Jimmy Akin – Page 499

Let’s Pray For These Guys

In case you haven’t heard, there was a horrific medical accident in England. Eight gentlemen were taking part in the first human trials of an experimental drug known as TGN1412, which is an anti-inflammatory steroid.

It worked okay in animal tests, but when it was given to humans, disaster resulted. Of the eight gentlement in the test, two received placebos, but the other six collapsed and two of them have major organ failure.

EXCERPTS:

A volunteer taking part in the trial who was given a placebo and therefore escaped the effects described the appalling scene on the ward.

Raste Khan, 23, a television technician, said: "The test ward turned into hell minutes after we were injected. The men went down like dominoes.

"First they began tearing their shirts off complaining of fever, then some screamed out that their heads felt like they were going to explode.

"After that they started fainting, vomiting and writhing around in their beds.

"It was terrifying because I kept expecting it to happen to me at any moment. But I felt fine and I didn’t know why."

Six volunteers suffered catastrophic reactions to trials of the new drug, TGN1412, at Northwick Park Hospital in Harrow, North-West London.

They were the first people in the world to test the drug, being developed by the German pharmaceutical firm, TeGenero, and designed to treat chronic inflammatory conditions and leukaemia. They were paid £2,000 each.

Four are in a serious condition but showing signs of improvement. Two remain critical.

GET THE STORY.

St. Patrick’s Day/Friday/Lent/Meat

Today is St. Patrick’s Day–and it’s a Friday during Lent. So the big question on everybody’s mind is: "Do we get to eat meat today?"

The answer is: It depends.

What it depends on is whether or not your bishop has dispensed everybody from the requirement of abstaining from meat.

St. Patrick’s Day is not a solemnity in the U.S. (though it is actually a holy day of obligation in Ireland, I recenlty learned–understandably since he was the single most important guy in the conversion of the Irish to the faith) and so it does not automatically override the abstinence requirement the way that solemnities do.

This means that your bishop has a choice of either doing nothing and letting the abstinence requirement stand or of dispensing folks so they can have corned beef with their cabbage (or whatever).

I know that the bishop of San Diego did dispense the requirement, and I’ve been told that the folks in New York City are similarly dispensed.

(BTW, for folks in other countries, y’all ought not to assume from this blog that you’re necessarily obligated to abstain. That’s U.S. practice on Fridays of Lent, but it’s not the practice everywhere. I recently got a new commentary on the Code of Canon Law that had an appendix with the particular legislation for other English-speaking countries, and I was startled to see how much variation there is on this point in other parts of the world. More on that another time.)

If you know what your bishop has done, you might want to share it in the combox so others won’t have to call the chancery and ask.

Proxies

A reader writes:

I’ve been coordinating the sacrament preparation @ my parish for 10 years. Early on, the issue arose of a would-be Confirmation sponsor unable to attend the actual Confirmation liturgy. In some places, pastors allow sponsors by "proxy" — they are listed in the official Church record, but someone physically stands in for them at the time of Confirmation. (This practice is not written into canon law.) When this idea was put forth here, an assistant pastor – a canonist – advised (and strenuously maintained/demanded) that no "proxy" was possible, but in fact a sponsor is the physical witness to the Confirmation.

Since that time, we’ve changed pastors/assistants and the new staff are not as certain/adament with regard to the proxy issue. I maintain that the logic used with the first resolution of this issue still is reasonable & defensible. However, I am not a canonist, but a laywoman – and, to make matters worse, the priest whose opinion carried so much weight years ago has since left the priesthood. So, my source of information is "tainted."

Now, my son was asked to be a Confirmation sponsor in another diocese, with the plan to have a proxy stand in for him at the liturgy while he is out-of-state. I told him that the proxy solution was not a true solution, but that whoever is present is the actual sponsor, (according to our errant priest-friend).

What is correct?

You are correct that the use of proxies as sponsors in confirmation is not found in the Code, however this of itself does not mean that the use of proxies is illegitimate.

There are all kinds of acts for which we can designate someone to act on our behalf, and canon law does not specifically have to name all of them. In general, people can ask someone to act on their behalf (i.e., serve as a proxy) unless this is specifically prohibited or otherwise impossible for some reason.

