Local Catholic Reporter

Thou shalt not kill...

2011-01-03T19:53:00.001-06:00

The State of Missouri has scheduled an execution for January 12.

Where is the Catholic outrage?

Latest from CAN

2010-08-27T15:37:00.001-05:00

Dear Friends of CAN,

Women Led Prayer is this Saturday, August 28th, at 11 am. We will gather at 1077 S Newstead. All are welcome for inclusive, creative, woman led liturgy!

Next week please join Union Ave. Christian Church and Instead of War for an
Interfaith Breakfast.
Countdown to Withdrawal with Raed Jarrar
Join us for a talk by Raed followed by a discussion.

Friday, September 3rd from 8-9:00 am (Raed Jarrar will be available for more informal discussion between 9-9:30 for those who can stay)
Union Ave. Christian Church
733 Union Boulevard
St Louis, MO 63108-1037

RSVP by Tuesday, August 31st to staff@insteadofwar.org or call Megan at 314.721.2977. More information available at http://www.insteadofwar.org

What can we as people of faith do to respond to what is left behind in Iraq(military contractors,military bases, troops and destruction)?
How do we educate ourselves and our faith communities around this issue?
What other resources do we need to continue working for peace?

The U.S. occupation of Iraq continues and the reduction of U.S. troops in Iraq can at best be called only a rebranded occupation. While the number of U.S. troops in Iraq will be reduced from a high of 165,000, there will still be 50,000 troops left behind, some 75,000 contractors, five huge “enduring bases” and an Embassy the size of Vatican City. The U.S. military’s overthrow of the brutal dictatorship of Saddam Hussein did not lead to a better life for Iraqis—just the opposite. It resulted in the further destruction of basic infrastructure—electricity, water, sewage—that continues to this day and the war has drained our treasury, leading to huge hardships as home. The War has not made us more secure.

Please join us to hear from Raed Jarrar, is an Iraq-born architect, blogger, and political advocate based in Washington, DC. He is currently the Iraq consultant for the American Friends Service Committee, and a Senior Fellow at Peace Action. Jarrar is half Iraqi and half Palestinian. He holds a degree in architecture from the University of Baghdad, and a Master's Degree in Architectural Engineering, specialized in post-war reconstruction, from the University of Jordan.

After the fall of Baghdad in 2003, Jarrar worked as the country director of CIVIC Worldwide, the only door-to-door civilian casualties survey in Iraq since 2003. He also founded Emaar, an NGO that carried out humanitarian and reconstruction work in Baghdad and southern Iraq. After immigrating to the U.S. in 2005, Raed Jarrar has been working on a number of projects aimed at ending the U.S. occupation.

Jarrar gained attention after an incident on August 12, 2006 at John F. Kennedy International Airport. Raed had attempted to board a JetBlue flight from New York City to Oakland, California while wearing a black T-shirt with the text "We will not be silent" in English and Arabic. After a lengthy exchange with airport staff, Jarrar was made to cover his t-shirt with another T-shirt bought for him by JetBlue staff from an airport gift shop. On August 13, 2007, the American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit against JetBlue alleging illegal discrimination against Jarrar. In January 2009 JetBlue paid Jarrar $240,000 to settle the case

--
Peace,
Megan Heeney

Catholic Action Network
can@catholicactionnetwork.org
314.766.8713 cell
314.721.2977 work

--

Words to ponder

2010-07-22T12:33:00.000-05:00

“I hope whatever emerging Christianity is,” said Franciscan Fr. Richard Rohr, a featured speaker at the conference, “it’s going to be much more practice-based than doctrine-based. Where has this obsession with believing correct doctrines gotten us? The Roman church is right back into it, although maybe that’s why God is humiliating us, to say: ‘This obsession with being right and having the whole truth, look where it’s gotten you, Roman church,’ ” he said in a not-so-thinly veiled reference to the then-breaking story that the shadow of the clergy sex abuse scandal had darkened the door of the papal palace. “It might well be in the great scheme of God’s grace the only way to bring us to humility, to balancing all of our absolutely certain knowing with a necessary unknowing.”

COME DISCUSS ..... and weep?

2010-07-22T08:22:00.004-05:00

Hi Friends of CAN,

On July 15, 2010, the Vatican issued a clarification of its canonical procedures for how dioceses should handle priests who sexually abuse children. As part of the statement, they have said that the “attempted ordination of a woman” has now been added to the list of “delicta graviora,” or most serious crimes in church law, alongside the sexual abuse of minors.

Many of us have been deeply hurt by the Vatican's statement due to its inadequate response to sexual abuse of children and its oppression of women.

Please join us this Sunday, July 25th from 12:30-1:30 at the Center of Survivors (1077 S Newstead). This will be an opportunity for us to process our feelings about this statement, as well as a chance to gather with others who are interested in further action. Thank you and we hope to see you there.

--
Peace,
Megan Heeney

Catholic Action Network
can@catholicactionnetwork.org
314.766.8713 cell
314.721.2977 work

CAN Events:

2010-07-13T09:47:00.000-05:00

Catholic Action Network

Hi Friends of CAN,

* Please join us this Saturday, July 17th, at 11 am for Women Led Prayer at CTSA(1077 S Newstead), if nice weather across the street outside. The feast day of Mary of Magdala is approaching on July 22nd, join us to celebrate her witness this Saturday morning and again with the Sisters of St. Joseph on Thursday, July 22nd

* Join Call To Action members throughout the US who will be withholding funds from this year's Peter's Pence(USCCB information on Peter's Pence available here.) "Send the Bishops a Message"by withholding funds during the Peter's Pence Collection on Sunday, June 27th. Catholics are encouraged to print the following flyer and drop it in the collection basket to let the pope know that we do not approve of his handling of the sexual abuse crisis. It reads: "This year for the Peter's Pence collection, I'm sending advice rather than money...." The flyer can be found here. Please share this with people in your parishes and communities.

Donate to disaster relief through reputable organizations and encourage the Pope to do the following;
1. For the protection of children around the world, institute a zero-tolerance policy for those credibly accused of sexual assaults on children.
2. For the healing of the survivors, insist that bishops publish lists of all credibly accused and the parishes in which they served.
3. Donʼt ask for forgiveness until you and the bishops have amended your ways to act with transparency—just, inclusive & accountable.

Thank you! For more information see www.catholicactionnetwork.org

If you are what you should be, you will set the world on fire. Nothing great is ever achieved without much enduring. Cry out with a million voices: it is silence that kills the world.
– St. Catherine of Siena
--
Peace,
Megan Heeney

Catholic Action Network
can@catholicactionnetwork.org
314.766.8713 cell
314.721.2977 work

CAN Events:

2010-06-23T10:15:00.000-05:00

Hi Friends of CAN,

Please join us this weekend for Women Led Prayer, PrideFest and Gather Again in the Garden with the Shareholders of JPS at McGurk's.

* Women Led Prayer, Saturday, June 26th, at 11 am at The Center for Survivors (1077 S Newstead). Come enjoy inclusive, creative women led liturgy.

* PrideFest this Saturday and Sunday from 11 am to 8 pm in Tower Grove Park. Pride Parade is at noon on Sunday!

* Gather in the Garden with the Shareholders of Justice and Peace Shares on Sunday, June 27, 2010, 4:30 - 6:30pm at McGurk's Irish Pub, 12th and Russell in Soulard (map). Accoustical music by City Lark, appetizers and first drink provided. Bring a new Justice and Peace Shareholder and you and your guest attend free. $10 suggested donation.

Also join CTSA and the Palestine Solidarity Committee as we welcome back Hedy Epstein to speak about her experiences with the Gaza Freedom Flotilla in late May and early June. Saturday, June 26th at 7 pm at CTSA, 1077 S Newstead. Suggested donation for Free Gaza Movement: $5.00

CAN's next book group is meeting August 10th at 7 pm to discuss "Between a Barack and a Hard Place: Racism and White Denial in the Age of Obama" by Tim Wise. The book is available at a discounted rate at Left Bank Books.

Hope to see you this weekend. More information available at www.catholicactionnetwork.org

--
Peace,
Megan Heeney

Catholic Action Network
can@catholicactionnetwork.org
314.766.8713 cell
314.721.2977 work

Oh sooo right...

2010-06-08T15:09:00.003-05:00

If Bishop Olmstead had been around when surgery was novel, he would certainly have been right there with the boys who excommunicated the first medics to grab a knife.

Conclusion:

If a bishop offers you medical advice, get a second opinion.

Israeli thugs do it again!

2010-06-05T08:46:00.002-05:00

The criminal state of Israel has again committed piracy on the high seas with the tacit blessing of the United States. Can we expect to hear condemnation from the pulpit?

Latest from CAN:

2010-05-19T17:14:00.000-05:00

Hi Friends of CAN,

Please join us this weekend for Women Led Prayer on Saturday and on Sunday for a 1:00 pm Vigil at the Cathedral.

* Please join us for inclusive, creative, Women Led Prayer at 11 am on Saturday, May 22nd, at 1077 S Newstead (CTSA). See you then! The next Women Led Liturgy will be June 26th at 11 am.

* Responding to the Spirit, We are called to Renew our Church: Join FOSIL and VOTF for a prayer vigil at the Cathedrals on Pentecost Sunday 2010 (May 23rd ): St. Louis at 1:00 P.M.; Belleville, 3:00 P.M.

As Catholics we struggle with feelings of betrayal and mistrust because of the despicable behavior of churchmen complicit in the sexual abuse of minors, now witnessed worldwide. So on Pentecost we will pray very simply, asking the Spirit to renew the face of our Church.

Our prayer will also be one of thanksgiving for all those who continue to serve as faithful ministers of the gospel, priests and religious men and women of integrity; we support them fully and join them as co-workers in faith.

We gather together in prayer, seeking a new perspective of church for the future, and we encourage area clergy, religious and laity to join us on this Pentecost Sunday as we listen to the Spirit within each of us. We cannot simply cower in the face of today’s scandalous headlines, but like the early disciples, must listen to the voice of the Spirit calling us to speak out with the openness, honesty and integrity so needed in our Church today. Our common prayer offers hope for a renewal of our church. The prayer vigil, lasting approximately 30 minutes, will be a familiar service of the Word, to include an opening song, Scripture reading, a brief commentary, prayers of petition and a closing song.

* The next CAN Book Group is "The Lemon Tree: An Arab, a Jew, and the Heart of the Middle East" by Sandy Tolan. We are meeting to discuss the novel on Tuesday, May 25th from 7- 8:30 pm at CTSA(1077 S Newstead). More information about this novel available here http://www.left-bank.com/book/9781596913431 Our summer book group is "Between Barack and a Hard Place: Racism and White Denial in the Age of Obama" by Tim Wise. We will meet on Tuesday August 10th to begin our discussion. Both books are available at Left Bank Booksat a discount. E-mail can@catholicactionnetwork.org if you are planning to join us for either Book Groups.

* This Week is Harvey Milk Week see http://stlmilk.wordpress.com/ for events. “What set Harvey apart from you or me was that he was a visionary. He imagined a righteous world inside his head and then he set about to create it for real, for all of us.” -Anne Kronenberg, his final campaign manager.

--
Peace,
Megan Heeney

Don't expect accountability from the last feudal system in the West

2010-05-17T13:51:00.000-05:00

by Donald Cozzens on May. 17, 2010

* Examining the crisis

Miters somewhat askew, the recent queue of bishops from Ireland to Germany, and beyond stepping forward to offer apologies for sexual abuse by their priests is unprecedented for the European Catholic church.

Even as the apologies pile up and policies for dealing with abuse allegations are tightened and meetings with victims are promised, something remains amiss that takes the heart out of the bishops' mea culpa.

There is no real accountability for bishops who abetted sexual abuse by failing to remove predator priests from access to children or for bishops who failed to comply with civil laws requiring reporting of abuse of minors.

Nor will there be soon.

Two explanations surface; one might be considered divine, the other, thoroughly human.

Bishops are jealous men. They are jealous of their responsibility as divinely appointed teachers of the Catholic church. To their way of thinking, anything that might weaken their God-given, divine authority as teachers and guardians of the faith merits immediate and fierce resistance. From this point of view, calls to hold bishops accountable save to the pope himself, offend the dignity of the bishops' office and are framed by Vatican officials as attacks on the church. Instead of accountability, we are told that mistakes were made, sometimes tragic in their consequences. But, it is explained, they were mistakes made in the best interests of the church. Anything more, the Vatican fears, would undercut the authority of the bishop's teaching office and diminish his credibility.

The other explanation rests on more humble, though still lofty, grounds. Bishops are princes. We need but look at their ermine-trimmed robes and catch the ring of their courtly titles, "your excellency," "your grace," "your eminence." As elite members of the last feudal system in the West and one of the last absolute monarchies in the world, we shouldn't be surprised if bishops, as princes of the realm, are answerable only to their sovereign, the bishop of Rome.

If the hierarchy's royal accruements were simply vestiges of their medieval past, they might be harmless enough. But these episcopal conceits have forged a culture of privilege, secrecy, and exemption that is now exposed as a detriment to both their teaching and pastoral roles.

Even armchair psychologists can imagine how insular the life of royalty inevitably becomes -- and how dangerous the royal power can be even in the best of men. A sobering insight follows: It remains exceedingly difficult for anyone in power to feel the pain of others, even the pain of young victims abused by their pastors. It's the exceptional bishop who maintains real contact with members of his flock, who listens to the laity as one disciple to another, who lets the pain of the abused rend his heart. Sadly, it appears that it's the exceptional bishop who puts the good of the children ahead of the good of the institutional church.

More than a half century ago, the Lutheran theologian Paul Tillich wrote that any religion that took upon itself the right to judge the values and mores of the world must be ready to subject itself to the same standards of judgment by which it judged the secular sphere. If a religion failed to do so, he warned, it rightly stood subject to the judgment of the world.

Then, Tillich added, this is the particular danger of the Catholic church.

[Fr. Donald Cozzens, author of The Changing Face of the Priesthood, is writer in residence at John Carroll University, a Jesuit university near Cleveland, Ohio.]

Technology undermining Catholic church structures

2010-04-27T16:57:00.000-05:00

Technology undermining Catholic church structures
By Thomas C. Fox
Created Apr 27, 2010

I toured China for three weeks in late 1998. Computers hooked to the expanding Internet were being set up in hotels frequented by tourists. While public Chinese access to electronic information was still in its infancy then -- and still largely restricted to foreigners -- I remember thinking to myself that the country was facing another revolution and that accessible information would be its catalyst. Secretly I was cheering it on.

The Chinese leadership today continues, as best it can, to battle the free flow of information. Government censorship continues, but reports out of China indicate those efforts are failing. As in the case of Iran, Myanmar, North Korea and other dictatorships, efforts to limit and control information in the age of the Internet with the explosion of mobile phones and Twitter accounts are on the losing side of history.

Some might cry foul, using the examples of modern thugs as a jump point into the situation within our own church today. Allow me this defense: I deal here not with personalities as much as I do with structures and systems. My broadest point is that the old top-down, one-voice-serves-all model of government and the information system it employs is anachronistic, dead as a functioning model.

People want give-and-take, understandable explanations. They want information to be a two-way street. Above all, they expect accountability. When all they get are press releases, you cannot expect them to be satisfied. No, they will be suspicious, they will question, they will most often not give you the benefit of the doubt. And this is what has happened, what is happening, as the Vatican tries to manage the current phase of the sex scandal that has rocked the Western world.

