Tuesday, August 31, 2010

A New Play About the Founder of the Knights of Columbus


From the blog of the Dominican Province of St. Joseph:
The Knights of Columbus recently asked Father Peter John Cameron O.P., to direct a play about their founder, Father Michael J. McGivney. The Catholic Transcript interviews Father Cameron about his own vocation.

"Author, editor, journalist, playwright, theatrical artistic director, professor of homiletics, preacher, retreat master - the list of Father Cameron's titles, interests and vocational activities is extensive. The common thread is his vocation. "My priesthood and my evangelizing ... my preaching is first," he said in an interview with The Catholic Transcript. "I'm a priest so that others can meet Jesus Christ," he said. "I met him and I realized that life doesn't make sense without him. Every need and longing of our heart has an answer, and he's the answer. When Christ gazes at you, your life changes. His gaze is on everyone, just waiting for our answer.""

Read the full article here.

Previous Pro Ecclesia posts on this subject:
Father Michael J. McGivney: A Saint for America

Decree on Heroic Virtues of Fr. Michael McGivney, Founder of Knights of Columbus

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Monday, August 30, 2010

Digest of Today's Posts (30 August 2010)

  • Media Leftist: Mention of God Inappropriate for "Sacred Spot" Like Lincoln Memorial

  • Abortion: The Signpost at the Crossroads


  • (Digest of Friday's Posts (27 August 2010))

    Labels:

    Media Leftist: Mention of God Inappropriate for "Sacred Spot" Like Lincoln Memorial

    Bill Press has never been the sharpest media tool in the shed. But this is just rank ignorance:



    What a maroon!

    Somebody should have notified the REVEREND Martin Luther King, Jr. back in 1963 of the inappropriateness of his speaking at the Lincoln Memorial:
    ... I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, and every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight; "and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together."

    This is our hope, and this is the faith that I go back to the South with.

    With this faith, we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith, we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith, we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.

    And this will be the day -- this will be the day when all of God's children will be able to sing with new meaning:

    My country 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing.

    Land where my fathers died, land of the Pilgrim's pride,

    From every mountainside, let freedom ring!


    [...]

    And when this happens, when we allow freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual:

    Free at last! Free at last!

    Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!
    (emphasis added)

    Hell, somebody needs to inform the National Park Service that they must sandblast the following quotes by that religious zealot Abraham Lincoln from the walls of the Lincoln Memorial:
    ... Neither party expected for the war the magnitude or the duration which it has already attained. Neither anticipated that the cause of the conflict might cease with, or even before, the conflict itself should cease. Each looked for an easier triumph, and a result less fundamental and astounding. Both read the same Bible, and pray to the same God; and each invokes his aid against the other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God's assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men's faces; but let us judge not, that we be not judged. [ED.: Well, there, at least, is a biblical sentiment with which every liberal seems to be in accord and can quote back to you at the drop of a hat. In fact, it appears to be only one of 3 Bible verses the typical liberal seems to know.] The prayers of both could not be answered--that of neither has been answered fully.

    The Almighty has his own purposes. "Woe unto the world because of offenses! for it must needs be that offenses come; but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh." If we shall suppose that American slavery is one of those offenses which, in the providence of God, must needs come, but which, having continued through his appointed time, he now wills to remove, and that he gives to both North and South this terrible war, as the woe due to those by whom the offense came, shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living God always ascribe to him? Fondly do we hope--fervently do we pray--that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondsman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn by the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said, "The judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether."

    With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan--to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves, and with all nations.


    ~ From Lincoln's 2nd Inaugural Address (inscribed on the interior of the Lincoln Memorial)
    (emphasis and editorial commentary added)

    Nope. No place at all for God at "sacred" sites, especially not at the Lincoln Memorial.


    UPDATE (31 August)
    See Pat Archbold's similar take at National Catholic Register (Hat tip: Creative Minority Report)

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    Abortion: The Signpost at the Crossroads

    Joseph Bottum writes at First Things:
    ... You travel the long road of religion in America, and you find the Bible chapels, scattered along the prairie like tumbleweeds that have somehow grown white vinyl siding. You drive past the green-lawn suburban churches with cutesy messages on the brick-framed signs placed out near the street. You pass the exhaust-stained marble fronts of the old city congregations, the yellow taxis inching angrily by. You visit the grand cathedrals and synagogues, announcing their people’s success in America, this newfoundland, and you see the pulpits and the choir lofts and the pews and the Sunday schools—the church basement halls, with their dented aluminum coffeemakers and styrofoam cups, their book tables, their after-service conversations burbling away. And somewhere down that highway you come, again, to the crossroads where the public life of the nation confronts you.

    There is a marker at that place, naming its many promises and dangers for travelers, with the word abortion at the top. Even now, abortion remains what it has been for more than thirty years: the signpost at the intersection of religion and American public life.

    Of course, there are those who think this shouldn’t be so. Personally, I cannot see how abortion could not rank first. We eliminate 1.3 million unborn children in this country every year, a number that dwarfs, by far, the impact of every other activity with which the moral teachings of the churches might be concerned. For that matter, the story of abortion is a tale of blood and sex and power and law—I do not know what more anyone could need for public significance. The people who say they are uninterested in the issue of abortion have always seemed, to me, to be trying to suppress the imagination that most makes us human.

    Nonetheless, even in the churches some do not see things this way, and they want the whole issue simply to go away. But the fact that they wish abortion didn’t matter shows that abortion does, in fact, matter. It’s proof that the social observation remains true, for good or for ill. Whether one approves or not, the issue of abortion is here in America—the signpost at the crossroads...


    [...]

    ... Abortion is here, and not to take a stand is to take a stand.

    Every two years, we seem to go through this. Usually it comes after the election—and often from Republicans. There’s a good-sized section of the conservative commenting classes that seems to blame the pro-lifers if the Republicans lose, and dismiss the pro-life vote if the Republicans win...


    [...]

    And here we get down to it—the real reason, beyond all party politics, that no truce on abortion is possible. One can imagine pro-life absolutisms that are unhelpful and counterproductive. The refusal, for instance, to accept the introduction of pro-life counseling into pregnancy centers because those centers also counsel for abortion. Or the denunciation of small, state-by-state measures because they do not address the central problem of the insertion of abortion as a right into the Constitution by Roe v. Wade. A particularly wrong-headed example, wasting incalculable money and energy, is the attempt made by several states over the last decade to pass state constitutional amendments that ban abortions—hoping thereby to create the silver bullet that would force the Supreme Court to reconsider the abortion license.

    But the rejection of Mitch Daniels’ truce proposal is not this sort of absolutism. We should not accept a truce on abortion because the pro-life position is, in fact, winning. With horrifying slowness, yes, but each graduating class of young people is more opposed to abortion than the last, and in the long run the great task of persuasion and argument will prevail...


    [...]

    No, we cannot halt. We cannot falter. We cannot pause. We cannot agree to wait. No truce—not now, not ever.

    [Read the whole thing]

    (Hat tip: Joe Scheidler)

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    Friday, August 27, 2010

    Digest of Today's Posts (27 August 2010)

  • The Crusades and Jihad Are NOT Moral Equivalents

  • John Cornyn and the Rest of the Idiots at the NRSC Will Never Learn, Will They?