The ability to use proxies goes so far as to inject itself into the sacraments. Canon law allows the use of proxies in the exchange of matrimonial consent, for example, and one could argue that confession is made by proxy when a person confesses through a translator–something else canon law also explicitly envisions. You can even argue that the parents are serving as proxies of a sort at the baptism of an infant and requesting baptism on his behalf.

There are limites to what a proxy can do for you, though. They cannot be baptized or absolved or married for you–only you can receive the sacrament. But proxies can act as your agent in doing things attendant to the sacrament, such as requesting it, making confession in a form the priest can understand, or conveying your consent to be married.

Given that, it would seem in principle that a godparent could make use of a proxy. If the person who will be receiving the sacrament can make use of proxies to perform certain functions for him then it would seem that a godparent–whose role is much less central to the sacrament–could do the same.

At the very least, there is no in principle impossibility of this (the way there is an in principle impossibility of anyone receiving the sacrament for you). That would seem to kick the question into the realm of what ecclesiastical law says.

As always in law, liberty is presumed unless the law provides otherwise, and there is no law barring the use of proxies by godparents at either baptism or confirmation.

In fact, the green CLSA commentary specifically notes:

Although the canon [i.e., 872] says nothing about a sponsor’s presence ethrough a proxy, this silence is not to be understood as barring the use of a proxy to stand in for an absent sponsor [at baptism] [p. 1061].

Regarding your former assistant pastor’s statement that the godparent must be present because he is the physical witness to the confirmation, this is incorrect, as is shown by several factors:

1) There is no strict mandate to even have a sponsor at confirmation. Canon 892 only says that there should be a sponsor "insofar as possible." If he was the witness to the event then the use of a sponsor would be mandated.

2) The canons on proof of confirmation (894-896) make no mention of the sponsor attesting to the event. Canon 895 does say that the sponsor’s name is to be put in the registry along with the names of the confirmand, the minister, and the parents, but that is so we can tell how who is related to whom–not who witnessed the event. (E.g., if a confirmand’s mother is in the hospital due to a car crash and can’t attend the confirmation, that doesn’t mean that her name gets left out of the "Mother" slot in the confirmatin registry.)

3) The role of confirmation sponsors is expressly modelled on baptismal sponsors in the Code, and when we look at the proofs of baptism section the Code EXPLICITLY envisions someone other than the sponsor serving as witness to the event (canon 875). If a baptismal sponsor is not a necessary witness to baptism then a confirmation sponsor (whose witnessing function isn’t even mentioned in the Code) certainly is not a necessary witness for confirmation.

YOU CAN LOOK UP THESE CANON HERE.

I therefore do not see any legal barrier to the idea of a confirmation sponsor using a proxy to stand in for him on the day of the event.

Who’s oppressing who?

SDG here making a rare foray from occasional-blogger semi-retirement spurred by a recent screening of V for Vendetta, scripted by the Wachowski brothers from a graphic novel by Alan Moore.

The scene: In the English-speaking West, a happy couple sits at home, minding their own business. Suddenly, jack-booted Lifestyle Police swoop in and arrest first one, then the other.

Q: Who are these people and what is their offense?

Conservative homeschooling parents guilty of withdrawing their children from mandatory kindergarten sex ed and diversity training about different kinds of families.
Lesbians guilty of violating the religious lifestyle laws of the fascist conservative Christian theocracy.

If the question is which of these two scenarios represents a more reality-based fictionalization or projection of actual current trends in the English-speaking West or anywhere in Europe, it seems to me that the obvious answer is A. Every so often I get a bulletin from the Homeschool Legal Defense Association detailing incidents from around the country of government harrassment of homeschooling parents. If there’s a GLBT Legal Defense Association dedicated to combatting government harrassment of that constituency, I’ve not heard of it.

But of course it’s scenario B that we find in V for Vendetta, which imagines a world in which homosexuals are actively hunted down, owning a Koran is a capital offense, the media is a mouthpiece of the conservative government (!), high-powered Catholic bishops conspire with the government and have kinky sex with child prostitutes, and razing the bastions of Western civilization (e.g., blowing up the English Parliament building) is a moral victory.

Alan Moore, the writer of the original story, has taken his name off the film, which he claims the Wachowskis have turned from an ambiguous story of anarchy vs. fascism into an allegory of the American Right (Evil) vs. the American Left (Good).