But there’s more. As noted above, the Internet has decentralized information and allows it to be sent globally in an instant. It occurred to me the other day that this latest round of church sex abuse reportage, which began in Germany three months back, is the largest eruption since 2002 — and the first such eruption since blogs and social networking and news sites matured on the Internet.

Remember how for much of our lives we heard it said that things change slowly within our church, over centuries, if at all. Well, in an age requiring rapid response to remain part of any ongoing conversation, this approach increasingly works against us. It was one thing when news of a papal action took weeks or longer to get across the globe. Today news assessments take place within minutes. To be influential one needs to be fast, nimble and flexible, like it or not.

One recent example supports the point. By the time Pope Benedict XVI issued his long awaited response on sex abuse last month to the Irish church, the story had already migrated to Germany and beyond. When his letter omitted any reference to the German situation, many in Germany were hurt. Others were offended.

Another related church matter that pitted old and new ways and technologies occurred in the final hours of the health care debate in Washington.

The U.S. Catholic Conference of Bishops, attempting to present one voice on the bill as they saw it relating to abortion, came off, in the eyes of many observers, as out of step with a quickly changing political scene. Meanwhile, they found themselves making judgments based on faulty and perhaps outdated information. On the other hand, Network, the Catholic women religious lobbying group, used electronic technology to rally members of their organization and to spread word of their analyses. The Leadership Conference of Women Religious, in turn, used the Internet to seek voluntary signatures in support of the bill. The bishops and the women appeared to be working out of two opposing authority models, one vertical and the other horizontal. The second, the invitational assessment model, it turned out, won the day — and the legislation, leaving the bishops in the dust, and with some upset and perhaps not quite yet understanding what or how it happened.

Even the old monarchies of Europe are now grounded in constitutions. The Enlightenment, new understandings of human dignity, public education, the liberation of women, access to information and, now, instantaneous global transmitting systems have rendered ineffective governing models. Is it any wonder our church’s prelates feel besieged?

When will it end?

2010-04-19T16:47:00.003-05:00

Here are two recent headlines from NCR:

For Benedict, Malta was a break in the storm

Munich vicar general reportedly says he took the fall for Ratzinger

CAN Schedule:

2010-04-06T15:57:00.001-05:00

Hi Friends of CAN,

I hope you are enjoying this beautiful Easter time weather! Please join us this month.

* Women Led Prayer- Saturday, April 17th at 11 am. Join us at CTSA (1077 S Newstead). All are invited!

* Our next Book Group will be on the novel The Lemon Tree: An Arab, a Jew, and the Heart of the Middle East by Sandy Tolan. The book is available at Left Bank Books- let them know you are with the CAN Book Group and you will receive a discount- the book will be under $12.00. We will meet to discuss the novel on Tuesday, April 27th from 7- 8:30 pm at CTSA(1077 S Newstead). More information about this novel available here http://www.left-bank.com/book/9781596913431 E-mail can@catholicactionnetwork.org if you are planning to join us for the Book Group.

* May Day Events: Join CAN and many others on May 1st from 11:30am - 1:30 pm to March for Immigrant, Civil and Human Rights. The March will be from the America Center (11:30 am) to Kiener Plaza (noon). There will be interfaith prayer, Puppetistas, music and call to action. Afterward from 1-10 pm there will be a May Day Festival on Cherokee Street. This will include a street fair of progressive groups, a screen filming, a rally and much more. More information available http://www.facebook.com/events/edit/index.php?new&step=2&eid=110478172308129#!/event.php?eid=200734103711

For more information see www.catholicactionnetwork.org. See you this month!

--
Peace,
Megan Heeney

Catholic Action Network

Catholic Sisters Support Passage of Healthcare Bill

2010-03-18T10:37:00.001-05:00

Washington DC: NETWORK, A National Catholic Social Justice Lobby, released the text of a letter to Congress supporting healthcare legislation from organizations and communities representing tens of thousands of Catholic Sisters. This letter, which is being delivered to each Member of Congress today, comes just days after a statement in support of passing healthcare reform by Sister Carol Keehan, President and CEO of the Catholic Health Association.

Dear Friends of CAN,

2010-03-16T16:57:00.000-05:00

I hope you are enjoying the spring weather! Please join us this spring for spiritually and mentally invigorating events and campaigns.

* Women Led Prayer is Saturday, March 20th at 11 am at CTSA (1077 S Newstead). All are Welcome to join us!

* Sunday, March 21, Angie O'Gorman will host a book signing for her recently published novel, The Book of Sins, from 4:00 till 6:00 PM at CTSA. "The Book of Sins" is available from CAN and Angie for $18.95 today.

* Promo Lobby Day is Wednesday, March 24th. Support PROMO's priority proactive legislation, the Missouri Nondiscrimination Act. MONA would prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity in house, employment, and access to public accommodation. Register to attend by calling 314.862.4900 or go to http://www.promoonline.org

* People's Settlement: Stand Up and Stand Together Against Corporate America!

March 24th, 3 p.m. at Kiener Plaza till Monday, March 29th. Join us for a 3 hour shift in Kiener Plaza.

Frustrated with Corporate Control of Politics? Angry over unjust Housing Foreclosures? Big Bank Bailouts? Continuous War? No Change?

All of us are working on issues from local control to clean energy to peace to jobs to healthcare and everything in between. We have been working separately for too long and we need to stand up and stand together on a united front! Many of us have worked hard on political campaigns and activist campaigns attempting to get legislators to listen to us. However, we feel the real issue is corporate power that is dividing us on every issue and blocking us from affecting real change from political figures.

That is why a group of us have decided us to take the power back and come together on a broad based front, united against a common threat. Join us at the People's Settlement, a week of action dedicated to focusing on various corporations in the downtown area; from Bank of America's bailouts to Peabody Coal's unethical energy to the prison industrial complex to Anthem's blocking of real healthcare reform.

* Economic Literacy and Building Solidarity Alternatives in a Time of Crisis Workshop: The St. Louis Justice and Peace Shares (www.jps-stl.org) in collaboration with the Center for Popular Economics will offer a two-day workshop designed to equip local activists to explain the roots of the current economic crisis and to design alternative economic projects. DATES: Thursday April 22 and Friday April 23 TIMES: 9 AM to 5 PM each day PLACE: TBA COSTS: $100 includes lunches (subsidies available) To register initial interest in participating please reply by e-mail staff@jps-stl.org or call 314-725-5303 by March 19

More information available at www.catholicactionnetwork.org.

--
Peace,
Megan Heeney

Catholic Action Network
can@catholicactionnetwork.org
314.766.8713 cell
314.721.2977 work

Children denied Catholic schooling, lesbian couple speaks out

2010-03-15T17:28:00.002-05:00

The women talk with NCR in their first media interview
NCR sits down with lesbian couple whose children are being denied to attend a Catholic parish school in Boulder. The couple explained they agreed to speak with NCR because they wanted to clear up misconceptions in the media and specifically wanted Catholics to better understand their situation.

By Thomas C. Fox

Two Boulder women have been at the center of a firestorm of media attention here for the past ten days since news broke that their daughters would no longer be welcome at the Sacred Heart of Jesus parish school because their mothers are lesbians.

Local media have been covering the story seemingly around the clock. Television crews have come to the school. Articles, letters to the editors, and opinion pieces, including one by Denver Archbishop Charles Chaput in support of the expulsion, have appeared. Protesters have shown up outside the church with banners calling shame on parishioners. Police have been called in to patrol the school grounds for the safety of the children. Division has emerged within the parish though many Catholics – and others – here ask themselves how this could possibly have occurred in their progressive, welcoming community.

Referred to as “the mothers” here by those who do not know the couple and by those who do and want to protect their identities, the women have avoided all media contacts and interviews – until now. They also asked that they not be photographed.

I sat down with the women, both professional physicians, in the living room of their home here, walls covered with framed photographs of their five-year-old and three-year-old daughters. As we spoke for more than an hour, a long haired dog playfully rolled on the living room carpet before us.

The couple explained they agreed to speak with NCR because they wanted to clear up misconceptions in the media and specifically wanted Catholics to better understand their situation.

The women, members of the Sacred Heart parish, describe themselves practicing Catholics eager to raise their children in the faith of their parents and grandparents. They say they attend mass weekly at the parish with their children and continue to believe the Sacred Heart of Jesus parish school, including pre-school and kindergarden through eighth grade, excels in education and Catholic formation.

The women, meanwhile, said they have been overwhelmed by the media coverage and by the support they have received by friends and family. They said they are not political activists and have no agenda other than providing for the safety of their children. For this reason they asked not to be identified by name.

The following is their story, as they told it together, For the sake of the report I distinguish between them, when necessary, using the names Mary and Martha.

“People are making assumptions about us that are flat wrong, completely wrong, and we felt it was time to clear up some of these misconceptions,” Mary said as we began the interview.

From the time they first enrolled at Sacred Heart three years back they never hid the fact that they are a lesbian couple, they said. “We decided for a number of reasons to send our children to Sacred Heart School,” Mary said. “We have loved it there. Our children were thriving there. When we first enrolled our daughter in pre-school we told the school administrators our daughter had two moms. We asked if this was going to be a problem. We said that if it was going to be a problem we could go else where. We were very open and they said it would not be a problem.”

The women said they never made a “big issue” of their family situation. “We have never flaunted it or pushed any political agenda at the school at all,” Mary continued. “The parents know; the teachers know. We’ve sat with the kindergarten teachers and have talked with them. Never over a three year period we never had any indication that it would be a problem at all. We found it to be a very accepting environment for our child.”

All seemed quite natural until a it came time for next year’s enrollment a couple weeks back, Martha recalled.

“I went in to turn in our daughter’s kindergarten application and was called into the principal’s office. That’s when, she said, she got “blind sided.”

“She sat me down and told me we were no longer accepted here any more. She said it was not going to be a good fit for our child and that she would encourage us to look elsewhere,” Martha went on, explaining the principal said she was worried there could be confusion when the teachers teach about the family unit.

“Her main point was she was concerned about our child, about her well-being. She never came out and said we were not welcomed to stay. But she pretty much told us it was time for us to move on.”

That evening the women discussed what was said adding they were upset and so they decided they wanted clarification because the principal had stopped short of saying their daughter could not enroll, just that it would not be wise to do so.

Mary said she called the principal and asked for clarification. She recalls asking: “Are you just worried about how this is going to be for my child because of the church’s stance on homosexuality?” She said she told the principal that if that was the case the women could handle it. I told her we did not expect any accommodations for our children based on our family situation. She then asked directly: “Are you telling us we are not allowed?”

At that point, Mary said, the principal replied that she needed to call the archdiocese. The next day, with the principal and the pastor of Sacred Heart parish, Fr. William Breslin, on the line, the women were told that their daughters could stay one more year in school and after that they would be out.

What changed?

The women say they don’t know. They said they were told that the issue had been thoroughly discussed by the parish administrators. Yet the women said they never heard of any complains about their children being in the school from teachers or parents.

“At first we were conflicted about what the right response would be,” Mary said. “We knew there was potential for this to become a big deal. But we felt it would be in our children’s’ best interest to simply focus on finding other educational opportunities for them.”

“We did not feel then and we still don’t feel now that pushing the church to change its mind would be in our children’s best interests. We don’t want our children to become targets in a place where they were not welcome. So we decided to meet with Father Bill and send a letter to the archbishop and we would leave it at that.”

They women said they were “personally hurt, personally upset,” but decided it was time “to move on.”

But that was not the end. It turned out to be only the beginning. Following the decision the parish administrators told the school teachers and as best the women can reconstruct one of the teachers contacted a local television news channel. Word of the decision was soon flashed on local television and the story appeared the next morning in the Daily Camera.

“Within hours it was out to the entire community,” Martha said. “The parents knew; it was the talk of the parking lot. This started on a Monday and by Thursday when I went to drop off our children I had people I didn’t even know coming up to me and hugging me with tears in their eyes. We hadn’t told any of them. It was spreading like wildfire. And it didn’t come from us.”

The women said there have been surprises along the way. One of the biggest was the amount of support they quickly received from parents at the Sacred Heart school. “We have been around for years but just didn’t think much about it and didn’t think that it would be such an issue for so many,” Mary said. “It meant a lot coming from this group of people.”

Was this somehow about making a point on gay issues?

“People have suggested that we put our children in the school to make a political point or that we are fighting this battle and making our children political footballs. This is not the case,” Martha insisted. “You are the first person we have talked to. We haven’t spoken to any of the reporters who have wanted to speak with us. We value our privacy.”

Both of the moms were born and raised Catholics. Mary went to Catholic schools from pre-school through 12th grade. Martha went to Notre Dame. Mary’s mother taught in a Catholic school system for 25 years. Martha’s aunt was a Catholic school teacher for decades. “We have a lot of history with the Catholic school system. It is what we are familiar with. It is what we are comfortable with. We value what a Catholic education can do for our kids,” Martha said.

As for Sacred Heart, the women say it has been good place for their children’s education. They say they appreciate the moral foundation the teachers have provided. They say they support the character of Catholic education. They say it is very important to them that their children be provided with religious education. “We want our kids to learn about religion. We feel religion is really important. And they love it. They love God. They love their school. They love their friends. They love their teachers,” Mary said.

The women take pride in the fact that their children like to repeat bible stories they learn in school. They say they encourage these stories.

Mary and Martha each gave birth to one of the children. Legally each has joint custody of both children. The women are not legally married. They have lived in Colorado for nearly a decade and Colorado does not allow gay marriages.

Each of the children was baptized by local priests, one who is in a neighboring parish and another who has been reassigned outside the area. The baptisms followed by months the publication of a 2006 statement issued by the U.S. bishops offering guidelines to ministers and parents of gay and lesbian children. The outlines suggest baptism for children of gays and lesbians, the women say, as long as there is a reasonable assumption that the children will be raised as Catholics.

“They asked if we would raise our children in the Catholic faith and we said we would and we have really tried to live up to that commitment,” Martha said. “We take them to church every week. We switched to the Sacred Hear parish when our kids starting going to the school. We signed up and our money goes into the basket every week. Our kids go to Sunday school. We are making the effort.”

Part of the disappointment for the women is that they feel the Catholic church is now not fulfilling its part of the promise to provide all the support it can in the raising of the children as Catholics.

Said Mary: “We are trying to live up to the promises we make to raise our kids as Catholics and now the church we made the promise to is sort of undermining our attempts to do so.” They said they were shocked when a local priest suggested they raise their children as Episcopalians.

After being told their children could not continue into the elementary school, they women said they spoke with Sacred Heart pastor, Fr. Breslin, and were told they could continue to come to church and that the their children could come to CCD classes. They then asked what was the difference between CCD education and school education. “Isn’t the doctrine the same?” they asked. They felt Breslin was not able to provide an understandable answer.

They say they are also troubled because behind the decision to forbid their children from going to the elementary school is a presumption about their personal lives and that no one ever asked them about what it means for them to live as a couple.

“No one has every asked us if we are celibates. How do they know we are not upholding official church teachings?” Mary asked. Meanwhile, other parish parents, they say, have been coming to them saying they are not upholding church teachings. Some have noted they are divorced and remarried without a church blessing. Others say they are practicing birth control methods contrary to church teachings.

Said Martha: “The frustrating argument for me is that our priest and archbishop are saying we are openly living in disagreement with the doctrine of the church. They are saying people who are divorced are not as open, but everyone knows they are divorced. They imply that we are flaunting our relationship. That is the last thing we do. We go to church as family. We never show any affection for each other in church. We are very private. But that’s how the archdiocese is seeing it.”

