wrong: I’d love to see Condi run if she were pro-life. I’d love for us to have a Commander-In-Chief who is Drop Dead Gorgeous (certainly compared to other women who are political officeholders!). Who doesn’t want that?

But being pro-life is more important than all of that–to me, and to millions of other pro-lifers.

If Condi doesn’t flip on the subject of abortion then, even with hard-evil Hillary as the opposing candidate, too many pro-lifers will simply stay home on election day rather than vote for someone who is "moderaly pro-choice."

Even Bush barely won the first time because social conservatives were dissatisfied with his long-ago DUI. That’s mild compared to being "moderately pro-choice."

Fortunately, Condi has time to be educated on the issue of abortion and, as she hasn’t spoken on it much nor built a pro-abort voting record, she has fewer ties to abortion than many other politicians.

Let’s pray for her.

Oh yeah, and if she’s pro-abort then she also needs to get educated on the need for originalists on the Supreme Court.

Let’s pray for that, too.

Birth Spacing

A reader writes:

I was wondering if it is wrong to use nfp to space out pregnancies to be 3 years apart. I want to enjoy each child’s babyhood. On one hand having many children close together would not be good for my emotional state. I really admire women who are not fazed by the strain. I seem to not be able to handle much stress. But the biggest reason is wanting to give each child as much of my attention as I can offer so I know each baby. I’m not saying that mothers who have children close together do not know their babies. But they seem to be made of something I am not. Trust me on this! My mother had her kids one after the other and acted like she wished she hadn’t had all of us. She also said she regretted not "knowing" her youngest because she was too "busy," that she didn’t have the time.

When I read my reasons they sound stupid, like I am making lame excuses for myself. I just want the baby to be more independant before I get pregnant again. What do you say? Do I have "Just Reasons" to use NFP?

The Church does not have a list of what counts as acceptable reasons, so I can’t simply go to a Church doc and tell you what it says.

What the documents do is speak in more general terms about the kinds of reasons that can be sufficient, and they allude to physical, psychological, and economic reasons. Obviously, trivial factors falling into these classes would not suffice, but is some significant human good is being protected.

The reasons that you cite are of a psychological nature protecting the human good of yourself (by not being overstressed) and the children (by being able to better mother them due to not being overstressed). These are significant human goods.

Whether they are sufficient is a decision for you and your husband to make based on your own knowledge of yourselves and your family situation. The Church does not propose a cookie-cutter solution to such questions as it recognizes that different people are different and are able to handle different numbers of children at different times in their lives. If your conclusion is that y’all are not able to have children closer together without unduly burdensome strain, the Church respects the choice to use NFP to space them.

One factor that may be of use in making your decision: In prior ages when breastfeeding was universal, usually for the first few years of life, then (given the diets people had) many women would frequently (though not always) end up with kids two to four years apart anyway.

On the other hand, there is something to be said for not having the kids too far apart. If they are sufficiently far apart then (a) it’s like having a series of only children as they have fewer contemporaries to interact with and (b) it prolongs the amount of time that you have to take care of infants.

Three years apart is not enough to create the fullness of effect (a), but it will have effect (b). Regardless of how many children you have (2, 5, 10, 15), if they are spaced three years apart then you will be involved in the care of infants and toddlers for three times as long as if they are spaced one year apart. By contrast, if the kids are bunched up then it means more work initially but less work later on.

I don’t know whether you have children or not yet, but whether or not you do, the best thing to do may not be to try to keep to a strict schedule, which will be hard to implement anyway. (E.g., if you wait 2.25 years after baby #1 before trying to have baby #2 and then it takes a few months to have baby #2 and then baby #2 miscarries then it will be more than three years before baby #3 can be born.) The prudent thing to do is likely to re-evaluate the situation after each baby rather than trying to implement an ideal plan.

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