  • The Last Refuge of a Liberal


  • (Digest of Yesterday's Posts (26 August 2010))

    Labels:

    The Crusades and Jihad Are NOT Moral Equivalents

    Read Joe Hargrave's excellent commentary on the dubious comparisons drawn between violence perpetrated by Islamists in furtherance of the Jihad and the violence engaged in by Christian soldiers during the Crusades:
    One of the memes – the unconscious, uncritical, lazy thoughts that spreads from person to person like a virus – that has been particularly virulent during this ground-zero mosque controversy is that Christians have no standing to criticize the violence of Islam, given a supposedly violent Christian history. And no one event is more often invoked as an example of Christian hypocrisy than the so-called “Crusades” (so-called, because no one who fought in them called them that).

    The latest and most appalling example appears in the NY Times, courtesy of a Nicholas D. Kristoff. Among the many absurdities one can find
    in this column, including definitive claims as to the intentions and desires of Osama bin Laden, Kristof writes,
    Remember also that historically, some of the most shocking brutality in the region was justified by the Bible, not the Koran. Crusaders massacred so many men, women and children in parts of Jerusalem that a Christian chronicler, Fulcher of Chartres, described an area ankle-deep in blood. While burning Jews alive, the crusaders sang, “Christ, We Adore Thee.”
    What could be more logical, more pertinent, more relevant, than to invoke thousand-year old wartime excesses as proof that Christians have no grounds to criticize Islam?

    [Read the whole thing]

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    John Cornyn and the Rest of the Idiots at the NRSC Will Never Learn, Will They?

    You've heard the old adage, "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me."

    But what to make of an organization so inept that they allow themselves to play the fool over and over and over again?
    ... If, as seems clear, the goal of the Committee is to defeat Democrats, why they should have any preference in a primary — especially one where two Republicans are separated by one percent — is beyond me. Drew counters that, as a sitting senator, Murkowski’s partly responsible for raising money for the NRSC and therefore should be able to call on its resources, but again, that’s not what the Committee is supposed to be for. If incumbents want to start a National Incumbent Committee and raise money for themselves that way, fine; as it is, fundraising on the NRSC’s behalf is ostensibly done for all Republican candidates in the name of the betterment of the party. How does Murkowski have a stronger claim to that than Miller? Besides, not all of the NRSC’s money is a product of incumbents showing up for fundraising events. They have an online donation page for small donors just like every other political group nowadays (note that the photos on the page are all of Democrats, not Republican incumbents), and in any event, given the enthusiasm among the base this year for “true conservatives” like Miller, I wouldn’t be surprised to find more support for him than for Murkowski among NRSC donors.

    So no, I still don’t get why the NRSC is helping her out. Neither does Erick Erickson, who hears that she’s angling to make a deal with the Libertarian Party in exchange for a huge donation even as an NRSC lawyer is on his way up there to help her with the next steps in the GOP primary. Which, by the way, is still winnable for her: Fully 20,000 absentee or “questioned” ballots, most of them Republican, remain to be counted and she only needs to net 1,700 votes to win. (Remember, Miller surged late in the race so early absentee voters might favor Murkowski.) But in case the absentees don’t come through for her, old Palin nemesis Andrew Halcro has reportedly commissioned a poll for this weekend showing how Murkowski would fare in a three-way race if she joined the Libertarians. And the Libertarians themselves seem increasingly open to the idea...
    For those of you who haven't been keeping score, here's the NRSC's recent track record in cases where they've gone to bat for the less conservative candidate over the more conservative candidate:

    •In the 2004 and 2010 Pennsylvania GOP Senate Primary races, the NRSC endorsed Arlen Specter, not once, but twice, over the more conservative candidate, Pat Toomey. The second time the NRSC involved itself in trying to pick and choose Pennsylvania's Republican nominee for U.S. Senate, Toomey actually had a sizeable lead over Specter and an arguably better chance of winning the general election. A month after the NRSC endorsement, Specter switched parties and became a Democrat.


    •In the 2006 Rhode Island GOP Senate Primary race, the NRSC endorsed the perennially unreliable Lincoln Chafee over the more conservative candidate Steve Laffey. Chafee went on to win the primary but lose in the general election. A short time thereafter, Chafee abandoned the Republican Party to run as an independent for Governor of Rhode Island.


    •In the 2010 Florida GOP Senate Primary race, the NRSC endorsed mushy moderate Charlie Crist over the more conservative Marco Rubio. When Rubio pulled well ahead of Crist, NRSC Chairman John Cornyn said he was sticking with his endorsement of Crist as a matter of "honor". With Rubio crushing Crist among Republican voters, Crist abandoned the GOP to run for the U.S. Senate as an independent. Crist has declined to say whether he will, if elected, caucus with the Republicans (unlikely) or the Democrats (quite likely).


    And now, wouldn't it just be fitting for the NRSC to rush to Alaska to help Lisa Murkowski in her recount efforts against the apparently victorious (and Palin-backed) Joe Miller, only to see Miller remain the victor and Murkowski abandon the party and land on the ballot as the Libertarian nominee?

    Jackasses.


    Previous Pro Ecclesia posts on this subject:
    The "Stupid Party" is All the More Stupid for Having John Cornyn Among Its Ranks [UPDATED]

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    The Last Refuge of a Liberal

    Charles Krauthammer writes:
    Liberalism under siege is an ugly sight indeed. Just yesterday it was all hope and change and returning power to the people. But the people have proved so disappointing. Their recalcitrance has, in only 19 months, turned the predicted 40-year liberal ascendancy (James Carville) into a full retreat. Ah, the people, the little people, the small-town people, the "bitter" people, as Barack Obama in an unguarded moment once memorably called them, clinging "to guns or religion or" -- this part is less remembered -- "antipathy toward people who aren't like them."

    [...]

    Note what connects these issues. In every one, liberals have lost the argument in the court of public opinion. Majorities -- often lopsided majorities -- oppose President Obama's social-democratic agenda (e.g., the stimulus, Obamacare), support the Arizona law, oppose gay marriage and reject a mosque near Ground Zero.

    What's a liberal to do? Pull out the bigotry charge, the trump that preempts debate and gives no credit to the seriousness and substance of the contrary argument. The most venerable of these trumps is, of course, the race card.


    [...]

    It is a measure of the corruption of liberal thought and the collapse of its self-confidence that, finding itself so widely repudiated, it resorts reflexively to the cheapest race-baiting (in a colorful variety of forms). Indeed, how can one reason with a nation of pitchfork-wielding mobs brimming with "antipathy toward people who aren't like them" -- blacks, Hispanics, gays and Muslims -- a nation that is, as Michelle Obama once put it succinctly, "just downright mean"?

    The Democrats are going to get beaten badly in November. Not just because the economy is ailing. And not just because Obama over-read his mandate in governing too far left. But because a comeuppance is due the arrogant elites whose undisguised contempt for the great unwashed prevents them from conceding a modicum of serious thought to those who dare oppose them.


