HAVE YOU HEARD THE NEWS?

I wish that the Church was as tight knit and conspiratorial as movie makers and those in the media at times make it appear.  I don’t even know what is happening at the next parish over let alone in Cleveland.  I love having priest friends over and asking them, “What’s going on up north of 303?  I haven’t heard any rumors lately.”

We occasionally get an Email from “downtown” informing us of important events.  There is a thing called the “Diocesan Memorandum” that anybody who wants can sign up for.  We have district meetings at which some information is disseminated with varying degrees of success.  When something really big happens we might be Emailed a letter to be read at all Masses (and hopefully the pastor complies.)  But really, your typical priest is going to find out about goings on in the Church the same way you do . . . when he reads it in the paper or internet.

It may be true that newspapers are slowly becoming the buggy whips of the news industry but I miss our diocesan newspaper (which had the coolest name EVER: The Catholic Universe Bulletin.  If anything was going on and news needed to get out, there was the paper.  “The Bishop says right here on page four . . .”  Certainly not everybody read it, but enough did to get a message out.  (And really, our paper was not well used in a manner that made it overly relevant but that is another story.)

Every now and then we have a magazine that comes out now that is more catechetical in nature.  And that is great for catechetics.  We also have a (completely non-navigable)  diocesan website that, if you want to see what is on the Bishops mind, you can waste an afternoon trying to find his words.  (They are working on it thank goodness.)  But we don’t really have anything that is pro-active.  (I hate that phrase.)  Just because we issue a statement does not mean that anyone will print it or your average Catholic will bother to go online to try to search out the diocesan reaction to any particular story out there.

Maybe this is a clever tactic: better to let things fade away rather than putting fuel on the fire by making statements to which others might react.  If the Bishop had a mechanism by which he could control all of the bulletins in the diocese to issue a state such as, “You heard about recent events concerning Cardinal Whosit in Rome, I would like to assure you that . . . and here’s some things we can do . . . “  who knows what delicious trouble that could get us in.  I could imagine the Bishop printing something in the bulletins and a pastor countering him in a merry war.  Hmmm.  Maybe it is better to keep our heads low.

In the meantime I’ll continue to invite my priest friends from Cleveland down to play cards on Wednesday nights and pump them for all the Church news from up north I can get.  Maybe the Medieval ways really are the best.

ITS ALL GOOD

I can’t think of a thing to write about today.

 

That is to say, I can’t think of ONE thing to write about.  There is just so much.  There is an incredible amount of GOOD happening within the Church but that isn’t nearly as fun as talking about the bad.  And even though the bad is miniscule compared to the good, sometimes it seems overwhelming whether it is attacks from without or seemingly rotten undermining from within, intentional or unintentional.

 

If too much time was spent on the negative, one could despair.  The problems could seem so overwhelming that we could feel powerless and just give up.  But history teaches us important lessons against this mentality.

 

Religious orders have died and religious life sprung back and flowered.  The Church has been viciously suppressed by governments and has been the government and back again.  At one point, 70% of the Church was in heresy and then the heresy passed.  We’ve survived “the bad popes” and have, especially recently, been blessed with saints.  Clergy and lay have lost contact and been best friends and back again.  Religious institutions have been rigorously Catholic, lost their way, come back, and lost their way again.  Catholics have been put on pedestals and hung on crosses.  Which all goes to say, no matter how good or bad it may seem to you, God’s Church prevails across the great arc of its journey through time giving further proof that the Church does not exists because we are so clever, but that it is the one true Church inspired by the Holy Spirit.

 

That is not to say we sit back then and let happen what will.  We are not fatalists.  But all things work to the glory of God and we can be used as sons or as tools as the Church moves forward through time and in the end.  And though being Christian in any given situation may be a trial for some, in the end we would rather be sons and daughters.

SPEAK UP I CAN'T HEAR YOU

Why isn’t the Church/pope/bishop speaking out on “X?”  Why do they seem so obsessed with sex when there is so much going on???

 

Funny how that seems isn’t it?  The fact is that the Church/pope/bishop IS speaking out on many of the hot button issues that are near and dear to your heart.  The problem is: How do they get the message to YOU? 

 

Firstly, the media has to be willing to print/report/post what was said.  You can send out a million press releases and hold ten thousand press conferences, but if someone doesn’t think it will sell or, and let’s be honest, if they are opposed to the Church, it will not make its way to your senses. 