Bottom line, the women regret this whole incident has happened. They regret it not only for themselves and for their children, but also, they say, for the school. “This is unfortunate because Sacred Heart is a great school. Those teachers are dedicated and they are good. And the families are wonderful. It’s just the people above. It’s the administration that’s the problem. I feel very bad that the school is getting such a black eye from this. It is a wonderful school.”

The women also regret their children are going to suffer from the decision. Then they gave a telling example.

Last week they were driving home from school having just picked up their children in the car. Recalled Martha: “In the car, our older daughter was helping our younger daughter with words from the “Our Father.” They were both trying to get the words right. Then they began the “Hail Mary” and we listened we had tears in our eyes. We were really sad about it because they are going to lose it.”

The women say they have tried really hard not to let anger take a grip on them. At the same time they wanted, they said, to express their gratitude to the parents of the children in their classes and to the school teachers. So they wrote them a letter and emailed it, expressing their thanks, trying, as they could, to explain the situation as they best understood it. They also asked the teachers not to say anything “that could put themselves at risk for our benefit.”

One point that the women wanted me to know and report is that they are not part of any gay movement. They are not activists. “You have never seen us at protests or marching in parades. We never intended to pave the way for gays in the Catholic church. We just wanted to be a normal family.”

The morning after meeting with Fr. Breslin the women woke up to see their story on the front page of the Boulder paper. They were shocked and worried. So they immediately called Breslin and had him paged. They said they wanted to let him know that the leak did not come from them. “I actually called to warm him this was coming out. He needed to know,” said Mary.

“All through this we have decided that we are not going to let our hearts be filled with anger and disgust and hatred. We decided we are just going to move on, take care of our family and we are going to be fine. The family is going to be fine and maybe bringing this out to the forefront of people’s minds is going to have some positive effect. You can’t let it drag you down.”

Later, the women said they were working on a press statement and wanted to be sure I knew its last sentence so that I could report it. The sentence reads: “We will continue to raise our children with strong Catholic values and hold faith that through our actions, we are doing our part to create a more loving, inclusive world."

Fox is NCR Editor.

There will be more related stories appearing on the NCR web site in the coming days.

Copyright © The National Catholic Reporter Publishing Company
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(TEL 1-816-531-0538 FAX 1-816-968-2268)

Anticipation high ahead of Romero anniversary

2010-03-04T15:49:00.001-06:00

Published statements from both the church and the government in El Salvador are raising hopes that the 30th anniversary of the death of Archbishop Oscar Romero may occasion an official announcement of his beatification. San Salvador Archbishop José Luis Escobar Alas told a press conference Feb. 7 that the bishops of El Salvador had written to Rome to ask that Romero be canonized “as soon as possible.”

Published statements from both the church and the government in El Salvador are raising hopes that the 30th anniversary of the death of Archbishop Oscar Romero may occasion an official announcement of his beatification.

San Salvador Archbishop José Luis Escobar Alas told a press conference Feb. 7 that the bishops of El Salvador had written to Rome to ask that Romero be canonized “as soon as possible.” Escobar cautioned that he had received no official word from the Vatican, but said the bishops would like to be able to give everyone the good news that Romero was declared “Blessed” on the anniversary day. Romero was assassinated while saying Mass on March 24, 1980.

Salvadoran President Mauricio Funes, who represents the political wing of the leftist rebels in El Salvador’s 1980-92 civil war, said when he was elected in March 2009 that he sought the “kind of government envisioned by Monseñor Romero,” including a commitment to the “option for the poor,” a phrase found in church documents and in liberation theology, which holds that the Gospel rejects the historic disequilibrium between privilege and wealth of the few and the vast poverty of the majority in many Latin American countries.

In a Jan. 17, 2010, statement, Funes formally apologized for the government’s role in human rights abuses during the civil war. Last November, he acknowledged official complicity in the 1989 murders of six priests, their housekeeper and her daughter on the campus of the Jesuits’ Central American University in San Salvador. Funes is widely expected to mark the Romero anniversary with a similar admission of government involvement in Romero’s death, clearing away any concerns that canonization might create a breach between the Vatican and the Salvadoran state.

Romero’s canonization could strengthen both Funes’ political and economic reforms and the church’s call for a process of truth and reconciliation, stalled by a general amnesty for war crimes that was built into the 1993 peace accords. Romero’s canonization would also help the church counter the wave of conversions of Latin America’s historically Catholic population to Pentecostal movements.

The cause for sainthood seemed on track in 2005 with formal verification from the Vatican that Romero’s writings contained no doctrinal errors and with strong support from Pope John Paul II, who had personally added Romero’s name to a list of slain church workers during a ceremony in Rome in May 2000 for contemporary martyrs.

But John Paul’s death in 2005 and the election of Pope Benedict XVI seemed to slow the process over charges by some in the hierarchy that Romero is too closely tied to liberation theology’s emphasis on social transformation and church involvement in politics. While Benedict praised Romero in 2007 as a “great witness for the faith and a man of great Christian virtue who worked for peace,” he also permitted an aggressive probe of the writings of Jesuit Fr. Jon Sobrino, El Salvador’s most prominent liberation theologian and a key advisor to Romero in the final years of his life. Sobrino, a tireless promoter of Romero as an embodiment of the “church of the poor,” said in August 2009 that he feared Romero’s canonization would be delayed for political reasons and that his legacy would be watered down over time.

What happens -- or does not happen -- during the upcoming ceremonies in San Salvador will be closely watched for signs that the road to sainthood is either open or being extended. Romero, controversial in death as in life and already revered throughout the world, is likely to continue to influence the direction of both church and state in the Americas.

[Patrick Marrin, editor of Celebration, NCR’s sister publication, will be in El Salvador to cover the Romero anniversary.]

Copyright © The National Catholic Reporter Publishing Company
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(TEL 1-816-531-0538 FAX 1-816-968-2268)

CAN Events:

2010-02-18T15:03:00.000-06:00

* Women Led Prayer Saturday, February 20th from 11:00- 12:30 at CTSA (1077 S Newstead.) All are welcome to join us for inclusive, creative prayer.

* Winter Book Group on Angie O'Gorman's novel "The Book of Sins" meets Monday, February 22nd and Tuesday, March 2nd from 7-8:30 pm at CTSA (1077 S Newstead). Information about the book is available at http://thebookofsins.wordpress.com/about/ . "The Book of Sins" is available for $18.95 through Angie and CAN. Books are available now, contact can@catholicactionnetwork.org or at 314.721.2977. E-mail can@catholicactionnetwork.org if you are interested in joining the book group. Thanks!

* Peaceable Assembly Campaign- CAN is taking part in the Peaceable Assembly Campaign which is a national campaign encouraging local communities to Demand Alternatives to U.S. Militarism. We are having a meeting on Sunday, February 21st from 3:30-5 pm at CTSA (1077 S Newstead) to discuss the Peaceable Assembly Campaign and get involved. . Before the meeting it would be helpful if people checked out the Peaceable Assembly Campaign Website (http://vcnv.org/pac). The meeting will be a space to learn about Peaceable Assembly Campaign and discuss peoples ideas on how they would like to act to demand alternatives to U.S. militarism. Ideally we can begin to meet in smaller groups(affinity groups), people whom we can commit to meeting and acting with on a regular basis, then we could meet as a big group once a month to coordinate efforts, discuss road blocks, etc. If you have any questions please let me know and feel free to share with others.

If you can make it to the Sunday meeting please let me know so I have materials available.

* If you are interested in being part of a working group for a Support Our Sisters Campaign please contact CAN. This group will work on raising awareness around the "Apostolic Visitation." As the Vatican continues its unjust investigation of US Women Religious Communities, we will stand in solidarity with our Sisters. E-mail CAN can@catholicactionnetwork.org today if you want to join this working group.

For more information check out the CAN website- www.catholicactionnetwork.org.

--
Peace,
Megan Heeney

Gay bashing again...

2010-02-10T19:02:00.000-06:00

Dear Friends and Supporters of Fortunate Families,

We write to ask you to consider writing in support of New Ways Ministry.

Most of you know that New Ways has been striving for many years in its mission to be a bridge-building ministry between lesbian/gay Catholics and their families and friends, and the institutional church. Yet, it's authenticity as a Catholic group has recently been challenged by Cardinal Francis George, archbishop of Chicago and president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.

Relative to Fortunate Families, New Ways has been extremely supportive of Catholic parents of LGBT persons, from its 1994 offering of the first national retreat for Catholic parents to its more recent symposiums, retreat/workshops and Next Steps programs that always include parent concerns in the programming.

If you have been to any New Ways program, you know how sensitive New Ways always is to the pastoral concerns of the attendees and addressing those concerns within the framework of the Catholic moral and social justice tradition.

Please read Frank DeBernardo's note below and the other material referenced, including Cardinal George's statement. We strongly encourage you to respond in the manner that Frank suggests.

Thank you for your consideration of this request!

Blessings!

Mary Ellen & Casey Lopata
Fortunate Families, Inc.
PO Box 18082
Rochester, NY 14618-0082
585-698-6100
www.fortunatefamilies.org
info@fortunatefamilies.com

The truth:

2010-01-20T07:41:00.001-06:00

The truth is that male religious leaders have had - and still have - an option to interpret holy teachings either to exalt or subjugate women.

They have, for their own selfish ends, overwhelmingly chosen the latter.

JC

How generous are we?

2010-01-16T14:25:00.003-06:00

Military budget plus supplements... $800,000,000,000

Aid to Hati... $100,000,000

WOW we're giving about an hour of our war money!

CAN Schedule

2010-01-16T14:24:00.000-06:00

Hi Friends of CAN,

Please join us for Women Led Prayer this weekend Saturday, January 16th at 11 am at CTSA (1077 S Newstead). All are welcome! Next months Women Led Prayer will be February 20th at 11 am. Please contact CAN if you are interested in helping plan prayer, preach or preside.

CAN's 3rd Annual Retreat will be Saturday through Sunday, February 27-28th at Rock Haven Retreat Center. Please contact CAN
(can@catholicactionnetwork.org or 314.721.2977) if you are interested in attending the retreat. Cost is sliding scale.

Book Groups: Our next CAN Book Group will be on "The Book of Sins" by Angie O'Gorman. We will begin meeting in mid-February. Please contact CAN if you are interested in being involved. More information about the novel here http://thebookofsins.wordpress.com/about/

Thank you! For more information see www.catholicactionnetwork.org.

Ten Things the US Can and Should Do for Haiti

2010-01-14T13:02:00.000-06:00

Published on Thursday, January 14, 2010 by CommonDreams.org

by Bill Quigley
One. Allow all Haitians in the US to work. The number one source of money for poor people in Haiti is the money sent from family and workers in the US back home. Haitians will continue to help themselves if given a chance. Haitians in the US will continue to help when the world community moves on to other problems.

Two. Do not allow US military in Haiti to point their guns at Haitians. Hungry Haitians are not the enemy. Decisions have already been made which will militarize the humanitarian relief - but do not allow the victims to be cast as criminals. Do not demonize the people.

Three. Give Haiti grants as help, not loans. Haiti does not need any more debt. Make sure that the relief given helps Haiti rebuild its public sector so the country can provide its own citizens with basic public services.

Four. Prioritize humanitarian aid to help women, children and the elderly. They are always moved to the back of the line. If they are moved to the back of the line, start at the back.

Five. President Obama can enact Temporary Protected Status for Haitians with the stroke of a pen. Do it. The US has already done it for El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Sudan and Somalia. President Obama should do it on Martin Luther King Day.

Six. Respect Human Rights from Day One. The UN has enacted Guiding Principles for Internally Displaced People. Make them required reading for every official and non-governmental person and organization. Non governmental organizations like charities and international aid groups are extremely powerful in Haiti - they too must respect the human dignity and human rights of all people.

Seven. Apologize to the Haitian people everywhere for Pat Robertson and Rush Limbaugh.

Eight. Release all Haitians in US jails who are not accused of any crimes. Thirty thousand people are facing deportations. No one will be deported to Haiti for years to come. Release them on Martin Luther King day.

Nine. Require that all the non-governmental organizations which raise money in the US be transparent about what they raise, where the money goes, and insist that they be legally accountable to the people of Haiti.

Ten. Treat all Haitians as we ourselves would want to be treated.

Bill is Legal Director at the Center for Constitutional Rights and a law professor at Loyola University New Orleans. He is a Katrina survivor and has been active in human rights in Haiti for years with the Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti. Quigley77@gmail.com

Pope's WORLD PEACE DAY MESSAGE

2010-01-12T10:06:00.002-06:00

Titled “If You Want to Cultivate Peace, Care for Creation,” Benedict’s World Peace Day message recommended:

* A new mode of calculating the cost of economic activity that would factor in environmental impact;
* Greater investment in solar energy and other forms of energy with a reduced environmental footprint;
* Strategies of rural development concentrated on small-scale farmers and their families;
* Progressive disarmament, including “a world free of nuclear weapons.”

Now the really important stuff...

2010-01-08T08:36:00.003-06:00

By the numbers:

1 Kneel.

2 Stick out your tongue.

God news!

2009-12-22T18:15:00.002-06:00

Celebrate! Carl's on his way home!

Father Carl Kabat OMI was convicted this afternoon. He has been held in the Weld County jail, Greely Colorado for his most recent PLOWSHARES action against nuclear missiles. He was sentenced to 'time served' (five months) and released.

Carl is on his way back to St. Louis with friends and admirers who journeyed to Colorado to attend his trial.

Quick... call the cops!

2009-12-15T15:16:00.002-06:00

All good gay-bashing Catholics know how to deal with a 'love thy neighbor' gathering...

CALL THE LAW!

Free speech? Not on your tintype. If you come to The Cathedral to hear The Word and contribute to the Archdiocesan Homophobia Fund, you expect to be protected.

CAN events this week end

2009-12-10T13:16:00.000-06:00

Hi Friends of CAN,

Please join us this weekend for these events;

Victoria Rue PhD is coming to St. Louis Dec. 12-13th. Victoria is a Roman Catholic Woman Priest, professor at San Jose State University, author of Acting Religious: Theatre as Pedagogy in Religious Studies, playwright and advocate for justice. (http://www.victoriarue.com)

Saturday, Dec. 12th 11:30-3:30 Creative and Liberating Liturgies Workshop at CTSA (1077 S Newstead)

* We still have space in this workshop contact Megan at can@catholicactionnetwork.org to register.
*
o This workshop introduces participants to the use of embodied prayer, theatre and feminist ritual as important additions to creative and liberating liturgies. While conventional liturgies stress spoken prayer and occasional gestures, embodied worship brings a congregation into the present moment and a sense of shared presence through the recognition of the whole body in worship. The use of theatre in worship offers a congregation the opportunity to encounter biblical texts and contemporary applications with an embodied/engaged approach. Feminist ritual and liturgy grew from people whose experience was marginalized in worship, particularly women. In our workshop will also explore facets of feminist ritual as it expresses authentic and inclusive relationships with God, one another and our created world. Bring your frustrations, your hopes and a willingness to explore new paths. Please wear comfortable clothes and shoes that would allow you to engage in movement.

