Run to the heart of Mary

In these disturbing times look to Mary's heart for comfort. 

Pray for us, St. Ambrose

Oh for a latter day St. Ambrose. Our modern bishops can't even muster up a mild rebuke of public heretics.

Lord to whom should we go?

Get in the boat, stay in the boat.  

Is the Al Smith Dinner Really Necessary?

Therefore when thou dost an almsdeed, sound not a trumpet before thee, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may be honored by men. Amen I say to you, they have received their reward. Matthew 6:2 

If the attendees of the Al Smith dinner really cared about  children's charities they could write a check without fanfare or the chance to be seen on TV. It's a largely secular and totally political ritual. Christopher Ferarra calls it an abomination. Should you wish to support the charities that receive money from the dinner you can contact them directly or use the Alfred Smith portal.  You won't get to dress up and be seen with the cardinal and nobody will  applaud you but God will know.


Astor Services
Cardinal McCloskey Community Services
Catholic Big Brothers and Big Sisters
Catholic Guardian Services
Catholic Diocesan Schools
Elizabeth Seton Pediatrics
Fidelis Care 
Good Counsel Homes
Incarnation Children's Center
Little Sisters of the Assumption 
Neonatal Care at New York Presbyterian Hospital 
Partnership for Inner City Education
Pregnancy Care Center
San Miguel Academy
St. Dominic's Home 

A history lesson

A really, really annoying whine that I've been reading all year is that politics has somehow descended into  a vulgar state never seen before and that things were better in the good old days. You don't have to be a former history major in college to know that this is  NOT TRUE. When Jefferson and Adams were running for president people were told that Jefferson was an atheist, and an adulterer with the wives of his neighbors, an attempted seducer of his close friend's unwilling wife, a pagan, a man who sold his own slave children by his slave, Sally Hemmings, and that he was a danger to American women and the family. Saying that this was a rough campaign is an understatement. The enslaved concubine story was openly discussed by his enemies and  quietly by his friends for the rest of his life and may have prevented him from speaking up in support of his son-in-law when the younger man proposed banning slavery from Virginia.

When Andrew Jackson ran for president the public was told that he was  bigamist and that his wife, Rachel was a coarse pipe smoking  backwoods harlot who would humiliate the country in front of European visitors to the White House.  John Quincy Adams was accused of gambling (he bought a chess board and a pool table) and of giving his maid to the Tsar of Russia while he was a diplomat there. There were whispers that  James Buchanan's fiancee did not die from illness but committed suicide because of something she learned about Buchanan.  Lincoln was accused of being the son of a black man. In a time when having one drop of black blood could get you sold into slavery or if you were above the Mason Dixon line, cast out from your job, marriage and social connections, this was seriously vicious talk. He was also called an ape, a liar and a dog.  Poor tortured Mary Todd Lincoln was accused of being a spy for the South. She was criticized when she entertained ambassadors during war time and paradoxically she was criticized for not doing anything social after the death of her youngest son and causing Washington to be no fun although the war was still going on. Andrew Johnson was accused of being an alcoholic.

Grover Cleveland was accused of having an illegitimate child and his opponents came up with the famous chant, "Ma, Ma, where's my Pa?"  Cleveland's supporters responded with, "Gone to the White House. Ha, ha, ha!" Woodrow Wilson was said to have been an adulterer during his university professor days. It was also said that he and his second wife were fornicating before the marriage.  Enemies of Warren G. Harding whispered that he had black ancestry. That claim hung around for many decades and has only been disproved this year with DNA testing.

There were people who tried to fear monger in Protestant USA by stating that Kennedy was going to a devout Catholic. Boy were they wrong! Poor Hubert Humphrey was accused by the Kennedy campaign of being a draft dodger. In truth Humphrey did try to enlist for World War II more than once but was turned down because he had a double hernia, calcified lungs and was color blind.  Does any of this seem nicer than what we've seen and read in recent years?


Politics is a filthy nasty low down business and it was ever thus.

Our Lord and the Gospel Writers

Dominican and Franciscan brothers

This charming painting shows a visiting Franciscan chatting with his Dominican hosts. Can you imagine an artist creating this today?