In principle, I suppose that Moore, who considers himself an anarchist, would be equally against any form of coercive, overbearing government intrusion into people’s lives, beliefs and expression, whether liberal or conservative (though this is just a guess and I could be wrong).

As Moore complains, though, the film turns the story into a parable of the American left (good) vs. the American right (bad), completely blowing over the facts that [a] both sides are capable of intrusive oppression of dissenters, and [b] right now, in spite of certain conservative trends in recent years, it still looks like being conservative is more likely to get you in trouble in one way or another than being liberal — at least, in the English-speaking West as well as throughout Europe.

At least, that’s how it seems to me, although I tend to be pretty isolated from political issues (which is one reason I avoided reviewing most of last year’s crop of politically themed films, Good Night and Good Luck, Syriana, Munich, The Constant Gardener, etc.).

I seem to recall hearing about, e.g., Catholic leaders in Canada running afoul of the law over the Church’s teaching on homosexuality. It also seems to be that while university professors are typically free to advocate the most radical and extreme leftist points of view, there have been a number of incidents in universities in which individual professors or other faculty members have been internally persecuted and forced to apologize or resign over expressing politically incorrect views.

Here’s an interesting tidbit: Earlier this week, apparently, the Netherlands instituted a "tolerance test" for would-be immigrants that requires applicants to buy and watch a video that includes footage of two men kissing in a park and a topless woman bather, in order to ensure that they’re all right with such behavior before the Netherlands will accept them.

GET THE STORY.

On closer examination, it turns out that this law seems specifically targeted at conservative Muslims, since there are apparently generous exceptions to the requirement for Americans and Australians as well as citizens of EU members, making the Middle East the obvious target of the law. But this merely illustrates that discrimination against Muslims is not the province of the conservative Christian right; here are ultra-liberal, anything-goes secular lefties doing this very thing. But of course that’s a provocative nuance you would hardly expect to find in an ideologically oriented Hollywood film.

Anyway, I’m writing my review tonight, and would like to be able to cite a few well-chosen specifics on the subject of liberal/secularist government/institutional opposition to, harrassment or punishment of, or otherwise discrimination against conservative/religious individuals, values, expressions, etc. So this is ultimately an info-bleg post. Help me out, politics watchers Who’s oppressing who, and how, and where?

The Rules Of Cheating

For a really grim view of the state of marriage in our society, just look at what some husbands and wives consider to be acceptable behavior: You can cheat on me so long as it is within the agreed-upon bounds of cheating on me:

"A New York magazine article entitled ‘The New Monogamy‘ [Editor note: Graphic picture illustrates article] states that marriages are becoming more and more open. The thinking is that agreed-upon ‘cheating’ will ward off the urge to stray further. In this view, as long as each spouse ‘sluts around’ (their words, not ours) within the boundaries deemed acceptable by both parties (rules range from just kissing to engaging in full-blown orgies), they aren’t actually cheating. Sure, it sounds pretty crazy. But let’s just go with it for now, keeping in mind how unnatural forsaking all others can feel to some in committed relationships — and how striving for true monogamy can outright ruin some relationships. So, provided the rules of engagement are mutually agreed upon, is the open approach reasonable?"

GET THE STORY.

One reason I think the idea of "slutting around" on your spouse is a perverse idea that is gaining ground in our society is because so many people simply have no idea what marriage is. People seem to think of marriage as an official stamp on a romance. Before extramarital sex gained enormous popularity, marriage was all too often seen as permission to have sex. Then when marriage was no longer seen as the gateway to sex, marriage became merely The Piece Of Paper that designated that a couple was Together, not for life but until they grew bored with each other. Now that it’s very easy to shed yourself of a spouse when he no longer thrills you, divorce seems to be becoming The Piece Of Paper that is unnecessary to obtain first before scoping out a hot date for the weekend.

A priest once told me that when he was in seminary some forty years ago, a fellow seminarian commented to him that the Church was badly in need of developing its marital theology. In the years since he was in seminary, my priest friend told me, John Paul II had given the Church fully seventy-five percent of its current theology of marriage. (There is no hard data supporting that number, only an educated guess by clergy with whom this priest had discussed the matter.)

