Fr. Ray Blake on the Natural Law

We have to hand the quote of the week to Fr. Ray Blake on the other side of the pond in the UK. The blogging priest is the pastor of Saint Mary Magdalen in Brighton.

He fisks some coverage in the secular news of Pope Benedict's blunt and to-the-point ad limina address to Britain's bishops. 

The newsagencies seem to have ignored, the idea of "natural law", perhaps because it is not a phrase upper most in the Ecclesdon Square vocabulary. Yet for anyone concerned with "justice and peace" issues, it obviously should be.


In what sense does Ms Harman's "Equalities Legislation", which incidently is Labour's only "big idea", violate the natural law?


It bases human rights on sexual orientation, the tendency is therefore to reduce human beings to being a set of genitals attached to a person, rather than seeing first and foremost a human being a mind, a soul who has a certain sexual orientation.

Do read the entire post, which is not that long if you want to see where we are headed here in the US.  What comes after the above is an account of a very disturbing practice taking place in nursing homes and Fr. Blake rightly asks, if 11 year olds will be next.

If you liked that post, you will probably also like his post on another part of the Pope's ad limina address in which he said the bishops must recognize dissent for what it is.  Below, fellow UK priest, "His Hermeneuticalness" - Fr. Tim Finigan, holds up a copy of the UK's leading dissident Catholic rag, The Tablet.  It has a "sister" paper here in the US called The National Catholic Reporter. It has come to be known by more popular names among faithful Catholics around the world familiar with it: "The Bitter Pill", "RU-486", and most appropriately, "The Suppository".  Fr. Finigan was the target of relentless attacks by The Bitter Pill for daring to offer the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite - just one per Sunday - at his parish in Blackfen. As seen in the photo below, Fr. Finigan took it all in stride.

Te Deum Laudamus! Home

The obedient are not held captive by Holy Mother Church; it is the disobedient who are held captive by the world!

Canon lawyer takes on the NCR's attack of the USCCB over marriage

Orthodox Catholics have begun to notice that the dissident wing of the Catholic Church is coming unglued as orthodoxy among bishops is increasing.  More and more, bishops, and the faithful with them, are functioning as they should, with the mind of the Church.  However, some want the Church to mind them and it doesn't work this way.

It wasn't too long ago that only a handful of bishops would stand up to dissidents- at least publicly.  Granted, just as a parent should discipline a child in privacy to preserve their dignity, a bishop will always work privately with someone who is out of line. 

The tide is shifting and not only do many more bishops have the mind of the Church, they are willing to endure persecution for the sake of Truth. By this, we know that the Holy Spirit has come to rest on them.  In charity, please pray for them daily, and for their missions.

The dissidents  - that is, those who want Catholicism to have as many truths as there are people who hold different views of the same thing - are in a panic.  They want to make Catholicism into a designer religion whereby everyone gets to decide their own  version of truth.  The articles at places like the National Catholic Reporter are getting more ridiculous and laughable.  Relativism and consequentialism permeate the works there.  Much of what is found in op-ed pieces, can be refuted with the Compendium of the Catholic Catechism. 

For example, Canon Lawyer, Ed Peters just analyzed one such article that came out a few days ago in which the editors attacked the US bishops for a draft of their Pastoral Letter on Marriage which was leaked to them.  Obviously, it was leaked by someone who did not like what they were reading, otherwise, why would it be leaked to a dissident paper like NCR?  It is an unvirtuous act to begin with - to leak a working document intended to be between bishops to an online magazine  - in particular to one with a reputation for distortion of Catholic teaching.  As an aside, I must say, that any time the NCR has gotten their dander up over something bishops are doing, there's a pretty good chance that humble, loyal Catholics will value the work and study it.

When the editors of NCR can't get a basic Catholic fact straight, how serious can you take the rest of their argument?  Go read: The NCRep's "simple fact" about marriage is simply wrong by Ed Peters, J.D., J.C.D. 

Te Deum Laudamus! Home

The obedient are not held captive by Holy Mother Church; it is the disobedient who are held captive by the world!

