The Orlando Victims List with brief obituaries.

Miguel Angel Honorato

with 2 of his children.

Many of the 49 victims of the United States’s 

worst mass shooting share much in common: 

Young Latino men in their 20s and 30s, 

most of them gay, who gathered at an Orlando club to dance. 

But the victims’ stories — promising artists, a young couple in love, 

a devoted father of three among them 

— are richly varied. - Washington Post

A reader brought the list to my attention.

It's deeply moving and very sad.  As 'E' mentioned, the youngest victim was 18 years old.  Among the victims was a husband and a father of three who was there with a group of friends who came to enjoy Latin night.

Sometimes a bar is a bar is a bar - is just a bar.

I just want to say that a gay bar or nightclub like this is not a sex club or bath house, it is a nightclub, a safe haven for gay people to go and dance and socialize without being afraid some gay-basher is going to beat them up because they dance with each other or wear make-up.  Not everyone who goes to clubs like this are gay or looking for sex, any more than an alcoholic is looking for cheap-over-poured alcoholic cocktails.  Not every one goes out on Saturday night to drink and get drunk and pick up someone for sex, or heads to the bathroom looking for a quick bj.  A 'mega' club like this attracts all sorts of men and women who are simply out to have fun and enjoy themselves.

Yet religious people online - especially Catholics - have condemned these people, one referring to the victims as 'musloids, faggots, dykes and fag hags in that gay disco, and denizens of hell on earth'.  Claiming their mere presence in the club was at the very least a 'proximate occasion of mortal sin' - that might be true for some - but I don't see how it applies to everyone there.  I may be wrong.  Walking down the street can be a proximate occasion of sin for some people, just like going to the gym or the beach - or watching television.


That said, the more fanatical of the bunch went so far as to judge that the '50 killed in that SODOMITE NIGHT CLUB, unless they fully repented of ALL of their sins and died contrite for for what they were ENTHUSIASTICALLY EMBRACING AND PRACTICING just seconds before, died in unrepentant mortal sin.'  That's a pretty heavy condemnation, certainly presumptuous, as well as an example of rash judgement.  The author speaks as if the club had been hosting an orgy.

Amanda Alvear

She was with her friend 

Mercedez Marisol Flores 

when they were killed.

Most gay bars do not have sex rooms, much less allow sexual contact on the premises - except maybe in San Francisco and a few other dives in bigger cities.  If a person wants that - they maybe can find a bear bar for it.  Bars and nightclubs like Pulse attract a more diverse clientele.  Straight people attend for the music, dance, and entertainment.  I'm thinking Latin Night is a bit like Carnival.  Many young people go for the dance music and drinks, not unlike Amanda Alvear and her friends.  Amanda's cousin said she recently lost a great deal of weight and she was out celebrating.  She is among the dead.

Take into consideration that one could easily claim the attack was anti-Latino bigotry - which is just as ludicrous as the claim it was a homophobic hate crime.  The nightclub was a soft target for ISIS terror.  The attack is being used by all sorts of people now to further their agenda with hate-filled rhetoric.  These people should be ashamed.

Please read the victims obituaries, the story of their life condensed into a paragraph or two.  Please recognize their humanity, their dignity as human beings created in the image and likeness of God.

And repent and pray.

Here's Omar

Omar Mateen, a 29-year-old U.S.-born citizen, has been identified as the suspect in Sunday's mass shooting that left at least 50 dead and more than 50 others wounded at the Pulse Nightclub, a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida.

Mateen's parents were born in Afghanistan, and he was "on the radar" of U.S. officials for some time, but was not the target of a specific investigation, law enforcement officials told ABC News. - source

Iconoclasm in NYC: Removing the iconography of the Church of Our Saviour

The appropriate 'development of doctrine" (in iconography) at Our Saviour.

Solid Catholic teaching for all to see.

Undoing the Sacred at the Church of Our Saviour in Manhattan.