The Church has had a great gift on the theology of marriage bequeathed to it by JPII and the Church will have its work cut out for it passing on JPII’s marital theology to a culture utterly clueless that marriage is not an amoral "hook-up" till boredom-do-us-part, but a vocation intended to form people in sanctity.

Undoing A Godparent

A reader writes:

Is it possible for a parent to un-do a godparent for a child? Here’s our scenario:

We asked a niece and a nephew (not siblings) to be godparents to our third daughter. My niece has responded nicely to being a godmother. She’s been faithful to the church and is an all-around good person. My nephew, on the other hand….

He’s turned out to be, well quite frankly, the southern end of a north-bound horse. He lives a lifestyle that is not becoming of what my wife and I agree with. Now, it’s not like we’re judgmental in the way other people act, I’m sure we have many faults, but the lifestyle he’s chosen is something we cannot condone. As much as I’d like to go into specifics, I realize you only have a few billion things to do and you don’t want our dirty laundry.

One of the biggest reasons I’m considering doing this, if possible, is the manner in which he treats his mother (my sister). Total disdain and disrespect. I don’t want my daughter to grow up and see her godfather treat his mother that way and think it’s okay.

If it’s possible to replace a godparent, what must we do?

Unfortunately, there is no canonical procedure for replacing a godparent or stripping him of his office. This is a little surprising since there have been lame, scandalous godparents ever since the institution was established.

In former days it was held that a spiritual relationship was established between the godparent and the godchild that was so strong and enduring that it served as an impediment to marriage, though this impediment no longer exists in canon law.

The fact that such a relationship was held to exist may be why no procedures for replacing godparents developed. If godparents are sufficiently understood on the model of actual parents then, just as you kinda gotta live with it if your actual parent is a dud then it might be inferred that you kinda gotta live with it if your godparent is a dud.

But even if godparents were understood as having relationships with their godchildren as unbreakable as those of parents, that does not mean that there is no way to address the situation, for when a parent proves fundamentally unable to care for his children then the children can be entrusted to another.

Thus it would be possible for you to tell the gentleman in question that until he shapes up he will not be able to function as the child’s godfather. You can then designate someone else to function as godfather and say, "Honey, Mr. Irresponsible isn’t able to serve as your godfather, so Mr. Responsible will be acting as your godfather instead."

I’d further note that I know that some current canonical opinion holds that, even though there is not a canonical procedure for replacing a godparent that it may be possible to go to the parish and have the baptismal registry annotated to reflect the new situation.

I’d like to have a more simple and definite answer for you on this one but, given the state of canon law on the subject, that’s a bit hard to do. At least there are ways to address the situation.

The Art of the Grant

For some weird reason, FOX News found it worth noting yesterday that actor Alec Baldwin and a bunch of other artsy types gathered in Washington for Arts Advocacy Day, in order to encourage lobbying for arts funding. That means, among other things, the National Endowment for the Arts. I guess my invitation got lost in the mail.

Baldwin and others addressed a "crowd of… lawmakers and state arts officials". I’m sorry, but as an artist I find the words "state arts officials" really creepy.

I can’t say that I really know that much about how the NEA funds things like dance or theater, but they have become notorious in recent years for funding controversial, shocking, offensive and ugly art exhibits. They probably fund a lot of other stuff, too, but they are best known for bankrolling modernist, anti-Christian claptrap.

I have considered applying for a grant, myself, but in the end I just couldn’t do it. It generally means attaching your art to some (liberal) cultural theme like "Art and Global Warming", "Art and the Inner City", "Art and the Goddess", or some such… it would just kill my soul.

Personally, I think the only visual art that the government should fund is art for public spaces. Murals, sculptures, that sort of thing. They should also feel an obligation to fund art that is not so "current" that it will fall out of style a couple of decades down the road. We owe it to our kids to leave something beautiful behind us, rather than rusting hulks of scrap metal.

Back in the Nineties, Congress made some big cuts to the NEA after it endowed some particularly stupid pieces that got a ton of press. It looked like they might let the agency dry on the vine.

No such luck. In his speech Tuesday, Baldwin said "If you told me back in 1996, we would have a Republican president and Republicans in charge of both houses of Congress, and the NEA would be flourishing and would be safe, it wouldn’t be possible…".