Dissident Theologian Fr. Richard McBrien and his public attack on Adoration and goofy pontification on the Year for Priests

Some of you know the Rev. Richard McBrien and some of you may not. I call him Father because he is still a priest, even though he makes this difficult to recognize. For some strange reason, he always seems to find his collar when being interviewed on cable news about something happening in the Vatican. For news outlets to even use him as a source on Catholicism is not much different than asking a vegetarian to offer a comment about cooking beef steak.

I won't use the term "left" or "liberal" because "dissident theologian" is most fitting. How he could still be teaching in any Catholic institution is beyond my comprehension. Perhaps you might be moved to raise this question to the Papal Nuncio - Pietro Sambi, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, and Congregation for Catholic Education. I don't have time to get the addresses, but if someone wants to drop them in the comment boxes that is fine (see Fr. Z's helpful notes about writing to bishops and congregations. These apply whether you are writing to your own pastor, bishop, or to someone at the Holy See).

What follows here are links to two posts made by Fr. Z in which he dissects McBrien's words in recent articles featured in the ultra-dissenting "catholic" rag, the National Catholic Reporter. I call it a rag without hesitation because it publicly promotes certain things that are opposed to Catholic teaching and provides to it's readers "all sorts of strange teachings".

What is good about reading it at Fr. Z's blog is the indepth analysis. He indeed captures it.

First, you may want to read the analysis on Fr. McBrien's attack on Eucharistic Adoration. ND's McBrien: Eucharistic Adoration "is a doctrinal, theologican, and spiritual step backward".

Please make some acts of reparation......in Adoration....for this blatant public attack.

Now, Fr. Z looks very closely at a more lenthy article. In it, Fr. McBrien has other ideas on the Year for Priests.

In the comment box, Tim Ferguson - a frequent commentor at Fr. Z's blog has offered a most interesting perspective on the challenges faced by newer priests who enter the typical parish scene. He's got some situations pegged very well. Hopefully, after considering the plight of some newer priests you will be moved even moreso to pray for them.



Te Deum Laudamus! Home

The obedient are not held captive by Holy Mother Church; it is the disobedient who are held captive by the world!

A short collection of analytical reading of dissident news articles

Fr. Z has been analyzing some recent articles from dissident sources (in particular, women religious who have their dander up over the apostolic visitation of active orders).

Here are two worth reading, with the first one having just been posted:

• Women religious in discontinuity
• US women (progressivist) religious defy Vatican Visitation

Similarly, you may be interested to read more analyses by Fr. Z on other issues. While there are more positive things to read, it is purely educational to see how dissidents twist things to sow the seeds of confusion. How I wish I would have had the understanding of the faith I now have, back in the 70's and 80's when priests, religious and theologians were trying pass off similar fluff as Catholicism.

• NCR's attack on the Year for Priests: Heresy and arrogance
• Anxious NCR editorial - They KNOW they are losing and they are terrified
• Response to America Magazine's editorial: "Community of Disciples"
  

Visit his site regularly to get read more like this

Te Deum Laudamus! Home

The obedient are not held captive by Holy Mother Church; it is the disobedient who are held captive by the world!

Awesome Analysis by Fr. Z of Dissident Spin in NCR Article

It calls itself the National Catholic Reporter (NCR). I can't help but call it the National "catholic" Rag (and the "c" is not capitilized intentionally).

These kinds of analyses are particularly valuable because when you read things such as the article dissected by Fr. Z, you know some things are wrong and it gets under your skin, but you don't always know why. After Father puts a floodlight on it, you will find that he expresses what you seem to know, but can't quite express.

Father repeats certain things because they keep showing up and he is right. For example, one point he has stressed is that numbers, polls, popular opinion, etc., matter to dissidents. We need to always keep in mind that Our Lord was hung on a cross through popular vote. Also, if the majority of a population believed that stealing was ok, would it change it's moral status?

Another recurring theme in articles by dissidents is that if you support the Church's teachings without eqivocation, then you don't care about the poor or the marginalized. This is utter nonsense. It's actually just a little bait and switch.

Go read: Anxious NCR editorial - They KNOW they are losing and they are terrified!

I just wonder how much longer the Church will allow the NCR to use the name "Catholic". It should be renamed, if not to the Rag, to the NCinoR - the National Catholic-in-name-only Reporter.

Te Deum Laudamus! Home

The obedient are not held captive by Holy Mother Church; it is the disobedient who are held captive by the world!