I call it a travesty.  I thought this type of personality 'marking' was gone - that a new pastor just can't show up and attempt to restore a parish to it's 'former glory' on his own initiative.  In this case, there was no former glory, just a bare canvas; allowing for the Church of Our Saviour to be appointed and given its visual glory by it's former pastor, Fr. George Rutler - financed in part by the donations of faithful parishioners.  As one author noted:

Fr. George Rutler was pastor of Our Saviour from 2001 until he was transferred in 2013 across town to St. Michael’s, a less prominent location. In the twelve years of his service to COS, he proved himself a gracious and effective steward. He reversed the parish’s decline, eliminated its debts, enlarged and revivified the congregation. Most visibly, he renovated the church building with great sensitivity. - MM - First Things

I can't tell you the number of churches I have seen 'renovated' in my lifetime.  By bishops, priests, seminary rectors, Catholic schools, religious superiors, liturgy committees, and so on.  Wonderfully appointed 'sacred spaces' white washed overnight, tabernacles exchanged for a lock box, statues winding up in antique shops, architectural details in architectural antique emporiums, and so on.  I worked in a Catholic institution for several years, and almost every time a new superior was appointed, the statuary in the building changed, memorials were ripped out, and replaced with new shrines.  The changes were made to suit the piety of one individual, or in an attempt to get on board with the latest liturgical trend.  It was subjective demolition, and a means of flaunting authority.

Is this diocesan competitiveness?   Is there some sort of vendetta against the former pastor?

It can be argued - perhaps - that Fr. Rutler did the same thing - until of course you examine the art.  The artist/iconographer Ken Woo is a master iconographer.  His work is of the highest quality, theologically, artistically and architecturally.  The interior of Our Saviour has been embellished, quite literally - divinely.  I know Rutler is perhaps 'disliked' by some - he's not your ordinary priest.  He can be off-putting to the more casual observer, since his manner may strike one as a little pompous.  Indeed, I had a hard time getting used to him when I'd see him on EWTN, but he won me over.  There are very few priests as erudite and doctrinally sound as he is.  Likewise he is an expert on art history and church design.  Until now I didn't know he was responsible for commissioning the exquisite design and iconography of Our Saviour.

Is it appropriate use of funds - spending money to 'fix' what doesn't need fixing?

The current wreck-ovation, vandalism, is handed off as a renovation.  That is unfortunate.   It seems to me it is an iconoclastic desecration and rebuke to faithful, devout Catholics as well as the former pastor.  Again, as Maureen Malarkey notes in her essay at First Things:

The new pastor began his tenure by making liturgical changes and, to the dismay of parishoners, by removing fourteen of the most prominent icons. In a gesture mimicking the iconoclasm of sixteenth century Reformers, the denuded pillars were white washed. On Tuesday we learned that the remaining ones, included the magnificent Pantocrator, are slated for eviction. Why? Is Fr. Robbins acting on his own initiative or at the behest of higher-ups? Certainly, a pastor has both his druthers and his prerogatives. But the severity—the totality—of this de-adornment gives off an odor of reprisal. It is hard not to sense malice at work. Whose? To what end? - MM- First Things

Please read the entire essay here, and at the end are instructions on how to contact the Cardinal, to politely ask that the church may be preserved from further dismantling.  Please be respectful.  I'll repost the address here:  Email: archbishop.dolan@archny.org or by phone: 212.371.1011 Ext 2935. Letters marked “Personal and Confidential” can be sent to His Eminence Cardinal Timothy Dolan, 1011 First Avenue, New York 10022.

Taking the spoils and scattering pearls before swine.

There is much talk of why people are leaving the Church, why men no longer go to Mass.  This is one more reason.  When my Italian parish church was 'renewed', the high altar, communion rails, and central tabernacle were removed - as were the memorial plaques of donors.  Old timer Italians, who donated in the name of their deceased loved ones, donated piously to embellish the church with the most noble of furnishings, the best money could buy, for the honor and glory of God.  They were heartbroken when the marble altar rail was sent to a dump.  Now the church belongs to a Christian fundamentalist group - while another parish church of my youth has been desacralized, sold and is now a mosque.

It's a scandal.

Fr. Robert Robbins is the pastor at Our Saviour,

and the man responsible for the take-down.

He is also rehabbing-renovating his rectory:

Katrina Fernandez is updating on this story - check out her blog here: Help Prevent this Church Wreckovation.  Please avoid the innuendo and ad hominem you'll find in the links and commentary if you choose to respond or contact the Cardinal or Fr. Robbins.  Thanks.