Saturday, Dec. 12th 4:00 pm Mass with Victoria at CTSA (1077 S Newstead)

Sunday, Dec 13th 12:00-1:00 Rally at the Cathedral Basilica Separation of Church and Hate at 4431 Lindell Boulevard

Sunday, Dec. 13th 1:15-2:30 "Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life? : LGBT Catholics and spiritual survival." at CTSA (1077 S Newstead)

* Come to discuss LGBT issues in the church and hear from Victoria Rue about surviving in the Church. People of all sexual orientations and faith traditions are invited to join us!

Thanks! More information available at www.catholicactionnetwork.org or e-mail can@catholicactionnetwork.org
Women Led Prayer this month is Saturday, December 19th at 11:00 am at CTSA (1077 S Newstead).

--
Peace,
Megan Heeney

Catholic Action Network
can@catholicactionnetwork.org
314.766.8713 cell
314.721.2977 work

Dear Father Bozek

2009-12-08T12:38:00.002-06:00

The unceasing vitriolic attacks by a leading conservative catholic character assassin prompts those of us who admire and love you to assure you that you do not stand alone.

Please pray...

2009-12-08T10:07:00.002-06:00

The State of Ohio intends to execute Kenneth Biro today.

Find details at DPIC (Death Penalty Information Center).

Please pray for the victim, and for an end to this outrage.

A necessary new blog

2009-12-07T16:25:00.000-06:00

A "Catholic Worker Healthcare Discussion" blog has been created in
hopes to facility this discussion:
http://catholicworkerforum.blogspot.com/

The first entree is a copy of Mona Shaw's Dec via pacis article "The
Quality of Mercy" followed by Brian Terrell's "A Personalist,
Anarchist Response to 'The Quality of Mercy' by a Catholic Worker".

We encourage you to read them both, add your own follow up comments or
take the dialogue into an entirely new direct.

"Let the discussions begin......"

The Bishop's PAC

2009-12-02T15:04:00.002-06:00

$100,000 solicited by the Bishops explicitly for political purposes is hard to classify as donations to the church. So how do we separate coins in the poor box from big bucks to subsidize right wing politicians?

Let's ask the tax man.

CAN action on the misuse of $10,000

2009-11-27T18:08:00.002-06:00

Dear Friends of CAN,

Happy Thanksgiving! I hope you are enjoying time with friends and family this weekend.

* If you can please join us this Sunday at the Cathedral Basilica from 11:30-1:30. This is a time to come together and peacefully tell the Archdiocese of Saint Louis, that there are better uses for the local $10,000 Catholic dollars, than to support the anti-gay marriage ballot measure in Maine. Invite friends to join us. We will be sharing what we think the $10,000 discretionary dollars could be used for locally.

Power of the purse?

2009-11-25T14:24:00.006-06:00

The next time the basket comes your way... Hesitate. Think about it.

Consider how your money is likely to be used. Do you really want to promote the political agenda of out-of-touch old white men?

$550,000

2009-11-25T10:15:00.002-06:00

That's how much the Catholic Bishops dropped to defeat civil same sex marriage. This thinly veiled 'we hate gays and lesbians' push by the bishops is an outrage to common decency.

Somebody should tell Jesus about these guys.

Love thy neighbor... love anybody?

2009-11-12T19:17:00.006-06:00

This seemed too inflammatory, so I decided not to publish it. Then one of our local ubercatholics had another go at CAN...

We see that the Saint Louis Fascist Catholic Blogger has sent his snitch to filch a copy of CRONAN CHRONICLES. He positively drools with glee proclaiming that a spontaneous act of love on the part of Sister Louise Lears' mother will drag the entire St. Cronan congregation to hell.

And while we're on the subject of hell, who the hell authorized Archbishop Carlson to contribute ten grand of church funds to the gay-bashing political movement in Maine? The people there only want civil recognition of their unions with the word marriage, and to be given the usual secular benefits. Opposing this is hate-based discrimination... ask anyone in the GLBT community.

Dear Friends of CAN,

2009-11-11T12:23:00.000-06:00

Last week the California bishops issued a statement of support to women religious in the face of the Vatican's investigation. They thanked these "women of the Gospel... for their witness to the richness and varied gifts of the Spirit."

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) will be meeting next week in Baltimore. We have a small window of opportunity to encourage Bishop Carlson to issue his own statement or to issue a collective statement with his brother bishops.

1. Call and leave a message for Archbishop Carlson- 314.633.2277 or Fax him a letter at 314 633-2333.

2. Ask him to stand with the California Bishops and make a similar statement in support of Women Religious in the United States.

3. Ask three friends to join you in this action and keep the sisters in your prayers.

4. Please contact us at CAN to let us know you called or faxed. Also let us know if you are interested in hosting or attending a house meeting to discuss what is going on with the investigation of women religious in the US and how we can stand with our Sisters.

For more information on the California bishops' statement, see http://ncronline.org/news/women/california-bishops-offer-support-us-women-religious

Thank You!

Women Led Prayer is this Saturday, Nov. 14th, at 11:15 am instead of 9:00 am. Please join us at 1077 S Newstead (CTSA)

For more information see www.catholicactionnetwork.org.

--
Peace,
Megan Heeney

Recite this before blogging

2009-11-11T07:41:00.002-06:00

The Serenity Prayer

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,courage to change the things I can,and wisdom to know the difference.

Living one day at a time; enjoying one moment at a time; accepting hardships as the pathway to peace; taking, as Jesus did, this sinful world as it is, not as I would have it; trusting that He will make all things right if I surrender to His Will; that I may be reasonably happy in this life and supremely happy with Him forever in the next.

Amen.

Is this a Monty Python skit?

2009-10-29T08:14:00.005-05:00

NCR published some disturbing Vatican fashion photos. The dresses worn by our church leaders are a global embarrassment. Kings no longer swan about in such opulent gold and lace frocks.

Jesus would be mortified.

Misogynist? Homophobic? We’ve got the church for you!

2009-10-22T17:10:00.001-05:00

by Jamie L Manson on Oct. 22, 2009

On Friday, Oct. 16 the most e-mailed article on The New York Times Web site was the story of Pat Bond’s fight to receive financial support for the terminally ill son that she conceived with a Franciscan priest over 20 years ago.

Four days later, the eighth most e-mailed Times article told of the Pope’s new initiative to welcome larger numbers of Anglican priests and seminarians, regardless of marital status, into the Roman Catholic clergy.

The Pontiff is putting this plan into practice in an attempt to offer a spiritual home to those who have either left or are considering leaving the Anglican Communion because of their opposition to the ordination of women and openly-gay priests as well as the blessing of same-sex unions.

Ms. Bond, who was impregnated and abandoned by a Catholic priest, cannot get funding for her son’s brain cancer treatments. The priest receives little disciplining from his superiors. She is told by the Franciscan order, who never encouraged the priest to leave the ministry, that they have already gone “far beyond what the law would require,” in their financial support. They also reminded her that, by speaking publicly, she is in jeopardy of paying a penalty because she is in violation of a confidentiality agreement that she signed years ago.

Married Anglican priests and seminarians are provided with their own sacred structure, called "personal ordinariates," to enhance their spiritual care and guidance. They earned this special privilege by being vociferously misogynist and homophobic.

A woman is punished by Catholic superiors for her relationship with a priest, while married Anglican priests who are anti-woman and anti-gay are welcomed more fully into the Catholic clerical fold.

This week the Catholic church seems to have reached another low point in its perennial war on sex. However, in this latest twist of events, one form of sexual activity has been legitimized: married sex between male Anglican priests and their spouses who have reached qualifying levels of misogyny and homophobia.

Ironically, it was Gene Robinson -- whose courageous assent to the bishop’s seat in the Episcopal church first elicited the Anglican firestorm and threat of schism over the ordination of out gays and lesbians -- who first showed me that the relationship between misogyny and homophobia runs deep. Several years ago I heard him offer a lecture at Union Theological Seminary in New York City. At one point in his talk, he addressed his sorrow at the lack of support that some gay men have for women in their own fight for fair and equal treatment in the church. He asked the audience, “When will we gay men realize that the reason the church hates us is because they hated women first? The hatred of gay men is rooted in the original hatred of women and the feminine.”

These new developments at the Vatican might be slightly more digestible if studies proved that the Catholic church is being led by a primarily heterosexual, celibate clergy. Unfortunately, they prove the contrary.

According to the Times article on Ms. Bond, “A landmark study in 1990 by the scholar A. W. Richard Sipe, a former Benedictine, found that 20 percent of Catholic priests were involved in continuing sexual relationships with women, and an additional 8 percent to 10 percent had occasional heterosexual relationships.”

Fr. Donald Cozzens, an author, psychologist, and former Catholic seminary president, estimates in his book, The Changing Face of the Priesthood, that 50 percent of Roman Catholic priests have a homosexual orientation. He adds, “Beyond these estimates, of course, are priests who remain confused about their orientation and men who have so successfully denied their orientation, that in spite of predominately same-sex erotic fantasies, they insist that they are heterosexual.”

Given these statistics, one must wonder if these latest conflicts over sexuality are just further evidence of church authorities’ conflicts over their own sexual desires and activities. Is this latest move yet another desperate attempt to maintain a closed, closeted, clerical “old boys network,” where no man is threatened with the possibility of having to speak openly and honestly about sexuality, desire, and relationships of integrity?

Some church leaders might have us believe that the lesbian and gay issue is the only real sexuality “crisis” facing the church. But it is important to remember that this is but one petition in an increasingly long prayer list: contraception, abortion, pedophilia, sexual abuse, and perhaps the most egregiously overlooked sexual issue, the mistreatment and exclusion of women.

The intensity of alarm over same-sex relations and their polarizing, if not schismatic, power may be evidence that the root cause of all of this concern is deeper than homosexuality. The cause of this controversy may very well be rooted in the church’s struggle with sexuality itself -- a struggle that, allegorically at least, was born in the Genesis narrative of Adam and Eve.

While many have interpreted the Adam and Eve story as a chronicle of birth, life and death, a closer reading also reveals that it is an account of the beginning of our shame towards our sexuality. Before taking the fruit, the man and the woman are said to be naked and unashamed. After realizing their nakedness, they hide from God, mistakenly convinced that God, too, will be embarrassed by their exposed genitals. When God realizes that they are hiding because they are ashamed of their nakedness, God is angry and, with a heavy heart, makes Adam and Eve clothes and expels them from the garden. Shame was not the response that God wanted us to have to our nakedness and our sexuality.

In its treatment of Pat Bond and its overtures to conservative Anglican priests, the church has exacerbated the culture of shame that has long compelled Catholics to hide from their sexualities. Unfortunately for misogynist and homophobic church authorities, most Western Catholic and mainline Protestants have come to understand another great biblical truth: by their fruits you shall know them.

In its latest moves, the church has only further alienated itself from those who are seeking healthy, life-giving, and honest expressions of their sexuality rather than the harmful, secretive affairs that estrange us from ourselves, from one another, and from God. The new generations of Catholics will not have inherited the church’s reign of sexual guilt that marked those who grew up Catholic 40 or more years ago. Until the church authorities begin to deal with our human, God-given sexuality in ways that propel us towards growth and greater wholeness, the relevance of the Vatican’s teaching authority will only continue to dwindle within the generations to come.

Jamie Manson received her master of divinity degree from Yale Divinity School. She currently serves as director of Social Justice Ministries at Jan Hus Presbyterian Church, working primarily with New York City’s homeless and poor populations. She is a member of the national board of the Women’s Ordination Conference.

News from CAN

2009-10-22T12:42:00.001-05:00

Hi Friends of CAN,

Here are events coming up this autumn, please join us!

Sunday, Oct. 25th from 1:00-5:30 pm Catholic, Open and Affirming Program (COPA) we will be running a day long workshop on the COPA program. If you are interested in attending please e-mail can@catholicactionnetwork.org For more information on COPA check out CAN's website- http://catholicactionnetwork.org/HF/canhf.html

Sunday, Nov. 1st "Capitalism: A Discussion" from 1:00 to 2:30 pm at CTSA (1077 Newstead). Justice and Peace Shares invites you to see Michael Moore's new film, "Capitalism: A Love Story" and then join us for a conversation and listening discussion about the implications of capitalism in our lives. We will discuss what we learned from the movie and what questions we still have.

Sunday, Nov. 1st at 5:00 pm Deacon MaryBeth McBryan will be ordained a priest. MaryBeth's Ordination will be at the Therese of Divine Peace Inclusive Community. The Therese Community meets at the First Unitarian Universalist Church of St.Louis, 5007 Waterman Blvd. Below is the Press Release for this event. Please join us for this joyous occasion.

Friday, Nov. 6th - Sunday, Nov. 8th Call To Action Conference in Milwaukee "Everyone at the Table: Rejoicing as the People of God." CAN still has car space and rooms available at the conference. If you are interested e-mail can@catholicactionnetwork.org We will be leaving Friday morning at 9 am and returning Sunday evening. The Annual Call To Action Conference is a beautiful, informative and life-giving event we hope many from St. Louis can attend. More information about the conference is available at http://www.cta-usa.org/

Saturday, Nov. 14th Women Led Prayer at 9 am please join us for liturgy and breakfast at CTSA 1077 S Newstead. All are welcome. Women Led Prayer was moved up a week because many will be attending the School of Americas Protest in Ft. Bennings, GA.

Anyone interested in attending or helping plan our Winter Retreat please contact can@catholicactionnetwork.org

Thank you!

--
Peace,
Megan Heeney

Note to Burke:

2009-10-20T12:52:00.003-05:00

Bishop Gerry Kleba!

pay for WHAT?

2009-10-14T07:42:00.002-05:00

I.i mil. That's what Rome is blowing on the women's inquisition!

Anybody willing to drop a penny in the basket for THAT?

Why not take it out of Ray Burke's frequent flyer fund?

Congratulations Nobel Laureat Obama!

2009-10-09T13:09:00.000-05:00

Dear Friends of CAN

2009-10-08T17:38:00.000-05:00

Support Our Sisters!
Please consider signing onto the ad sponsored by WOC(see below), also there is a website www.thankyousister.com where you can write letters in support of women religious. Let CAN know if you would be interested in talking more about the Vatican interrogation of women's religious communities and what we can do to support women religious during this time. E-mail Megan at can@catholicactionnetwork.org or call us at 314.721.2977.

Afghanistan: 8 Years of War. End it Now!
Join Instead of War and CAN this Sunday at College Church (Grand and Lindell) to Vigil. We will gather from 7-8 pm. If you have been at the vigil any time since 2001, please come this Sunday! If you haven't been to the vigil yet now is the time to step up our peacemaking efforts.

Women Led Prayer- Friday, Oct. 16th 6:30-8:30 pm
Join us for liturgy and a potluck at Marie's house (3832 Botanical). Bring a dish and a sweater, we will gather for liturgy outside and have a bonfire for music and marshmallow roasting after liturgy. Since this October marks 8 years of war in Afghanistan the liturgy will be centered on peace.

Catholic Open and Affirming Program
Sunday, October 25th from 1-5:30 pm we will be running the COPA program. This is a program that facilitates small faith sharing groups and parishes discussing LGBT issues and the church. If you are interested in joining us to learn about the program or are considering bringing it to your parish or small group please e-mail can@catholicactionnetwork.org

Please join us. More information at www.catholicactionnetwork.org

Peace,
Megan
CAN

The bishops have spoken...

2009-09-24T08:30:00.002-05:00

End poverty? Sure!

Deny health care to the undeserving slackers who will not (or can not) come up with the money, and the problem solves itself.

See? It's simple.

Thanks Bish.