    [Read the whole thing]

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    Thursday, August 26, 2010

    Digest of Today's Posts (26 August 2010)

  • Archbishop Chaput: "Systematic Discrimination Against Church Now Seems Inevitable"

  • Cordoba House: A Closer Look at the “Ground Zero Mosque”

  • How Mother Teresa's 100th Birthday is Being Celebrated



  • Labels:

    Archbishop Chaput: "Systematic Discrimination Against Church Now Seems Inevitable"

    From LifeSiteNews:
    SPISSKE, PODHRADIE, Slovakia, August 25, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) - MUST READ Excerpts from Denver Archbishop Charles Chaput's address to the 15th symposium for the Canon Law Association of Slovakia on Tuesday:

    Today's secularizers have learned from the past. They are more adroit in their bigotry; more elegant in their public relations; more intelligent in their work to exclude the Church and individual believers from influencing the moral life of society. Over the next several decades, Christianity will become a faith that can speak in the public square less and less freely. A society where faith is prevented from vigorous public expression is a society that has fashioned the state into an idol. And when the state becomes an idol, men and women become the sacrificial offering.

    We face an aggressively secular political vision and a consumerist economic model that result - in practice, if not in explicit intent -- in a new kind of state-encouraged atheism.

    To put it another way: The Enlightenment-derived worldview that gave rise to the great murder ideologies of the last century remains very much alive. Its language is softer, its intentions seem kinder, and its face is friendlier. But its underlying impulse hasn't changed -- i.e., the dream of building a society apart from God; a world where men and women might live wholly sufficient unto themselves, satisfying their needs and desires through their own ingenuity.

    This vision presumes a frankly "post-Christian" world ruled by rationality, technology and good social engineering. Religion has a place in this worldview, but only as an individual lifestyle accessory. People are free to worship and believe whatever they want, so long as they keep their beliefs to themselves and do not presume to intrude their religious idiosyncrasies on the workings of government, the economy, or culture.


    [...]

    In the United States, a nation that is still 80 percent Christian with a high degree of religious practice, government agencies now increasingly seek to dictate how Church ministries should operate, and to force them into practices that would destroy their Catholic identity. Efforts have been made to discourage or criminalize the expression of certain Catholic beliefs as "hate speech." Our courts and legislatures now routinely take actions that undermine marriage and family life, and seek to scrub our public life of Christian symbolism and signs of influence.

    In Europe, we see similar trends, although marked by a more open contempt for Christianity. Church leaders have been reviled in the media and even in the courts for simply expressing Catholic teaching.

    The West is now steadily moving in the direction of that new "inhuman humanism." And if the Church is to respond faithfully, we need to draw upon the lessons that your Churches learned under totalitarianism.


    [...]

    Relativism is now the civil religion and public philosophy of the West. Again, the arguments made for this viewpoint can seem persuasive. Given the pluralism of the modern world, it might seem to make sense that society should want to affirm that no one individual or group has a monopoly on truth; that what one person considers to be good and desirable another may not; and that all cultures and religions should be respected as equally valid.

    In practice, however, we see that without a belief in fixed moral principles and transcendent truths, our political institutions and language become instruments in the service of a new barbarism. In the name of tolerance we come to tolerate the cruelest intolerance; respect for other cultures comes to dictate disparagement of our own; the teaching of "live and let live" justifies the strong living at the expense of the weak.


    [...]

    Writing in the 1960s, Richard Weaver, an American scholar and social philosopher, said: "I am absolutely convinced that relativism must eventually lead to a regime of force."

    He was right. There is a kind of "inner logic" that leads relativism to repression.

    This explains the paradox of how Western societies can preach tolerance and diversity while aggressively undermining and penalizing Catholic life. The dogma of tolerance cannot tolerate the Church's belief that some ideas and behaviors should not be tolerated because they dehumanize us. The dogma that all truths are relative cannot allow the thought that some truths might not be.

    The Catholic beliefs that most deeply irritate the orthodoxies of the West are those concerning abortion, sexuality and the marriage of man and woman. This is no accident. These Christian beliefs express the truth about human fertility, meaning and destiny.

    These truths are subversive in a world that would have us believe that God is not necessary and that human life has no inherent nature or purpose. Thus the Church must be punished because, despite all the sins and weaknesses of her people, she is still the bride of Jesus Christ; still a source of beauty, meaning and hope that refuses to die -- and still the most compelling and dangerous heretic of the world's new order.

    The full 12-page talk can be read here.
    Definitely read the whole thing.


    Previous Pro Ecclesia posts on this subject:
    Pope Critical of Labour’s "Unjust" Equality Laws Ahead of UK Visit

    Same-Sex "Marriage" and Religious Liberty

    Bork Predicts “Terrible Conflict” Will Endanger U.S. Catholics’ Religious Freedom

    Same-Sex "Marriage" and the Persecution of Civil Society

    InsideCatholic on "The Unintended Consequences of Gay Marriage"

    Secularist Attacks on the Catholic Church in Britain

    Regular Guy Paul on What's Next for Same-Sex "Marriage"

    Catholic Provocation?

    Federal Judge: Catholic Church’s Position Against Homosexual Adoptions Justifies Government Hostility Towards Church

    San Francisco's Hateful Anti-Catholic Resolution Prompts Lawsuit by Thomas More Center

    Catholic League Says Gay Adoption Issue Spurring Anti-Catholic Bigotry

    9th Circuit Rules Okay to Censor Terms "Marriage" and "Family Values" as Hate Speech

    UK Catholic Schools Endangered by Sexual Orientation Regulations

    Official Anti-Catholic Bigotry Returns to British Parliament

    "A Charter for Suing Christians"

    A Catholic Londoner on "The Last Acceptable Prejudice"

    British Bishops: U.K. Sex Equality Law "Threatens Catholic Adoption Agencies"

    UK: Churches "Could be Forced to Bless Gay Weddings"

    The Coming Persecution of Churches Over "Gay Marriage"

    The Coming Conflict Between Same-Sex "Marriage" and Religious Liberty

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    Cordoba House: A Closer Look at the “Ground Zero Mosque”

    Take the time to read Steven Greydanus' very thoughtful piece on the controversy over plans to build a mosque/Islamic center near the site of the World Trade Center.

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    How Mother Teresa's 100th Birthday is Being Celebrated


    Tim Drake writes at National Catholic Register:
    While the Empire State Building won’t be lit up in the blue and white colors of Mother Teresa’s Missionaries of Charity, there are many other ways that Mother Teresa’s 100th birthday – August 26 - is being honored worldwide.

    Bill Donohue, president of the Catholic League, who originally asked for the Empire State Building to be lighted, instead will hold a rally outside the Empire State Building on behalf of Mother Teresa on August 26.

    Meanwhile, the Peace Bridge, on the Niagara River in New York, and the Hutchinson Metro Center’s two office buildings in the Bronx will be lit blue and white.


    [...]

    In the U.S., the Mother Teresa postage stamp is being issued. Similar stamps are being issued in Austria, Kosovo, and Monaco. France is issuing four collector-edition coins, one which shows Mother Teresa with Pope John Paul II.

    The Knights of Columbus Museum in New Haven, CT is hosting the American premiere exhibit of Mother Teresa: Life, Spirituality and Message...


