the truth sucks sometimes

I've never had a successful pregnancy. The last time I got pregnant back in 2007, it ended in an ectopic rupture. I've told myself and others that I'm okay, Since I can't have children I've tried to convince myself that I dont' like them anyway 'cause they're noisy and then I see a photo like this and I just.....

Catholic Charities giving needles to junkies?

Crap like this is why I don't give to Catholic Charities. That's like telling a drunk driver to use a scooter instead of a car becuase it's safer. The drunk, like the junkie is still slowing killing himself and making life hell for his family but at least you've "done something", and feel good about yourself.

Okay, Archbishop Dolan, what're you going to do about this?

Sacrilege took place at St. James Church in Manhattan. Apparently the pastor thought the concert was going to be a Life Teen type thing which is bad enough but the poor man was too trusting and horribly mistaken. I don't wan to beat up on a priest but oh how I wish he had taken better care of his church by checking out the promoter or at least having someone from the parish staff at the church to observe things instead of naively allowing the concert promoters and the attendees to wound the Sacred Head of Our Lord in His own house. I've looked at pictures of the event on other blogs and tears poured from my eyes.

Lord have mercy.

If you want to get married in the Phoenix diocese you'll have to take 9 months of prep classes

I predict that a lot of couples in the Phoenix diocese are going to say to heck with it and get married in a civil ceremony or go to other denominations.

God bless you, Grant

Grant Desme has given up a major league baseball career to go to the seminary and become a priest. A lot of people are mystified and angry. Poor silly folks. God bless you, Grant. You have chosen the better part.

March for Life day

I tend to check in on Inside Catholic a lot. It's a good site for seeing what's going on in Catholic circles. Some of the writers are interesting. Most of the males strike me as having once been kids who were picked on a lot and they are still bitter about it. This week there was post from Steve Skojec on why he doesn't attend the March for Life. He is an intriuging man and he has a talent for writing but I have never been able to figure him out. I read his post and my immediate thought was that it was a cop out.My next impression was that it was an unfair put down of the marchers. Apparently for him the March is mostly just a chance for Pro-Lifers to get together with friends once a year and feel good about themselves. (see footnote)

I've said before on this blog that the Pro-Life movement needs a reboot. We need clever, media savvy, articulate spokesmen with backgrounds that are above reproach. Some of the leaders are devoted and brave but they are lousy on camera and some-- Randall Terry for example, mean well but actually repulse fellow Catholics never mind anyone else. I admit that until last year when the Tea Party movement rocked DC I had my doubts about the usefulness of marches for any cause and no, I've never been to the March but knocking it entirely makes no sense at all to me.

Last night after work Rocky and I went out to dinner and the place was full of families who marched in DC that day. They were the nicest people, they charmed the waitresses, left good tips and when asked why they were in town they gave polite witness to the cause. Those good, cheerful people were impressive and I'll bet they planted a seed in the minds of the other patrons in the restaurant. Those marchers did more than Mr. Skojec, bah humbuging away at his keyboard.

*** Let's say for a moment, that the March is merely a venue for Pro-Lifers to pray together, renew courage and gain comfort from being the presence of like-minded souls. What's wrong with that? If you've ever stood in front of an abortion clinic with your sign protesting the evil within, while people hurl curses and sometimes objects at you then you know how lonely pro-life work can be. I met a woman who spends a couple of hours every week standing within 30 feet of my town's local abortion clinic. She's there in the snow, in the rain, in the heat. Some people sneer at her, others have enough conscience left to hurry past her with their heads held down in shame. I wish I had that plain, quiet little woman's guts. She deserves a pat on the back and a pint of beer raised in her honor.

Things that are starting to irritate me

• The Haitian coverage. Reporters and photographers are treating the Haitians like animals. I saw a photograph of an elderly woman sitting on the ground topless. She didn't look happy about having her picture taken. I know Haiti is a primitive place but people haven't walked naked in public there in centuries. Imagine you're sitting in your tub or lying in bed or shampooing your hair when the earquake hits. You run outside and find yourself half dressed but alive. And then some foreigner comes along, gapes at you and takes your photograph as if you are a dumb beast on the saharra. I have seen photos from Hurricaine Katrina, the last Japanese earthquake and the last American one and I never saw such disrespect for human pride before.
  