He descended into Hell

In this incredibly moving painting Our Lord has just descended into Hell and speaks to His creatures and parents, Adam and Eve and tells them that it is alright now. He has smashed the chains they forged they are free to come be with Him forever.

Random thoughts on a Sunday afternoon.

Our Lady of Good Help

Some people say--- well a lot of people are saying it but only a few dare publish it--- that we should calm down because Pope Francis is only going to live so long. When he dies everything will be okay. That is nonsense.  The cardinals and the bishops he chooses live on and they can drive good priests out and put compliant priests in. Your children will be living with the Francis decisions long after he goes to his destiny. You see this in families all the time. A grandfather was a drunkard and his kids reacted to it. His grandchildren are raised according to the reaction. An ecclesiastical example is Cardinal Bernadin. He's  has been dead for years but his proteges are still out there and still in charge.



The last few weeks of One Peter Five haven't held my attention but Hilary White's piece on the revival of an old idea that could serve the Church in these bad days is luminescent.


Is anybody  over the age of six really surprised about the latest Wikileaks?  Outside forces have attempted with varying degrees of success to interfere with the Church from the very beginning and you know what? It won't matter. Most Catholics vote the way we do for reasons of habit and loyalty to our tribe. Many of us are unthinkingly  like the woman in the song, "My Man." I mean the early Fanny Brice version, not the sanitized Streisand one. The protagonist sings that her man isn't good, cheats and occasionally beats her but fatalistically asks, "What can I do? I love him."  She knows and more importantly, he knows that she's not going anywhere.



John Zmirak has a new book out. According to a review in Crisis magazine:

 "His targets include left-wing Catholic dissenters but also the ever-growing numbers of—how would you describe them?—self-proclaimed orthodox Catholics with private college degrees who live mostly on social media, hate “conservatives,” hate the pro-life movement, hate the pro-family movement, hate Republicans especially, and rather than getting real jobs to support their ever growing families instead love welfare checks. He argues they are increasingly insinuating themselves into Catholic institutions where they can spread their new gospel."

This group of folks can be quite annoying because they dominate comment boxes with their pet theories no matter what the subject of conversation is. Zmirak is correct that they seem to hate everything and they are for their level of education often unemployed or underemployed. There are only so many Catholic college jobs, or Catholic media jobs to go around and those who refuse to join the rat race or work for a worldly corporation are going to have a hard row to hoe.  Most of this group  seem proud to be living in genteel poverty and condemn anybody who has a new car (never mind that the old car was 20 years old and falling apart) or who goes on vacation as unholy worldlings.  Unlike Zmirak I've only come across one person who said she was on welfare.  Several of her readers were incensed and criticized her mightily in the comment boxes. I didn't write in but I stopped reading her blog. 

 I'm not going to buy John Zmrak's book because it sounds like it's just a rehash of his essays that I can read for free and I think it's funny that the review appeared in Crisis at all, because quite a few of its readers are the kind of folks Zmirak delights in skewering, but Zmirak fans will like it. 

At prayer

Your priest can't control the noisy babies so give him a break

After Mass a person approached our pastor and complained about the noisy kids and babies. I wanted to ask "What do you want Fr. to do? Should he stop Mass and offer to spank them all?" Some of the things people ask priests are really unreasonable.  Normal human beings are simply hard wired to notice  to the sounds babies make. I can hear a baby coo in a noisy room or at work.  I ignore anger cries but if it is the distinct fear cry I will go and peep to see what's wrong. Yes, the little kid banging his metal truck on the pew can be maddening. The big kid playing video games is obnoxious and hapless the man who   who keeps getting up and down with his little one, dragging toys, blankets and sippy cups behind him while stepping all over you is enough to make you want to say something spicy and uncharitable but here are things you can do to minimize the noisy tot problem. You can ignore it and offer it up.  A friend of Rocky's uses ear plugs at Mass, others simply avoid the Family Mass. There are others who concentrate on the missal and throw themselves so deeply into prayer that they hear nothing. I have been known to switch pews.  You wouldn't dare go up to a woman and tell her to "Shut that kid up," so why demand that poor Father do so?








