Smarter Than God

It always fascinates me when I encounter people who say they believe without belonging. To them, being a “small-C” “christian” is little more than a matter of one’s believing Jesus might be who He said He was, and one’s liking their own idea of Heaven. “I don’t need a church. I can just believe/worship/pray/confess in my heart.” The problem with this approach is that they DON’T. Ever. Their statement is their escape clause, to prevent them from being subjected to any situation which might require an examination of conscience.

Having the oversimplified opinion stated above isn’t going to do much good when the person arrives at the Judgment Seat. We often have the idea that our particular, personal version of Christianity/religion is exactly right for us, and that God is going to ratify that choice as being in line with His own plan. How do I know they think like this? Because that’s how I thought when I was drifting around during my twenties. If these people think their plan is the same as God’s, I have some beachfront property up around Fairbanks I’d like to show them.

A particular “church” is also a problem here. All Christian churches, no matter what they teach or signify, are offshoots at some point from the Catholic Church. If, as the Bible states, Jesus started the Catholic Church at the moment he called Peter “Rock,” then there is only one choice for believers, and that is the Catholic Church. Calling one’s particular brand of religious concepts the “Apostolic Church of God in Christ Jesus With Signs Following, Tongue-Speaking, and Handling of Serpents” isn’t going to get one’s soul into Heaven any faster than submitting one’s will to a larger and older Church. People don’t really “hate” the Catholic Church. They hate what they think they know or have been told about the Catholic Church.

There have been heresies and apostasies all down through the history of the Church. The Church knew that these offshoots would do little besides turn people away from the historical congregation of believers, so the heresies and apostasies were squelched. Now, if you hate the Catholic Church from the outset, this single fact is going to be enough for you to turn your back on all the Church has taught since the beginning. It’s all you need to take your four-pound Scofield Chain-Reference King James Thumb-idexed Bible in the Genuine split-leather binding and the padded zip-up case, and go start a church of your own; a church that will teach nothing that isn’t contained in that Bible (except, of course, the concept of such a church).

Atheists have a real problem with the fact of evil in the world, and try to second-guess God’s plan to deal with such evil simply because they can’t bring themselves to believe in an INFINITE Being without a beginning, who is big enough to make allowances for such evil in any plan He might make. For them, a God who allows evil to exist is not believable, especially one who calls Himself GOOD. “How can there be a Good God when there is so much evil rampant in the world? How can GOOD allow such EVIL to exist? It is just plain WRONG, and to think that a being of infinite existence, knowledge, love, and justice can really exist is beyond our ability to believe.” They use the same rationale for the Church. How can the Church call herself “Holy,” if she is filled with sinful, evil people? (Wasn’t it Jesus who said, “Healthy people don’t need a doctor. I have come to save the sick ones.”) The Church is filled with sinners. I guess atheists don’t belive in sin, so they don’t need a church. Simple.

For them to believe in somebody who actually might know more than they do, especially an invisible spiritual Being who claims to be everywhere at once is unthinkable.

But, since they are all so much smarter than God, they don’t have to think about any of it at all. Atheists don’t THINK about God. They just deny Him.

"Just Go Find Another Parish…"

The Catholic Church is big enough and strong enough to withstand two thousand years’ worth of attacks and calumny, so stuff like this is never new. It does make one wonder, though, what certain Cardinal Archbishops are doing while their priests are getting away with stuff like this, time after time. (Probably applauding…)

But although there are certain groups of people who will think this is “cute,” or “cutting-edge” or maybe even “good” theology, there are even more who are horrified at this use of Catholic Church property, not to mention what the good parishoners think of this kind of indecent behavior on the part of their pastor. This priest needs to explain the dancing girls, but most of all, he needs to explain why “Just go find another parish, then,” should be the proper response to someone who comes to him with issues about the reputation of the parish.