Check your schedule... CAN events!

2009-09-17T15:43:00.000-05:00

Dear Friends of CAN,

We hope you can join us for some upcoming events!

Saturday, September 19th- Women Led Prayer at 9 am at CTSA (1077 S Newstead) All are welcome to join us!

Monday, September 21st- Paul Coutinho- "How Big is Your God?" at 7 pm St. Francis Xavier/College Church ballroom (Grand and Lindell) Paul Coutinho, SJ is an internationally recognized Ignatian scholar, author, and speaker who brings an Eastern flavor to Western spirituality. A native of India and a Jesuit from the Bombay province, he frequently leads retreats, gives spiritual direction, and trains people to lead the Spiritual Exercises. He will be speaking to us about the Spirituality of the Feminine and "How Big is Your God?"

Thursday, Sept. 24th- Bike for Change- Clean up Dirty Money, Dirty Energy and Dirty Politics! from 3:30-5:30 starting at the green space off Market and Tucker ending in Forest Park. As the G20 meets in Pittsburgh, join Instead of War and Greenpeace, by gathering in resistance to Dirty Money, Dirty Energy and Dirty Politics! Register at http://www.insteadofwar.org

Sunday, Sept. 27th- 4th Annual CAN Hootenanny and Sing- A- Long at 7:30 pm at Schlafly's Tap Room (2100 Locust)! Gather for great music by several friends of CAN, songs like Revolution, Wagon Wheel, Singing for Our Lives, and If I had a hammer. If you have song suggestions send them to us, or if you'd like to play bring your instruments. Donations can be made on a sliding scale $12-$60 or $50-$200 per family. Song books, Schlafly beverages, and Hootenanny snacks are provided! Come and join us for a hoot of a time while supporting CAN's program work.

Thanks! Have a nice weekend. We look forward to seeing you soon.

More information at http://www.catholicactionnetwork.org

--
Peace,
Megan Heeney

Archbishop Daniel E. Pilarczyk takes another swing at Sister Louise Akers

2009-09-09T14:42:00.003-05:00

The archbishop wants this nailed down tight. It goes something like, "Women are all right, as long as they KNOW THEIR PLACE (in the back of the bus)! And no fair wearing a dress in church. That's reserved strictly for men."

So I asked a canon lawyer...

2009-09-06T16:59:00.000-05:00

Okay, it's complicated.

Jesus only made men priests, so why should we make women priests....

First of all, who said Jesus only made men priests. Actually Jesus didn't ordain anyone. He had thanksgiving dinner (more or less the modern equivalent of Passover) with the family. A normal passover would have the family gathering for a festive meal, parents, children, inlaws, grandparents, friends, assorted nieces and nephews, etc. And Jesus did something special - so that unusual twist is recorded. Now if there were no women there - I think it would have been worthy of note - but the scriptures are SILENT.

People say if Jesus wanted women priests he surely would have made Mary a priests. Well, first of all - that doesn't necessarily follow - She had a particular role, and being a priest didn't have to be part of that role. Secondly, who says he didn't make her a priest? We just don't know. Again, the scriptures are SILENT.

And down through the years, the constant practice of the church has been not to ordain women. Well, here we know that women have been ordained deacons a least, and probably bishops. There's less evidence about the priest issue. But there is only one 'clerical' state, only one sacrament - in three orders. That's what the CODE of canon law says. The first christian millenium had women clerics. Probably not the majority, but certainly enough of them to make rules about how it happened. This time the historical record is clear, but it is SILENCED.

Now one thing about all this: men wrote the scriptures, and most of the historical record. So they wrote about their buddies. No great surprise that women didn't figure too large in the account. And perhaps they were shunted aside. But in the religious life world, we were making stuff happen - that is until the start of the second christian millenium, when the pope said all nuns had to stay in super-max, oh, that would be the holy cloister.

Paul VI asked the pontifical biblical commission to research the matter and give him the scriptural evidence regarding women's ordination. They searched the scriptures and came up with: an honest, scholarly reading of the scriptures does not give enough evidence to say yes or no - we just don't know. Then the Office of the Holy Inquisition: now called congregation for the doctrine of the faith, CDF, said no you can't and gave lots of reasons for it. Now if they really had a good reason, they could have given it, but they didn't so they did the next best thing - gave lots of bad reasons, making up for quality with quantity. Then finally the pope said, I know the reason: God said so! Ha! End of discussion..... And the discussion goes on....

....long answer to a short question.....

News from Pakistan

2009-09-04T18:53:00.004-05:00

Kathy Kelly is coming. Dan Pearson is coming. They are coming to share their experience of the situation in Pakistan.

Don't miss it! September 16 in the Saint Louis Room of the Busch Student Center at Saint Louis University.

If you know Kathy, of course you are coming. If you don't know her, you should come for an unforgettable encounter. She's well informed, passionate, eloquent, and Irish enough to make a stone cry.

I wish I knew more about Dan Pearson, but he travels in good company.

Cincinnati nun given ultimatum over ordination views

2009-09-02T15:38:00.002-05:00

“We are losing the voice of justice,” said one member of her religious community.

Sister of Charity Louise Akers has been told by Cincinnati Archbishop Daniel E. Pilarczyk to publicly disassociate herself from the issue of women’s ordination if she wishes to continue making any presentations or teaching for credit in any archdiocesan-related institution.

The above was clipped from National Catholic Reporter.

Ponder if you will the fate of our church when the Hierarchy lives in such terror of the ultimate admission of women to their closed 'old boys club'. It is absurd to expect bold social justice initiatives confronting true evil from men who tremble before pious women.

So... Who will lead us?

Father Roy Bourgeois speaks out!

2009-08-26T17:57:00.004-05:00

By Michael Paulson
Boston Globe Staff / August 24, 2009

WESTON - A prominent priest whose support for women's ordination has him in trouble with the Catholic Church ratcheted up his confrontation with the hierarchy yesterday, calling the church's refusal to ordain women a "scandal'' and "spiritual violence.''

"I will not be silenced on this issue,'' said the priest, the Rev. Roy Bourgeois, to about 100 people in Weston at an event hosted by the congregation of Jean Marchant, a former staffer for the Archdiocese of Boston who claims she was ordained as a priest in an unsanctioned ceremony four years ago.

The Catholic Church views Marchant and Bourgeois as having been automatically excommunicated for participating in unsanctioned ordination ceremonies. Yesterday Bourgeois said he remained unclear about his status because he has had no formal communication from his order, the Maryknoll Fathers, or from the Vatican, which last fall told him he would face excommunication if he did not recant.

"If they choose to kick me out of the church because I believe that men and women are equal, so be it,'' Bourgeois said. "I will never be at peace being in any organization that would exclude others.

"What's going on in our church today is spiritual assassination, it's spiritual violence being done that's inexcusable. That is a scandal,'' he said.

The Archdiocese of Boston yesterday declined to comment on the event in Weston, referring instead to a statement it issued last year saying, "The ordination of men to the priesthood is not merely a matter of practice or discipline within the Catholic Church, but rather, it is part of the unalterable Deposit of Faith handed down by Christ through his apostles.''

And in 1994, Pope John Paul II declared that "the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women,'' citing both tradition and the fact that Jesus' apostles were male.

For their part, advocates for women's ordination say Jesus also had women in his inner circle, that polls show most American Catholics support their cause, and that the church faces a crushing shortage of priests.

But church officials say women play other valuable roles in the church, and the answer to the priest shortage is a combination of prayer and efforts to help young men recognize and accept callings to the priesthood.

Bourgeois is the first Catholic priest in good standing to participate in an unsanctioned ordination ceremony held by advocates of women's ordination. He took part in a ceremony in Kentucky last summer.

In an interview yesterday, Bourgeois, 70, a Louisiana native, said he has stopped wearing a clerical collar and celebrating the Eucharist and other sacraments out of respect for the church's view that he has been excommunicated.

But, he also said at one point, simply, "I am a priest.''

He said he is confident his position on women priests is the correct one.

"If anyone should be excommunicated, it is the patriarchy involved in this discrimination,'' he said. "But I don't believe in excommunication - no one has a monopoly on the truth.''

Bourgeois said he is winning some support from other priests.

He said five priests around the country have agreed to go public with their support for women's ordination, and yesterday's gathering drew at least three archdiocesan priests, none of whom would comment publicly.

Another attendee at yesterday's event was Joe McLaughlin, 60, a Dorchester native who now lives in Storrs, Conn.

He said he came to the event after becoming frustrated by the diminished role for women at his own parish.

"My sister is a nun, I was an altar boy, and I don't want to leave. But I get angry now, instead of inspired,'' McLaughlin said.

Roberta Robinson, 60, of West Roxbury, said she now worships at an "ecumenical Catholic congregation'' - a group not recognized by Rome - and that she came to the event "to support the movement.''

She said she believes the Catholic Church will change its position on women's ordination, saying, "it has to, or it will fall.''

The event was held at the Congregational Church of Weston, a United Church of Christ congregation.

The pastor, the Rev. Joe Mayher, said in an interview that the church regularly hosts Marchant's congregation, called "Spirit of Life,'' because "we strongly share their values and their prophetic justice commitments.''

*Michael Paulson can be reached at mpaulson@globe.com. *

--

$ $ $

2009-08-18T13:25:00.002-05:00

Finally the word 'finance' has surfaced in discussions of the rather murky investigation of women religious currently being carried out by The Vatican.

The women under investigation, most notably those who minister in health care, control a considerable amount of valuable property. Would it be crass to suggest that the investigation might indicate more than a passing interest in the eventual disposition of such property?

BROTHER, CAN YOU SPARE A DIME...

2009-08-12T09:02:00.005-05:00

Ok, let's talk about health care:

With THE INTERNATIONALE playing softly in the background, I speak on behalf of SINGLE PAYER.

There are options that please the well off, the various interested corporations, the uncaring and the truly stupid, but SINGLE PAYER is the only plan that addresses the needs of all.

The "I'm all right Jack" attitude that self righteously condemns the lazy, the ignorant, and those in other ways undeserving, to survive as best they can is unworthy of any civilized nation.

Can anyone with a right conscience believe that the corporate executive whose concept of work is polishing his golf clubs is more deserving of care than the lettuce picker who sends part of her pay across the border for a nephew's school shoes?

Shame on us for even hesitating!

Father Carl Kabat continues his struggle against nuclear weapons...

2009-08-07T07:39:00.005-05:00

Fr Carl Kabat O.M.I. the man who was arrested this morning at a Weld County Missile Silo.

Fr Carl's statement to press

We are Fools and Clowns For The Holy One And Humanity's Sake.

I Father Carl Kabat O.M.I. come to this evil place today as a Roman Catholic priest, of fifty years, to show what insanity is in the ground here and other silos in our beautiful country.

President Barack Obama has stated, "As the only nuclear power to have used a nuclear weapon, the United States has a moral responsibility to act...So today I state clearly and with conviction America's commitment and desire to seek the peace and serenity of a world without nuclear weapons."

The Roman Catholic Church, of which I am a priest, at the close of its Vatican Council II in 1965 condemned nuclear bombs as a CRIME AGAINST HUMANITY and are to be condemned unreservedly.

The World Council of Churches has proclaimed that "the manufacture, deployment or use of nuclear bombs is a CRIME AGAINST HUMANITY"

I support President Barack Obama's desire and have attempted to do my little bit in his effort.

The nuclear bomb that is in the ground here is more than 20 times more powerful that the atomic bombs we dropped on the Japanese. Each of those bombs killed more than 100,000 people. At lest twenty times that number totals more than 2 million people.

The Bible says in the words of Isaiah "They shall beat their spears into pruning hooks and their swords into plowshares".

May the Holy One have mercy on us for not doing so.

"Anti-nukes priest here readies for next arrest" Bill McClellan

2009-08-04T16:02:00.002-05:00

Carl Kabat will turn 76 in October, and he figures to be in jail again by then. In fact, he's headed to Colorado today to commit a crime, the same crime he's been committing for the last 25 years. He intends to attack a missile silo. He's a Roman Catholic priest involved in the Plowshares movement, which is named after the passage from Isaiah: "They shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks."

He was resting Sunday, preparing for the long drive today. I visited him at a home owned by the Catholic Workers on the city's near north side. We sat at a picnic table in the backyard. He was wearing a green and white pullover shirt and a pair of tattered shorts. I asked if he ever wore his Roman collar.

"When I break the law," he said, and then he laughed. He seemed to be in a very good mood.

He was raised on a farm near Mount Vernon, Ill. He celebrated the 50th anniversary of his ordination a couple of weeks ago with a Mass at the picnic table in the backyard. He very seldom goes to a traditional church. Still, he remains in good standing with his order, the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate.

In the early days of his priesthood, the order sent him to the Philippines and then to Brazil. He came back to this country in 1973 just as the Vietnam war was winding down and the peace movement was losing steam. Nevertheless, he found a niche — the anti-nuclear weapon movement.

With all the evils in the world, it's hard to pick one, he told me, but if this one doesn't get solved, it could mean the end of everything

He also talked about the need for individuals to act before there is a nuclear holocaust. He said we can't ask God to stop this because God didn't start it. We started it, and we have to stop it, Kabat said.

He seemed serene about getting arrested again. How much time did he expect to get?

"Somewhere between 18 years and 15 months," he said, and he laughed. He was given an 18-year sentence for taking a jackhammer to a silo in 1984 — the sentence was reduced on appeal and he did less than 10 years — and he was given a 15-month sentence in 2006 for attacking a silo in North Dakota.

Maybe the country is becoming more sympathetic toward your cause, I said. Speaking of change, I asked if the election of Barack Obama seemed auspicious for the Plowshare folks. He dug through some papers he had in front of him, found a newspaper article in which Obama talked about the goal of eliminating nuclear weapons. Kabat read it aloud, quoting Obama: "I am not naive. This goal of a nuclear-free world will not be reached quickly, perhaps not even in my lifetime."
Then Kabat looked up and smiled. "Basically, I want to help Obama. I'll take one off-line."

I asked if he expected to go to a minimum security prison camp, or a medium security federal prison. He shrugged, and said it didn't really matter. He said that in some ways, he got along better with poorer inmates. The more downtrodden, the more supportive they were of him, he said. He spoke almost wistfully of a stint he did in a Washington jail. He said that in a minimum security camp, the inmates tended to be better off. Crooked businessmen, he said. Right-wingers tended not to be sympathetic toward his ideas, he said.

I asked if he had seen "Dr. Strangelove."

No, he had not, he said. He didn't see many movies. He said he didn't seem to have the time.

"I have to get back to jail so I can get back to reading and writing," he said, and he laughed again.

He's been out of prison for almost two years. His last incarceration had to do with an attack on a silo in North Dakota, a state that has long fascinated him. He once told me that if North Dakota were to secede from the union, it would be the third greatest nuclear power in the world.

During his next attack, which he figures will take place on Thursday, he intends to wear a clown costume. He first wore a costume when he attacked a silo in North Dakota with a sledge hammer in 1994. That attack occurred on Good Friday, which was also April Fool's Day. "We are fools for God's sake," he said, and I must have looked mystified, because he then added that the quote came from the New Testament. He got five years for that attack.

Kabat is odd, but smart, and he knows that many people think it's silly to attack missile silos with sledgehammers, and to go to jail for doing so. Tilting at windmills might make more sense. But he does it, he said, out of love.

"The opposite of love is not hate, it's apathy. I don't want to be apathetic," he said.