 

That is the supposed purpose of the diocesan newspaper.  It is to be the voice of the bishop and the diocese.  Sadly that is not always the case.  Further, print is just going the way of the buggy whip.  It was announced this past week that the Diocese of Cleveland’s newspaper the Catholic Universe Bulletin (coolest name ever) is going out of print.

 

For years I have been hoping to find someone to write an article for the parish bulletin (I may have finally found somebody) who would scour the internet, Vatican, diocesan, NCCB, etc . . . and give the briefest of summaries on what is going on and being said in the Church and giving links so people CAN read and catch up.

 

The other problem is that the Church seems so obsessed with SEX.  But it comes back to how a story is reported.  It is fun (but sad) to read an article in the paper about something the pope said concerning the mating habits of humans which makes the headlines and absorbs 90% of the article only to find out that it was a passing comment within a much broader and far more important talk.

 

How do we get our voice back?  I know our diocese is looking for alternatives and not only online.  My hope is that not only will the form of the news reach each person but that the content will be worthwhile.  We don’t need any more fluff.  In the meantime we must be pro-active.  Do not take the T.V. or the local newspaper or internet story as the complete Gospel on Church reporting.  If something catches you, look it up on line.  Be careful of which sources you choose.  Scour the Vatican, USCCB, and diocesan websites.  Find original materials.  It’s work, but for now, if you want it, you have to look for it.

DID YOU KNOW THAT 48% OF ALL STATISTICS ARE MADE UP ON THE SPOT? (I JUST MADE THAT UP.)

Today is not so much a rant, but an observation.

 

It’s difficult to get good news out about the Church even when the news is good.  Just for example, can you imagine trying to organize and lead 1.2 billion people from every country, socioeconomic level, age, government, education level, etc, etc, etc, and making them all happy?

 

Aint going to happen.

 

I wanted to organize an outing for dinner with my sister and my cousin yesterday and the three of us couldn’t agree on a place to eat.

 

So, an accurate and documented article came out in the Plain Dealer on Wednesday, March 6^th entitled, “U.S. Catholics Mixed on Benedict, Poll Says” written by Dalia Sussman of the (wait for it) New York Times.  The poll stated that most Catholics were positive about the Church in the United States, 54% giving it a good to excellent rating, and 77% said that things were either improving or remaining the same.  Three quarters thought the next pope would be in touch with today’s Catholics.  (Which ones?  The ones in the desert?  The ones in countries in which the faith is suppressed?  The ones in the jungle?  Oh, I know, you mean the ones that drive minivans and shop at the mall and have three computers and five televisions at home. – Sarcasm there.  Sorry.  I digress.)

 

Wow.

 

Wow.

 

Wow.

 

(I’ll say it again.)

 

Wow.

 

Most presidents would KILL for numbers like this!  And they are only concerned with one country for votes!  Reurters reports that our president has a 43% approval rating according to this article.  Bet he would like to exchange his numbers for those above.  Considering that the Church and our pope have to fashion a faith that speaks to the African, the European, the Asian, the American, etc. etc. etc., and not just cater to the West, and then to have numbers like this IMHO is nothing short of the miraculous.

 

But then it is couched in the article stated above.  “Only” 50% that thought things were good.  “A mere” 4% thought things were excellent.  “But only 3 in 10” of the three quarters who thought positively about the new pope had a “great deal of confidence in that.”

 

Talk about a killjoy.

 

Then there was this totally disconnected little ditty that I absolutely loved.  “’He just seemed kind of bland,’ Dorothy Lascuola, 66, a frequent churchgoer from Butler Pa., said of Pope Benedict XVI in a follow-up interview.”  Perhaps we should elect Justin Bieber for the next pontiff.

 

Thank goodness we know what Dorothy thought.  But Fr. Pfeiffer was just saying yesterday what a masterful mind our papal emeritus has and was commenting on some of his masterful and quite exciting writing.  Of course nothing of this kind was reported so I thought I would make up for it here.

 

*sigh*

 

That did get kind of ranty after all didn’t.  Perhaps I get too much fun out of it.

 

HOW TO ELECT A POPE

I received a phone call yesterday from a local psator who is also a classmate.  “Are you going to get gold and yellow bunting for the new pope to put on the outside of your church?”  I’d completely forgotten about this tradition.  When John Paul II was elected pope I was in junior high school.  I remember I was at St. Ambrose when he died and we were instructed, in those parishes that were willing and able, to hang black bunting up.  It was a windy day and I got a ladder out to hang some from our roof.  A mighty gust blew the ladder down and I was suck up there until a friendly jogger happened by.