Amen, brother. Amen.

GET THE STORY.

Underage Drinking

A reader writes:

I have been debating a friend on why underage drinking is wrong even if it is in moderation and if its intention isn’t to rely on alcohol for a good time or fit in.

He believes that the law is unjust because of the binging and rebellion that has occurred as a result of a drinking age (in his opinion.) He believes that he is living a Catholic example best by drinking responsibly and showing others how to drink responsibly despite the fact that it is against the law. He believes that by staying away from alcohol completely I am actually hurting the common good and God’s law.

I personally feel that to help the common good and the law we should obey it, and we are in fact morally bound to obey the law as long as it does not threaten morals or directly contradict God’s law.

Go with your instincts on this one.

There are several issues here:

1) At what age does it become appropriate to consume alcoholic beverages?

This is something on which the Church has no specific teaching. While it is certainly true that one should not partake of alcoholic beverages "before one can handle them," this tells us nothing about when specifically that is.

The drinking age varies widely by culture and, if I understand matters correctly, some cultures have no minimum drinking age. (Though that is not of itself proof of anything, because some cultures are pretty messed up.)

There are a number of possible ways of handling the issue. Among them are these: (a) The matter should be exclusively determined by parents, so that parents can determine when and how much alcohol their children should have and thus guide them into its responsible use over time, (b) the matter should be largely determined by parents, but with a minimum age of some kind, (c) there should be a minimum age that still is below the age of legal majority (18 in our culture), (d) a person should be able to drink when he reaches the age of legal majority, and (e) a person should not be able to drink until after he reaches legal majority.

It seems to me that Catholic moral theology permits an individual to
hold–as a matter of personal opinion–that any of the above are the preferred way of dealing with the
subject.

Civil law does not give a similar latitude to what people can actually do. Option (e) is what civil law requires in the United States. The U.S. grants legal majority to individuals at 18 years of age but does not (generally, so far as I know) allow them to drink until they reach 21 years of age.

This brings us to the next issue . . .

2) When can you break the civil law?

This is another subject on which there are different opinions, but one thing that is certain is that you’ve got a pretty high burden of proof to meet before you can excuse yourself from observing the civil law. There are two reasons for this: (a) except when a law is manifestly unjust, it participates in some manner in natural and divine law and compels obedience for this reason and (b) you’ll get punished if you get caught, so there is a prudence issue as well.

Since it seems to mee that Catholic moral theology would allow any of the options mentioned above (1a-1e) as legitimate ways of handling the drinking issue, it seems that Catholic moral theology would NOT HOLD that laws stipulating (1d) or (1e) are clearly unjust.

The premise of your friend’s argument (that it is unjust not to let people drink before they are 21) thus strikes me as very, very shaky.

Even if we were to grant his premise, though, that still leaves a third issue . . .

3) When can you break the law as an example to others?

If you need to meet a high burden of proof to be able to break the law yourself, you need an even higher one to break it as an example to others.

It would be one thing for parents to conclude–in spite of whatever local drinking laws there may be–that their children need a slow introduction to alcohol to prevent them from going nuts once they are out of the home and thus give them sips of wine or champaigne at Christmas and New Years in the privacy of their own homes.

It would be entirely another thing for them to start encouraging other people’s children to do this.

To conclude that you are not morally obligated to follow a particular civil law is one thing (and a thing which requires a HIGH burden of proof), but it is a whole new order of magnitude to conclude that you should break the law as an example to others.

Society hangs together because people obey its laws. Society depends on a generalized respect for the law.

To privately break a particular law involves some disruption of the social fabric, but to publicly encourage others to break the law involves a much worse disruption of the social fabric.

As a result, this requires a much higher burden of proof–not only that the law is unjust but that it involves SO MUCH injustice that action in public defiance of the law must be taken.

I therefore find your friend’s argument wholly unpersuasive.

Not only is the premise that it’s based on (i.e., that 21 as a drinking age is unjust) something that is very, very shaky but the idea is simply boneheaded that he–or you–should go around publicly breaking the law as an example to others to encourage them to break the law, too.

This is especially the case when we realize that we’re talking about young people: Even if you and your friend are sterling examples of maturity for your age (and your friend isn’t holding up well in this regard to my mind), the people who you would be influencing by your behavior probably are not all equally responsible.

