Links, quotes, lines, and anecdotes

I've been building up a backlog of links and stories to comment on, rave upon rashly, and otherwise blather about with abandon, and the dam is breaking. So, in no particular order, here are some things that have caught, held, and kept my interest in the past week or two.

• Archbishop Joseph Naumann on SNAP: "My take is that they have a hatred toward the Church. Their mission is no longer to assist victims, but is to strike at the Church and wound the Church." And: "In my experience, they have never acknowledged a false accusation. As far as they are concerned, if you are accused, you are guilty. They don't take anyone off the list. They don't serve themselves well by insisting that every accusation is true." Read the entire interview.

• Some Muslim students at Catholic University are complaining that the school is so, uh, Catholic:

The complaint was filed by John Banzhaf, an attorney and professor at George Washington University Law School. Banzhaf has been involved in previous litigation against the school involving the same-sex residence halls. He also alleged in his complaint involving Muslim students that women at the university were being discriminated against. You can read more on those allegations by clicking here.

Banzhaf said some Muslim students were particularly offended because they had to meditate in the school's chapels "and at the cathedral that looms over the entire campus – the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception."

I suppose this makes perfect sense in light of how countries such as Saudi Arabia, Syria, and Iran go out of their way to help Christians build churches and have safe places of worship. Perhaps the students can transfer to Georgetown, a school that happilly covered up references to its Catholic roots when asked to do so by a lawyer-turned-POTUS.

• Dr. Robert Moynihan, editor of Inside the Vatican, has a good piece about the Holy Father's address earlier today at Assisi. He writes:

The paradox: Benedict was speaking to a group of religious leaders, men and women representing nearly all the major religions of the world, but instead of praising religious faith unreservedly, and calling for more of it, he criticized it for often going radically off track in acts of violence, war, and terror.

 In short, at a meeting of religious believers, he criticized religious believers for losing sight of the very faith they professed, criticized them, essentially, for falling into error about the nature of God.

I've now read the Assisi speech a couple of times and am inclined to think that it is short and powerful presentation of some key themes explored at length in Benedict XVI's 2006 Regensburg Address.

• I thought Huff-and-Puff commenters, in general, were the most rude, ignorant, sophomoric, and pathetic group of commenters on things Catholics until I read the comments in this CNN piece about Rep. Paul Ryan being asked about Catholic social teaching. Goodness. Stupidity that toxic makes nuclear waste look like maple syrup.

• The September/October 2011 issue of Saint Austin Review is about religion and poltics. A free article can be downloaded from the magazine's site.

• WhyImCatholic.com has some wonderful stories about conversion, including this one by Lorraine V. Murray, author of several books, including Confessions of an Ex-Feminist (Ignatius Press, 2008).

• DarwinCatholic has one of the longest and most detailed commentaries on the recent note from the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace on global economics.

• And Fr. Robert A. Sirico of Action Institute writes in the Wall Street Journal about the same document, which he finds to be good at locating the problems but poor at providing solutions.

• Unplanned: The Dramatic True Story of a Former Planned Parenthood Leader's Eye-Opening Journey Across the Life Line, by Abbey Johnson, is now available in paperback.

• The wonderful, wise, and witty Rev. Fr. John Trigilio, has a great post titled, "Why Priests are Happy and Sometimes Not". I'll give you the conclusion and encourage you to read everything that leads up to it:

When the human element of the Church is fair and just, that enables the rank and file to busy themselves with the pastoral work that has to be done. When there is cronyism, politics, skullduggery and intrigue among the clergy (upper and lower), then the zeal can be robbed from those who find it distasteful and inappropriate. Happiness is the natural object of the human person that is why we seek eternal happiness in the next life. Happiness is like joy. It comes from having inner peace which is tranquility of order. When our will conforms to the Divine Will, there is harmony and peace in our soul and that creates a sense of happiness. Knowing you are doing what the Lord wants you to do makes you happy. But human beings can also bring unhappiness when they distort the truth and when they deny justice to fellow human beings. A former bishop told me that he loved to get letters of support for his priests since most people only write their bishop when they want to complain about a priest and rarely to compliment him. We have all had the experience of the nasty letter from the irate parishioner who feels mistreated. Whenever a positive letter came in, this bishop made the same effort to call the priest in and share the contents. If more parishioners wrote supportive letters before their pastor got transferred or before he leaves this earth, it might help keep more guys happy on the job. When you doubt that your efforts have any effect, that there may be no fruit to your labor, it can be discouraging. Hence, I always tell people when I visit other parishes that they need to express their satisfaction from time to time, to their priest and to their bishop. No need to remind them to complain when he is not doing what he is supposed to do, people react immediately and rightfully so. Jesus often gave encouragement and so should all of us.   

• Father Paul Check, executive director of Courage, which was founded by the late Rev. John Harvey, is interviewed by Matthew A. Rarey for National Catholic Register:

How is Courage seeking to correct the chastity problem, especially as it relates to the manner in which homosexuality is addressed among Catholics?

