Read this-tensions between America and Israel

http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/09/intelligence-committee-chair-describes-explosive-confrontation-between-netanyahu-and-american-ambassador/262056/

Vocation Encouragement from St. Thomas More and Rudy

I do not believe in lost vocations, unless a person has said "NO".

If you have been rejected by a diocese, religious order or convent, move on. Try another diocese. Try another order.

Think about marriage. If you have a divorce and annulment, pray for healing and wholeness.
Ask God what He wants you to be, how He wants to love you.

Be open.

Do not go on and on about your "lost vocation".  God has his way.

Remember that St. Thomas More tried and did not complete a religious vocation.

God had other things for him to do.

God has something for you to do.

The Blessed Virgin Mary probably thought she would live her life in a celibate way.

She became the Mother of the Messiah, the Theotokos.

Try and try again. I have a love-hate relationship with Notre Dame.

God made me what I am by giving me opportunities.

Do it!

You do not know what you can do unless you try.

Steele: Rudy,are you ready for this, champ?

Rudy: I’ve been ready for this my whole life!

Steele: Then you take us out on the field.

More on Maritain, Alinsky and Chomsky

I have this as a comment on another blog. The Saul Alinsky connections are finally being seen by many people. Fr. Z., has seen this for years. Here is more:

 Of course, not only Obama and Emanuel, but Hilary read and employ this philosophy. Jacques Maritain answered many of these statements in his discussion with Chomsky. In the States, the first attack was on the school systems as early as 1980, with the dropping of required World History courses in many areas to deaden the thinking and reflective skills of the voting populace. Then, the second ploy was to mobilize groups using the language of Marxism. Haves and have not, rich and poor, etc. had been more unified in political philosophy-the American dream was replaced by the dualism of atheistic materialism.

Alinsky and his groups were, in the early days in Chicago, anti-religious, as like Gramsci, they could see that the ONLY organized grass roots power was the Catholic Church and others, like the Evangelicals. Like Gramsci, these Machiavellians saw that the nexus, the source and process as well as center of power had to be moved from any institution to the people-who were being disunited.

Now, one may ask, what is the goal of all this and are all Alinsky and Chomsky followers Marxists?

Yes, to the last question and the goal is power, period. Machiavelli was a utilitarian and a political genius. He understood and wrote on the power of the focussed individual. Now, Machiavelli was not a moral philosopher. He separated conscience from politics.

And, like Alinsky, Marx, Lenin, Chomsky, and Gramsci, he thought all people were basically bad, flawed, and therefore, the political philosophy behind all these men, and Obama, is cynicism.

What people in the media call Obama’s aloofness is merely his narcissism and cynicism. A political cynic cannot “connect”, as Binx says in The Moviegoer. This lack of connection stems from a soul which is not connected to God.

By the way, all of this philosophy forms an “anti-Gospel” and is credal. The proponents and followers have the zeal of real Christians. These words do not reveal games but converts of the dark side who are not after the common good or, as Maritain notes, “the health of the state” but power.

I read Maritain years ago and his ideas on the person and the concept of personal identity and freedom are based on Aquinas and the encyclicals of the Popes from 1848. I hope readers recognize that year.

Maritain and Gilson addressed these problems as Neo-Thomists who had to speak to a world of growing and finally successful atheistic communism and other tyrannies. This is Maritain’s strength. And, Catholics must address Alinsky and crew. We have the weapons at our disposal, but so many Catholics are ignorant of the rich legacy of our Church regarding all these ideas.

How far the American culture has fallen

Read this from Michelle Malkin: unbelievable.

http://townhall.com/columnists/michellemalkin/2012/09/07/circus_of_the_vaginagogues
and more here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRBTrlc77l0&feature=player_embedded#!

http://washingtonexaminer.com/sluts-and-condoms-for-obama/article/2507187#.UEmnIbKPV5U

Planned Parenthood pink shirts and blue condoms at DNC

Pope's Itinerary for Lebanon Visit-please pray for him

Benedict XVI's Sept. 14-16 trip to Lebanon, where he will sign the postsynodal apostolic exhortation following up from the 2010 synod on the Middle East.

The Pope will leave Rome on the morning of Friday, Sept. 14, and arrive in Beirut at 1:45 p.m., local time. 

After the welcome ceremony he will travel to Harissa where he will visit the Basilica of St. Paul and sign the postsynodal apostolic exhortation.

The next day, the Holy Father will pay a courtesy visit to the Lebanese president, prime minister and speaker of the parliament. 

He will then meet with the heads of Muslim communities before going on to pronounce an address before representatives from government, state institutions, the diplomatic corps, religious leaders and the world of culture.

On the same day the Pope will have lunch at the Armenian Catholic Patriarchate of Bzommar with patriarchs and bishops of Lebanon, members of the Special Council for the Middle East of the Synod of Bishops, and the papal entourage. At 6 p.m. he is scheduled to deliver an address to young people gathered on the square in front of the Maronite Patriarchate at Bkerke.