    [More]

    Other stories at National Catholic Register commemorating the occasion of Mother Teresa's 100th birthday:

    Adopted Country
    Non-Catholic India Goes Big on Mother Teresa Centenary

    ‘Do ordinary things with extraordinary love’
    The Things that Made Mother Teresa Tick

    The World Celebrates Mother Teresa
    Nun Recalled Far and Wide on 100th Anniversary

    Mother Teresa at 100
    From Skopje to Calcutta to the World

    Danielle Bean: Is Mother Teresa Embarrassed?

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    Wednesday, August 25, 2010

    Self-Critical Navel Gazing for Thee, But Not for Me

    Bingo!
    ... Know what stuck out about that to me? The self-satisfied, misguided "above it all" tone of the piece. Yes, Brooks is correct that, "very few in public life habitually step back and think about the weakness in their own thinking and what they should do to compensate." However, I can't help but notice that he seems to be exempting himself and other people who think like he does from that criticism. Yet, David Brooks in his own mentally flabby way, is every bit as rigid in his thinking as the hardcore activists he scorns. The little tribe that Brooks belongs to, Team RINO, has its own "tribal purity tests" and its own weaknesses in thinking that are habitually brushed aside as easily as those on the Left and Right.

    So, here's the question: When do people like David Brooks start asking themselves some tough questions? When do they engage in some self-criticism? When do they consider the possibility that maybe the principled people with the fire in their bellies have it right? When do they consider the possibility that their smug attitudes, upturned noses, and lukewarm politics represent exactly the sort of epistemic closure that they like to complain about?

    If Brooks genuinely considered questions like those in print, it might lead to his first worthwhile column in years.


    [Read the whole thing]

    Previous Pro Ecclesia posts on this subject:
    Another Elitist "Conservative" Realizes Too Late That "This Obama Fellow Is Unequal to the Task"

    David Brooks Wonders What Went Wrong [UPDATED]

    "Educated Class" Waking Up to Fact That Us "Yokels" Were Right All Along

    Noemie Emery on David Brooks and the "Educated Class"

    Michael Barone on David Brooks and the "Educated Class"

    The "Elizabeth Bennett Conservatives"

    Brooksback Mountain

    Today's Must-Read: "Palinphobes and the Audacity of Type"

    A Conservative Manifesto

    Another Elitist "Conservative" Likes the Cut of Obama's Jib

    The Liberal Media's Elitist Conservative Rats Leave the Sinking Ship

    Victor Davis Hanson: "What is Wisdom?"

    Let's Get One Thing Straight ...

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    Tuesday, August 24, 2010

    Cardinal DiNardo Urges U.S. House to Support Permanent Ban on Federal Abortion Funds

    From Catholic News Service via The Catholic Chronicle:
    WASHINGTON (CNS) — The chairman of the U.S. bishops' Committee on Pro-Life Activities is urging members of the U.S. House of Representatives to support proposed legislation that would permanently forbid federal funding of abortion.

    Cardinal Daniel N. DiNardo of Galveston-Houston said the No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act, H.R. 5939, introduced by Reps. Chris Smith, R-N.J., and Dan Lipinski, D-Ill., would "write into permanent law a policy on which there has been strong popular and congressional agreement for over 35 years: The federal government should not use taxpayers' money to support and promote elective abortion."

    "Even public officials who take a 'pro-choice' stand on abortion, and courts that have insisted on the validity of a constitutional 'right' to abortion have agreed that the government can validly use its funding power to encourage childbirth over abortion," he added in an Aug. 20 letter to House members.

    As of Aug. 23, the bill had 166 co-sponsors, including 20 Democratic members of the House. It has been referred to the House committees on the Judiciary, Energy and Commerce, and Ways and Means.

    Cardinal DiNardo said some people think the legislation's position already is fully reflected in U.S. law, and "some wrongly assumed during the recent debate on health care reform that there was no need for restrictions on abortion funding in the new health legislation, because this matter had already been settled by the Hyde amendment."

    The Hyde amendment is approved annually as a rider to the appropriations bill for the Labor and Health and Human Services departments and applies only to funding through those departments, the cardinal noted.


    [...]

    The bill also will codify into federal law the Hyde/Weldon amendment, which prohibits federal agencies and state and local agencies that receive federal funds from discriminating against health care providers who do not perform abortions. That amendment has been included in Labor/HHS appropriations bills since 2004.

    "It is long overdue for this policy, as well, to be given a more secure legislative status," Cardinal DiNardo said. "No hospital, doctor or nurse should be forced to stop providing much-needed legitimate health care because they cannot in conscience participate in destroying a developing human life."


    [More]

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    Monday, August 23, 2010

    "The Spirit of Michael Collins"


    Yesterday, in a ceremony that annually memorializes the anniversary of the death of Irish patriot and statesman Michael Collins at the site where he was shot down in August 1922, the Civil War politics that have dominated and haunted the Irish state for the better part of 90 years may have been finally laid to rest.

    From RTE:
    Lenihan addresses Collins commemoration

    Finance Minister Brian Lenihan has become the first Fianna Fáil Cabinet member to deliver an address at the annual commemoration of the death of Michael Collins in west Cork this afternoon.

    Traditionally a Fine Gael event, he told the gathering that the spirit of Collins is the spirit of our nation and it must continue to inspire all in public life, irrespective of party or tradition.

    He described the invitation to speak at Beal na Blá as both generous and unexpected saying that if today's commemoration can be seen as a further public act of historical reconciliation, at one of Irish history's sacred places, then he will be proud to have played his part.

    And he pondered what might have been if Collins had lived - would the party he, Brian Lenihan, belongs to have been pre-empted by the party Collins would have created?

    He also referred to Collins role as Minister for Finance between 1919 and 1922 saying here was a man at constant risk of arrest and death, running a ruthless guerrilla war and masterminding the highly efficient intelligence system which secured its success. Yet he still had the time to build the foundations of a system of financial control.

    Mr Lenihan added that while there is no substantive connection between the economic and financial position the country faces today, and the challenge faced by Collins, he is comforted by the essential resilience of the country, of the political and administrative system and above all, of the Irish people...
    From The Press Association
    Let Collins inspire us - Lenihan

    Finance Minister Brian Lenihan has called on all in public life to let the spirit of Michael Collins inspire them through Ireland's economic crisis.

    The Fianna Fail minister made history when he became the first figure in the party to deliver the keynote oration at the annual commemoration at Beal na mBlath.

    The sun shone in west Cork as the crowd applauded Mr Lenihan, who said he was honoured and privileged to speak at the traditionally Fine Gael ceremony. "If today's commemoration can be seen as a further public act of historical reconciliation, at one of Irish history's sacred places, then I will be proud to have played my part," he said.
    From The Irish Examiner:
    Lenihan in historic Béal na mBláth address

    Finance Minister Brian Lenihan this afternoon addressed crowds at the annual commemoration of the death of Michael Collins at Béal na mBláth in west Cork.

    He is the first Fianna Fáil Minister to deliver a speech at what has been traditionally a Fine Gael event.

    Speaking at Beal na mBláth this afternoon, Minister Lenihan praised what he described as the "generous and unexpected" invitation for him to address the ceremony.