Well, in general, there is resolute opposition to the Church's teaching on homosexuality. Well-funded and strident groups in the media and culture are pitted against the Church on this issue. We all know that. But I think the greater problem is misplaced compassion, even among Catholics. I think that's a more difficult challenge to overcome. Here again, we have to return to the question of our theological anthropology. Who is man in Jesus Christ? What has Jesus Christ revealed to us about ourselves? He spoke plainly about chastity in the Sermon on the Mount and in Matthew 19 when he addressed marriage. So these things are clear and guide us to the truth. God comes into the world in the person of Jesus Christ to restore lost love and joy. And it's possible for us to know with confidence the route to Christ and happiness through the Church.

Read the entire interview. For books by Fr. Harvey, visit www.Ignatius.com.

• My friend, Dr. Bradley Birzer, who teaches history at Hillsdale, ponders the question: "What is the role of true education in twenty-first century America?", with references to Newman, Eliot, Dawson, Kirk, and many others.

• The prolific Russell Shaw asks, "Why don't Catholics read or even know about important Church documents?"

• From the Dominicana blog:

In a delightful passage from his little novel The Quiet Light, Louis de Wohl imagines a meeting between St. Thomas Aquinas and his beloved sister. Many years have passed since they saw one another last, and the difference between them when they reunite is striking. As their conversation comes to a close, the tired woman turns to her brother and asks, almost pleadingly, "Thomas, how can I be a Saint?"

The response that de Wohl places in Aquinas' mouth is marvelous and true. And how does he have the Church's greatest theologian, indeed, one of the most powerful thinkers of all time, respond? Not with "I answer that . . ." Instead, St. Thomas looks at his sister with love and intensely whispers but two simple words: desire it.

The Quiet Light and several other de Wohl novels have been republished in recent years by Ignatius Press.
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• Ignatius Press recently published an edition of The Song at the Scaffold: A Novel by Gertrud von le Fort. Here is some background to the novel:

Despite its gruesome historical context of the French Revolution, The Song at the Scaffold by Gertrud von le Fort is a exquisite little gem of a book.  It's only 110 pages so even the busiest reader can pick it up.  Reading it is almost like going on retreat at a cloister – a charming break from the every day routine and grind.

Le Fort based her story on the historical martyrdom of sixteen Carmelite nuns in the last days of the Reign of Terror.  She, however, invented the main character of Blanche de la Force whom she admitted was based in some ways on her own experiences, especially of the horrors of war.  Blanche is a fearful, timid, anxious child not altogether suited to the difficult, ascetic life of Carmel.  She joins the cloister partially because she believes it is a place where she will find peace.  But distress follows her, for the Revolution begins soon after she enters, and with it persecution of clergy and religious in France.  Blanche has a crisis of vocation and abandons the convent before it is raided and the other Carmelite sisters arrested, tried and sentenced to the guillotine.  Blanche secretly attends the execution and while the nuns ascend the scaffold, a miracle happens.  As the introduction to the English translation states "The Divine purpose, we seem to understand, could not have been achieved without the service of the weakness of fear.  A timid girl seeks refuge in flight, and out of that running away come victory and unforgettable beauty."

• Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, who was recently chosen to be head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, has been in the news a bit as he recently visited Chicago to preside at the 50th anniversary celebration of the Eparchy of St. Nicholas. Archbishop Shevchuk is young (forty-one years old, if I'm not mistaken), fluent in English, and very bright. From a National Catholic Register interview:

Unifying the Church doesn't mean uniformity of Church: building a unique structure under the Pope. It's not like that. Christ's Church is the communion of the different local Churches. That communion doesn't mean the dissolution of one Church inside of another. From our point of view, we need to restore the life of the Church of the first millennium of Christianity: one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church. Not a uniform, unifying Church, but one in communion with Rome — and also restoring regional ways of being Christians.

Before the division of the Great Schism in the 11th century, the Church of Kiev had double communion — with the See of Constantinople and the pope of Rome — so it was united with East and West. The Church of Kiev, you see, existed before that division. So, in order to restore the communion with the Churches in Ukraine, we don't have to invent something strange or different, but restore the original unity of the Church of Christ. And this process, this ecumenical dialogue between Catholics and Orthodox: Is it easier now when the patriarch of Moscow is Kirill? That is hard to say. I would say it is different, because he is a different person. But we are trying, first of all, to restore this unity of action, not the unity in structure.

Read the full interview.

• On a related note, Orthodox priest Fr. Johannes L. Jacobse writes about the possibility of a 2013 meeting between Pope Benedict and Patriarch Kyrill of the Russian Orthodox Church.

• Yet another poll finds that cafeteria Catholicism is alive and, well, widespread. In related news, the Pope wrote, "For the time has come for judgment to begin with the household of God; and if it begins with us, what will be the end of those who do not obey the gospel of God?" That would be the first Pope, Saint Peter.