Month: June 2005

This Week's Show (June 23, 2005)

LISTEN TO THE SHOW.

DOWNLOAD THE SHOW.

HIGHLIGHTS:

  • What does it mean for us to offer up Jesus’ sufferings to the Father? Why would we do that?
  • Is there a move to "restore" the order of the sacraments of initiation?
  • Can Jimmy recommend Lives of the Popes by Richard McBrien? What is an alternative resource?
  • Is B16 changing the way things have been historically done in canonizations by holding off on the canonization of a French priest?
  • If Mary was conceived without original sin, why does the Church hold out the possibility that she died physically?
  • What does the word porneia mean in the passages where Jesus talks about divorce?
  • Does the Catholic Church ignore the first thousand years of Church history and why does it regard itself as the true Church rather than the Greek Orthodox church?
  • Are deacons traditionally ministers of the chalice? How does this square with using extraordinary ministers for distributing the host?
  • Is there a resource written by an ex-SSPXer on the problems of this movement?
  • What is one to think of Thomas Merton? How to deal with those who rely on his more Buddhist-sounding stuff?
  • How can a sex offender find resources to help him live the Catholic life?
  • Why don’t we hear priests talking more at Mass about the state of our souls?

This Week’s Show (June 23, 2005)

LISTEN TO THE SHOW.

DOWNLOAD THE SHOW.

HIGHLIGHTS:

  • What does it mean for us to offer up Jesus’ sufferings to the Father? Why would we do that?
  • Is there a move to "restore" the order of the sacraments of initiation?
  • Can Jimmy recommend Lives of the Popes by Richard McBrien? What is an alternative resource?
  • Is B16 changing the way things have been historically done in canonizations by holding off on the canonization of a French priest?
  • If Mary was conceived without original sin, why does the Church hold out the possibility that she died physically?
  • What does the word porneia mean in the passages where Jesus talks about divorce?
  • Does the Catholic Church ignore the first thousand years of Church history and why does it regard itself as the true Church rather than the Greek Orthodox church?
  • Are deacons traditionally ministers of the chalice? How does this square with using extraordinary ministers for distributing the host?
  • Is there a resource written by an ex-SSPXer on the problems of this movement?
  • What is one to think of Thomas Merton? How to deal with those who rely on his more Buddhist-sounding stuff?
  • How can a sex offender find resources to help him live the Catholic life?
  • Why don’t we hear priests talking more at Mass about the state of our souls?

Testing Is Fun For Everyone!

Howdy, folks!

The .mp3 tests from yesterday seemed to lead to a consensus that folks wanted higher quality encodings of the show, and also mono recordings. Y’all’s wish is our command! Here’s a new batch to check out, plus Link 3 from yesterday for comparison.

Whadda y’all think?

UPDATE: BTW, it occurred to me that some folks might not know that Windows Media Player (at least recent version of it) are able to play .mp3 files. If any Windows users have been thinking that they’re left out of the .mp3 revolution because they don’t have a specialized .mp3 player, don’t worry. Windows Media Player will play these files automatically, so almost anybody with a recent version of Windows should be able to join in the testing (and, later, the listening).

Rehersal & Reception Attendance

A reader writes:

Is it a mortal sin to attend the rehersal party and reception but not

the actual wedding ceremony of a catholic who is getting married

without a priest present? If the catholic is not going to practice

their faith what is the right thing to do?

For a sin to be mortal, it must have grave matter and you must have adequate knowledge of this fact and deliberately consent to doing it anyway.

As to whether attending the rehersal and reception in question, whether this will have grave matter depends on the damage done (to the couple and to others) by your attendance. To the extent they are confirmed in the idea that what they are doing is okay or to the extent they are confused on this point, they are damaged.

A clearer message would be sent by simply not attending any of these and explaining that you care about the party (or parties) but can’t imply by your presence that a genuine marriage is or will come into existence by their actions.

If the party obtains a dispensation for having a non-Catholic wedding then the marriage will be valid and there is no problem attending. I assume that’s not happening in this case based on your question, though.