    He said while Fine Gael has of course been the political custodian of the memory of Michael Collins, the spirit of Collins is "the spirit of our nation, and it must continue to inspire all of us in public life, irrespective of party or tradition".

    He said that if today's commemoration can be seen as a further public act of historical reconciliation between the two largest political parties in the State, at one of Irish history's sacred places, then he will be proud to have played his part...
    From The Irish Times:
    Civil War wounds healed by St Brian of Béal na mBláth

    WHO’D HAVE thought this was an incursion into enemy territory? As he stepped down from the podium, an adoring crowd surged forward, clapping and cheering at the first senior Fianna Fáil figure to deliver the keynote oration at Béal na mBláth.

    Older women thrust their hands through the railings to shake his hand (or just tug at his trouser legs). “You’re looking smashing, Minister!”, an elegant lady cooed. “Well done, altogether.”

    Another woman tried to manhandle a photographer out of her way. “We want to see the Minister! We want to see him!” she insisted.

    One dyed-in-the-wool Fine Gaeler in his 80s jostled forward to get the Minister’s autograph, dropping his crutches in the process. “He’s been cured!” shouted a woman alongside him, to roars of laughter.

    As the Minister lingered in the sunshine to sign countless autographs and pose for innumerable family photographs, there was no mistaking the warm affection of the crowd. His speech had been marked by spontaneous and sustained ripples of applause, and a sense that this was a symbolic burying of old hatchets.

    It was a world away from the dark mutterings in the weeks beforehand. Fine Gael senator Liam Twomey had warned that Lenihan – whose predecessors “murdered” Collins – wasn’t welcome. Young Fine Gaelers, too, said they would boycott the occasion in protest at the Minister’s appearance.

    In the end, they seemed woefully out of touch with the spirit of the day.

    Helen Collins, Collins’s grandniece, said: “Michael belongs to all the people of Ireland and beyond.”


    [...]

    In a post-Civil War world where differences have been well and truly laid to rest, it may be inevitable the issue of a Fianna Fáil-Fine Gael merger will feature on the landscape. If it did rear its head yesterday, it did so discreetly.

    For Tom O’Shea of Kilkenny, a staunch Fine Gaeler who’s been coming to Béal na mBláth for decades, that’s for another day. Yesterday was about laying old ghosts to rest. “I used to bring my father here, who sent dispatches to Collins during the War of Independence. There used to be lots of old IRA men here too. The divisions in those days were still quite raw . . . But I really welcome what’s happened today. The talk of a boycott was uncalled for. It’s 2010. It’s time for us all to move on.”
    From The Irish Independent:
    'Spirit of Collins inspires us all'

    THE spirit of Michael Collins is the spirit of the nation, Finance Minister Brian Lenihan declared yesterday.

    Making history as the first figure from Fianna Fail to deliver the oration at the annual commemoration at Beal na mBlath, Mr Lenihan said Collins must continue to inspire all in public life through the current economic crisis.

    A far larger crowd than usual -- up to 3,000 -- applauded Mr Lenihan, who said he was honoured and privileged to speak at a ceremony so closely linked to Fine Gael.

    "And if today's commemoration can be seen as a further public act of historical reconciliation at one of Irish history's sacred places, then I will be proud to have played my part in that regard," he said.

    Many members of the Collins family, including three grand-nieces of General Collins -- former Fine Gael justice minister Nora Owen, former MEP Mary Banotti and Helen Collins -- were among the crowd who gathered at the spot where he was ambushed at the height of the Civil War in 1922.

    [...]

    The minister gave a nod to the greats on both sides of the Civil War divide.

    "Even if we can never know how the relationship between Collins and de Valera might have evolved, surely now we have the maturity to see that in their very different styles, both made huge contributions to the creation and development of our State," he said.

    Mr Lenihan was even able to venture what was viewed as a veiled criticism of Fianna Fail and de Valera's treatment of the Big Fella when he acknowledged that: "De Valera himself felt a sense of challenge from the ghost of Collins."

    [...]

    He continued: "In meeting challenges, in seizing opportunities, the Irish people have always shown courage, determination and creativity -- just as Michael Collins and his comrades and colleagues did in the campaign for independence and the establishment of our State.

    "The spirit of Collins is the spirit of the nation and it must continue to inspire all of us in public life, irrespective of party or tradition."

    [...]

    Following the oration, Helen Collins said that Beal na mBlath was never meant to be a place of bitterness and stressed that Collins and his legacy belonged to all the Irish people.

    "Beal na mBlath is not a place of division, recrimination and loss. It is a place of idealism," she declared...


    Previous Pro Ecclesia posts on this subject:
    In Memory of "The Big Fella", Michael Collins (d. 22 August 1922) [UPDATED]

    85th Anniversary of the Death of "The Big Fella", Michael Collins

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    Sunday, August 22, 2010

    In Memory of "The Big Fella", Michael Collins (d. 22 August 1922) [UPDATED]


    The Laughing Boy
    by Brendan Behan

    T'was on an August morning, all in the dawning hours,
    I went to take the warming air, all in the Mouth of Flowers,
    And there I saw a maiden, and mournful was her cry,
    'Ah what will mend my broken heart, I've lost my Laughing Boy.

    So strong, so wild and brave he was, I'll mourn his loss too sore,
    When thinking that I'll hear the laugh or springing step no more.
    Ah, cure the times and sad the loss my heart to crucify,
    That an Irish son with a rebel gun shot down my Laughing Boy.

    Oh had he died by Pearse's side or in the GPO,
    Killed by an English bullet from the rifle of the foe,
    Or forcibly fed with Ashe lay dead in the dungeons of Mountjoy,
    I'd have cried with pride for the way he died, my own dear Laughing Boy.

    My princely love, can ageless love do more than tell to you,
    Go raibh maith agat for all you tried to do,
    For all you did, and would have done, my enemies to destroy,
    I'll mourn your name and praise your fame, forever, my Laughing Boy.




    Michael Collins assassination scene from the movie "Michael Collins"


    The death of Michael Collins from "Shadow of Béal na mBláth"
    (music by Sinead O'Connor from the "Michael Collins" soundtrack)



    The bark of a dog breaks the silence like a bitter last hurrah
    And a raven spreads it's wings for flight over fields near Beál Na mBláth
    With a rifle still clasped to his breast, but hanging low his head
    A black August day in the County Cork, Michael Collins is dead

    Hang out your brightest colours, his memory now recall
    Each one wants a part of him but no-one wants it all


    ~ "The Ballad of Michael Collins" by Brendan O'Reilly



    Tom Barry describes the scene in Kilmainham Jail
    where he witnessed hundreds of Republican prisoners
    on their knees praying for Michael Collins
    after hearing the news he had been killed during the Civil War.



    Historical footage of the funeral of Michael Collins
    set to "Wrap the Green Flag 'Round Me" by The Wolfe Tones



    Oh long will old Ireland be seeking in vain
    Ere we find a new leader to match the man slain
    A true son of Grainne his name long will shine
    O gallant Mick Collins cut off in his prime


    ~ "Michael Collins" by The Wolfe Tones





    “We bend today over the grave of a man not more than thirty years of age, who took to himself the gospel of toil for Ireland, and of sacrifice for their good, and who has made himself a hero and a legend that will stand in the pages of our history with any bright page that was ever written there. Pages have been written by him in the hearts of our people that will never find a place in print. But we lived, some of us with these intimate pages; and those pages that will reach history, meagre though they be, will do good to our country and will inspire us through many a dark hour. Our weaknesses cry out to us, 'Michael Collins was too brave.' Michael Collins was not too brave. Every day and every hour he lived he lived it to the full extent of that bravery which God gave to him, and it is for us to be brave as he was—brave before danger, brave before those who lie, brave even to that very great bravery that our weaknesses complained of in him.”