*Note to young parents: the people frowning at you at church are not necessarily annoyed by you and your offspring. They heard a panic cry and are instinctively reacting to it.

First Friday for the Sacred Heart of Jesus

Pope Leo XIII has something to sy to you

“The worst kind of heretic is the one, while teaching mostly true Catholic doctrine, adds a word of heresy, like a drop of poison in a cup of water.” 

Pope Leo XIII

We have a new bishop

• I recently read  The Book of Feasts and Seasons and I hated it. I wanted to like it because the author, John C. Wright is Catholic, a very erudite man and he caught a lot of flak when he converted. The book is a collection of short stories each inspired by different holidays. It is beautifully written and he means well but it struck me as blasphemous on occasion. The best story in the book is about a mad scientist who is mourning his dead wife. He jumps into his time machine and goes back to Bethlehem in time to see a mass crucifixion, get roughed up by a suspicious Roman soldier, talk to a Passover lamb and finally run into St. Joseph who calmly realizes that this stranger is just another person who needs to see the Baby Jesus.  When he meets the Holy Family he ends up explaining to Mary what the sign of the cross will eventually mean the the future followers of her Son. Again, this story meant well but if we still had an Index of Forbidden Books it would probably be listed there for the twisting of the gospels alone.

• So, the Loverde era in the Arlington diocese is coming to an end. I never cared much for Bishop Loverde but I was concerned that after his retirement we would get someone really terrible. According to Rorate Caeli, while Bishop Michael Burbidge may not be Prince Charming, he's no cave troll either and that is a relief.
  
  
•  In your charity could you pray for the repose of the soul of Fr. Daniel Mudd? He was once a parochial vicar at my childhood parish and we all loved him.
  
  
  
• Blessed Zenon Kovalyk, tortured and crucified in a Soviet prison camp, pray for us. 
  

Your Excellency, what were you thinking?

Bishop John Stowe of Lexington, Kentucky celebrated Mass in a barn near the stall of the famous racing horse, American Pharaoh. Ostensibly this Mass was supposed to be about Bishop John Manz's pastoral visit to farm workers but the gushing article is really about meeting the stallion. Some dear person is probably saying, "But Dymphna, Our Lord was born in a stable. Isn't this sweet?" No, it's not sweet. This was a cutesy stunt and I have some questions:  Do you honestly believe that the Catholic family that owns the stud farm doesn't allow their workers off the property? Is it common knowledge that farmhands are not allowed to set foot in town or inside the local mission or church?  Did the bishops say Mass at every farm they visited or was it just this one that houses one of the greatest race horses to ever live?
The bishops could have toured the barn and visited American Pharaoh without having Mass there. They could have celebrated in a tent outside or in the bunk house. They could have celebrated Mass at the home of the farm owners and invited the farmhands inside. Cute stunts like this disgusted untold numbers of people over the last 50 years and many of them left the Church for good.

Pope St. Pius X has something to say to you

"Further, whilst Jesus was kind to sinners and to those who went astray, He did not respect their false ideas, however sincere they might have appeared. He loved them all, but He instructed them in order to convert them and save them.”

Cut to the Heart and Random Thoughts Before Michaelmass

Mary, the Divine Shepherdess

• I was reading a Catholic site and came across a man's comment that he checks his son's tablet and phone every week and changes the passwords in order to keep the boy from looking at porn. Other people congratulated him for his vigilance but I thought that if I knew this man personally and if I had a daughter she'd never be allowed within ten feet of this his son. Dude, you just admitted to the whole world that your son can't stop looking at pornography.
  
  
  
  

  The always interesting blogger and reader of this blog, Hans Georg Lundahl   points out that this man could also be inadvertantly telling the world

  that he is an overly suspicious  father.  I hadn't thought of that and I am reminded

  of a sad story from  many years ago. A Baptist preacher was so strict and 

  distrustful of his five daughters that the youngest simply snapped.  