The mere fact that a Catholic has given up the practice of the faith, though, is not enough to solve the situation. If the Catholic party or parties have defected from the Church by a formal act (e.g., joining another church as an adult with the intent of no longer being a Catholic) then the marriage will be presumed valid and there would not be an instrinsic problem attending, but merely ceasing to practice the faith is not a formal defection.

As long as the marriage is going to be invalid, I cannot recommend involvement in it. At best, involvement sends a confusing signal to the couple. At worse, it can lead them and others in attendance to think that what is happening is okay.

20

Rehersal & Reception Attendance

A reader writes:

Is it a mortal sin to attend the rehersal party and reception but not
the actual wedding ceremony of a catholic who is getting married
without a priest present? If the catholic is not going to practice
their faith what is the right thing to do?

For a sin to be mortal, it must have grave matter and you must have adequate knowledge of this fact and deliberately consent to doing it anyway.

As to whether attending the rehersal and reception in question, whether this will have grave matter depends on the damage done (to the couple and to others) by your attendance. To the extent they are confirmed in the idea that what they are doing is okay or to the extent they are confused on this point, they are damaged.

A clearer message would be sent by simply not attending any of these and explaining that you care about the party (or parties) but can’t imply by your presence that a genuine marriage is or will come into existence by their actions.

If the party obtains a dispensation for having a non-Catholic wedding then the marriage will be valid and there is no problem attending. I assume that’s not happening in this case based on your question, though.

The mere fact that a Catholic has given up the practice of the faith, though, is not enough to solve the situation. If the Catholic party or parties have defected from the Church by a formal act (e.g., joining another church as an adult with the intent of no longer being a Catholic) then the marriage will be presumed valid and there would not be an instrinsic problem attending, but merely ceasing to practice the faith is not a formal defection.

As long as the marriage is going to be invalid, I cannot recommend involvement in it. At best, involvement sends a confusing signal to the couple. At worse, it can lead them and others in attendance to think that what is happening is okay.

20

Blubber King

Word to the wise: When traveling abroad, be sure to find out exactly what ingredients are used in the food you buy. Even the fast food:

"With Japan under fire for plans to expand its whaling program, a fast food chain is offering a new product aimed at using up stocks from past hunts — whale burger.

"The 380 yen ($3.50) slice of fried minke whale in a bun went on sale Thursday at Lucky Pierrot, a restaurant chain in the port city of Hakodate on Japan’s northernmost island of Hokkaido.

"’The taste and texture are somewhere between beef and fish,’ said Lucky Pierrot manager Miku Oh. ‘People in Hakodate have a long history of eating whale, so customers are looking forward to trying it.’"

GET THE STORY.

Word to the wiser: My dad, who was an extremely finicky eater when he knew what was being offered, developed an effective means of dealing with strange food offered by well-meaning friends or relatives. He would eat just about anything as long as the person serving it did not tell him what was in it. It might not work in a restaurant, but it goes a long way toward preserving friendships.

RX: Religion?

Doctors are not as religious as their patients. . . . True.

Doctors are horribly irreligious. . . . False.

A new study is out on the religiosity of doctors and it finds that the picture is . . . complex.

The study wasn’t the gold standard of research as it relied upon doctors filling out and mailing in questionnaires, though it got a surprisingly high return rate (about 2/3rds of those sent the questionnaires returned them). Still, the results showed doctors were more religious than anticipated, though not quite as religious as their patients.

76 percent said they believe in God and 59 percent said they believe
in some sort of afterlife. That compares to 83 percent and 74 percent
of the general population.

Researchers say that although more than 80 percent of patients describe
themselves as Protestant or Catholic, only 60 percent of doctors
describe themselves the same way.

5.3 percent of doctors are Hindu vs. 0.2 percent of nondoctors 14.1
percent of doctors are Jewish vs. 1.9 percent of nondoctors 1.2 percent
of doctors are Buddhist vs. 0.2 percent of nondoctors 2.7 percent of
doctors are Muslim vs. 0.5 percent of nondoctors

Surprisingly,

Although
doctors were less likely to believe in God or an afterlife, the survey
showed that 90 percent of doctors attend religious services at least
once a month compared with 81 percent of their patients.

Many doctors (particularly among Christians, Buddhists, and Mormons) said that their faith influenced their medical practice, though others (particularly among Jews and Hindus) did not.