    ~ Richard Mulcahy, IRA Chief of Staff (and Collins' superior) during the War of Independence, who succeeded Collins as commander-in-chief of the Free State Irish Army, in his oration at Collins' funeral.


    “. . . So tear up your mourning and hang up your brightest colours in his honour; and let us all praise God that he had not to die weakened by age and saddened by the disappointments that would have attended his work had he lived.”

    ~ Dublin-born playwright George Bernard Shaw in a letter of condolence to Collins' sister





    ‘‘He was the man whose matchless energy, whose indomitable will, carried Ireland through the terrible crisis; and though I have not now, and never had, an ambition about either political affairs or history, if my name is to go down in history I want it to be associated with the name of Michael Collins.’’

    ~ Arthur Griffith
    Founder and leader of the original Sinn Féin (not its modern Marxist namesake) and President of Dáil Éireann (the Irish parliament), whose work with Collins on negotiating the Treaty to end the Irish War of Independence, and whose untimely death at the age of 50 from either a heart attack or stroke just 10 days prior to Collins' assassination (thus depriving Ireland of yet another key leader in its political infancy) ensured that his name would, indeed, go down in history associated with that of Michael Collins



    Michael Collins' brother, Johnny, at the rededication
    of the Collins gravesite at Glasnevin Cemetery in 1939.
    According to Collins and De Valera biographer, Tim Pat Coogan:
    "It is a matter of record that for years Johnny Collins,
    a civil servant, and thus very much at de Valera's mercy,
    strove unsuccessfully to have a fitting memorial erected
    over his brother, who, as the first Commander-in-Chief of
    the Irish Army, lay in a military grave... Finally,
    de Valera called Johnny in and stipulated that the cost
    of the memorial should not exceed £300, and it should be
    in limestone, not marble. He prescribed a formula of words
    he wanted used on the cross and ordered that there be no
    English on the front of it. The cemetery records show, that,
    on July 31st, 1939, a few weeks before the world went to war,
    Taoiseach de Valera took time out to sign personally the
    certificate of authorisation for the design and erection of
    the memorial cross over his old adversary... What the
    certification does not show is the fact that de Valera forbade
    Johnny to allow attendance at the dedication ceremony, either
    by the press, the public, or by any member of the Collins family
    apart from Johnny himself. Only the officiating priest and an
    altar boy were permitted to be present. Had an outraged off-duty
    gravedigger, who tended Collins's grave, not accidentally come
    across the melancholy little ceremony and hailed a passing tourist
    with a camera, there would have been no pictorial record of Johnny
    standing alone, apart from the gravedigger, at his famous brother's graveside."


    ‘‘It is my considered opinion that, in the fullness of time, history will record the greatness of Michael Collins, and it will be recorded at my expense.’’

    ~ Eamon de Valera


    UPDATE
    See G. Thomas Fitzpatrick's tribute to Michael Collins at Recta Ratio, which includes a reflection on a personal connection between The Big Fella and his grandfather.


    For more on Michael Collins, see
  • General Michael Collins (website of the Collins 22 Society, of which I am a member)

  • Michael Collins - The Lost Leader

  • The Michael Collins Centre

  • The Michael Collins Web Page

  • An excellent and very comprehensive Michael Collins Site

  • A Man Against An Empire - History Net

  • Michael Collins Irish Leader - Economic Expert

  • Michael Collins - Military History Online

  • Michael Collins - University College Cork

  • The "Michael Collins" Official Movie Site

  • MICHAEL COLLINS - A Musical Drama

  • Michael Collins Irish Whiskey



  • Recommended Reading:
  • The Path to Freedom by Michael Collins

  • Michael Collins: The Man Who Made Ireland by Tim Pat Coogan

  • Michael Collins: A Life by James MacKay

  • The Big Fellow: Michael Collins & the Irish Revolution by Frank O'Connor

  • Michael Collins : The Lost Leader by Margery Forester

  • Illustrated Life of Michael Collins by Colm Connolly

  • Michael Collins - A Life in Pictures by Chrissy Osborne

  • Michael Collins and the Troubles: The Struggle for Irish Freedom 1912-1922 by Ulick O'Connor

  • Michael Collins's Intelligence War: The Struggle Between the British and the IRA 1919-1921 by Michael T. Foy

  • The Squad: and the intelligence operations of Michael Collins by T. Ryle Dwyer

  • Michael Collins and the Making of the Irish State by Gabriel Doherty (Author), Dermot Keogh (Editor)

  • "Michael Collins' Ireland: Following In The Footsteps Of The Big Fellow From Dublin To County Cork", Chicago Tribune, March 7, 1999



  • Recommended Viewing:
  • "Michael Collins"
    (1996 Neil Jordan film starring Liam Neeson in the title role - can be purchased via
    Amazon.com)

  • "The Treaty"
    (1991 RTE/BBC production starring Brendan Gleeson as Michael Collins, in a much better portrayal of The Big Fella than that of Neeson - difficult to find, but a DVD copy can be purchased
    here)

  • "The Shadow of Béalnabláth"
    (1991 documentary on the life and death of Collins by Colm Connolly - used VHS copies available on
    Amazon.com)

  • "Hang Up Your Brightest Colours"
    (1973 documentary on the life and death of Collins by Kenneth Griffith; banned for many years in both England and Ireland - a DVD copy can be purchased
    here)

  • "The Wind That Shakes the Barley"
    (2006 Ken Loach film is a fictionalized drama focusing on the War of Independence and the ensuing Irish Civil War in Collins' native Cork - can be purchased via
    Amazon.com)

  • Shake Hands with the Devil
    (1959 film is a fictionalized drama starring James Cagney, Michael Redgrave, and Don Murray as members of the IRA battling the "Black and Tans" in 1921 during the War of Independence - can be purchased via
    Amazon.com)



  • Previous Pro Ecclesia posts on this subject:
    85th Anniversary of the Death of "The Big Fella", Michael Collins

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    Thursday, August 19, 2010

    Michael Sean Winters Reveals His Ugly, Boorish, Small-Minded Pettiness Via His Sullivanesque Obsession With Prof. Robert George [UPDATED]

    The Opinionated Catholic brought to my attention an attack on Professor Robert George by lefty Catholic Michael Sean Winters of National Catholic Reporter.