To encourage them to start drinking under age would be to tempt them into situations that could cause them grave harm–like getting drunk and doing immoral things, putting themselves in danger of long-term alcohol abuse, tempting them to break other laws casually, and getting busted by the police.

Your friend’s argument that you are harming God’s law by not breaking civil law is simply absurd. Even if he thinks that it is his duty to publicly defy drinking laws, his trying to guilt you into doing so is preposterous.

Catholic moral theology would IN NO WAY hold that you have an obligation to break drinking laws in order to set an example for others.

It sounds more to me like your friend is seeking to rationalize his own giving of scandal to others and is trying to rope you into doing the same thing so that he’ll feel more justified in what he is doing.

That is such a serious lapse in judgment that it should lead you to question your friend’s judgment generally.

With friends like that, you don’t need enemies.

One added note: If you have not yet attained the age of legal majority (18) then you are most definitely still under your parents’ authority and thus should not be doing ANYTHING regarding alcohol or breaking the law contrary to their instructions. Their right under natural and thus divine law to direct you in such matters is unambiguous.

Altzheimer’s & Communion

A reader writes:

My grandmother had altzheimer’s for several years before she died. During that time, she went through a series of stages; first she started forgetting things, then she became deranged (trying to light a cigarette with a pen, etc), and finally, she became near catatonic. When my grandfather looked into having Communion brought to her, it was denied because it was speculated that she no longer recognized the Holy Eucharist as the True Presence of Christ. When he told me this, I was horrified! I can think of very few times when the administration of Holy Communion is more urgent.

In any event, when she died, it had been a period of several years since she had received Communion.

What justification can there possibly be for denying my grandmother Holy Communion, simply because she was very mentally ill? The explanation given above is insufficient on theological grounds, since in the Byzantine rite, Holy Communion is given to infants, who do not recognize Christ’s presence in the Holy Eucharist. How can communion, then, be denied in the Roman rite?

Please explain this to me …

What happened to your grandmother is reprehensible. I wish I’d known about it at the time, and I may have been able to point you in the right direction for getting the situation redressed.

Here are the facts:

While it is true that in the Latin Church there is a canonical requirement for people to be able to discern the Real Presence as a requirement for making their first Communion, there is NO REQUIREMENT that a person must retain this faculty in order to continue to be able to receive Communion.

The fact that the ability to discern the Real Presence is not an absolute requirement is illustrated by two things:

1) The Church’s practice (that you point out) of allowing infants to receive Communion in many of the Eastern Catholic Churches, and

2) The historic practice of the Latin Church itself in giving Communion–at least in the form of Viaticum–to people who have lost the use of reason due to illness or age.

The Church feels very strongly that the faithful receive Viaticum no matter what their circumstances, and it is normal to provide Viaticum even to people who are totally unconscious.

I know that if I’m rendered comatose on my deathbed, that’s what I want to happen (after I’m given the anointing of the sick)!

Even apart from Viaticum, though, the Church still make available Communion to those who are mentally handicapped.

This subject was touched on at the recent Synod of Bishops on the Holy Eucharist. The Propositions that the synod fathers wrote for the consideration of Pope Benedict contain the following:

Proposition 44

The Eucharist and the Sick

We consider it of utmost importance to favor Eucharistic celebration for the sick, through an appropriate catechesis on active participation in the Passion, Death and Resurrection of Christ. A special significance of the Eucharist, as summit of Christian life, is enclosed in its reception as Holy Viaticum. Given that it opens paschal fullness to the sick person, it is recommended that its practice be intensified.

It is especially requested that Eucharistic Communion be provided to baptized and confirmed mentally disabled persons: The latter receive Communion in the faith of the family and of the community that support them.

The impossibility of knowing the effective sensitivity proper to certain types of sick people is not sufficient reason not to give them all the sacramental supports of which the Church disposes. It is important that those who suffer from disability may be recognized as members of the Church in all aspects, and have their just place in her.

It is desirable, moreover, that the architectural functionality of churches facilitates their participation in celebrations.

I need to point out that the Propositions released by the synod fathers are not a legally binding document, but they are illustrative of the attitude taken by the Church toward the interpretation of its law on these points, and the law simply does not prevent someone in your grandmother’s condition form receiving Communion.