  
• People who knock Michelle Obama for her looks instead of her politics. Yes, the poor woman is unattractive and I don't think she spent much time reading Emily Post as a child but she's not the president and attacking her for her appearance is ungracious, unserious and unmanful. And the people who pick on her children -- there is one blogger who seems to delight in this-- are beyond repulsive. Minor children are out of bounds. Americans used to know this. The people at my job who made fun of Bristol and her baby brother, Trigg Palin are dead to me as far as a social relationship goes and I dont' like snotty cracks about Sasha and Malia Obama either. They can't help having a jackass for a father.
  
  
• Activist Catholics in church. I came to Mass to worship the Lord, not sign your petition. Maybe I'll listen to you after Mass and in the parish hall or the parking lot but save your cause for later.
  
  
• Folks who insist on holding hands during the Our Father. Dude, I only hold hands with blood kin and my husband. You are neither. And the next man who tries to give me a "holy kiss" and a butt squeeze is getting a knee to the groin.
  
  
• Catholics who nitpick every good thing they see. A few days ago four Benedictine postulants took their vows and recieved their novice veils. One guy wrote in and complained that the young ladies in their white gowns were too attractive. I wanted to write in but decided not to. All I could think was that if this indvidual finds nuns on their espousal day too sexy then he has ...issues and had better book himself a one way flight to Saudi Arabia. I think he and his loins would be happier there.
  
  Another gloomy gus of a person wrote in to say that she hopes none of the nuns stay in the convent out of perseverence. That's like remarking to a couple on their wedding day, "I hope you don't stay married out of duty to God and your vows to Him." What kind of a whack thing is that to say?
  
  Then there's the people who bitch for the sheer joy of it. This happens quite a lot on New Liturgical Movement blog, I'm sorry to say. Someone will post pictures of a TLM and then readers will filood the comment boxes with petty complaints: the vestments don't fit the priest (never mind the fact that the church in question only has one set), there were six candles when there should've been three, somebody is upset because the bishop has on a blue habit, despite the fact that this particular bishop's order always wears blue from the time of their founding two or three decades ago, someone is pissed because of the priest's high and tight haircut-- turns out that the priest is a military chaplain, (I personally prefer short haired priests, if you have a Samson fetish, get thee to the Byzantines), someone attended the Mass and says that the priest's Latin wasn't good enough-- ungrateful wretch! How good is your spoken Latin, really? Most of us never get to attend a TLM, many people prayed and died waiting for the chance and you pick on a priest who is brave enough and kind enough to say the Mass---ugh!

Hard heads

Hard head make soft asses, my mother used to say. What she meant was that fools and naughty children are determined to do as they please and then cry when they get spanked. Spc. Alexis Hutchinson is in the army and refused to deploy when she got her orders. She has a reason: her beautiful baby boy is only one year old and her mother refused to take care of him while Alexis was to be serving her country.

Well now. First, Alexis should not have gotten pregnant out of wedlock. That sounds harsh but Alexis willfully chose to fornicate with an unsuitable man. He didn't marry her and is apparently so unfit to care for his son that he's not even mentioned in any news story about the case. Alexis picked a real dud.

Second, she never should've joined the army. If you can't do the job like a man then we don't need you. Don't yell "equal rights" when it's time to get the goodies and then cry "But I'm a mommy!," when it's time to do the work. So now, Alexis is sitting in confinement. Her baby is being cared for by her mother--for now-- granny may change her mind and the child could end up in foster care--- and she's probably going to get a dishonorable discharge if not jail time.

Haiti

Haiti is a horrible place on a normal day with ghastly poverty, corruption and voodoo-- the real kind, not the stuff college girls play with but now, oh now it must indescribable. The Anchoress blog has a good round up of charities to give to. I picked Mercy Corps. They do good work and are prudent with their money.

Our Lady of Prompt Succour, pray for Haiti.