At 10 a.m. on Sunday, Sept. 16, the Holy Father will celebrate Mass at Beirut City Centre Waterfront and consign the postsynodal apostolic exhortation. 

Having prayed the Angelus he will then travel by car to the apostolic nunciature at Harissa where he will have lunch with members of his entourage. At 5.15 p.m. he is due to preside at an ecumenical gathering in the Syro-Catholic Patriarchate of Charfet. From there he will travel directly to the airport of Beirut whence his return flight to Rome is due to depart at 7 p.m.  from Zenit

Prayer for Priests Number Twelve or so....

A PRAYER FOR THE HOLY CHURCH AND FOR PRIESTS

O my Jesus, I beg You on behalf of the whole Church:

Grant it love and the light of Your Spirit,
and give power to the words of Priests
so that hardened hearts might be brought to repentance
and return to You, O Lord.

Lord, give us holy Priests;
You yourself maintain them in holiness.
O Divine and Great High Priest,
may the power of Your mercy
accompany them everywhere and protect them
from the devil's traps and snares
which are continually being set for the soul of Priests.

May the power of Your mercy,
O Lord, shatter and bring to naught
all that might tarnish the sanctity of Priests,

for You can do all things.

My beloved Jesus,
I pray to you for the triumph of the Church,
that you may bless the Holy Father and all the clergy;
I beg you to grant the grace of conversion
to sinners whose hearts have been hardened by sin,
and a special blessing and light to priests,
to whom I shall confess for all of my life.

(Saint Faustina Kowalska)

Number of Posts and the Time for Decision

As those who follow this blog can see, I have posted 100s of articles in the past month and a week. I am moving to Ireland at the end of the month and access to the Internet will be limited. I hope to keep blogging, and will let you all know. Blogging depends on several things which may be out of my control. Stay with me here until I let you know the details, which are in the pipeline.

God has given all of us Catholics a window of opportunity to preach the Gospel each in our own ways. As long as we are true to the Church and remain in sanctifying grace, the Trinity dwells within us. Our baptism calls us to evangelize. This call is not an option, but a command from Christ Himself.

Bloggers, blog. Media gurus, make your videos and DVDs. Dads and Moms, home school your children. Singles, make real decisions and real commitments. Do not float. Do not put off following a vocation.

Do it now. I repeat a prayer of Blessed Cardinal John Henry Newman here. This prayer is about YOU.


God has created me to do Him some definite service. He has committed some work to me which He has not committed to another. I have my mission. I may never know it in this life, but I shall be told it in the next. I am a link in a chain, a bond of connection between persons. He has not created me for naught. I shall do good; I shall do His work. I shall be an angel of peace, a preacher of truth in my own place, while not intending it if I do but keep His commandments. Therefore, I will trust Him, whatever I am. I can never be thrown away. If I am in sickness, my sickness may serve Him, in perplexity, my perplexity may serve Him. If I am in sorrow, my sorrow may serve Him. He does nothing in vain. He knows what He is about. He may take away my friends. He may throw me among strangers. He may make me feel desolate, make my spirits sink, hide my future from me. Still, He knows what He is about.

A love letter to Iowa

If I am ever homesick, it is in September. The mist beings to come off the rivers in Iowa, holding the areas in a soft gauze of mystery. In the fields, the grasshoppers make a slow, restful sounds, as these know the weather is changing and they will die. Birds stay close in the small clumps of empty choke-cherry bushes, and in the small copses of oak on the edge of the hot fields. The heat varies from day to day, and becomes a strange combination of comfort, yet the prophet of cold nights to come.

Egrets and ducks vie for room in the backwaters and small rivers. The ash, burr oaks,red and white oaks, elms, hickories, red and silver maples all change, coming to their brightest by the last week of September into the first ten days of October.  Fall festivals start this coming weekend and go into October. The ales are judged at some of these, and later, in October, the pumpkins.

Sometimes, we have proper Indian Summer in the third week of September, when the temperature goes up temporarily and kids squirm in their school rooms. Bees and butterflies slowly disappear. The nights grow quieter, as the tree frogs and crickets stop their nightly songs. One sees the pheasants and quail alongside the roads, as the corn is harvested, ending up in kitchens, being shucked by nimble hands or cut off the cob for seed corn and stacked away; the fields left brown and flat, reaching out to the horizon as far as the eye can see. Deer begin to travel through the cut fields and one must watch for them on the old roads. Six or seven at a time, these noble animals re-claim the land they left during planting and growth of the tall corn. Their young stare into the mist and wait for the elder stags and does. The deer population has gotten lower in recent years. If one commutes into the country every day in the car, twilight is the most dangerous time for deer. One must drive carefully.

Things slow down right before, and of course, after the harvesting. Hunting regulations are printed yearly and complicated. For some game, the season does not begin until September 14th or October 6th. One must plan and keep tabs of the rules and which animals may be hunted when. The same is true for the migratory birds. September is a time for thinking about what to hunt and when. The rules on fishing are so complicated one almost needs a translator to find one's way through the state guidelines. There are some fishing seasons for some fish.  I grew up on fresh game and fish. There is nothing like eating a trout which has just been caught.

