I'm tired of hearing about it.

Politics and homosexuals.

Oh.  And my cat.  She is really vocal.

That's all.

Photo:  Steve McQueen dancing with the president's daughter Luci Baines Johnson at a political gathering - Young Citizens for Johnson in 1964.  Political science majors.

Drinking, smoking mystic.

Caryll Houselander

Over the past few years I've taken an interest in Caryll Houselander.  My fear of being too influenced by feminine spiritual writers kept me from reading her works in the past, although her letters have helped me discover her genius.  Anyway - I've decided I like her very much - and agree with her even more, although I have never read a book by her or about her.  I'm more interested in her letters - there one encounters the person, very often without artifice.

I don't want to be part of her fan club or cult either.  It is better to be poor, that way you only get what you need the most. 

On that note, a couple of quotes from Wiki:

We go through life with dark forces within us and around us, haunted by the ghosts of repudiated terrors and embarrassments, assailed by devils, but we are also continually guided by invisible hands; our darkness is lit by many little flames, from night-lights to the stars. Those who are afraid to look into their own hearts know nothing of the light that shines in the darkness.

God’s will for you is to serve him, in his way, as he chooses now. It is only a want of humility to think of extreme vocations, like being a nun or a nurse, while you try to by-pass your present obvious vocation . . . Today you have to use what you have today, and do not look beyond it.

Learn to love yourself, to forgive yourself, to be kind to yourself, by looking outwards to God, by accepting the fact that you are infinitely loved by Infinite Love, and that if you will only cease to build up notions of the perfection you demand of yourself, and lay your soul open to that love, you will cease to fear, and you will cease to be exhausted as soon as you stop fighting one part of yourself with another.

An Example of Diabolic Delusion... with disastrous results.

Alexandra Feodorovna Romanova

 

According to Monsignor Milivoj Bolobanic, an exorcist from Croatia who has written extensively on the topic, deceptive spirits can "cause physical and spiritual visual and auditory illusions; a false state of ecstasy; make a body radiate and cause a feeling of great warmth in the heart; cause a sensual sweetness; cause stigmata and other sensory or mystical bodily occurrences; and cure uncommon diseases in an instant that have originated from evil spirits."

The evil ones ape them as a diversion... - Source

Remember Rasputin and the Empress.

They eat their own: Bishop Williamson expelled by SSPX.

Getting rid of the evidence.

Now they decide to dismiss him.

As they say about Roman Catholic Bishops - he was thrown under the bus.  Talk is Williamson may find sanctuary in Brazil.  Isn't that where a few of the Nazis of WWII found refuge as well?  Sounds like a Dan Brown novel in the making.

Menzingen, Switzerland, Oct 24, 2012 - The Society of St. Pius X has expelled Bishop Richard Williamson, saying he has distanced himself from the traditionalist Catholic group’s leadership and he has refused “to show due respect and obedience to his lawful superiors.”

The bishop told Swedish public television that only as many as 300,000 Jews died in the Holocaust, when the accepted figure is about six million.

Bishop Williamson caused internal strife in August when he made an unauthorized visit to a Brazilian breakaway Benedictine monastery and celebrated the sacrament of Confirmation there for nearly 100 lay Catholics.

A Society of St. Pius X district superior protested that the visit was an act of disobedience that disrespected the society’s procedures. - CNA

Figure that one out.  An already disobedient group - many regard as schismatic - expells a bishop for disobedience.  Hello?  Aren't they all disobedient?

Lay people:  Stay outta church politics - pay, pray, and obey.

UPDATE:  The real reason why Williamson was expelled. Go here.

 

Blow 'em up good! Man injured while making a bomb in his basement.

Does anyone know Ronald Rofshus?

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) – An explosion in the basement of an Albert Lea home over the weekend prompted an investigation involving the FBI and of what authorities believed to be bomb-making components.

The explosion happened just after midnight, early Monday morning, in a home on 18115 Pelican Road and seriously injured the homeowner, who was mixing components to make a bomb, the Freeborn County Sheriff’s Office said. An ambulance brought the owner, 48-year-old Ronald Rofshus, to the Hennepin County Medical Center for treatment. His condition is not known. - Finish reading here.

No reports of alcohol or drug use have surfaced.  Thus far authorities have not said if they have found his blog or Facebook page, nor are they saying which side of the Marriage Ammendment debate he's on, and nothing has been announced regarding any SSPX affiliations, or political party leanings.  There is no record of the primary ethnicity of the name Rofshus. Many surnames travel around the world throughout the ages, making their original nationality and ethnicity difficult to trace.

What?

Thanks to N. for the incomplete 'original' story.  What?

Crescat is big - in fact she is huge...

One body, many blogs!

Gigantic even.

Kat has been published...  like Proust!  Like Edna Ferber!  Vanna White!

One Body, Many Blogs is a collection of answers from some of the giants of the Catholic blogosphere to the following question: In your opinion, what are the “ten commandments” that Christian bloggers should keep in mind while pressing on in their digital mission? - Crescat
 

Congratulations.  See.  I told you Patheos is the place for good writers.