It also casts some serious doubt onto the validity of the Sacraments Fr. Mandala (why does this name sound so PHONY?) has been adminstering to the people entrusted to his spiritual care.

The priest in this case appears to have some issues, not all of which are related to the parishoner in question. Be that as it may, it is time and past for the good people who attend Mass at Blessed Sacrament parish to present this situation to the Vatican. This is the kind of behavior that the Church neither needs nor wants, and which it specifically forbids. It IS however, the job of the bishop to see to it that his priests not only don’t behave in this manner, but also that they do NOT subject their parishoners to scandal.

I just wish the picture was bigger, and yes, it really is the poster for last year’s parish carnival at Blessed Sacrament…

Last Year At This Time…

A year ago on the sourdough, I was talking about this…

Poster Children

Wow! Michelle Malkin’s page today has an absolutely awesome array of (we wish they were real!) poster ideas for the Democrat party. Enjoy! It’s amazing how much truth can be squeezed into a small space. These are wonderful.

A Fifth Set of Mysteries

I was sitting here this morning preparing for my usual morning rosary, and got to wndering about which set of Mysteries to pray today, on Saturday. Generally, it’s the Glorious Mysteries, which are good almost any time. But I have a special fondness for the “new” Luminous Mysteries, though, so sometimes I pray them, instead. But, today, as I thought about it, the idea of a set of mysteries that I could relate to personally came to mind. So, I started out with “My Salvation” mysteries, and it went something like this:

1. The First Mystery of My Salvation: I Was Conceived. This, obviously, would be the first step in anybody’s salvation. This is God’s choice, and I’m glad he chose me. Very “mysterious,” indeed, considering what I tried to do with his unique creation. None of my roller-coaster life, let alone my journey to Salvation, could have been possible without this mystery, of course. Thank You, Lord.

2. The Second Mystery of My Salvation: I Was Born. I’m one of the lucky ones. At one time not too long ago, fully one third of American pregnacies ended in abortion. When I was born, it wasn’t much of a problem managing to spend the full nine months in the safest place (we thought) that there was–our mothers’ wombs. Nowadays, there are an awful lot of persuasive and evil people engaged in search-and-destroy missions against the unborn of us for reasons of convenience, politics, or greed. Thanks for life, Mom!

3. The Third Mystery of My Salvation: Mom Takes Us Kids Into The Catholic Church. Wow! Thanks, again, Mom! This, next to being born, was the absolute most important step in my journey. I don’t know if Mom realized it at the time, but she (obviously with the Grace of God) saved my soul right here. This was the watershed moment in my life, and everything that has happened to me since then for good or ill can find some relation to this event. Yet another wonderful mystery.

4. The Fourth Mystery of My Salvation: I Fall Away, Then Come Back. Here’s the roller-coaster part. I spent a lot of years away from the greatest gift of my life because I was selfish, ignorant, and lazy. During that time, I experimented with some of the darnedest stuff you can imagine, from astrology to Syncretism, New Age creation spirituality, and everything in between. I was literally “blown about by every wind of doctrine,” as St. Paul mentions in one of his letters.

Meeting and marrying Joe was the turning point in this phase of my life. The Lord can turn all sorts of things to His Glory if we cooperate. We are offered chance after chance, choice after choice. Making the wrong decisions means we must repeat the lessons again and again, until the correct choice is made. For me, choosing to accept Joe, then choosing to return to Mass was MAJOR. We were both hungering for the Church, and both had fallen so far away, we feared there was no way back for us. We decided to go to Mass one Sunday in Valdez. About midweek afterwards, I turned to Joe and said, “This is the moment of truth. We either decide to go back to Mass on Sunday, or we decide not to.” Fortunately for all of us, and for my salvation, we chose to return, and the rest is (my Salvation) history.