I read a comment on another blog, someone, a young person I hope, asked how this earthquake could happen and said he'd question God about it when they meet. I sighed at the arrogance and almost wrote in to say that when this person meets God at the Judgement seat he won't be asking for anything but mercy.

Christians so often make the mistake of thinking that nothing bad should ever happen. Maybe it's the influence of the Protestant proseperity gospel. Jesus never said life in this world would be peachy keen for believers. In fact, He said quite the contrary. We live in a fallen world. There is disease, there are earthquakes, fires, floods, and blizzards and Christians are not immune. The difference between us and pagans is how we deal with this world.

St. Therese had TB-- one of the cruelest deaths known to mankind. St. Bernadette suffered horribly. St. Pio was in pain for 50 years. St. Alphonsus had arthritis so bad that his back was bent and his chin rested on his chest. St. Josephine was tortured by slave owners. St. Damian was a leper. St. Lyndwine had a condition so ghastly that I got shivers just reading her story. And let's not forget the Roman martrys-- some were ripped to pieces by animals, some were covered in tar and set afire, some were hacked to death, some were beheaded, some were disembowled. This life is not one of ease and never has been.

King of Kings -- the crucifixion scene

Two moments really stand out, Mary comforting a woman and the grief of Heaven when Christ dies.

I think I know what the problem is, Father Z.

I am fond of Fr. Z's blog. I'd never eat anything he makes (too fussy for me) but I actually like his food posts. They're interesting. He gets a lot of criticism for the food posts and I think it really bewilders and annoys him. The problem is, I think, that Father spent way too much time living in Europe. Americans love food, (my family members like talking about what we ate last night and what we're going to eat tomorrow) but a lot of what Father cooks is so far beyond the average American's taste or wallet depending on where you live that a small but vocal number of his readers find it very irritating.

And then there's the other problem. In the last 40 years Catholics have been badly burned by distracted priests. We get nervous when a priest seems to be passionate about something other than the priesthood. It's not fair but too many of us have seen motorcycle priests, ventiloquist priests, priests who were experts in Waterford crystal (at parish expense), priests who spent more time in their studios painting abstract art than in the confessional, priests who like to travel with lay people to beach houses rather than pilgrimage sites, priests who rock and roll, priests who never seem to be in the parish because they're doing whatever their hobby is.... and people are bitter and distrustful.

I don't think that Father's food post critics really want him to live on one baked potato a day or beans and soup like a Carthusian but the food posts do strike a nerve. Again, I'll say it's not fair but dear, dear priests so many American Catholics are walking wounded and prone to lash out at the slightest provocation. Sorry.

Thanks Fr. Pat

An elderly priest just realized that importing millions of illegal aliens doesn't help the poor and working class Americans who are already here. Thank you Father. I wish more bishops had your sense.

Oh Mary, mohter of priests

I just heard that a local priest is taking a break to discern his vocation.

Oh Mary, mother of priests, wrap this son of yours in your veil.

Mary Daly died

The late Dr. John Senior (author of the Death of Christian Culture) once wrote that feminist professors seek to turn their impressionable young students into dried out husks that no young man could ever love. He didn't mention Mary Daly but she fits the description. The poor woman hated God, men and the Blessed Virgin. I wonder how many students she ruined?

Feast of Mary, Mother of God

Happy New Year to you all. 2009 was the worst year I can remember. I've seen hard working people sick with worry about their jobs and homes. My cousin and her husband both lost their jobs at the same time. I have one friend who's been looking for work for 6 months now. She's got an excellent resume and years of experience but there are no jobs in her field. Rocky and I drove through Baltimore back in the Summer and we saw block after block of empty foreclosed houses. One neighborhood looked like something out of a apocalyptic sci-fi movie. And now people who have jobs and who can afford their mortgages are choosing to walk away from their homes. Lord, I never thought I'd see the day...

There are people at my job who believe Obama will save them. Poor saps. I do not put my trust in princes. I look to God, the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost and I look to Mary, Mother of God and saint of saints. I put my trust in Heaven.

Ex Fide, Fortis