"I kinda feel like a Dana song now!"

"You too?"

"Yeah!"

"Well let's do it then!"

"Okay!"

"All right then!  Blogging students, all together now..."

"We are one body...

  one body...
huge...
  big...
one body, many blogs!"

[raise your hands for the chorus]

"We are one body...

  cute...
     funny...
one body....
     many blogs!"


As Paula Abdul would say, "I am so proud."


What?
 

It's getting really bad.

Even those closest to me...  although few in number, hold me in contempt.
 

U.S.A. - The most litigious country in the world.

I read that somewhere recently about the United States. 

I think it is probably true.

Everyone is so aware, so possessive of their rights. Right to privacy, right to love who you want, right to life, right to die, right to marry, right to divorce.

We are also greedy and vindictive and jealous and possessive and full of ourselves.  Affluence fosters this stuff.

Copyright and the right to copy.

I used an artist's sketch the other day without permission, he protested that I neither spelled his name right when linking to his site and crediting him for the work, he likewise protested I didn't ask for permission to use his work. Similarly, a famous Portuguese artist did the same with me a couple of years ago. I apologized, removed the art work, removed the link and will never ever acknowledge their existence ever again. I was using their work because I admired it, I wanted to use the work not only to illustrate my non-commercial, not for profit post of the day, but I wanted to introduce the artist's work to my readers. I thought I was doing them a favor, not realizing perhaps some people do not want to be associated with this blog - and they never will be again.

I have contacted well known artists for permission to use their work, and some have almost eagerly agreed to do so, while a couple of others were less than polite in refusing me - in fact rather puffy and condescending about it. Artists are special people... sometimes very odd... very moody... very jealous... I digress.

So. Is it a sin to use other people's stuff?

Oh. My. Goodness! Isn't everything a sin though? Our rights are violated all of the time!  In a day when people no longer understand the meaning of sin or hell, theologians and ethicist debate the number of sins dancing on a pixel. I know about intellectual property rights and the air space for sale above St. Patrick's Cathedral in NYC. But still...

Anyway, a friend sent me the following from moral theologian, Germain Grisez:

What about the morality of this copyright infringement? Except when a property owner’s consent can be reasonably presumed, using his or her property in any way that goes beyond his or her expressed, limited permission is using it contrary to his or her will; and using anything contrary to its owner’s will is the same kind of act, morally speaking, as taking something from an owner contrary to his or her will. Provided the owner’s will in the matter is reasonable—which is to be presumed unless the contrary is established—the using is unfair and constitutes theft. Thus, copying, using, or transferring commercially marketed software in violation of the terms of the license generally should be considered theft. Moreover, such theft generally is a grave matter, because people do not consider most comparable infringements insignificant.
 

What do you think?  I think Andy Warhol could be in hell for copying trademarks and calling it art - but surely not for the decadent lifestyle he promoted.

Anyway.

I think maybe I should stop using the internet...  It's got to be a sin - voyeurism, idle curiosity, envy, avarice, stealing... on and on. Yeah.  So.  I'm going to the basement to scourge myself bloody. (Actually, I'll be painting.)

BTW, I have seen my art used for pamphlet covers, illustrations in books, without permission, albeit it usually crediting me for the work - sometimes not.  I'm fine with that.

Photo source:  http://justtrademarks.org/tag/internet-copyright-infringement

H/T Mercury


 

I was VERY impressed with the Romney/Obama debate tonite. They seemed very much alike...

I can't pick a winner on this one.

I blame the Protestants.

For what Gracie?

I blame the Protestants for all the anti-Catholicism.  Really fundamentalist Protestants think the Catholic Church is the seat of the Antichrist and they say Catholics worship idols.  Mainline Protestants say we worship Mary and throughout history they made fun of Catholics for everything, ever since the Mayflower landed.  Thus forcing Catholics to make compromises and send nuns out in full habits to play baseball and priests and bishops to wear secular clothes and smoke cigars and drink.

Then the reforms of Vatican II came along and pretty much threw out the rest of the stuff the original Protestant reformers objected to.  With the Novus Ordo in place, Protestants came back to Rome with their Protestant ideas.  Evangelizing culture.

So what is so bad about that?  No one likes Protestants - so prim and proper, 'goes to church on Sunday but watch out on Monday' Bible-bangers.  The whole purpose of the '60's was to get rid of oppressive WASP morality.  Kind of.  Anyway, now Protestantism is in decline - who wants to go to church and just sing hymns.  Him no like hymn.  They did it to themselves - they made so many concessions to inclusiveness and diversity, they secularized themselves out of religion.  Kind of.  Who wants women bishops anyway?

Protestantism in decline...

A new study by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life found that Protestants now make up 48% of Americans, compared with nearly two-thirds in the 1970s.

The decline, concentrated among white members of both mainline and evangelical denominations, is amplified by an absence of Protestants on the U.S. Supreme Court and the Republican presidential ticket for the first time.

"It's a slow decline but a noticeable one," said Cary Funk, a Pew senior researcher. Funk said a major factor driving the decline is an increase in religiously unaffiliated Americans to 20%, up from 15% five years ago.