    It all started with this particularly boorish and mean-spirited attack by Winters at NCR:
    Professor Robert George is a different kind of fraud. He pretends to be concerned with “American Principles” as his website says, but he seems only concerned with those American Principles that cohere with the current political agenda of the Republican Party. That bias is fine by me, but when he explains that the signatories of the Manhattan Declaration “will not remain silent” one is hard-pressed to ascertain why he has been so conspicuously silent about the religious freedom of Muslims to build a mosque on private property in lower Manhattan. Does he share the “all Muslims are the same” bigotry of Colson? Does he think, like Mr. Newt Gingrich, that we should only allow a mosque here when Saudi Arabia permits a church in Mecca, as if the Saudi Royal Family should be a moral compass for anyone? He has found time at his website to post articles about Proposition 8 being overturned, a photograph of King George III, a bizarre article about returning to the Gold Standard, but not a word about the religious freedom of Muslims to build a mosque, not atop the World Trade Center site, by the way, but two blocks away, not far from St. Peter’s Catholic Church and St. Paul’s Episcopal Chapel to which, presumably, no on objects because, well, you know. (As I write these words, I entertain a vision of the Uptons in “Auntie Mame” explaining that their neighborhood was “restricted” because they did not want the wrong type of people, namely Jews, living there.) Cat got your tongue professor?
    To which Prof. Rick Garnett of Mirror of Justice responded:
    I think it is unfair, though -- and in the case of the baseless charges lobbed at our own Robby George, mean-spirited and unworthy -- to charge those who (a) are publicly and unquestionably dedicated to religious liberty but (b) have not (yet) spoken out in strong defense of the proposal with 'hypocrisy" or "fraud." (I'm being defensive here, of course, because I spent the weekend doing things besides commenting on the mosque.)

    We do this too much in our public conversations, I think (I am guilty of this sometimes too, I am sure): "You say you are on the side of the angels, but you have failed to condemn publicly [insert outrageous act or current controversy] and so . . . gotcha! You are a fraud!"
    But Winters wasn't backing off:
    Whenever I disagree with Professor Garnett, such disagreement always makes me think again on any topic. But, it is painful to disagree with someone I respect when there is a personal aspect to the disagreement. I understand his loyalty to his friend, Professor George. He, like others, assures me that Professor George is an upstanding person, a fine scholar, a great teacher. He may be all those things in spades for all I know. Another mutual friend of Professor George’s and me wrote a note observing: “Even if you conclude that someone advocates a policy that contradicts one of his own principles, that only makes him inconsistent or foolish, not fraudulent.” I recognize the distinction although, for someone who claims to be a philosopher, the charge of inconsistency is a grave one, and I have watched Professor George in action and he is no fool.

    Fraudulence is when a person presents themselves in one way but connives to achieve other, opposed objectives. Unless Professor George has the gumption to stand up to some of his fellow political conservatives, to stand up for religious freedom and for the Constitution at a time when some of his fellow conservatives are using the issue to whip up the basest of passions, unless he is willing to recognize that, throughout history, it is not merely “the government” but the mob which is prone to threaten religious liberties, then, yes, I am afraid he is a fraud.
    It was then Prof. George's turn to defend himself against Winters' unprovoked attack:
    Because I've been dealing with a horrible family tragedy, I have not been reading or contributing to MoJ for the past ten days or so. During a visit to South Africa, my brother Edward's fiance, Helen Elaine Hill, was thrown from a horse and severely injured. After lingering in a coma for several days, this charming, beautiful, and brilliant young woman died. Her obituary appeared in last Sunday's New York Times. I returned to Princeton last night after attending her funeral in Lewisburg, West Virginia. As you can imagine, my brother is utterly grief-stricken and our entire family is devastated. It has been a rough period for us.

    When I opened MoJ this morning to catch up, I found your report that Michael Winters, who seems to have some sort of obsession with me, has found a pretext for launching yet another vicious, flailing, personal attack at his blog. Thanks for defending me, but, honestly, the guy is plainly not interested in reasonable debate. You won't get anywhere with him. I have no idea whether what is driving him is ideological or psychological, but it is certainly not devotion to truth. He seems to have some sort of score to settle with me---what it is I can't say, since I don't know the man---and he's not going to let truth get in the way of settling it.

    The last time you called attention to one of Winters' bizarre attacks, I posted a response on MoJ noting that "[w]e can go step by step to show how he willfully twists and misrepresents an interlocutor's words in order to create a false impression of what his opponent is saying." This, as it turns out, is his modus operandi. As his conduct consistently shows, he is a deeply intellectually dishonest person. This time he is trying to smear me by drawing preposterous inferences from the fact that I haven't yet published anything on the New York mosque controversy.

    As a matter of fact, I'm writing an op ed with Jennifer Bryson, an outstanding scholar of contemporary Islam with whom I've worked closely in the cause of Muslim-Christian understanding, concerning controversies about mosques not only in New York City, but across the country. We are submitting our piece to the Wall Street Journal. Although we have not yet finalized the draft (precisely because I have been occupied with my family's bereavement), here are the opening sentences:
    Across the country in recent months, from California, to Louisiana, to New York, anti-Muslim sentiment has become a prominent feature of opposition to new mosques. At risk in this is religious freedom itself. But not just religious freedom. Also threatened is the respectful civility that enables constructive public discourse in religiously pluralistic democratic societies. First, an attitude of "freedom for me but not for thee" rings the death knell for liberty itself. Freedom of religion is a right of all human beings, including Muslims. People who oppose the building of mosques in their communities out of anti-Islamic animus are guilty of intolerance and a lack or respect for religious freedom. Such hostility assaults the human dignity of both the hater annd the hated.
    [Read the whole thing]
    WOW! Pretty compelling evidence that (1) there was good reason for Prof. George to not be engaged on this topic as it became a national news story and (2) Prof. George is ANYTHING BUT a "fraud" on the topic of religious freedom.

    So, you'd think an apology from Winters would be forthcoming, right? Think again. You obviously haven't been paying attention to the way a real fraud like Michael Sean Winters operates:
    Unbeknownst to me, Professor Robert George has been dealing with a dreadful personal family tragedy, so I shall ignore his comments about myself and my writings at the blog Mirror of Justice.

    Souls that are hurting tend to say hurtful things. Of course, I do not retract a word I have written in his regard.

    [...]

    Professor George has made a name for himself as a defender of religious liberty. That is why his silence heretofore was so noteworthy and so disturbing.
    (emphasis added)

    "That is why his silence heretofore was so noteworthy and so disturbing."

    WTF?

    Hey, Mikey Sean, as is clear from your acknowledgement that "Professor Robert George has been dealing with a dreadful personal family tragedy", you know damned well that Prof. George's "silence heretofore" was because he was dealing with more pressing matters of a personal nature, NOT from any reticence on his part to speak out on behalf of religious freedom for Muslims. There is absoulutely nothing "noteworthy" or "disturbing" about his being preoccupied with urgent family business and not being immediately available to wax philosophical about free exercise matters on YOUR time table.

    What's worse, YOU attacked Prof. George as "a fraud" and then, without offering an apology for that - given what has been going on in the man's life that might have been distracting him somewhat from the events you believe he should have immediately spoken out about, have the chutzpah to play the victim card - "I shall ignore his comments about myself and my writings" - in that disgustingly Wormtonguesqe passive-aggressive manner that makes one feel like they need to take a shower to wash off all the slime after reading it.

    To stand by and "not retract a word of" your previous comments, especially in light of what you now know to be the truth, reveals once and for all what many of your critics already knew about you: that you are a small, petty, and pathetic man (and "man" may be giving you too much credit).


