Power Hungry Bishops?

The Catholic Church has a habit of promoting bishops from smaller to larger dioceses. Father Kenneth Baker, S.J., argues in the Homiletic & Pastoral Review that this is bad policy (emphasis added):

It frequently happens that a bishop of a small diocese is moved to a large archdiocese when that see is vacant. Question: Is this policy good for the Church?

Some years ago, when Bernardin Cardinal Gantin retired as prefect of the Congregation of Bishops, he gave a final talk in which he stated that, in the early Church, bishops were not moved from one diocese to another. A bishop was considered married to his diocese in an indissoluble union, similar to the indissoluble union between husband and wife.

The present policy is not good for the Church because it promotes ambition among certain clerics who lust for the purple and the red, who position themselves in the most positive way so that they will be promoted to a higher position. Ambition to dominate others and to have power in the Church is certainly not the mark of a humble or holy man. The bishop is supposed to be first of all a holy man, for it is his task to sanctify and help work out the eternal salvation of the members of his flock. No one can give what he does not have. If he is scheming to get ahead in the clerical world, to become a bishop, then archbishop, then cardinal, he is not humble and not holy and should not even be a bishop.

The whole article can be found for a limited time HERE
Personally I could see promoting bishops in certain circumstances, but as a matter of policy I agree with the article. Treating the church like a corporate entity is generally a bad idea.
H/T Insight Scoop

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What's in a Name?

I read with dismay this article at Catholic News Agency: Dutch bishop says Christians should call God ‘Allah’

Now, Anyone who knows me knows that my number one goal in apologetics and ecumenicism is to strive towards unity. I believe we as Christians must strive for the unity that Christ called for in john 17:11 "Holy Father, protect them by the power of your name—the name you gave me—so that they may be one as we are one." (Note the power of the name -- we'll return to that shortly...)

And if I thought that calling God Allah might actually help bring unity to the faithful I might be inclined to entertain the idea (At least until I thought it through). However, what the bishop would accomplish if he were to get his way is to simply disguise dis-unity as unity, where none exists, and that never brings about true unity.

Let's explore exactly why changing what the name by which we call God does not actually cause unity. When a Muslim speaks of Allah, he is not praying to the trinitarian god. If a Christian were to pray to 'Allah' he is praying to the trinitarian God. This may cause the appearance of unity between the Muslim and the Christian, but unless one of the two is deeply misguided about their own religion then the dis-unity is only veiled. The uneducated person would hear this and would become confused, believe there is little difference between the religions and be more apt to dismiss them all or join one on a whim as they are 'all the same anyway'. This is a large cause of apathy in religious sects today and leads to the idea that unity is vague, or only necessary at very high levels such as 'we believe in god so we are in union of belief'. This in turn causes further dis-unity as everyone simply believes whatever they want, no need to search for truth, we have a vague notion of unity and that's good enough. Why work toward greater unity? (it's no wonder why we have 30,000+ christian sects today)

Do we really want to duplicate that with Islam?

Now, I have no problem with stressing those areas that we do agree, but changing the Name by which we call God is about the worst possible way of doing this...

The bishop apparently fails to understand the value of a name. Especially in antiquity and the names of gods. Pagans would use the name of their god -- a secret name, their 'true' name that only the priests knew -- to get at the power of the god. They only had to speak the name because the name was power; the name was the god.

A similar understanding was prevalent in Jewish culture. When Abraham asked God's name He replied, "I AM", because his name is Him. "I AM" describes God's own existance (i.e. it is Him) Later God was referred to as YHWH (transliterated from "יַהְוֶה") which is either unpronounceable or pronounced 'Yahweh' or 'Elohim'. Leviticus 24:16 was understood to mean: “Anyone who pronounces the name of YHWH must be put to death.” The only time one was permitted to pronounce the Name of God "YHWH" was during the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur) by the priest while in the Holy of Holies (the inner sanctum of the Temple)

Why are we free to use God's name today? because Jesus has freed the name (His Name!) to be used by all of us! Phil 2:10 "at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth" We can call upon the power of God through the Name of Jesus, the name above all names.

Do not underestimate the power of His name and do not believe that the name that we call god by is not important.

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It Was Ecumenical!

The CDF Document about which I wrote earlier that is. As I was previously perplexed as to why the CDF relased a document that said nothing new and I worked on straightening some of the misunderstandings regarding it. OK fine maybe it really didn't damn all Protestants, But is it Ecumenical? YES! At least that's the theory being posited on Insight Scoop:

Events may be providing an answer that should have been clear from the beginning. Perhaps the “target audience” for the CDF statement are the Orthodox (and perhaps especially the Russian Orthodox). After all, Kyrill of Moscow immediately welcomed it. Now, word comes, via Cardinal Etchegaray that a Rome/Moscow summit may be in the offing.

