The Digital Dispatch

From NOEBIE.net

Catholic

The Culture of Prosperity Deadens Us

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“To sustain a lifestyle which excludes others, or to sustain enthusiasm for that selfish ideal, a globalization of indifference has developed. Almost without being aware of it, we end up being incapable of feeling compassion at the outcry of the poor, weeping for other people’s pain, and feeling a need to help them, as though all this were someone else’s responsibility and not our own. The culture of prosperity deadens us; we are thrilled if the market offers us something new to purchase; and in the meantime all those lives stunted for lack of opportunity seem a mere spectacle; they fail to move us.”

They’re Gonna Have To Kick Me Out

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Quit the Church? Thanks, but no thanks. [E. J. Dionne, Jr. | Commonweal] – Recently, a group called the Freedom from Religion Foundation ran a full-page ad in the Washington Post cast as an “open letter to ‘liberal’ and ‘nominal’ Catholics.” Its headline commanded: “It’s Time to Quit the Catholic Church.” I’m sorry to inform the FFRF that I am declining its invitation to quit. They may not see the Gospel as a liberating document, but I do, and I can’t ignore the good done in the name of Christ by the sisters, priests, brothers and laypeople who have devoted their lives to the poor and the marginalized.

Brian’s Comment: I had much the same reaction as Dionne when I first saw the letter from the FFRF. Granted, it is sometimes hard to be a free-thinking Catholic these days, but the Faith is not merely the institutions and the Church is not merely the hierarchy. Our Catholic Faith belongs to me and to my family as much as it does to the bishops, to the Vatican or to any of the Right-Wing bigots to whom I may be offering the sign of peace this weekend.

Catholic Bishops Investigate The Girl Scouts

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Today’s WTF Story:

Girl Scouts under scrutiny from Catholic bishops. [CSMonitor.com] – Long a lightning rod for conservative criticism, the Girl Scouts of the USA are now facing their highest-level challenge yet: An official inquiry by the US Conference of Catholic Bishops. At issue are concerns about program materials that some Catholics find offensive, as well as assertions that the Scouts associate with other groups espousing stances that conflict with church teaching. The Scouts, who have numerous parish-sponsored troops, deny many of the claims and defend their alliances.

Brian’s Comment:

Clean up your own power-mad money-grubbing homophobic misogynistic pedophiliac den of iniquity, Bishops.

Leave our Girl Scouts alone.

JFK Speech to the Houston Ministers

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On September 12th, 1960, Presidential candidate John F. Kennedy addressed a group of Protestant ministers at the Rice Hotel in Houston, Texas. Many Protestants in the United States (particularly in the South) had expressed concern that a Roman Catholic President would be a mere puppet of the Vatican. Senator Kennedy went into the lions’ den to address the issue directly.

Here is a short excerpt.

I believe in an America where religious intolerance will someday end – where all men and all churches are treated as equal – where every man has the same right to attend or not attend the church of his choice – where there is no Catholic vote, no anti-Catholic vote, no bloc voting of any kind – and where Catholics, Protestants and Jews, at both the lay and pastoral level, will refrain from those attitudes of disdain and division which have so often marred their works in the past, and promote instead the American ideal of brotherhood.

That is the kind of America in which I believe. And it represents the kind of Presidency in which I believe – a great office that must neither be humbled by making it the instrument of any one religious group nor tarnished by arbitrarily withholding its occupancy from the members of any one religious group. I believe in a President whose religious views are his own private affair, neither imposed by him upon the nation or imposed by the nation upon him as a condition to holding that office.

This speech is getting some attention once again in the 2012 Presidential campaign, as Republican contender Rick Santorum (also a Catholic) has condemned the sentiment in some very strong terms.

Thank you, Rick, but I hold with JFK.

You can watch a video of the entire speech at the following link.

Address of Senator John F. Kennedy to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association, September 12, 1960. [John F. Kennedy Presidential Library & Museum]

7 Years of Verbum Domini

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On February 7th of 2005, I plugged a microphone into the side of my notebook and began reading the Scriptures for the day. Seven years later, Verbum Domini is the longest-running Catholic Podcast on the Net.

It was actually the second expressly Catholic Podcast. My pal Jayson Franklin began producing The Catholic Cast shortly after Christmas of 2004. Alas, Jayson ceased production in July of that same year.

Father Roderick Vonhögen’s The Catholic Insider came along in April of 2005, and after it a flood of others, including The Saintcast, The Rosary Army Podcast, Catholic Rockers, Tupelo Catholic, Catholic Family and so many more.

In those early days of Podcasting, we still hadn’t figured out precisely what the medium was. Was it broadcasting? Was it blogging? There was a lot of experimentation going on, and issues relating to copyright and licensing were still very much up in the air.