Period.

Blessings At Communion Time

A reader writes:

My wife is Episcopalian. I am Catholic. Recently, she was attending Mass, sitting up in the choir loft with our 2 1/2 year old son, while I was the cantor. At communion, she normally stays up in the choir loft at the back of the church (my father sings in the choir, so she gets privileges to sit off to the side/back), but one of the choir members normally carries our son down to Communion- mainly just to give him a ride.

So, this most recent time our son went with his usual ride, and I think another choir member, or possibly the choir director (who is pretty Orthodox)- not sure which it was, said she should go down to get a blessing. As you probably know, at Episcopal/Lutheran/probably other churches you can cross your arms on your chest to receive a blessing if you don’t want to receive communion.

So, she went down, and did that, and the pastor basically looked at her and said "We don’t do that". She handled it gracefully, but my questions are as follows:

1) I thought blessings could be given in such a case. Is this wrong? I thought I’d read at one point had indicated this was possible.

The giving of blessings during Communion time is a sticky subject. There are several principles to keep in mind:

Since giving a blessing is not the same thing as giving Communion, this represents an interruption of the distribution of Communion.
It is not provided for in the liturgical books, and canon and liturgical law prohibit introducing new elements into the liturgy.
That being said, a priest is empowered to interrupt the liturgy for an adequate cause. For example, if a plane flies over during a prayer or his homily, he can pause for a moment until the plane is past.
It strikes me as reasonable–and it’s certainly within the realm of legitimate liturgical opinion to hold that it is reasonable–for a priest to pause the distribution of Communion in order to administer a blessing if the alternative is sending someone away disappointed and possibly angry and disaffected.
That being said, I would not be encouraging people to go up for such a blessing since it is not provided for in the liturgical books–yet. (See below on this.)
What I have said applies to priests and deacons. It does not necessarily apply to laity who are giving Communion and who are empowered to give blessings in many fewer circumstances than members of the clergy.

Having said that, I suspect that the giving of blessings during Communion time is may receive authorization at some point.

At the recent Synod of Bishops meeting on the Eucharist, the bishops talked about this practice as a way of giving people (including non-Catholics) a way to participate so that they don’t feel pressure to receive Communion if they aren’t able to receive it. We know that because the topic showd up in the Instrumentum laboris for the Synod, which stated:

Some responses [by bishops to a questionnaire sent out to prepare the groundwork for the Synod] mention that priests, while distributing Holy Communion, give a blessing to children or catechumens—both duly pointed out—who approach the altar and have not made their First Communion. In some Churches, a blessing is imparted to non-Catholics who approach the altar at Communion time. In this regard, some responses from Asia suggest finding some gesture at Communion time towards non-Christians to make them feel more a part of the liturgical community.

It is possible that Pope Benedict will take up the subject in his Post-Synodal Exhortation, which should be released within a year or so. If he does take it up (and I’m not saying that he will) then my guess is that he will approve the practice for precisely the reasons that the bishops’ responses spoke positively of it–that it will relieve social pressure to receive Communion for those who are not able to receive, thus resulting in fewer sacrilegious receptions of Communion (something that the synod fathers were very concerned about).

It is also possible, giving how widespread this practice is, that the Congregation for Divine Worship may weigh in on it. If that happens, it could either approve or disapprove of it.

All this is just speculation, though. The issue at hand is what does liturgical law provide now (covered in the bullet points above).

Since this practice does not have current authorization, I’d try to be understanding of your priest. He’s trying to do what he think is right, even if his application on the law of this point may have not taken account of the idea that it is reasonable to pause the distribution of Communion for a just cause.

2) He also does not bless the smaller children, which I have seen done other places. What is the common (or alternatively, the advisable) practice regarding that?

The same considerations apply. If you have a child being brought up for a blessing and one is denied then either the parents or the parents and the child may go away disappointed, angry, and disaffected, which strike me as legitimate reasons to pause to give a blessing.

3) If a blessing is allowed and/or proper/encouraged, what would you recommend as supporting evidence to the pastor?

Since this practice is not provided for in liturgical law, there isn’t really any documentation on it, but feel free to show him this blog post as a liturgical law opinion.