Some of the vegetables and fruits begin to be harvested in July, but some not until late September. The harvest season is different for seed corn or ornamental corn, for raspberries or for bunching greens. Winter squash is winter, and not fall, squash. Nuts are brought inside. Soybeans should be harvested by October 20th or so, depending on the weather. The air is full of soybean dust and those with allergies stay inside during and after harvest.

The burst of energy at harvest time defies imagination. Bins are filled, bails dot the landscape, cheeses laid up, pickling done, apples collected in bushels towards the end of the month into October, and accounts begin to be settled.

Pigs and cattle find their way through the stubble. Then, the rains come.

The university year still follows the rural time-table, with the first break happening at real harvest time. This year, there are many tragedies in Iowa. The drought has tripled the price of meat and bread. The fields emaciated. The crop is ruined and a depression looms. This year is different.

I miss Iowa in September. It is less manic than in the summer months, more purposeful and secure, and less hostile than the winter. There was always an air of expectancy, like the entire landscape was waiting for something to happen. September in Iowa is a gentle, resolute giant moving quickly, then slowly, towards late autumn.

But, I am afraid for Iowans, who traditionally have been independent thinkers. I am afraid that the glut of bloated government and the fuzzy lines of ethically remote phrases have been like siren songs calling the materialistic heart instead of the independent heart. I am afraid that relativism, which is antithetical to nature and natural law, so obvious when works with ones' hands in rural area, has destroyed discernment. I sincerely hope not.

All these photos were taken in Iowa, mostly by farmers.

Charterhouse in London

Today and tomorrow, I am highlighting the Carthusians in England. Nothing happens by accident.

St. John Houghton, thanks to Wiki

Yesterday, I had a delightful tour of the London Charterhouse given by The Reverend Canon Hugh Williams, Preacher of Charterhouse. Mother General of the Tyrburn Nuns had suggested I visit and a seminarian friend and I had a fantastic private tour.

The Charterhouse was established in 1371 and brutally ruined by Henry VIII in 1538. Henry was particularly angry with St. John Houghton and especially St. Sebastian Newdigate, a court favourite who became a monk of the Carthusians. Henry thought he would woe the order into accepting him as Head of the Church. Remember, the first martyrs under Henry were Dom John Houghton, Prior, Dome Robert Lawrence, Prior of Beauvale, Dom Augustine Webster, Prior of Axholme, Rather Richard Reynolds, a Brigittine Monk of Syon and Father John Hale, Rector of Isleworth.

They were hung, drawn and quartered on May 4th, 1535 at Tyburn. Now, also remember, that St. Thomas More saw them being dragged from prison on the hurdles, and he describe them as "bridegrooms" going off to meet their brides.

In the end, from that date, and on June 19, 1535 at Tyburn,  and on May15, 1537 at York, more were killed. Imprisoned at Newgate, nine Carthusians, including lay brothers died in 1537. The last one, Brother William Horne, Converse, or lay brother, was martyred on Aguest 4, 1540.

The priory was brutally ruined, and WWII bombing almost finished the building off completely.

However, as Canon Williams told us, a strange lay person, who was the richest man in England not in the aristocracy, Mr. Thomas Sutton, eventually bought the property, which, for a short time, was owned by the Howards.

Mr. Sutton was an interesting man, as he garnered wealth in some interesting ways. Enough said.

I cannot go into all the rich history, but one must visit the Charterhouse.

For me, the most numinous place was the ruins of the Priory Church tucked in behind the newer buildings. To see the original site of  the altar and the tomb of the founder, Sir Walter de Mauny was so awesome, in the real sense of the word. One could sense the holiness of the place.

Please go and have a tour. Public tours are on Wednesday afternoons. Also, if you can, help the poor who live there. The Charterhouse takes care of up to 46 laymen who need care.

On strange comments regarding the TLM...

Why is there a generation of priests who refuse to learn the Latin Mass? It is one of two accepted forms and people want to experience it. I have had some conversations recently with some fifty-ish year old priests on the form of the Mass and these are sentences paraphrased said by priests.

1) The TLM did not encourage a personal relationship with Jesus!

2) The TLM did not encourage the priest to reach out to the laity!

3). The TLM was always said too fast and without reverence!

4) Priests experience joy with the NO but not with the TLM!

5) It was the will of the Church to change the Mass and break away from the TLM!

6) No one wants Latin Masses and these are divisive!

7) The Spirit of Vatican II is not found in the TLM, which is retrograde! (I have to think about that one)

8) The NO evangelizes but the TLM does not!

9) The TLM does not encourage lay involvement and therefore is not part of the post-Vatican II Church!

10) I came into the priesthood years after Vatican II and the TLM is not part of my experience!

11) In this diocese, the TLM is not a priority!

12) The TLM is all about the priest and not the laity!

13) The TLM is showy!

None of them wanted to learn it.