On Wednesday, September 7th of 2005, I received a “cease and desist” email from the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. From the beginning, I had been reading from the New American Bible, to which the USCCB held copyright. The permissions page on their Website at the time allowed text from the NAB to be used in radio or television broadcasts, and the Lectionary Readings for the day to be used without license for “one time use.” There was language which required permission for use “in a sound or video recording” but I believed that to mean audio tapes, CDs, DVDs, etc. – not Podcasts. I did comply immediately with their order, using the Douay-Rheims version for a time and then gaining permission from the U.S. Council of Churches to use their Revised Standard Version for Catholics. The ornery side of me still counts is as something of a badge of honor to have received a C&D from the Bishops.

Joel Anderson of A Klingon Word From The Word approached me in October or November of 2005, and asked if I could use some help with the Podcast. He became the first guest lector for the program and has continued reading for it over the years. James Jerskey followed shortly thereafter, then the Sweeney family. Today there are many other lectors who have joined in this volunteer effort to bring the Scriptures to life each day.

In February of 2007 after two years of producing Verbum Domini, I decided that it was time to place it in someone else’s care. There were several reasons for this decision. Part of it was a desire to keep the program independent from advertising. I was going to work for an online media company that appended ads to their content and I thought there might be a conflict if I were to host the program elsewhere. Also, I had already drawn quite a bit of fire from politically conservative Catholics during those first two years over my own left-leaning outspokenness. I did not want that to become a distraction or a hindrance for listeners. My friend Greg Willits worked to bring the program under the auspices of SQPN. It has remained under their care ever since.

It is hard to believe that five years have passed since that time. Verbum Domini remains an important part of my daily devotional life, and to that of thousands of others around the world. I’m thankful to the volunteers who read and produce and coordinate the effort, particularly to David Sweeney who has taken the lead these many years. They remain in my prayers.

It gives me a great deal of pleasure to think back on those early days of Podcasting. We didn’t know what we were doing. We were just doing it. We had grand notions that we were changing the world, and it was quite an experience.

There are tens of thousands of Podcasts listed at iTunes these days. Giant old media companies have gotten into the mix and giant new media companies have been created around the technology. Despite that, individuals with something to say can still plug a mic into the side of a notebook – or grab a video camera, or pick up a smart phone – and say it, with the likelihood of reaching thousands and the possibility of reaching millions.

Is that cool, or what?

If It Be Dark

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If Candlemas Day be fair and bright,

Winter will have another flight;

But if it be dark with clouds and rain,

Winter is gone, and will not come again.

One of my favorite days of the year, Feburary 2nd is a cross-quarter day, falling between the Winter Solstice and the Spring Equinox. It brings the hope of renewal, the coming of light. Catholics celebrate it as the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord. In our tradition, candles are blessed and distributed. In some cultures it also marks the end of Christmastime.

In Celtic tradition, it is Imbolc, the feast of the lactating ewes – again, a celebration of hope for Spring to come.

…and of course it was the Germans settling in Pennsylvania who brought the tradition of Groundhog Day to the United States.

Garrison Keillor offered a succinct history on The Writer’s Almanac a few years back.

It is cloudy and foggy here in East-Central Illinois this morning. Dare we hope that Winter is gone?

UPDATE: Bright sunshine here now…

The Coming of the Bride

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Today we celebrate St. Bridget of Kildare, “Mary of the Gael.”

Here’s my weblog entry from four years ago:

Scotsman John Duncan painted this depiction of St. Bridget in 1917. She is the patron of newborns, blacksmiths, milkmaids and poets. Her feast day in the Catholic Church is February 1st, but traditions for “Bridie’s Day” predate Christianity. In Celtic lore, Bridget was the Triple Goddess – poet, smith and healer. She was associated with the Feast of the Lactating Ewes (Imbolc) marking the impending return of Springtime. Bridget is still, to this day, represented by the equal-limbed cross (which symbolized the Sun in the old religions). Candles and hearth are other obvious representations.

Catholic tradition tells us that she had a vision of the Nativity and was mystically transported across space and time to adore the Christ Child.

Whatever your faith or beliefs, this time of year presents an opportunity for renewal – and if ever we could use a fresh start, we could certainly use one now.

Those words still ring true for me.

Today is also, not merely coincidentally, the anniversary of the day that Claudia and I chose for our wedding nine years ago. From the beginning, our marriage has been under Bridget’s patronage. I cannot help but feel blessed to be building a life with my true love, and I am so grateful that she and I found our way to each other. When one considers the seemingly infinite span of possibilities, such occurrences are a wonder.

The Bishops and the Affordable Care Act

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At Mass this past weekend, most Roman Catholics in the United States heard sermons or were read letters from their Bishops railing against a recent decision by the Department of Health and Human Services concerning implementation of health care reform. My own Bishop, Thomas John Paprocki of the Diocese of Springfield in Illinois, said in his letter that President Obama was “being either dishonest or delusional or he is incompetent.” He also referred to Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius as a “pro-abortion Catholic.” This rhetoric was apparently typical, as Bishops across the nation characterized the HHS decision as nothing less than an attack on religious liberty.