    UPDATE (20 August 2010)
    Prof. George has responded to Winters' non-apology:
    Michael Winters lets us know just what kind of guy he is
    Last night, one of my former students sent me a link to Michael Winters' blog at the National Catholic Reporter, where Winters has posted a response to my MoJ post about his most recent attack on me. Here is the link: http://ncronline.org/blogs/distinctly-catholic/professor-george-ground-zero-mosque. If anyone has the slightest doubt that what I said about Winters and his modus operandi is true, please open the link and see if you don't find what I said more than amply confirmed. Winters' own words fully reveal the kind of person he is. He offers no apology for the ugly smears and taunts that prompted my criticisms of him. He retracts nothing. He admits no error. On the contrary, he engages in more of his vile innuendo---suggesting that he merited no rebuke from me, and that I criticized him only because I am "hurting" from a family tragedy ("souls that are hurting tend to say hurtful things")---while purporting to applaud me for speaking up for religious liberty. The comments following his post make it plain that his readers have no difficulty seeing through this ploy. They are on to the guy. Evidently, a few of them have been on to him for some time now.
    (Hat tip, once again, to Opinionated Catholic)


    Previous Pro Ecclesia posts on this subject:
    Liberal Catholic Michael Sean Winters Calls Out Media for Shoddy Coverage of Pope

    Michael Sean Winters: "Deceitful Bogeyman" of the Catholic Left

    Fr. Z Defends Well-Known Catholic Apologist Patrick Madrid ... [UPDATED]

    Pro-Life Kudos to Michael Sean Winters

    REPOSTED and UPDATED: "... Dollars to Doughnuts ..."

    "... Dollars to Doughnuts ..."

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    Wednesday, August 18, 2010

    Digest of Today's Posts (18 August 2010)

  • The Left's New-Found Respect for "Bushitler"

  • For Those Interested in Irish History ...

  • "Ardent, Practicing Catholic Grandmother"™ Wants to Investigate Opponents of 9-11 Victory Mosque

  • Soros-Funded "Catholic" Groups Still Running Cover for Pro-Aborts (Of Course, That's the Sole Reason They Exist)



  • Labels:

    The Left's New-Found Respect for "Bushitler"

    The left needs W's "gravitas"
    To bail out Barack's craven ass
    .

    Labels: , , ,

    For Those Interested in Irish History ...

    ... I have a sort of "omnibus" post coming up on Friday regarding what is arguably the most important (certainly the most history changing) event in modern Irish history.

    I'm giving you a heads up now because Friday tends to be one of my "low-traffic" days here at Pro Ecclesia (although, for the past year or so, every day has tended to be a "low-traffic" day here at Pro Ecclesia).

    ;-)

    Labels: , , ,

    "Ardent, Practicing Catholic Grandmother"™ Wants to Investigate Opponents of 9-11 Victory Mosque

    Ed Morrissey reports:
    Of course! What better way to defend the First Amendment freedom of religion than to have the Speaker of the House ask the federal government investigate those exercising their First Amendment right to free speech? Nancy Pelosi just guaranteed at least two new news cycles for a story, tossing even more gasoline on the fire than Barack Obama’s pas de deux this weekend:
    House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Tuesday said she supports an investigation into groups opposing the building of a mosque near ground zero in New York.

    Pelosi told San Francisco’s KCBS radio that “there is no question there is a concerted effort to make this a political issue by some.”

    “I join those who have called for looking into how is this opposition to the mosque being funded,” she said. “How is this being ginned up?”
    Does that mean that Pelosi wants Harry Reid investigated, too? Rep. Michael Arcuri (D-NY)? This should be fun!

    One might think that Pelsoi would want a peek at where the Park51 will be getting its funds to build the mosque, especially since the State Department is footing the bill for a tour conducted by the imam at the head of the project. Instead, Pelosi wants the power of the government directed at people taking political positions. That goes well beyond any supposed extremism by the mosque’s opponents, most (but not all) of whom acknowledge that the property owners have the right to build on their lot anything that meets code, but want to express their opposition to the plans. Pelosi would take this opportunity to use the government as a thought police to silence dissent...

    Previous Pro Ecclesia posts on this subject:
    San Fran Nan the Theologian Won't Say at What Point Word Became Flesh


    Pro-Abortion "Ardent, Practicing Catholic Grandmother" Just Doing What Jesus Would Do [UPDATED]

    Bishop Morlino: “Speaker Pelosi is Not Called by Jesus Christ to Lead the Catholic Faithful”

    Nancy Pelosi ... Dumb@$$

    U.S. Catholic Bishops Conference Contradicts Pelosi's Claim That Senate Health Bill Doesn't Fund Abortion

    San Fran Nan Gets Taken to the Woodshed: Speaker Pelosi’s Bishop Corrects Her Once Again

    Boston-Area Priest: Pastoral/Teaching Approach Has Failed Miserably in Persuading "Pro-Choice" Catholics of Their Error

    "Ardent Practicing" Conservative Catholic Grandmother™ Calls Opponents of ObamaCare Nazis

    Pelosi Accused of Muzzling Opposition to Taxpayer-Funded D.C. Abortions

    Wuerl: Why I Won't Deny Pelosi Communion

    Pope to Speaker Pelosi: Reject Abortion Support [UPDATED]

    "Conservative Catholic Grandmother"™ Pelosi Backs Down: Contraception Removed from "Stimulus Package"

    "Conservative Catholic Grandmother"™ Pelosi Says Birth Control a Boon for the Economy [UPDATED]

    More U.S. Bishops Issue Statements on Abortion

    LA Times Columnist Lies to Cover for Pelosi

    Obama Camp to Speaker Pelosi: "Shut Up, Already!"

    The Follow-Up Question Brokaw Should've Asked

    Pelosi: St. Augustine Agrees With Me - That's My Story and I'm Sticking to It [UPDATED]

    Archbishop Chaput on Speaker Pelosi: "On the Separation of Sense and State" [UPDATED]

    Biblical Scholars Challenge Pelosi's "Scripture" Quote

    Pro-Abort Catholic Politicians to Receive Communion at Papal Mass [UPDATED]

    "Conservative Catholic Grandmother" Pelosi Defends Removal of "God" from Flag Certificates

    President Bush to Veto Stem Cell Bill

    Never Mind Church Teaching, Catholic Nancy Pelosi Says ESCR "a Gift of God"

    "Anti-Catholic" Pelosi Accused of Promoting "Culture of Death"

    Pelosi Sings Praises of Embryo Destruction

    Bishop Vasa on Nancy Pelosi: It's "Categorically Impossible" to be Catholic and Hold Abortion is "Just a Choice"

    Worth a Thousand Words

    Nancy Pelosi: "My Family is Very Pro-Life"

    Catholicism, Pelosi style

    Archbishop Wuerl's Stand on Lawmakers Who Back Abortion Angers Some Conservative Catholics

    NARAL Pro-Choice America Salutes Nancy Pelosi on Her Inauguration as Speaker of the House

    More on Speaker Pelosi at Open Book

    A Catholic Speaker in the House

    American Life League's Judie Brown: Pro-Abortion Pelosi Insults Catholic Faith

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