GET THE STORY.

Announcing The Society Of St. Pius I

From their website:

Welcome to the fledgling website of the Society of St. Pius I (SSPI). Unlike other so-called “traditionalist” Roman Catholic groups, we adhere to the ORIGINAL Roman Catholic Mass of A.D. 40-200, and described by St. Justin Martyr and the Apostolic Constitutions, and used by Pope St. Pius I of happy memory.

Don’t be fooled by PHONY “Vulgate” neotraditionalists, who claim to protect tradition, and yet still defend the RADICAL and totally UNCATHOLIC reforms of the 4th century A.D.

So-called “trads” pretend to be against the modernism of the last hundred years, but where were they when the original Rite of Rome, the Greek rite USED BY ST. PETER AND THE APOSTLES was being totally gutted and revised by unknown scholars and translated into the vernacular language of Latin?

Y’gotta admire the (tongue in cheek) moxy here, but I sense a potential schism. Some members of the SSPI may well conclude that St. Peter and the apostles celebrated Mass in Aramaic, not Greek.

Till then . . .

CHECK IT OUT.

(CHT to the reader who e-mailed!)

Top 100 Movie Quotes?

Frankly_my_dearThe American Film Institute has released a list of what it considers the top 100 movie quotes of all time.

As you may guess from the image on the left, the #1 line was Gone With The Wind‘s "Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn."

To compile the list the AFI asked 1500 "leaders from the creative community, including film artists (directors,
screenwriters, actors, editors, cinematographers), critics and
historians." The "leaders" voted their favorites of a list of 400 nominated quotes.

The film with the most quotes was Casablanca, with 7 quotes, followed by The Wizard Of Oz, which had six.

I agree with most of the entries on the list (not necessarily the order they’re in, but their presence). Some, I don’t. For example, I don’t agree with Moonstruck‘s "Snap out of it!" It seems to me that for something to qualify as a movie quote, it needs to be something that people weren’t saying to each other All The Time before the movie came out. Folks have been saying "Snap out of it!" for far too long (and even in movies before Moonstruck).

GET THE LIST.

I definitely agree with Patrick over at Southern Appeal, though:

My reaction: What no quotes from The Princess Bride, the most quotable movie of all time?

No quotes from The Princess Bride????

<lisp>Inconceivable!!!!</lisp>

Southern Baptists Nix Disney Boycott

At their annual convention the nation’s Southern Baptists have voted to end their eight-year boycott of Disney.

"We believe for the boycott to be effective, it had to have a beginning and an ending," said Gene Mims, chairman of the Southern Baptist Convention committee that put the Disney resolution before some 12,000 members at the meeting.

"We felt like it was time to end it. We’re hopeful Disney will do what the resolution calls for," Mims added.

"We have cost them (Disney) hundreds of millions of dollars," said Wiley Gray, an SBC member from Florida, who spoke in favor of lifting the boycott because Disney had made corporate changes, including the March announcement that longtime Disney Chief Executive Michael Eisner would leave the company in October.

On the other hand:

A spokesman for The Human Rights Campaign, a Washington-based gay rights advocacy group, said Disney continues to be one of more than 8,200 companies that offer domestic partner benefits to gay employees.

GET THE STORY.

(CHT: Southern Appeal.)

Personally, I’m rather ambivalent about this announcement.

There is potentially wisdom, even if you don’t get all of what you want, to waiting until the enemy does something for which you can claim victory (like booting Michael Eisner over low corporate earnings) and then end the boycott. That way you show (a) that you are capable of costing them large amounts of money (as should become more obvious to them once people who were participating in the boycott start throwing business their way again), (b) that you are capable of being reasonable, and (c) that you are capable of hurting them again the same way in the future–thus strengthening your hand to go after more of what you want (like getting rid of "gay days" at Disneyland).

I don’t know if these were their motives. I’d like to see more of what the Baptist leadership had to say on the matter (rather than just what the AP reported).

I also don’t know how many folks will give up the boycott in the absence of unconditional surrender on the part of Disney. Boycotts can take on a life of their own, and the Southern Baptists could even take a P.R. hit if they are perceived as calling off the boycott in the absence of real progress.

Maybe the Donatists will even go into schism over it.