5. The Fifth Mystery Of My Salvation: I STAY In The Church. Regardless of what I professed, for the full decade of my twenties, I wandered around willy-nilly amid the wreckage of the Post-Vatican II Catholic Church. Nothing was what it had been when I was baptized, let alone anything like what it was when I fell away, and it looked like nobody cared much. Priests were openly rebellious and sexually indiscreet, nuns were ripping off their habits and racing for the New Age, and the laity were left to flounder and muddle along as well as they could. Like a rudderless ship, the Church was tossed and battered by waves of humanism and progressivism, and it almost ran aground on the rocky shoals of Modernism. Life as a Catholic in those days was a chancy thing.

I tried most of it, then somehow managed to settle down and begin a consitent prayer campaign for restoration and purification, having somehow miraculously made a complete 180-degree turn, through the sheer Grace and Mercy of a loving God. It has taken years, but we are at last beginning to see the fruits of the prayers of myself and the millions of other Catholics who had simply been cut adrift by the rush to relevance of the Post-Vatican II priesthood and heirarchy. At any rate, this mystery is still unfolding. Stay tuned here, and I’ll keep you posted. Thank You again, Lord!

Holidazed

“Without God, there is no virtue, because there’s no prompting of the conscience. Without God, we’re mired in the material, that flat world that tells us only what the senses perceive. Without God, there is a coarsening of the society. And without God, democracy will not and cannot long endure. If we ever forget that we’re one nation under God, then we will be a nation gone under.”—Ronald Wilson Reagan

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“Okay, kids. Today’s lesson is on the meaning of life. Anyone know what the meaning of life is?”

“…”

“Exactly! Life is a meaningless, existential void! Very good, children. Now, since life is meaningless, what’s the point of living? Anyone?”

“…”

“Very good! There is no point to living! We’re all just cosmic accidents, and our existence matters no more in the big scheme of things than a termite’s life does! Now, who can draw me a picture of a termite?” –B Chan (Catholic Freeper)

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Today is a good day to reflect on yesterday, and what it means to us. Of course, there are those people who will celebrate the Judeo/Christian holidays without the slightest belief in the God Whose bounty they celebrate, or Whose birth they commemorate without the slightest passing thought to the message of the Babe in the manger Who was born to die.

The First Thanksgiving Proclamation, 1789

Whereas it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His protection and favor; and Whereas both Houses of Congress have, by their joint committee, requested me to “recommend to the people of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer, to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many and signal favors of Almighty God, especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety and happiness:”

Now, therefore, I do recommend and assign Thursday, the 26th day of November next, to be devoted by the people of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being who is the beneficent author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be; that we may then all unite in rendering unto Him our sincere and humble thanks for His kind care and protection of the people of this country previous to their becoming a nation; for the signal and manifold mercies and the favorable interpositions of His providence in the course and conclusion of the late war; for the great degree of tranquility, union, and plenty which we have since enjoyed; for the peaceable and rational manner in which we have been enable to establish constitutions of government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national one now lately instituted for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed, and the means we have of acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge; and, in general, for all the great and various favors which He has been pleased to confer upon us.

And also that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations and beseech Him to pardon our national and other transgressions; to enable us all, whether in public or private stations, to perform our several and relative duties properly and punctually; to render our National Government a blessing to all the people by constantly being a Government of wise, just, and constitutional laws, discreetly and faithfully executed and obeyed; to protect and guide all sovereigns and nations (especially such as have shown kindness to us), and to bless them with good governments, peace, and concord; to promote the knowledge and practice of true religion and virtue, and the increase of science among them and us; and, generally to grant unto all mankind such a degree of temporal prosperity as He alone knows to be best.

Given under my hand, at the city of New York, the 3d day of October, A.D. 1789.

Happy Thanksgiving to you and may God bless you richly.

Giving Thanks

I’m still trying to discover the tie-in between eating until you explode and thankfulness. As far as I can tell, there is no logical explanation for the practice of one person eating more than a whole day’s food at one meal, and the idea of several people doing this same thing under the headline of “Celebrating Thanksgiving” is even more perplexing.