Look the other way?

2009-08-02T16:00:00.002-05:00

Published on Saturday, August 1, 2009 by ConsortiumNews.com

'Christians' Wink at Torture
by Ray McGovern

Anyone harboring doubts that the institutional Church is riding shotgun for the system, even regarding heinous sin like torture, should be chastened by the results of a recent survey by the Pew Research Center.

Who but the cowardly crew leading the "Christian" churches can be held responsible for the fact that many of their flock believe torture of suspected terrorists is "justified?"

Those polled were white non-Hispanic Catholics, white Evangelicals, and white mainline Protestants. A majority (54 percent) of those who attend church regularly said torture could be "justified," while a majority of those not attending church regularly responded that torture was rarely or never justified.

MOTHER JONES

2009-07-30T16:26:00.002-05:00

Ammon Hennacy on Mother Jones

"Like Thoreau, Mother Jones stands in a class all by herself. One reading her life would think that it was too good to be true. I regret not having met Jack London and Mother Jones. There is no one with whom you can compare Mother Jones. She was not circumscribed by any dogma.

When a show of guns was needed in Charleston, WV, she had her 'boys' buy them. Marx never wrote anything about getting a women's brigade with dishpans and hammers to create havoc among the mules, scabs and mine owners. She told off the union officials and the governors. By her wit she confounded the militia; by her unselfish compassion she shamed the police, and their wives fed her mill children. She, more than most of the rebels today, had suffered more from the police, yet she did not call them 'pigs.'

Perhaps her ancestors, like those of Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, had, in
County Cork, fought the British, and some of this spirit had to come
out eventually, and it did here in America to help the poor miners and
the mill children. Her bravery has not been surpassed in American
history. Her endurance in fake quarantine was coupled with the
endurance of those miners she sought to help.

Mother Jones puts to shame the union 'pie-cards.' She puts to shame the segregated unions whose increased wages come from not allowing blacks, Puerto Ricans and Mexicans to join their unions. She put to shame those today who squabble over radical theory, and who would never stand a tenth of the 'quarantines' that she endured.

She saw the truth about radical communities seventy-five years ago when she said that such groups would succeed only if they had a religious basis. She did not mean a church basis. If the young Hippies today who have their rural colonies will forsake their 'acid' ---mechanical methods of gaining 'interior peace' and will study the life of Mother Jones, of Krishnamurti, and of Gandhi, they might make a success and 'show the world.'

To those who are weak, Mother Jones should give strength. To those who are strong she presents love. To all of us she shows the menace of giving power to others over ourselves. Finally, she shows the power which a truly dedicated life can give to upset tyranny."

THE ONE-MAN REVOLUTION, Ammon Hennacy Publications, 1970

Upcoming CAN Events

2009-07-27T15:54:00.000-05:00

Saturday, August 16th at 9 am- Women Led Prayer at CTSA (1077 S Newstead) Please e-mail can@catholicactionnetwork.org if you are interested in getting more involved.

Tuesday, September 1st at 7 pm- CAN Potluck "What is next for CAN?" Come and let us know what you are interested in and discuss upcoming conversations with the new Archbishop of St. Louis.

September Book Group on Paul Coutinho's book "How Big is Your God?" E-mail can@catholicactionnetwork.org if you are interested in participating.

Prayers urgently needed...

2009-07-26T07:55:00.002-05:00

Father Gerry Kleba is still giving 110% for the spiritual and temporal good of the St. Cronan community. But cancer is still his unwelcome companion.

There are those who may disagree with goals of the formally declared Archdiocesan 'Peace and Justice Parish', but it would be impossible to overlook the long and tireless ministry of our Pastor, loving the less fortunate of St. Louis.

Please...PLEASE! pray for Fr. Gerry's recovery that he may long continue God's work.

Gold and Silk?

2009-07-23T12:48:00.006-05:00

From the comments received about Fr. Carl Kabat's anniversary celebration, I can only express my surprise that the 'gold chalice and silk robe' crowd bothers to visit this blog.

I understand how those who believe Jesus wore fine robes and used gold dishes at the last supper must be appalled.

Some of us see it a little differently.

Which gathering would Jesus choose?

He could come to a backyard picnic in a bad neighbourhood with a ragtag bunch who gathered (some from several hundred miles) only because they love Him and each other...

Alternatively He could attend a rigidly programmed ceremony in a grand building in a fine part of town. Gold dishes and silk robes aplenty! Lots of well dressed people will be there, because some relatively modern rule book demands come or else. Alternatively, a loving God offers Hell for eternity.

Congratulations Fr. Carl!

2009-07-20T07:55:00.008-05:00

Father Carl Kabat OMI celebrates the fiftieth anniversary of his ordination to the priesthood. His half-century of ministry as missionary, pastor, teacher and social activist inspires all who know him.

His religious community celebrated, his family celebrated, and finally his Catholic Worker family celebrated. The picture above is typical Catholic Worker liturgy... Joyful - loving - informal. Carl is our spiritual leader, our brother, our friend. He lives among us and he leads us in love of Jesus by word and example.

Probably best known for his PLOWSHARES acts of resistance to atomic weapons, Carl helps us all to find our calling to works of mercy.

Thank you Father Kabat.

We love you!

Catholic hospitals and labor: A velvet revolution?

2009-07-16T18:49:00.002-05:00

The above headline appeared on the front page of July 10 issue of NCR... a publication with which I usually agree.

But, not so fast here:

The article lays out a hopeful process by which hospital management and labour can sweetly coexist, respecting each other's needs and aspirations. So far so good. Everybody wins.

Finally, once the stage is set, every standard union-busting platitude is invoked.

Just to be on the safe side folks, better get the IWW point of view before signing up.

Advocates Say Budget Will Have a Body Count

2009-07-16T13:33:00.001-05:00

Columbus Dispatch

The budget storm has passed, but Ohioans who use libraries, home care for the elderly, mental-health treatment or services for abused children will be counting casualties for weeks and months to come. Those and dozens of other state-funded services will be hard hit by $2.5 billion in cuts built into a controversial $50.5 billion budget approved yesterday by state lawmakers. Legislators are taking a "huge gamble" with the lives of the state's neediest families, said Joel Potts, executive director of the Ohio Job and Family Services Directors' Association. "They're betting that we really don't need money for these people and they will get services somewhere else and children will not suffer," he said.

Something to smile about...

2009-07-14T08:17:00.002-05:00

Good news!

Fr. Gerry Kleba reported to the St. Cronan congregation that he spent a pleasant hour with Archbishop Carlson. Without going into detail, the summary is, HE LIKES THE GUY!

That goes a long way with me.

Welcome Louise!

2009-07-12T16:36:00.002-05:00

A dear member of the St. Cronan community participated in our Celebration of the Eucharist this morning. Smiles and Hugs all around for Sister Louise Lears.

Cronanites know how to love.

The Words of God Do Not Justify Cruelty to Women

2009-07-12T14:36:00.001-05:00

The Words of God Do Not Justify Cruelty to Women
Discrimination and abuse wrongly backed by doctrine are damaging society, argues former US president Jimmy Carter

"Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status ..." (Article 2, Universal Declaration of Human Rights)

"There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus." (Galatians 3:28)

I have been a practising Christian all my life and a deacon and Bible teacher for many years. My faith is a source of strength and comfort to me, as religious beliefs are to hundreds of millions of people around the world.

So my decision to sever my ties with the Southern Baptist Convention, after six decades, was painful and difficult. It was, however, an unavoidable decision when th e convention's leaders, quoting a few carefully selected Bible verses and claiming that Eve was created second to Adam and was responsible for original sin, ordained that women must be "subservient" to their husbands and prohibited from serving as deacons, pastors or chaplains in the military service. This was in conflict with my belief - confirmed in the holy scriptures - that we are all equal in the eyes of God.

This view that women are somehow inferior to men is not restricted to one religion or belief. It is widespread. Women are prevented from playing a full and equal role in many faiths.

Love everybody... (and everything)

2009-06-28T11:53:00.000-05:00

Reciprocity or Death
Leonardo Boff
Theologian
Earthcharter Commission

When human beings decided to live together, they established an unwritten social contract, setting up norms, prohibitions and common purposes that allowed them to coexist with a modicum of peace. Later on, thinkers appeared, like Locke, Kant and Rousseau, giving the contract a formal status.

Those historic contracts have a common defect: they imply naked and acosmic individuals, who lack even a minimal link with nature or the Earth. The social contracts ignore and totally suppress the natural contract.

Even worse: beginning with Descartes and Bacon, the founding fathers of modernity, the illusion was sown that human beings are above and outside of nature, and that their goal is to dominate and own her.

This project has continued throughout the war of conquest, that continues appropriating all the natural resources and services, always resulting in the devastation of nature and a brutal dehumanization.

Previously, wars were waged to conquer regions and peoples. All Earth's territory has been conquered, and what is going on now is a total war, one without mercy, against the Earth, her goods and services, exploiting them to the point of exhaustion. The Earth can no longer rest: she has no refuge nor space into which to withdraw.

This aggression is worldwide, and the reaction of the Earth - Gaia - is also worldwide. Her reply is a collection of various crises, together forming a devastating planetary warming. It is Gaia's revenge.

There is no way out but to consciously and quickly reintroduce that which we had forgotten: a natural contract articulated with the social contract. We must overcome our arrogant anthropocentrism and put everything in its place, and ourselves as well, as a part of a whole.

What is a natural contract? It is the acknowledgement on the part of the human being that he is integrated into nature, from which he receives all, and the recognition that he must behave as a child of Mother Earth, giving her caring and protection in return, so that she may continue doing what she has always done: give us life and the means to live.

The natural contract, as all contracts, presupposes reciprocity. Nature gives us everything we need, and we, for our part, must respect her and recognize her right to exist and to preserve her integrity and vitality.

To the exclusively social contract we must now add the natural contract, one of reciprocity and symbiosis. We must renounce our drive to dominate and to posses, and enter into a brotherhood with all things. We cannot just use them, but when we do use them, because we need them, we must contemplate them, admire their beauty and their existence as an organism, and we must care for them.

Nature is our generous hostess, and we are her grateful guests. We cannot just seek to establish a truce in this endless war. Rather, we must establish a perennial peace with nature and with the Earth.

At no time did the 1929 economic crisis consider nature or the Earth. Its illusory presupposition was that they would always be there, at their disposal and with infinite resources. Now the situation is different. We can no longer take for granted the Earth, with her goods and services. These have been shown to be finite, and we have already surpassed by 40% their capacity for recuperation.

When will this factor be brought into the debate, into the search for solutions to the present crises? We are dominated by economists -- the great majority of whom are true Fachidioten, (“specialized idiots”), who see only numbers, markets and coins, and forget that they eat, drink, breathe and walk on contaminated soil. In other words: they can only do what they do because they are seated in nature, which allows them to do what they do, primarily, justifying egotism and the barbarities wrought by the present economy, that damages millions and millions of persons and that keeps damaging the base that sustains it.

Either we reestablish the reciprocity between nature and human beings, and rearticulate the social contract with the natural contract, or we must accept the risk of being expelled and eliminated by Gaia. I trust that we will learn from our suffering and that we will use the good sense that we will still have.

Leonardo Boff

06-26-2009

Free translation from the Spanish by
contacto@servicioskoinonia.org,
sent by Melina Alfaro, done at
REFUGIO DEL RIO GRANDE, Texas

Remember Stonewall? Do we even know what Stonewall meant?

2009-06-20T19:00:00.000-05:00

The Stonewall Inn, a gay and lesbian neighborhood bar with a large number of African American and Latino patrons, was also well-known as a safe space for those who did not conform to gender norms: butch lesbians, effeminate gay men, and transsexual and transgendered persons before the terms were in popular use. All of these factors brought the police to Stonewall in 1969 for the purpose of illegally raiding the bar, and arresting its occupants -- an action not unknown in New York in the 1960s. In the early morning hours of June 28, 1969, the New York City police raided The Stonewall Inn. On that fateful day, however, the Stonewall’s patrons had enough. Nobody knows who threw the first bottle that day. It may have been Sylvia Rivera, a transgendered activist and later a founding mother of political movements on behalf of transgendered and transsexual Americans. It may have been a still unidentified butch lesbian arrested in the bar. Over 2000 GLBTQ Americans clashed with 400 police officers on June 28. Arrests and beatings were concentrated among Stonewall’s African American, Latino, butch and trans patrons. What ensued was known in the New York press and among the police as the Stonewall riots. For gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgendered, transsexual and queer Americans, and later the world, that fateful day marked the beginning of the Stonewall Rebellion. With shouts of “Gay Power,” the rebellion that lasted five days in New York began to spread across the country. Gay, lesbian, trans and other queer Americans took to the streets to protest their continued oppression, objectification, and criminalization. This singular event, the Stonewall Rebellion, marked the beginning of the modern GLBTQ liberation movement, and brought GLBTQ political and social struggles out of the closets on onto American streets. Using this date as the flashpoint, cities across America and around the world continue to celebrate the last week of June as Pride Weekend, a weekend where we remember the Rebellion, organize to continue the fight for queer liberation, and celebrate our culture, community, families and history.

Stonewall never meant fundraising at black-tie galas. It never meant focusing on marriage as the sole agenda. It always meant, it still means, freedom and pride. The fight for marriage is just one piece of a worldwide fight about
rights. In American states GLBTQ people can still be fired, evicted, violated, attacked, and murdered for being anything except a heterosexual. There are 1,100 federal and state rights that are guaranteed only to “legally
married” couples in America in 2009. Among these are rights to government and veteran’s pensions, judicial rights, and the right to be considered one’s next-of-kin in an emergency. Hate crimes against GLBTQ individuals are up 6% from 2008 already, with only half of the year behind us. Americans serving in the military are denied these 1,100 rights, and must remain silent for fear of being harmed and discharged under the repressive “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” doctrine. Everyday GLBTQ Americans are attacked, harassed, and forced to live in fear, but Americans are not the only ones. In Brazil, a GLBTQ person is killed every two days. In Iraq, homosexuality is still legally punishable by death. Stonewall was about refusing to submit to fear, tyranny, and violence. Stonewall was, and is, about a community that repudiated the very idea that being GLBTQ made you anything less than human. On this 40th anniversary of the Stonewall Rebellion, remember that.

Remember Stonewall.

Got two coats? Well then...

2009-06-19T18:15:00.001-05:00

Downward Mobility in an Upscale World
by Shane Claiborne

The vision of Jesus is not spread through organizational structures, but through touch, breath, shared life. It is spread through people who have discovered love.

Not long ago, I sat and talked with some very wealthy Christians about what it means to be the church and to follow Jesus. One businessman confided, "I, too, have been thinking about following Christ and what that means … so I had this made." He pulled up his shirt-sleeve to reveal a bracelet, engraved with W.W.J.D (What Would Jesus Do?). It was custom-made of twenty-four karat gold.

Maybe each of us can relate to this man — both his earnest desire to follow Jesus and his distorted execution of that desire, so bound up in the materialism of our culture. It is difficult to learn to live the downward mobility of the gospel in this age of wealth. For the most part, those of us who are rich never meet those of us who are poor. Instead, nonprofit organizations serve as brokers between the two in a booming business of poverty management.

I believe that the great tragedy of the church is not that rich Christians do not care about the poor, but that they do not know the poor. Yet if we are called to live the new community for which Christ was crucified, we cannot remain strangers to one another. Jesus demands that we live in a very different way.