Two-thirds of the religiously unaffiliated still say they believe in God. But they overwhelmingly expressed disenchantment with religious organizations for being too concerned with money, power, rules and politics.The study did not give reasons fewer Americans now identify with any religion.

But it presented theories that included political backlash against the religious right, delays in marriage, broad social disengagement and secularization related to economic development.

Some analysts said a softening of American religiosity could affect such areas as charitable giving and volunteerism, which traditionally have been driven by churches.
Others, however, said that ideals originally identified as Protestant and Puritan have become firmly entrenched as secular American virtues. The idea of America as a "city set on a hill" — a biblical phrase — with a special destiny to lead the world to freedom and democracy remains a bedrock civic value, said Richard Land of the 16-million-member Southern Baptist Convention, the nation's largest Protestant denomination.

"America is a nation with the soul of a church, and that soul is Puritan-Protestant," said Land, president of the convention's Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission. "But in terms of defining the purpose of the nation, it's been secularized long ago." - LATimes
 

So now maybe the remnant is coming into the Catholic Church, but they don't understand Catholicism.  They don't understand devotions such as the rosary and the scapular, they don't even know what an Ember Day is, they think the Infant Jesus wears dresses, they think Latino people are superstitious - in other words - they are still influenced by that Protestant bigotry.  (Many Catholics have bought into the same, BTW.)  They come in with their wives and expect to be ordained.  They wear capes but don't even know what a fanon is. 

What?

Never mind.

 

The Birth Certificate - something is off.

Fr. Malloy Mysteries...

I don't pay a lot of attention to the Birthers who claim Obama isn't a citizen - obviously the powers that be didn't care and certifed the election.  It remains an interesting conspiracy theory - but is it more than that?  I don't know.  However, Fr. John Malloy has a provocative post pointing out a few major discrepencies regarding the President's birth certificate.  Here they are:

        1. Back in 1961 people of color were called 'Negroes.' So how can
the Obama 'birth certificate' state he is "African-American" when the
term wasn't even used at that time?

2. The birth certificate that the White House released lists Obama's
birth as August 4,1961 & Lists Barack Hussein Obama as his father.
No big deal, right? At the time of Obama's birth, it also shows that
his father is aged 25 years old, and that Obama's father was born
in "Kenya, East Africa". This wouldn't seem like anything of concern,
except the fact that Kenya did not even exist until 1963, two whole
years after Obama's birth, and 27 years after his father's birth. How
could Obama's father have been born in a country that did not yet
exist? Up and until Kenya was formed in 1963, it was known as the
"British East Africa Protectorate".

3. On the Birth Certificate released by the White House, the listed place
of birth is "Kapi'olani Maternity & Gynecological Hospital". This cannot be,
because the hospital(s) in question in 1961 were called "Kaui Keolani
Children's Hospital" and "Kapi'olani Maternity Home", respectively. The
name did not change to Kapi'olani Maternity & Gynecological Hospital
until 1978, when these two hospitals merged.

How can this particular name of the hospital be on a birth certificate
dated 1961 if this name had not yet been applied to it until 1978?

Why hasn't this been discussed in the major media ?

4. Perhaps a clue comes from Obama’s book on his father. He states
how proud he is of his father fighting in WW II. I’m not a math genius, so
I may need some help from you. Barack Obama’s “birth certificate” says
his father was 25 years old in 1961 when he was born. That should have
put his father’s date of birth approximately 1936—if my math holds
(Honest! I did that without a calculator!) Now we need a non-revised
history book—one that hasn’t been altered to satisfy the author’s goals—
to verify that WW II was basically between 1939 and 1945. Just how
many 3 year olds fight in wars? Even in the latest stages of WW II his
father wouldn’t have been more than 9. Does that mean that Mr. Obama
is a liar, or simply chooses to alter the facts to satisfy his imagination or political purposes (still qualifies as a “liar”)?  - Taken from A Shepherd's Voice
 

I have a call in to Michele Bachmann to get to the bottom of this.


Photo: Obama with his mother and second husband and half sister from that marriage.  Obama's dad had numerous children.  Obama's family life was anything but stable.

Mass Chat: Signs?*

 

Honderden pelgrims geëvacueerd uit ondergelopen Lourdes!

 

Water meer dan een meter hoog.  I know!

The grotto at Lourdes flooded.  Even the town.   Story here.

I wonder if it has ever happened before - since the sanctuary was established I mean?  I never thought of the possibility of floods to intrude upon the place.  I love Lourdes - some people complain it is too commercial, but it doesn't bother me.  I hope the shrine recovers soon.

Just think, some day everything will be destroyed, wiped away - the sacred and profane.  Imagine Venice sinking.  St. Peter's collapsing into rubble.  Las Vegas erupting in a volcano.  NYC washed away in a mammoth tsunami.  Something to think about over donuts and coffee, huh?


*I just borrowed the 'Signs' title from Spirit Daily. 

Here's a thought:  If the church allowed dykes, this might not have happened.  What?