If the idea is to give thanks to God, I don’t see how stuffing yourself with stuffing and other stuff is going to show the Almighty that you are grateful for His bounty. We usually go to Mass on Thanksgiving day, and express our thanksgiving in worship. But what about the people who don’t take this opportunity to thank the real source of the bounty that graces their tables and the freedoms they enjoy without thought? Are they really thanking God for His bounty?

If the idea of Thanksgiving Day is to thank the Indians who showed the Plymouth settlers how to farm and plant corn, that one gets lost, too. We stuff ourselves in order to show the Indians that we are glad Squanto taught the Pilgrims how to bury a dead fish by each corn plant? American farmers feed the world, and they do it on a fraction of the acreage they used to require for the task, and we thank the Indians by turning them into Welfare dependents? As Squanto might say, “Something heap fishy here…”

Whatever the reason, I can understand a celebration of friends and family who are near. Relatives who make the annual trek to join the family for this feast are serious about their family ties. The kind of effort put forth by those who travel far for Thanksgiving is at least worth a mention. And a feast is always a traditional way to show that your family ties are as strong as ever, even though the members may be scattered to the winds.

Maybe that’s it…we are celebrating our friends and their friendship, our family and all they mean to us. But, do we have to wait for Thanksgiving Day to show our friends and family how much we love and appreciate them? One day a year? Of course, this isn’t really the case, and families get together frequently and celebrate the fact that they are family. That’s as it should be.

So, in the interests of simplicity and tradition, I guess we can just keep calling it “Thanksgiving,” but I propose that we use it for that purpose. Attend church or synagogue and give real thanks. During the meal, emphasize the “thanksgiving” aspect of it. Talk about things we should be grateful for, even if we’ve never thought of it that way before. Restore broken relationships and cement new ones. Give thanks for the love of family and the closeness of friendships. Give real Thanks, not just to each other, but to God. And, maybe, just maybe, we can reclaim the real meaning of “Thanksgiving.” It’s not just for dinner any more.

NOTTAFINGA!!

Well, it’s that time of year again. No, I’m not talking about Thanksgiving. I’m talking about the traditional and ceremonial annual viewing of “A Christmas Story,” which takes place with great frequency and enjoyment from this time on virtually nonstop until almost New Year’s Day.

This quirky little movie was made almost as an afterthought in 1981. For the old duffers among us, there are a few minor anachronisms, but they are so small as to be quibble-proof. I’ve never talked to anyone who has seen the movie who didn’t like it a lot. It was never meant to be a blockbuster, but as time has passed, it has gathered afficionadoes all across the country. It is standard, required fare in millions of households nationwide as the Christmas season draws closer and closer.

It has a lot to recommend itself to us. Memorable lines, good, believable charachters, and nostalgia that can’t be quantified. Who could forget “Nottafinga!” “Soap…poisoning!” “So help me, he had yellow eyes!” and “You’ll shoot your eye out!” or, most especially, the Queen Mother of Cusswords–the F-dash-dash-dash word!” How long until we can listen to Tchaykovski’s “Peter And The Wolf” and not see the kids fleeing down the alley to escape Scutt Farkus and his toady, Grover Dill, or see a bar of Lifebuoy soap, and not think of a bar of the coral-red stuff sticking out of Ralphie’s mouth? And who could ever forget “the soft glow of electric sex” shining through the front window from The Old Man’s Major Award?

I have to go. I’m almost to the part where Ralphie goes to see Santa at Higbees, and I have to concentrate…

Oh, My Goodness!

Get a hankie. CLICK HERE. Watch the video. Rejoice. As long as we can have this kind of patriotic display at school, all is not lost, after all. The words of this song are so magnificent. Usually, when we hear it or sing it, it is edited for length, but also for language. It’s rare to hear the whole thing performed anywhere. Thank God for this beautiful rendition. (Putting it into my favorites file…)