  She got married to a relative of mine, mainly to get out of the house and proceeded

  to become the monster that her father feared she could be. She had an affair, toyed with
  witchcraft and did other things I won't go into here. My my relative divorced her and got
  custody of their child. She  later had a child out of wedlock and turned to 

  alcohol. Yes, her choices were horrible but her father's super tough approach 

  helped make that way. Parents, you can drive an good kid crazy.  As St. Paul 

  said, "Fathers, provoke not your children to indignation,  lest they be discouraged.
  
  
  
  
• Maybe Catholic and any other serious academic establishment should drop Homecoming and the Prom.  Half, if not most of what goes on at our schools has nothing to do with education.
  
• Anybody who makes their living from talking to your kids about sex day in and day out and who gets angry and insulting if you object is probably a pervert. A pervert is what he or she is just as a rabid raccoon is what it is. You can't reason with the pervert or expect any mercy.The really infuriating people are they useful idiots who go along with the pervert because they don't want to lose social status or their jobs. The Nashville debacle is going to force parents to take their kids out of Catholic schools or try homeschooling.
  
• An old woman in her 70s wrote on another site that Mass at her parish is too solemn now and that there is less room for socializing. I don't know why, because I have heard such talk before,  but it cut me to the heart.  The only ones having a jolly time at Mt. Cavalry were Our Lord's enemies. 
  
  

  The Holy  Mass only has four precious aims. They are to adore God, to may reparation for sins, to petition God, and to thank Him. That's it. Socializing has no place in Mass. Save that for the parish hall or the parking lot afterwards.

  
  
• Be very careful with people who pay their bills according to what they write or say about the Church. When the mortgage or their kid's tuition is on the line people can be dangerously....flexible.

•  My parish, St. Rita's is having a sung Mass on Thursday, September 29,  for Michaelmass at 7:0 PM. 

St. Michael, the Archangel

Um... about that smell of the sheep thing...

 Most people's experiences with sheep is meeting a groomed pet at someone's hobby farm or seeing them at the fair. Sheep that aren't pets can get a bit whiffy when their wool gets wet from the rain or when they get sick and suffer from diarrhea. In ancient times shepherds weren't always welcomed at the finer establishments because they smelled like their sheep or to speak plainly, they stank.  When a priest or a bishop or a pope says go be among the people and smell of your sheep they're saying in a roundabout way that the laity are so dumb and sinful that we actually stink of it and that's okay. Our Lord never said "Go right along with the stinking, dumb sinner and don't hold them to any standard or ask them to mend their ways." He really didn't.

Dearest, clergy, how about washing the sheep with the sacraments and cleaning yourself while you're at it?

Random thoughts after vacation

Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal Shrine, Philadelphia

• Rocky and I went on vacation in Pennsylvania last week and took my mother with us.  We ate Pennsylvania Dutch cooking, gazed upon the beautiful farms and quilts and admired the animals. On Friday we went to Philadelphia and visited the Miraculous Medal and St. John Neuman shrines and we went to the Holy Spirit nun's Divine Love chapel for adoration. The chapel is gorgeous and we listened to the nuns praying their Office. We also saw both the extern sister and a cloistered nun who was adoring. We went to the vigil Mass at a Redemptorist parish and while it wasn't horrible it wasn't very good.  Mass at a Redemptorist parish always seems to mean no Confiteor and lots of jokes but on the bright side, the parishioners are very friendly and don't mind tourists at all. Another good thing about St. Anthony of Padua church in Lancaster, PA is that it is handicapped accessible with ramps and an elevator which was great for my mother.
  
  
• If a guy pulls out a knife and cuts your throat it really doesn't matter if he's a lone wolf or a member of an organized international pack. You are still dead and your family is still miserable and the people who stood helplessly and watched you be butchered are still terrorized.
  
  
• Are you in the Navy?  It's time to get out. Oh and please, if you belong to another branch of the military don't think this won't be forced on you too. It's coming.
  
  
• Two priests in Mexico were kidnapped and found dead.  They are not lions or gorillas so their deaths will not make the world news.
  
  
• Our Lord was not a social worker. 

St. Maximilian

When I was a child someone told me that a messy desk is sign of a disorganized person.  I cant' tell you how delighted I was to find this photo of St. Maximilian at his desk.