 

Anyway, I remember that I purchased a little pamphlet entitled “When a Pope Dies” by Christopher Bellitto Ph.D. those many years ago.  And by small I mean tiny.  I’d carried it from assignment to assignment (just in case) and always threw it somewhere behind books on the bookshelf.  Well, last night I remembered that I even had the book and started pulling shelves of books out looking for it and . . . IT WAS FOUND.  I can’t believe it!  Such things are usually lost until one week after they were needed.

 

When looking at the election of a new pope it is interesting that books tend to assume that the previous pope had expired, not simply given up the papacy for lent.  There are elaborate descriptions on how the cardinals oversee the destruction of his ring and seal and how he is to be buried with them along with them along with copies of his most important works.  (I imaging it was crowded in there with John Paul.)

 

So we are moving in to a new election without celebrating a funeral.  At the end of the month there will a period of interregnum between Benedict’s retirement and the newly elected pope.  Our current method of electing pope is relatively new – only about 1,000 years old.  It came about with the election of Gregory X.  There was such rivalry and fighting about who should be the next pope that the Church went almost three years without one.  Finally the town, tired of the whole thing (and probably tired of feeding and housing these guys) locked the cardinals in a building, ripped off the roof exposing them to the elements, and threatened to feed them only bread and water.  Quickly Gregory X was elected.

 

Since then it has been pretty much the same.  Every day the cardinals are will be driven from their simple accommodations to the Sistine Chapel and locked in with no access to news from the outside world.  They will meet twice a day and each session is can have two votes.  A man must have two thirds of the votes to be elected.  (Interestingly, if the number is such that they cannot be divided into three equal groups, the man must receive two thirds plus one.)

 

At the end of each vote a tally is made and a needle is inserted through the ballot so that it may not be counted again.  If no man is elected, the ballots are burned and black smoke tells the waiting crowd that there is still no pope.  If a two thirds majority is given to one man, he is approached and asked, “Do you accept your canonical election as Supreme Pontiff?”  If he says yes he is asked by what name he wishes to be known.  When he answers, he is then pope.  The ballots are not burned but sealed and put in the Vatican archives and chemicals are added to the fire to let people in the outside world know that it has a pope once again.

 

The man is taken to the sacristy and dresses.  He first receives the cardinals and then is taken to the balcony in St. Peter Basilica and the crowd hears, “Annuntio vobis gaudium magnum.  Habemus papam!”  “I announce to you with great joy.  We have a pope!”  Then parishes throughout the world hang up their gold and white bunting.

 

Interestingly enough, the minimum requirement for becoming pope is that you be a Catholic, baptized male.  We have more requirements than that for becoming the milk lady in the parish school cafeteria. 

 

There is much more to the story.  If you found this the least bit interesting I assure you there is much more to know and plenty of places to find it.

TOP CATHOLIC STORIES OF 2012: VATILEAKS

Continuing our countdown to the New Year using John Allen’s talk at the Akron First Friday Club concerning the top Catholic stories of 2012 we hit #3 of 4: Vatileaks!  This is the story of how the Pope Benedict’s personal secretary removed documentation from the Vatican and sold it to the press.  This was an early Christmas present for the world that loves a good story.  It was full of all the right details: The mysterious Vatican, high ranking officials in the Church, an insider giving the public sneak peeks at the inner workings (and some inglorious ones at that) of this rather unique city-state, and best of all:  THE BUTLER DID IT.

 

Be that as it may there were some interesting and somewhat controversial results of this incident.  The pope opened up the books of the Vatican bank in order to be more transparent to the world – to try to establish trust again in the Vatican.  What is so controversial about this you might ask?  Think of how vulnerable the Vatican is.  Rome has been sacked more times than bread in a grocery store.  We have fought “with blood” to keep this small patch of land sovereign.  Is the Vatican in any way compromised because it allowed “outsiders” to come in and examine its books?  In any event, this is completely unprecedented.  And, as John Allen made mention, when you are talking about a 2,000+ year organization that has gone through what the Catholic Church has gone through, saying that something of this nature is unprecedented is saying something.

CATHOLIC NEWS YEAR IN REVIEW II

The second of four topics in John Allen’s Catholic news year in review is the New Evangelization.  This new effort within the Church will be “the engine that steers the financial train” of the Church making this the most important internal priority in the Church.