I recently surveyed people who said they were "strong followers of Jesus." Over 80 percent agreed with the statement, "Jesus spent much time with the poor." Yet only 1 percent said that they themselves spent time with the poor. We believe we are following the God of the poor — yet we never truly encounter the poor.

About five years ago, I became part of a community called the simple way, a group of Christians literally born out of the wreckage of the church. Dozens of homeless families and children had moved into St. Edward's, a cavernous, abandoned Catholic church in one of the most struggling neighborhoods of Philadelphia. A small group of us who were students at Eastern College, a suburban Christian school, decided to move in with them as a gesture of solidarity. From that initial step, one miracle followed another as those families mentored us in community, worship, and love.

Eventually, we settled in a rowhouse in Kensington, a few blocks from St. Edward's. It is the poorest (but most beautiful!) district in Pennsylvania. There is no place we'd rather call home. Here, we play and dance. We plant gardens. We feed people. We cry. We have a community store. We help kids with homework. We live, and we spend our lives joining folks in poverty as they struggle to end it. Because we know that we cannot end poverty without ending wealth, we also spend time talking with Christian communities about our work and hosting visitors.

Before moving to St. Edward's and then Kensington, I had worked in Calcutta, India, first at Mother Teresa's home for the destitute dying and then in a leper colony. A week after returning to the United States, I began a year at Willow Creek Community Church, one of the largest, wealthiest congregations in the world — where a food court graces their worship center. Talk about culture shock!

This contrast brought me face to face with Christ's radical love, a love strong enough to bring us together across chasms of difference. I longed for the two worlds to meet, for the lepers to know the landowners. I committed my life to trying to make that a reality.

Over the years I have come to see how charity fits into — and legitimizes — our system of wealth and poverty. Charity assures that the rich will feel good while the poor will remain with us. It is important that the poor remain with us, because our capitalist system hinges on it. Without someone on the bottom, there is no American dream and no hope for upward mobility.

Charity also functions to keep the wealthy sane. Tithes, tax-exempt donations, and short-term mission trips, while they accomplish some good, also function as outlets that allow wealthy Christians to pay off their consciences while avoiding a revolution of lifestyle. People do their time in a social program or distribute food and clothes through organizations which take their excess. That way, they never actually have to face the poor and give their clothes, their food, their beds. Wealthy Christians never actually have to be with poor people, with Christ in disguise.

If charity did not provide these carefully sanctioned outlets, Christians might be forced to live the reckless Gospel of Jesus by abandoning the stuff of earth. Instead, thanks to charity, we can live out a comfortable, privatized discipleship.

But when we get to heaven and are separated into sheep and goats (Matt. 25), I don't believe Jesus is going to say, "When I was hungry, you gave a check to the United Way and they fed me" or "When I was naked, you donated to the Salvation Army and they clothed me." Jesus is not seeking distant acts of charity. He is seeking concrete actions: "You fed me, … you visited me, … you welcomed me in, ... you clothed me.…"

If we are to truly be the church, poverty must become a face we recognize as our own kin.

Several years ago, I attended a protest against sweatshops where the organizers had not invited the typical rally speakers — lawyers, activists, advocates. Instead, they brought kids from the sweatshops. A child from Indonesia pointed to his face. "I got this scar when my master lashed me for not working hard enough. When it bled, he did not want me to stop working or to ruin the cloth, so he took a lighter and burned it shut. I got this scar making stuff for you."

I was suddenly consumed with the overwhelming reality of the suffering body of Christ. Jesus now bore not just nail marks and scars from thorns, but a gash down his face. How could I possibly follow Jesus and buy anything from that master?

If we are content with discipleship that ends merely with generosity, we still serve money. Generosity is a beautiful response, but we should not confuse it with love. Generosity is merely what is expected; what is required is to return that which has been stolen. God did not create some of us rich and others of us poor.

Basil the Great, writing in the fourth century, put it this way: "When someone strips a man of his clothes, we call him a thief. And one who might clothe the naked and does not — should not he be given the same name? The bread in your cupboard belongs to the hungry; the coat in your wardrobe belongs to the naked; the shoes you let rot belong to the barefoot; the money in your vaults belongs to the destitute." Or, in the words of Dorothy Day, "If you have two coats, one of them belongs to the poor." Should we not, then, return our stolen goods with humility, like a child returning a stolen candy bar to the grocery store clerk? Should we not cry out, in the words of St. Vincent de Paul: "May the poor man forgive me the bread I give him"?

Often wealthy folks ask me what they can do for the simple way. I could ask them for a few thousand dollars, but that would be too easy for both of us. Instead, I ask them to come visit. Writing a check makes us feel good and can fool us into thinking that we have loved the poor. But seeing the squat houses and tent cities and hungry children will wreck our lives. We will never again be the same.

As we have done this work and have accompanied others new to it, we've come to see a pattern. People join us with the idea of "saving the poor." Later, they say instead that "the poor saved me." But both comments have one thing in common. They revolve around me — what I have to give poor people and what they can give me. God wants us to move beyond ourselves to join all of creation in groaning for liberation. There we face, perhaps for the first time, the reality that we, too, are poor.

I believe the church has forgotten its identity. The church is not an institution, a meeting, or a building. It is not something we go to. The church is something we are — an organism, not an organization.

Instead of living out this alternative vision, the church has been content to be a broker between the rich and the poor. Both those trapped in poverty and those trapped in riches view the church as a distribution center, a place where the poor come to get stuff and the rich come to dump stuff. No radical new community is formed.

In this model, both go away satisfied (the rich feel good, the poor get fed) — but neither goes away transformed. They do not join together to discover a new way of living.

In ministering in this way, the church has adopted the model of many of our nonprofit organizations. Functionally, many nonprofits act as brokers between the rich and the poor. They facilitate the exchange of goods and services, putting plenty of professionals in the middle to guarantee that the rich do not have to face the poor and that power does not shift. Rich and poor are kept in separate worlds. Charity does not feed fundamental change.

Brokering poverty also seduces Christians into being gatekeepers to power. Our progressive movements are haunted by the temptation to facilitate power. If anything, the recent dismantling of the welfare system and the corresponding public praise of small attempts by churches, nonprofits, and other faith-based institutions to take up the slack has increased this pressure. Policies like charitable choice (where churches compete for federal funding to run social programs) allow our government to pat churches on the back: "You do a better job at managing poverty than we do, so we'll just discontinue our social supports and let you do the job!" And our churches, flattered and uncritical, scramble for the new state money like a prize.

In that model, the power structure has not budged. The power has merely changed hands. But power does not trickle down. Just as trickle-down economics has failed, trickle-down politics does not bring change.

Many beautiful Christians working for social change in a range of movements believe we can bring about fundamental change by using power benevolently rather than reworking the power equation. We see ourselves as the good guys who will use our influence for justice — and perhaps, in these terms, we succeed in getting our candidate on the ballot or elected. But the Christ we follow has a different, harder path--one of downward mobility, of struggling to become the least, of joining those at the bottom.

Several years ago, I was at a meeting where a new movement to end poverty was announced. I looked around. The only poor people in sight were the handful of people I had come with. Launching a movement to end poverty without poor people in critical roles is like launching a civil rights movement without Black people, or a feminist movement without women. As long as the poor are not present and intricately involved in the process, ending poverty will remain an intellectual, political concept. It will not convert us.

The church needs to stop talking about ending the pain of the poor and instead join the poor. All around us, the poor are crying out. They can no longer be silenced. Wherever that outcry is heard, the church must be present.

All this does not mean that social-service organizations do not do a great deal of good. I am not calling for all these organizations to be dismantled. But I am calling Christians to ask critical questions about their relationship to God's poor people.

I believe all our "programs" should have their genesis in true relationship. At our house, we tutor — but we did not start by deciding to do a tutoring program. We simply fell in love with kids who needed help with their homework. We feed people — but we did not begin with a decision to start a feeding program. We simply fell in love with our neighbors, and they were hungry.

We have now established a nonprofit organization ourselves, but we did this in order for the organization to serve us. We are not committed to the organization, but rather to our fellowship together.

I see many communities doing amazing things through established organizations. God can — and does — work through these organizations. But the reign of God dwells in people.

Those of us who yearn for the kingdom of God must follow in the steps of Jesus. Jesus was not "in charge" of the poor. He was poor. The message of Christ from the manger to the cross is that the world is conquered through weakness, through leastness, through struggle--not from the top, but from the bottom.

The people wanted a mighty Messiah. They got a baby refugee. They wanted a powerful king to take over Rome. They got a wandering homeless man. He could have saved the world with his mighty power, but he did it through his ridiculous love. The power of God lies in the brokenness of Jesus: naked, cursed, spit upon, with birds picking at his flesh as he died the rotten death of a criminal.

The great temptation of the church, and of every believer, is the offer Satan made to Jesus in the desert: to win the world with power. But power will not end poverty. We must discover another way of living.

Jesus did not set up a program, but rather modeled a way of living that incarnated the reign of God. That reign did not spread through organizational establishments or structural systems. It spread through touch, through breath, through life. It spread through people who discovered love.

I am haunted by the command of Jesus to love our neighbor as ourselves. I struggle because I sleep in a house while my neighbor sleeps in a cardboard box; I eat twice a day while my neighbor hasn't eaten once. I draw strength from following Jesus in community. I live with people who, if they pass someone with a worse pair of shoes, have taken their shoes off and switched; people who have quietly handed over winter jackets to someone they met on the street without a coat.

This is the reckless love of Jesus, which teaches us to see the connections between our wealth and our neighbor's poverty. The love of Jesus will teach us another way of doing life, a way that will bring God's reign to earth as it is in heaven. The reign of God is not for the future. It is something we live today.

Jesus reminds us that it is easy to love people who are just like us: "Even idolators do that" (Matt. 5:47). We are called to love those who hate us. Love those who create poverty, and love those who are trapped in it. See in each of them yourself — the same blood and tears We are all capable of the same evil, and we have potential for the same good. As one believer said, "In the oppressed I recognize my own face, and in the hands of the oppressor I recognize my own hands." From addicts I learn of my addiction, and from the saints I learn of my holiness.

The God of love and the love of God know no bounds. The unending love of Jesus teaches revolutionaries to love police officers, anarchists to love politicians, vegetarians to love meat eaters, peacemakers to love soldiers. This is the love that makes us the church.

Ultimately, only this radical love of Jesus can end the poverty-wealth dichotomy. When the rich meet the poor, together they will end wealth. When the poor meet the rich, together they will end poverty.

People do not get crucified for charity. People are crucified for living out a love that disrupts the social order, that calls forth a new world. People are not crucified for helping poor people. People are crucified for joining them.

Recommended
Few pastoral and practical guides help conscientized Christians to move beyond guilt, charity fatigue, or paralysis when they finally confront privilege that insulates. In Beyond Guilt (Adventure Publications, 2000), George Johnson addresses the struggles common to Christians as their social consciousness changes, moving through the natural emotional cycles of reflection, denial, and feelings of frustration and disempowerment to develop a commitment to justice that can be sustained. Though it sometimes diverts from its focus (moving privileged people into liberated, constructive engagement) to talk about the issues themselves, this is a good resource for individuals and groups who wish to make their privilege a tool of empowerment for themselves and others.

This article was first published in the November 1, 2000 issue of The Other Side, and was reprinted with permission of the author.

THE FIX IS IN

2009-06-06T09:44:00.004-05:00

Mother Millea can stay home. Her survey of American Women's Religious Communities can be completed without all that travel and bother.

1. Mail the list of pre-ordained conclusions to the various women's religious communities.

2. Direct the leader of each Order to check the "I agree" box and sign the oath.

3. Tuck the form in an envelope and mail to:

VATICAN REPOSITORY OF IRRELEVANT DOCUMENTS

Read lots more in NCR

Good news!

2009-06-06T09:15:00.004-05:00

The state killing of Reggie Clemmons is on hold, pending an appeal.

Excellent news... but don't give up the struggle to

eliminate the Missouri Death Penalty.

Anybody out there pro-life?

2009-06-05T16:01:00.003-05:00

Why isn't everybody out in the streets pleading for the life of Reggie Clemmons?

If ever there was a time to take a stand, this should be that time! There are some issues concerning the trial, but all these objections were raised in the Skillicorn case... to no avail.

Leave the legal moves to the lawyers. Let's approach this purely as a moral issue.

THOU SHALT NOT KILL

Every execution brings out the usual social activists. Fr. Carl Kabot OMI went to jail to underscore his opposition to killing Dennis Sillicorn.

Conservative Catholics, PLEASE! Don't just stay home and pray. It's high time we abandon state killing.

EVERYBODY!. We know that you conservative abortion protesters Are pro-life. Write letters! Join the vigils!

Advocacy for California LGBT rights

2009-05-26T16:11:00.001-05:00

Dear Friends of CAN,

Please join CAN this week in working for LGBT Rights.

Please join us tonight (Tuesday 5/26/09) as we gather with Missourians "Show Me No H8" to protest the decision made today in California. The California's Supreme Court decided today to reject marriage as a constitutional right for every citizen of California by allowing Proposition 8 to stand. We will gather this evening from 5:30-7:30 on the steps of City Hall (inside if it rains). We look forward to seeing you there.

Let's alert Archbishop-elect to Missouri's death penalty crisis!

2009-05-26T16:04:00.004-05:00

Dear Friends of CAN,

Please join CAN this week for an end to the Death Penalty in Missouri.

As many of you know a week ago the state of Missouri executed Dennis Skillicorn after a 3 1/2 year hiatus. They also set an execution date for Reggie Clemons. This week please take some time to write a letter to Archbishop-elect Carlson asking him to speak out on the Death Penalty, in specific against the June 17th execution of St. Louisan Reggie Clemons. Attached and below are a letter draft. Use this letter or write your own. Please let CAN know when you have sent a letter. We are hoping to write 500 by Wednesday, June 10th when Archbishop-elect Carlson will be installed as the Archbishop of the Archdiocese of St. Louis. Please give 15 minutes of your time and a 44 cent stamp to this effort. Share the idea with friends and write letters together. For more information on the Church and Capital Punishment views check out http://www.cacp.org/ Please feel free to add to the letter ideas for how the Archbishop can speak out(Press conferences, letter to priests in the dioceses asking them to talk out on this issue, Column in the Review, etc). We truly appreciate your effort!

Check out www.catholicactionnetwork.org for more details!

--
Peace,
Megan Heeney

Catholic Action Network
can@catholicactionnetwork.org
314.766.8713 cell
314.721.2977 work

Archdiocese of St. Louis
Archbishop - elect Robert Carlson
4445 Lindell Blvd.
St. Louis, Mo. 63108

Dear Archbishop-elect Carlson,

Welcome to St. Louis! I am writing to you because as you well know Missouri has begun executing persons after a three and a half year hiatus. We are so grateful for your voice at this crucial time. On June 17th, 2009 Reggie Clemons is sentenced to be executed. Reggie and his family are from North St. Louis, and as the new Archbishop in St. Louis we are hoping that you will courageously speak up and ask the Governor to grant Reggie clemency.

As you well know, "Ending the death penalty would be one important step away from a culture of death and toward building a culture of life.” (A Culture of Life and the Penalty of Death United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, 2005.) Please join us in echoing a resounding no to this culture of death and encourage our state to respect life. We look forward to your voice in these matters.

Thank you!

Sincerely,

Progressives... take a look!