Let’s think about it. CDF says that the Orthodox churches are real Church – “defective” principally in that they do not recognize the Petrine prerogative of the Bishop of Rome to teach, govern and sanctify all of the particular churches. The Orthodox have no problem with that classic Roman formulation. That’s something they, and Rome, can work on in real ecumenical dialogue.

And I am prone to believe it. It seems that our cool pope Benedict XVI is doing all kinds of great stuff to promote unity in the church. It seems to be one of his top priorities and this fits the mold.

It also shows the ignorance of some of the Church members and the continuing lazy editing by our local paper The Catholic Spirit to publish letters like "Reader discouraged by new proclamation" (scroll down to the 3rd article) without so much as an explination of what the document did say. Not to mention any great insight on why the Document may have been written. I guess you need to go here to do that!

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Do Pro-Lifers have the courage of their convictions?

There has been some buzz recently surrounding this YouTube video showing Pro-Lifers hemming and hawing over the question of what punishment (if any) women having abortions should receive if abortion were outlawed. Admittedly this does not portray the right to life crowd in a positive light, however I contend that this is a product of our culture as a whole which has been educated to not think; rather than a reflection on just those on the side of life (see my TJEd Post for more on that). Also it is relatively easy to simply cut out anyone who might have given coherent answer when you are trying to put out a propaganda piece.

So what is the answer? Of course there should be punishment under the law, but the kind of punishment and if any is actually given to the woman who had the abortion depends on what common law refers to as extenuating circumstances. Was the woman under duress or otherwise pressured from a the father or someone else? Did she know that what she was doing was murder? Was she emotionally stable in her current state?

Steve at Stand to Reason aptly puts it this way:

Five minutes into the video, a pro-lifer gives the right answer: it depends. As with any other homicide, the intent and premeditation of those participating in the abortion has to be taken into account...

...It's the same with women (or doctors) who would be prosecuted for illegal abortion. The doctor might be prosecuted under a murder charge and the woman might be prosecuted under a manslaughter charge. It might be murder or manslaughter for both parties. The point is, you cannot know what the charge should be without knowing about the intentions and premeditation of the actors. Whether the woman or doctor knows the unborn is a human being may also be relevant to the legal calculation.

This does not imply that women are infants or that they are simply helpless victims as the left might have you believe. That's why we have Judges who can take circumstances into account when it comes to sentencing and don't simply look on some judicial spread sheet to cross reference your crime with the prison time listed for it.

Pro-lifers need to be able to answer these types of questions and they should be able to do so even before they have determined that abortion should be illegal, because the consequences of their actions needs to be taken into account when forming their opinions.

Now I'd like to see a similar video that asks the Pro-Death crowd what endows a baby with a right to life at the moment birth, when it had no rights whatsoever just seconds earlier. I want to know exactly what caused this fundamental change in it's nature...

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The Transfiguration

Today is the feast of the Transfiguration of Christ. The Compendium of the Catholic church has this to say about the Transfiguration:

What is the meaning of the Transfiguration?

Above all the Transfiguration shows forth the Trinity: “the Father in the voice, the Son in the man Jesus, the Spirit in the shining cloud” (Saint Thomas Aquinas). Speaking with Moses and Elijah about his “departure” (Luke 9:31), Jesus reveals that his glory comes by way of the cross and he anticipates his resurrection and his glorious coming “which will change our lowly body to be like his glorious body” (Philippians 3:21).

“You were transfigured on the mountain and your disciples, as much as they were capable of it, beheld your glory, O Christ our God, so that when they should see you crucified they would understand that your passion was voluntary, and proclaim to the world that you truly are the splendor of the Father.” (Byzantine Liturgy)

Spend some time in meditation on the event. There is something amazing taking place here, it is a look into future glory before impending agony. John Paul the Great added this event as the 4th Luminous mystery of the rosary so it may be appropriate to say the Luminous mysteries today.

Read about the Transfiguration on New Advent

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I-35W Collapse

I am in complete shock over the I-35W bridge collapse that happened yesterday at 6:05PM. Currently there are 4 confirmed dead with approximately 20 people still unaccounted for. This is a bridge I have driven over thousands of times and in this day and age we just don't expect anything like this can happen. The 35W is a major artery going into and out of Minneapolis and officials are saying that it will most likely be upwards of two years before the bridge is replaced.