 

Statistics are a funny thing.  It is said that 67.2% of all statistics are made up on the spot (that is a joke) and that you can make statistics mean just about anything.  But if we only look at the number of new adherents, Christianity is the fastest growing religion in the world.  Interesting, but the happy news is not great for the western Catholic world.  Catholicism continues to be the largest single religious group in the United States with Baptists coming in a distant second.  (Protestantism as a whole is larger than the Catholic Church, but they are splintered into thousands of denominations.)  However, larger than even the Baptists are those who consider themselves former Catholics.  Though 68% of those baptized Catholic as infants remain Catholic into adulthood, that leaves 32% that “leave” and we are not doing a good job of retaining or replacing them.

 

Part of the reason is we have become so terribly polite.  “I’m Okay, your Okay, let’s not talk about religion” has become the political fashion.  While it may allay fist fights, it does nothing for evangelization and the furthering of the faith.  Hand in hand with yesterday’s post, we are to stop focusing on issues that are not on the Catholic playing field and get cracking on real matters of faith and truth that enliven peoples’ hearts.  The fire of evangelization has grown cold.  It is time to wake from our slumber, shake of the cloudiness of confusing issues, and carry forth the banner in the clear light of the sun – to banish complacency and apathy – and to relight the missionary fire to warm those around us in our everyday lives.

OF COURSE YOU KNOW THIS MEANS WAR from BUGS BUNNY

Politics have been the cause of so many wars in history. It is obvious that politics are bad for human beings. Therefore it is my recommendation that we should get rid of all politics.

While we are at it we should get rid of all land ownership, ethnic differences, wealth, power, natural resources, national pride, and national memories. All of these have caused numerous wars over the centuries. We cannot live with it any longer! It is time we rid ourselves of all these things!

I hope you get my point. I made the mistake of listening to the radio concerning the Pope’s visit to England (to which he was invited by the way.) The ranting about how evil he and the Catholic Church are was at fever pitch. I will give kudos to the program for bringing some non-disgruntled Catholics on to give other views of the visit – quite an unusual event in and of itself. But to the rest of it I just kept telling myself, “Just listen so that you can speak intelligently about this,” but it was just one unsubstantiated, illogical diatribe after another. I have absolutely no problem with someone who wants to engage in a conversation about any topic calmly and intelligently, but this reached to point of ridiculousness.

I can’t even go into everything that was said but one guest on the show – not a call in – went on at length about how religion should be wiped off the face of the earth because it has been the cause of death and war for centuries. He was so worked up that the host had to turn off his microphone and move on. Has God and religion been cited as reasons to go to war and/or to rally troops? Yes. Absolutely. Even by popes and leaders of other religions. But does that mean that religion leads to war? Hardly.

There are two things to consider here. One is similar to reasons people give for leaving the Church. There is usually the presenting problem. For example; “I think the Church is unfair and uncaring about (blank),” and there is usually the real problem, “I was divorced, remarried without a decree of nullity, my new spouse wants nothing to do with it, we already have a kid, the Church won’t make it all go magically away and my parents are on my back.” Much easier to point at the evil Church than to take responsibility for one’s actions.

In war it may be that someone is saying, “This is a holy war! Fight on for God and for the Right!” That is the presenting reason whereas the real reason is, “They have oil!” or “We want that land” or “I want to be richer and more powerful!” I mean, let’s be serious. Let’s take the case of a radical Christian (not a person who simply does as he wills yet claims to be a Christian and acting for Christ.) If you are a radical follower of Christ you embrace poverty, you glory in your weaknesses, you fail to see but Christ in another, you are moved to forgiveness and reconciliation and love of your enemy, and turning the other cheek. So does it sound remotely like someone who goes to war can truly declare they do so on behalf of Christianity alone? Only a simpleton would think so.

Of course we could make reference to even wars sanctioned or declared by the Church. It is always dangerous and completely unfair to judge anybody of past generations by the morays of the present. If you want to judge a war one cannot sit comfortably in their armchair with their cup of mocha and expound upon the horribleness of past epochs going to war over things they do not approve of without experiencing at least through the lens of historian the fear of, let’s say, a barbarian invasion in a time of little to no communication that, at least to their minds, seems to threaten the very existence of civilization itself.