It being the (sad) case that a dedication to the facts has been lacking in some similar communications from the Church hierarchy in the past, I felt it necessary to investigate the matter myself. It has been difficult to parse, but here is what I’ve learned.

The controversy centers on which preventive services for women will be mandated for insurance plans under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act which was passed into law by Congress in 2010. The law gave HHS broad discretion to determine which services would receive required coverage.

In the Summer of 2011, HHS announced rules requiring all new private health plans to cover preventive services such as mammograms, colonoscopies, blood pressure checks, and childhood immunizations without charging a copayment, deductible or coinsurance. In the Interim Rule announced by HHS in August of 2011, “FDA-approved contraception methods and contraceptive counseling” was added to the list of required preventive services. “Religious institutions” were given an exemption from the requirement.

“The administration also released an amendment to the prevention regulation that allows religious institutions that offer insurance to their employees the choice of whether or not to cover contraception services. This regulation is modeled on the most common accommodation for churches available in the majority of the 28 states that already require insurance companies to cover contraception.”

– HHS Press Release, August 1st, 2011

So churches would be exempt from the provision, and could legally exclude such services from their employee health plans.

The problem, as I understand it, is that the exemption does not apply to organizations such as hospitals, schools, universities and charitable groups that are affiliated with churches, but only to the churches themselves. The Bishops and other religious groups were in conversation with the Obama Administration during the period of comment for the rules, advocating for a broader exemption. On January 20th, Secretary Sebelius announced that the final rule will allow the affiliated institutions an additional year (until August 1st, 2013) to comply with the law, but will not exempt them from the provision.

Whether this constitutes an attack on religious liberty (or violates First Amendment protections) I do not know. I’m still trying to understand the implications more clearly, and would welcome pointers to more information, commentary and discussions. Clearly at issue is the tension between the rights of faith-based institutions to practice and defend their beliefs, and the rights of individuals and our society to be free from imposition of those beliefs.

I’ll be posting more here as I give the matter additional study and prayerful consideration.

A Few Links

Conscience Protection (USCCB)

Bishop Paprocki’s Letter

E.J. Dionne’s Analysis (RealClearPolitics, 24 November 2011)

CBS New Coverage of the Bishops’ Letters

HHS News Release August 2011

HHS News Release January 2012

Obama’s Catholic Problem

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Obama’s Catholic Friends and Enemies. [RealClearPolitics] – Any time the Obama administration touches issues related to the Roman Catholic Church, it seems to get itself caught in a rhetorical and moral crossfire that leaves all involved wounded and angry. This is what’s happening in the battle over how contraception should be covered under the new health care law.

Daily Readings, Order of Mass and Divine Office for Kindle

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My wife gave me a Kindle on my birthday back in September, and I’ve been thoroughly enjoying the device. It’s very nearly the perfect thing for someone who spends a lot of time reading, and I find that I make more time to read as I have more content at hand on the device. I grab it as I’m walking out the door to go just about anywhere, and can usually steal a few moments away to read something of value while waiting in the van to pick up my daughter from school or such.

Of course, one of the first things that I looked for was a Kindle version of the Bible, which was relatively easy to find, but I also wanted to get the daily readings of the Catholic liturgical calendar on to the device. If I don’t make time for any other study or prayer during the day, I can almost always at least make it through those. Surprisingly, although the readings are online in several spots, it was a bit of a hunt finding them formatted for Kindle or other ebook reader.

Fortunately I eventually found Universalis, a site that offers not only the daily readings at Mass, but also the Liturgy of the Hours and the Order of Mass. All of these are available on the Web, for mobile devices or in a downloadable version. They can also be exported to any of the major ebook formats.

As we approach the end of Ordinary Time and the beginning of Advent, the revised Order of Mass for the English speaking world will take effect. For those of us who were born (or who converted to Catholicism) after the reforms of the Second Vatican Council were implemented, some of the phrases we’re leaving behind are all that we’ve ever known. Having the new Order at the ready on my Kindle is really nice, though I’ll probably still slip up and say “and also with you” for a long time yet. I also had to assure my mother-in-law that I was, indeed, reading the Scriptures after she caught me with the Kindle at Mass last Saturday night.

I’ve not yet made it through an entire day praying the Divine Office, but having all of the prayers handy for each day has made it easier to explore this beautiful devotion – and I do aspire to one day adopt the habit of praying the Hours each day.

The online resource at Universalis is entirely free of charge. If you’re interested in the software download or smartphone apps, the full featured free trial version lasts for one month, after that it reverts to a simple calendar version unless you purchase a registration code for a (one-time nominal) fee.

You can click the banner below for more information, including today’s propers.


Universalis