This is one glaring example of how we humans fool ourselves into believing that we are in control and that in our post-modern age nothing bad should ever happen (myself included). As I read my evening prayers last night I thought how appropriate that we read from psalm 112:

[1]Blessed is the man who fears the LORD,
who finds great delight in his commands...
[7]He will have no fear of bad news;
his heart is steadfast, trusting in the LORD.
[8]His heart is secure, he will have no fear;
in the end he will look in triumph on his foes

Trust in the lord, because trusting in ourselves is vain and self-delusional. And pray for the victims of this tragedy.

I want to give Kudos to all the first responders, Police, Fire medical personnel and the Red Cross who were on scene. All reports are that they did a superb job. Also Governor Pawlenty and Mayor RT Rybak worked well coordinating the rescue efforts and were also on scene and provided information to the media for those of us who could not turn off our TV's. Congrats to all of them. If you would like to help please consider donating to the Twin Cities Red Cross they are in need of blood and money so please help out if you can.

Lastly one thing I could not get out of my head last night was the fact that a section of 35W is now laying across the TC10 Mile route that my sisters and I are signed up for. I can't imagine the cleanup going quickly as they need to determine exactly what caused the collapse. My guess right now is that they will re-route the race.

Information about the bridge can be found on Here on Wikipedia but as always be cautious of information there as information may be changing quickly. There is some good historical information there.

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Are Protestants Damned?

Recently the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) released a document entitled "Responses to some questions regarding certain aspects of the doctrine of the Church". And even more recently it has come to my great surprise that there is actually some controversy surrounding it. I read with amazement this post on the Insight Scoop Blog outlining some of the misconceptions about it. Apparently there are people out there who believe that the document says that only Catholics can go to heaven. This is a tired misconception, however I feel I must respond lest there be a stone left unturned.

First off, the idea that Benedict would approve of such a statement damning all non-Catholics is simply preposterous. I was speaking to my wife about this idea and she was right to point out that Catholics recognize any baptism that uses the tridentine Trinitarian formula ("In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit") as valid - even if it is performed by a non-christian! Since baptism is the initiation into the Kingdom the idea that the church is damning the baptized is again preposterous. Now lets look at what the document actually does say regarding salvation of non-Catholics (emphasis added):

[quoting from Unitatis Redintegratio] It follows that these separated churches and Communities, though we believe they suffer from defects, are deprived neither of significance nor importance in the mystery of salvation. In fact the Spirit of Christ has not refrained from using them as instruments of salvation, whose value derives from that fullness of grace and of truth which has been entrusted to the Catholic Church

See now, the document actually says the exact opposite of the hysteria regarding the salvation of non-catholics.

Secondly, when in doubt always look to the Catechism. Without even reading the document one should know that the CDF would not contradict what the Catechism of the Catholic Church states regarding the catholic Dogma: Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus ("Outside the Church there is no salvation") CCC 846-847:

"Outside the Church there is no salvation"
How are we to understand this affirmation, often repeated by the Church Fathers? Re-formulated positively, it means that all salvation comes from Christ the Head through the Church which is his Body:

Basing itself on Scripture and Tradition, the Council teaches that the Church, a pilgrim now on earth, is necessary for salvation: the one Christ is the mediator and the way of salvation; he is present to us in his body which is the Church. He himself explicitly asserted the necessity of faith and Baptism, and thereby affirmed at the same time the necessity of the Church which men enter through Baptism as through a door. Hence they could not be saved who, knowing that the Catholic Church was founded as necessary by God through Christ, would refuse either to enter it or to remain in it.

This affirmation is not aimed at those who, through no fault of their own, do not know Christ and his Church:

Those who, through no fault of their own, do not know the Gospel of Christ or his Church, but who nevertheless seek God with a sincere heart, and, moved by grace, try in their actions to do his will as they know it through the dictates of their conscience—those too may achieve eternal salvation

Thirdly, oddly enough there is nothing new in the document to speak of. I concur with Edward Peters' confusion about why it was released in the first place. Mostly the document attempts to clarify things written about in the other documents such as Lumen Gentium. (which was one of the two Dogmatic Constitutions released during Vatican II.) But does not advance any theology beyond what has already been understood.