Or say that Rome is sacked (yet again) and the Vatican is taken over and used for some other reason. Radically I don’t think Jesus would care one jot. But many people not on the level of Jesus would. We might think it Okay to go in and relieve Rome from her distress (which is actually at least partly our distress) but generations from now (especially if we should fail in our mission) might say, “See how they invaded our nation! Killed our people! Tried to suppress us!” and no doubt there would multitudes listening to their car radios nodding their heads and saying, “Yes! See! We should get rid of religion!”

Let us suppose for a moment that we could wave wand and get rid of all religious beliefs. Say I could wave it over the Middle East and like that – ZAP – all religious fervor is gone. Does anybody really think that all of the war would stop? Do they really think that it is really just about religion? And without those who really practice what their religion says do they really think we would do better without those who would say, “But if you are serious about religion we are really going too far!”

Well, anyway, that is what was rushing through my mind as I listened to the radio and since the only one who could hear me was Sebastian I thought that I would let at least part of it out here.

Believe me . . . Sebastian heard a lot more.

READ ALL ABOUT IT!

Last week I was invited to hear a talk given by Teresa Tomeo. She is a veteran broadcast journalist that worked in the Detroit area for many years. If you would like to read more about her and her career and subsequent rediscovery of her Catholic roots look here.

Coming from an insider’s perspective she told how our newsrooms are generally staffed with people who know little about the Church or our faith or who may even be hostile toward it. This is easy to see from reading local newspapers how many errors in reporting our faith there is. It can be frustrating at times and I wonder if they could they not have asked somebody who really knows the faith to check their reporting before they go to print.

She gave several suggestions for engaging the various news media out there in hopes of helping them understand us better and report on the Church in a more fair, informative, and truthful manner. What follows are her suggestions:

1) Pray for those in mass media. Pray for those who are hostile toward the faith, pray for those who report errors because of a misunderstanding of the faith, and pray for Catholics who feel pressured by their peers. The point is not to make them a Catholic news source but a better, more factual news source.

2) Know your stuff. We cannot help others know their stuff if we do not know it. Read documents. Go to sources. Find out the story.

3) Encourage Christians to go into secular media. Our first knee jerk reaction is to say, “Fine. Then I’ll abandon you.” But then nothing changes. Rather, enter the problem and be part of the solution. Then go back to step one.

4) Support Catholic and other Christian media that helps get the other side of the story out.

5) Examine your own media habits. Is it fair and balanced?

6) Be proactive with the media rather than reactive. If there is something going on important in your area and you or someone you know is an expert on the topic contact the media and let them know that this person is available for research or interview.

7) Write to the editor. You may not get published and that is Okay. However your letter may be the only source to broaden the editor’s perspective in the matter.

8) Be polite. Don’t fuel a stereotype or give reason for someone to be further distanced from wanting to cooperate in getting the full story.

9) Don’t give up. Like Monica praying for Augustine keep plugging ahead. Who knows what good might be going on even if you are not aware of it?

TUESDAY QUOTE OF THE WEEK (or) WHY YET AGAIN I AM GLAD TO BELONG TO THE ONE, HOLY, CATHOLIC, AND APOSTOLIC CHURCH

FINDING TRUTH WHERE IT MAY BE FOUND - "I was walking across a bridge one day, and I saw a man standing on the edge, about to jump off. So I ran over and said, "Stop! Don't do it! . . . There's so much to live for!" He said, "Like what?" I said, "Well, are you religious or atheist?" He said, "Religious." I said, "Me too! Are you Christian or Buddhist?" He said, "Christian." I said, "Me too! Are you Catholic or Protestant?" He said, "Protestant." I said, "Me too! Are you Episcopalian or Baptist?" He said, "Baptist!" I said, "Wow! Me too! Are you Baptist Church of God or Baptist Church of the Lord?" He said, "Baptist Church of God!" I said, "Me too! Are you original Baptist Church of God or Reformed Baptist Church of God?" He said, "Reformed Baptist Church of God!" I said, "Are you Reformed Baptist Church of God, reformation of 1879 or Reformed Baptist Church of God reformation of 1915?" He said, "Reformed Baptist Church of God, reformation of 1915!" I said, "Die heretic scum," and pushed him off. - Emo Philips from 'Moonbeams' in the magazine "The Sun"

More links from the Cleveland Diocese E-Newsletter: Catholic World News is an independent Catholic news service staffed by lay Catholic journalists, dedicated to providing accurate world news, written from a distinctively Catholic perspective.