Lastly, The document references Dominus Iesus in explaining why protestant christian communities are not properly called 'Churches'. Beyond what the document already says regarding that issue I would like to point out that the Catholic church distinguishes itself as the One True Church from other 'ecclesial communities' -as they are called (and have been called for some time, again there is nothing new here). There being only one Church, despite other communities possessing elements of truth, there cannot logically be another Church. Some of this is semantics because it comes out of a difference of what Protestantism and catholics mean when they say 'Church.' Although most protestants would agree that there is only one Church, it has generally been explained to me that their understanding is that that Church is a 'Church of spirit' if you will, and does not consist of any organized or visible unity. Therefore they are comfortable in saying that any ecclesial community is a Church (or more properly part of The Church), while Catholicism teaches (in brief) that the oneness of the Church must be more than a vague notion, it must be a "visible and spiritual community" that necessarily has these features: One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic. Only the Catholic Church can claim all these qualities and therefore rightly lays claim to the title of The Church.

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The God Blogs

Are you looking for a good God blog? The Evangelical Outpost has put together a list of the Top 100 God Blogs

Jimmy Akin is not in the top 20 so you know the list has issues, but there is a lot of good stuff there if you are bored.

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Scaling the Secular City

What a breath of fresh air Scaling the Secular City: A Defense of Christianityby J.P. Moreland was to read while living in our 'God is Dead' culture. I generally feel comfortable while defending Catholicism to my protestant brothers and sisters, but always felt just a little inadequate when discussing God with agnostics or atheists. This book is a good foray into defending Christianity as a logical conclusion in our hyper-scienced culture.

As someone with a Math background I especially liked his appeal to the Kalam argument for the existence of god and the use of a mathematical understanding of infinity to argue the the universe must have a beginning. (Please don't shy away from this book if you don't have an aptitude in math, this is the only area in the book that deals with it and he explains it well enough, it just may seem odd to think that it is possible to have one infinite list larger or smaller than another infinite list. I assure you it is true or much of mathematics is wrong)

Moreland covers a lot of distance in this relatively short book including (but not limited to) Evolution, Physicalism (only mater exists), The Historicity of the Gospels, The Resurrection of Jesus and Morality. His logic throughout the book is impeccable and you may often be amazed of how the logic of most atheistic arguments lead one in a direction you (and most times the atheist themselves) do not want to go. The depth which each topic is covered is sufficient and well footnoted, some of which I will plan to read to dive into some topics with more depth than was covered here.

I only took one issue with Moreland when he used Jesus' brothers and sisters to make an argument. I understand that Moreland is not Catholic, but He must know that this would not sit well with us (as Mary's Perpetual virginity is Catholic Dogma) and he really didn't need to have it in there to make his argument, so I was saddened he felt it necessary to include it.

That small point aside this was a great book that would leave any skeptic questioning their beliefs (or lack there of). His chapter 'Science and Christianity' in which he explores the tension between the two, their proper balance, the limits of both and why we should actually put less faith in science than we do (again using inescapable logic), was a particularly good one. A point I will be sure to take with me: Consider this statement, "only what can be known by science or quantified and empirically tested is rational and true" (p.197) While I believe that much of our culture currently believes this statement as an unquestionable fact upon which their entire lives are based (whether consciously or unconsciously), Moreland exposes this as a logical fallacy by explaining that the statement itself cannot be known by science or empirically tested. Therefore the statement is not true by it's own standards. That is the type of clear reasoning you can expect from this well written book.

Buy The Book Now

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Motu Proprio!

Brush up on your Latin! Pope Benedict XVI (B16) recently released a Motu Proprio (which means by the popes "own initiative") called 'Summorum Pontificum'

What it essentially does is allow older Tridentine mass to be said without a Bishops approval or upon the request of the faithful. The replacement of the Tridentine mass after Vatican II caused a bit of a stir because it was much beloved by many of the faithful and has caused a split within the church; some of whom have created schisms such as as the Setavacanists and the Society of Saint Pius X (SSPX)

Now B16, wished to close this schism (esp with SSPX) as his predecessor Pope John Paul the Great did and I hope that this new loosening on the Tridentine mass helps accomplish that. However, as I look to the past I find that most schisms are not mended under any circumstances. This leads me to believe that those people who lead schisms tend to care less about the reasons for the schism in the first place and care more about their leadership position in the new movement. If they would reunite with the church their power would be lessened and therefore will always find a new excuse to maintain their schismatic attitude rather than to reunite with the Church. (NOTE: Just after writing this I found a press release regarding the Summorum Pontificum by SSPX here. It appears that my hunch was right after all)

While Society of St. Pius the X may never officially rejoin the church, I do believe this will help many of its members to come back home and eventually the groups leaders will either die off or become irrelevant. (That may sound flippant, but the movement is starting to be aged and everyone will die at some point, that's just the facts ma'am.)

In any case we are left with the gift of having more opportunities to celebrate the mass under it's more traditional Tridentine form, and although I have not had the opportunity to do so yet, I hope to attend a Tridentine mass in the near future as I hear they are quite lovely. I enjoy discovering how diverse our church is. I will never forget the first time I attended a Byzantine Rite Divine Liturgy. It was amazing.

One thing to take note: I already said you should brush up on your Latin, but the Motu Proprio also allows the Tridentine mass to be said in the vernacular I have been mistaken on this point. Upon a more careful reading of the document, It is only the Readings that may be said in the Vernacular (That's whatever language is spoken by the people) as long as the translation has been approved by the Apostolic see (i.e. The Vatican).

If you want a full analysis of the text you must read the Commentary on Summorum Pontificum by Jimmy Akin. he does a great job and in fact you should probably be reading his blog JimmyAkin.Org on a regular basis. I already do.

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Who is Archbishop John Nienstedt?

We here in the Archdiocese of St. Paul will soon have a new Archbishop. So I thought it might be a good idea to find out a little bit about the man before he replaces our current Archbishop Harry Flynn next year.

The local media has already pegged Nienstedt as 'Conservative'. Not that I fault the media for being ignorant or just plain lazy or both, but that label is simply not appropriate for a variety of reasons that I will get into in a moment.

This is a perfect opportunity to show how the media is completely incapable of thinking and I need to spend a moment dissecting it. You see the media has these square holes that are the templates to which they create stories and they shove each and every peg they can find regardless of whether it is round, triangle, square or otherwise into that same hole.

Take the title of this Star Tribune article: Archbishop-elect John Nienstedt: 'I do not come as a politician but as a priest...'
Who ever heard of an Archbishop-elect? Bishops are not elected they are appointed! The proper title is Coadjutor John Nienstedt. This is simply laughable coming from the Star Trib's 'religion' correspondent. But they have this square hole and...

Now you can start see why they label Nienstedt as conservative. Later in that same article the Tribune tries to explain why they are justified in painting him in such a manner:

All Roman Catholic bishops are expected to support church doctrine. But the
issues they emphasize lead observers to characterize them as conservative,
moderate or liberal.

Here is the key phrase: the issues they emphasize. But if you keep reading the article that's not really what they mean. what they really mean is the issues they don't emphasize:

Flynn has been considered moderate by Catholic standards. For instance, although
in 2005 he advised parishes to deny communion to worshipers wearing rainbow
sashes, a symbol of support for gay rights, he did not punish a parish that
defied him

Here we come down to the crux of the issue with the Star Trib. If a bishop supports church doctrine he is conservative and if he does nothing (or close to nothing) he is liberal. I would argue that the correct terminology would be Orthodox and Heterodox (or for those of you a little weaker in the stomach: Less Orthodox). I would even prefer something like 'Active' vs. 'Passive' (as this seems to be what the Star Trib really means) or even 'Strict' vs 'Lenient'. Also the examples the Tribune uses to site Nienstedt's 'conservatism' do not even include any punishment so exactly what criteria the Tribune is using remains unclear.

In any case, the terms 'conservative' and 'liberal' are political terms, and based on politics alone Nienstedt is certainly not a conservative. One only needs to spend a few minutes reading the current Diocese of New Ulm (His current seat) page on him to discover some of his more liberal political leanings:

• He joined the lawsuit to challenge the constitutionality of Minnesota's Concealed Carry law
• He leans to the left on Illegal Immigration
• He signed on with the rest of the Minnesota Bishops supporting legislation that would attempt to mitigate Global Warming
• although I could not find specific examples, by reading between the lines all indications are he leans to the left on minimum wage, affordable housing, universal health care, welfare etc.

While I may disagree with our new Coadjutor over many of these issues, they are political issues about which he is free to come to his own prudential judgement and still be well within the bounds orthodoxy. Conservatism and Orthodoxy are not the same thing as the Star Tribune would have us believe. Every indication I have seen indicates Archbishop Nienstedt as being 100% faithful to the Magisterium of the Church (read: orthodox) and is vociferously outspoken about it. Every Catholic in the diocese should welcome with open arms an orthodox Catholic as our Archbishop. I for one hope that his zeal for the Truth will inspire him to reign in some of the abuses that have gone on far to long in this diocese (e.g. general absolution). When we have an 'active' bishop that will stand up for orthodox positions we will be less likely to end up with problems like the rainbow sash movement which was a direct result of a 'passive' bishop.

If you happen to be catholic and are dreading the arrival of an orthodox bishop then I have to question what you believe it means to be Catholic in the first place.

Welcome to the Twin Cities Archbishop Nienstedt!

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