2009-05-25T08:51:00.002-05:00

American Catholic Council is a coalition of organizations, communities and individuals (many involved in American Catholic Church reform) calling for discussion at every level of the Catholic Church in the United States to consider the state and future of our Church. We believe our Church is at another turning point in its history. We recall the promise of the Second Vatican Council for a renaissance through a radically inclusive understanding of the role and responsibilities of all the Baptized and an engaged relationship between the Church and the World reflecting the true meaning of the Incarnation for our times. This promise is eroding. We will reinvigorate the Spirit of Vatican II and bring all the Baptized together to demonstrate our re-commitment. We seek nothing short of a personal conversion of all to create a new Church, fully in tune with the authentic Gospel message, the teachings of our Church, and the American context in which we live. Our reading of the Signs of the Times, our strategic plan, and our agenda are set out in the Declaration set out on this site. We will educate; we will listen; we will facilitate discussions and encounters; and, we will build toward an American Catholic Council at Pentecost 2011.
• • •

Much much more at americancathoilccouncil.org

I can't resist this!

2009-05-23T17:15:00.009-05:00

Every time a conservative blog features a deliberately unflattering image of Marek Bozek or Gerry Kleba I grit my teeth and pull back from the keyboard. But this article from NCR is just too good to pass. I think you will agree that it resonates perfectly with the usual images of a porky former local church leader posing in one of his pretty lace dresses.

Rightsizing the church: physical accountability
May. 11, 2009
By TOM GALLAGHER

(Pat Marrin)

Mission Management

From the fictional Friar Tuck and the saintly Thomas Aquinas to the Blessed but rotund John XXIII, the Catholic imagination recalls many wise and compassionate, if conspicuously overweight, models of wisdom, prudence and compassion. But such corpulence, however endearing in retrospect, can have a decidedly negative impact on the church and its ministries.

Size, it seems, does matter.

In late February, for example, the Siena College Research Institute -- the survey and polling arm of the Albany, N.Y.-based Franciscan school -- released a report that found 44 percent of Empire State residents acknowledge that they are overweight. Less than one-third believe they are in good health and at the correct weight.

The Siena survey found that more than 90 percent of New Yorkers agree that obesity is a serious public health problem and three-quarters (76 percent) have all the information they need in order to eat a nutritious diet. Nearly two-thirds, meanwhile, have had a doctor talk to them about diet, exercise or nutrition.

“When it comes to health, nutrition and exercise, knowing and doing just don’t match up,” said institute director Dr. Don Levy.

When it comes to Christian clergy, the picture is decidedly worse. A 2004 national survey of more than 2,500 religious leaders by Pulpit and Pew, a research project on pastoral leadership based at Duke Divinity School, found that 76 percent of Christian clergy were either overweight or obese, compared with 61 percent of the general population.

The costs are real: Overweight or obese persons can raise group health insurance rates, are more likely to miss work for health reasons, and, when it comes to clergy and other church managers, say some, set a bad example for the work force.

“Influential people ought to live the example that resonates with this survey data, namely, people should take care of themselves,” says Levy.

Siena College practices what it preaches. The school supports a health and wellness program for all of its employees called the “Employee Fitness Challenge,” cosponsored by its Human Resources and Health Services departments.

The multiweek program puts participants on a “Round Trip Passport to Health” that relates good nutrition tips and exercise to a geographical region. An employee in the program, for example, might describe the value of tomatoes, which were first cultivated in South America. Employees are then encouraged to play soccer and to learn about Brazil.

The free program is open to all college employees, who are encouraged to create teams and to compete for prizes.

The key to any program is support from the top of the organization, says Levy. “Employees need to be encouraged to take time to exercise, even during the workday and sometimes an organization needs to dedicate resources to develop and implement such programs,” he said.

And the church is no exception.

“It is a problem and it needs to be addressed by the bishops in each diocese,” Fr. David Toups, a priest of the diocese of St. Petersburg, Fla., told Catholic News Service last year. Toups is associate director for the Secretariat of Clergy, Consecrated Life and Vocations for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

“As the bishops look at accountability of priests, that physical accountability has to be there, for their own well-being and the well-being of the people they tend to,” he said. “It’s about making sure their physical and spiritual needs are being met and about them being credible witnesses for God.”

There is plenty of church teaching to back Toups’ view.

Vincentian Fr. Robert Benson, professor of moral theology at St. John’s Seminary in Camarillo, Calif., cites Pope John Paul II’s “Theology of the Body” to make the case for fitness. “Moral stewardship of the body is not only a negative one (don’t smoke, don’t mutilate the body, don’t use contraceptives, don’t abuse alcohol, don’t use drugs, don’t abuse steroids, don’t engage in risky behavior like drinking and driving, etc.),” he writes. “It also entails a positive mandate, that we are morally responsible to do what is in our power to maintain good health.”

Meanwhile, the Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches, “Life and physical health are precious gifts entrusted to us by God. We must take reasonable care of them, taking into account the needs of others and the common good.”

Tom Gallagher is a regular contributor to NCR. Ideas for a “Mission Management” story? Contact him at tom@tomgallagheronline.com.

Online resources

To read the Siena College Research Institute Report, "Special New York State Health Poll," visit www.siena.edu/sri/research and click on "Archives."

Latest news from CAN

2009-05-23T09:19:00.000-05:00

Hi Friends of Catholic Action Network,

* Join us for Women Led Prayer on Saturday at 9 am at CTSA- 1077 Newstead- hopefully outside in the garden across the street! All are welcome!
* The Missouri Supreme Court set an execution date for Reggie Clemons. His execution has been scheduled for June 17, 2009. Now, more than ever, it is important to alert the public and bring national/international attention Reggie’s case.

- Please call Governor Nixon at 573-751-3222 ask him to grant clemency for Reggie.
- Write to Steve Long, Chair, Board of Probation and Parole, 1511 Christy Drive, Jefferson City, Missouri 65101, FAX (573) 751 - 8501.
- Check out http://www.justiceforreggie.com/ and http://www.moabolition.org/ for more updates.

* Join CAN and Justice and Peace Shares at McGurk's on Saturday June 14th from 4:30-6:30 for Music, Drinks and Appetizers. Suggested donation $10. JPS Shareholders who bring a new shareholder attend free with their guest. Please join us for tunes from another hard time.

* If you are interested in our upcoming book groups: Ivone Gebara's "Longing for Running Water" in late june or Paul Couhtinho's "How Big is Your God" in August please e-mail CAN at can@catholicactionnetwork.org

Check out www.catholicactionnetwork.org for more information.

Have a peaceful weekend!

--
Peace,
Megan Heeney

Catholic Action Network
can@catholicactionnetwork.org
314.766.8713 cell
314.721.2977 work

Bishops urged to restore civility in pro-life efforts

2009-05-11T17:50:00.002-05:00

WASHINGTON

Calling the Obama presidency a new moment in U.S. history, Jesuit Fr. John P. Langan of Georgetown University warned April 27 of a current “three-way impasse” on abortion. He urged U.S. bishops seeking real change to act with caution, pastoral care and “civil respect for those with whom they disagree.”

“The bishops are certainly right to condemn the moral evil of abortion and to warn us against the individualism, selfishness and greed which have had such a devastating effect on American culture and family life as well as on our financial institutions,” he said.

“But if they think they make their witness more credible and more effective by developing a quasi-excommunication of the Democratic Party and by aligning themselves with politicians who think that combining pro-life slogans with American chauvinism and exercising American military power without regard to international criticism constitutes an adequate response to evil in the world, they are sadly mistaken,” he added.

Bishops who try to make abortion the sole or overriding political issue for Catholics are “marginalizing the church’s political influence,” he said.

Langan is Georgetown’s Cardinal Joseph Bernardin professor of Catholic social thought and rector of the university’s Jesuit community. He delivered a carefully nuanced analysis of the Catholic social teaching challenges facing the new Obama administration and the 111th U.S. Congress at a seminar on Capitol Hill, held at the Dirksen Senate Office Building and sponsored by The Catholic University of America’s Life Cycle Institute.

Read the full text at NCRonline.org

So who's complaining?

2009-05-08T15:34:00.002-05:00

The State of Missouri is preparing to execute Dennis Skillicorn May 20. The state is so acting in the name of its citizens... a pathetic few of whom are crying out against this barbarity.

Will we have the appropriate pastoral letter this Sunday? The combined voices of all Catholic citizens would be a powerful force.

Let us hope and pray we will be urged, from the pulpit, to call upon the Governor to stop the killing!

How's that for a progressive church?

2009-05-06T16:36:00.003-05:00

Vatican army 'may recruit women

APRIL 27: Members of the Swiss Guard stand to attention

Women may be allowed to join the exclusive ranks of the world's smallest army, the head of the Vatican's Swiss Guard says.

"I can imagine them for one role or another," Commander Daniel Anrig told Italian television.

Such a move would represent a significant departure from tradition.

The 500-year-old force, devoted to protecting the pope, usually recruits only young, single, Roman Catholic soldiers from Switzerland.

Previously logistical problems, such as the cramped living quarters for the forces, had been cited as an obstacle to allowing women to join.

But Commander Anrig said he believed such problems could be overcome. His predecessors have fiercely opposed such a move.

The comments came on the eve of an annual swearing-in ceremony for new recruits.

The Swiss Guard was founded in 1506 when Swiss mercenaries marched into Rome to serve under Pope Julius II, known as the "warrior pope".

HAIL OUR HEROS!

2009-04-30T17:14:00.004-05:00

Last Monday two brave young women put it all on the line... FOR US. They confronted an evil gang of mercenary thugs coming into our midst.

Carolyn Griffeth an Chrissy Kirchoefer of the St. Louis Catholic Worker Community were among those arrested at the BLACKWATER training site in Northern Illinois. A large number of concerned citizens gathered at the gate of the BLACKWATER complex where they asked the Illinois State Police to assist in foreclosing the property on grounds of MORAL BANKRUPTCY.

When the police declined to help, twenty-two of the protesters entered the complex and were arrested. One newspaper headline referred to the peaceful group "POLITE TRESPASSERS"

Video of the event is available at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_J8tPbUrPgY

URGENT... STOP THE EXECUTION!

2009-04-28T15:19:00.002-05:00

Dennis Skillicorn is scheduled to be executed May 20.

Log onto moabolition.org/slillicorn.php for details.

Offer prayers for Dennis in your parish.

Be ready to join anti-death penalty demonstrations and actions as they are organized.

Earth Day

2009-04-22T17:21:00.002-05:00

God gave us the earth.

All of us.

To share.

People are starving.

Why?

Catholic Action Network news

2009-04-14T07:52:00.002-05:00

Hi Friends of CAN,

Happy Easter!

* Join us this weekend for Women Led Prayer. Saturday, April 18th, 9 am at CTSA (1077 S Newstead). All are welcome. Please join us and bring friends.

* Tuesday, April 21st, at 5:30 pm join Instead of War to hear testimonies from soldiers and Marines who have witnessed firsthand the devastation in Iraq and Afghanistan. Winter Soldier will take place at the Friends Meeting House at 1001 Park Ave. For more information see www.insteadofwar.org.

* Fr. Louie Vitale will be speaking on "A Non-Violent Response to Terrorism"- Monday, April 27th at 7 pm in the Busch Student Center, St. Louis University, Ballroom 173 (downstairs) Fr. Louie will explore alternatives to our current policies of killing and torturing terrorists, thereby inciting others to join terrorist organizations. He will discuss how nonviolence can be used as a much more effective response to terrorism.

* Are you interested in receiving "The Burning Bush," CAN's quarterly publication? If you are not currently receiving the publication and are interested please let us know. E-mail can@catholicactionnetwork.org with your mailing address.

Thanks!

--
Peace,
Megan Heeney

Catholic Action Network
can@catholicactionnetwork.org
314.766.8713 cell
314.721.2977 work

Add your voice...

2009-04-11T08:40:00.002-05:00

Many of you on this elist have signed the powerful and beautifully
written,

CATHOLIC WORKER STATEMENT CALLING FOR CONFESSION OF AND REPENTANCE FOR HETEROSEXISM

that came about as a result of the Vatican's refusal to support the safety of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people through out the world.

http://www.desmoinescatholicworker.org/repentingheterosexism.html

Soulforce http://www.soulforce.org/ has been in dialogue with the
Papal Nuncio to the United Nations for some time now, hoping to help
them understand the damage the Vatican has done with this and other
statements that demean and deminish LGBTs. Over the last decade their
rhetoric and actions have only increased and the Church has become the
major proponent of anti-gay legislation throughout the world.

We are coming together from all over the country in NYC April 21-23 to
further the communication concerning the consistent antigay language
and actions of the Vatican. At the same time, there will also be
local solidarity actions in Little Rock, , Dallas, Phoenix, Detroit,
Los Angeles, New Haven, and St. Louis. Soulforce invites you to
join us in NYC or any of the other cities in helping to change hearts
and minds one person at a time and to become the "change we seek."

To register for our NYC action or to find out more about local actions
in your area, I invite you to check out our website,

http://www.soulforce.org/catholic-action

Kara Speltz
5375 Manila Ave #404
Oakland CA 94618
kara4peace(at)aol.com

Are women safe anywhere in the church?

2009-04-02T15:52:00.003-05:00

Madison Bishop Morlino has taken a broad swipe at organizations that recognize women as full members in good standing in the human race.

In a bit of hysterics aimed at justifying his firing of Ruth Kolpack, The bishop named Call To Action and FutureChurch "anti-Catholic organizations".

Sweeping between the pews is probably still open to women, as long as they cover their heads and stay out of the sanctuary.

Add your name to very worthy cause!

2009-03-31T10:12:00.001-05:00

In 2008, a group of Costa Rican human rights activists, along with Father Roy Bourgeois and Lisa Sullivan, met with Costa Rica's President Oscar Arias, a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize for his valiant efforts to promote peace in Central America. When Father Roy asked that President Arias honor the martyrs of Central America by withdrawing Costa Rican police from the SOA, Arias responded "it is done." A few weeks later, however, the U.S. ambassador asked Costa Rica's Security Minister to reconsider this decision, and he agreed. Costa Rican citizens are outraged at Arias for backtracking on his promise. They have launched a campaign to remind Arias of his promise to withdraw Costa Ricans from the SOA and have asked citizens of other countries to join their voices, noting that Arias gives high value to his reputation as a world peacemaker.

The link below will send your message to President Arias.

http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/727/t/3823/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=26964

Civility, respect should be our aim Give Benedict the benefit of the doubt

2009-03-30T16:31:00.000-05:00

Mar. 30, 2009
By Nicholas P. Cafardi

It was hard not to be moved by Pope Benedict XVI's recent cri de coeur on the Catholic world's reaction to his remission of the excommunication of the Holocaust-denying Bishop Richard Williamson. "I was saddened by the fact that even Catholics who, after all, might have had a better knowledge of the situation, thought they had to attack me with open hostility," the Holy Father wrote in a letter to all the bishops in the world.

A lot of the criticism of the pope's action came from the United States: bishops, priests and laity alike. Welcome to the politics of the American church, Holy Father.

Yet we would be missing something much deeper were we not to pay attention to the Holy Father's point: Why would his fellow Catholics presume his bad faith? Why would they, who know him better, not give him the benefit of the doubt?

As the vitriol of the last presidential campaign proves, we in the American church have forgotten how to give our fellow Catholics the benefit of the doubt. Those Catholics who supported the Democratic ticket for what they honestly believed were social-justice concerns consistent with Catholic teaching were pilloried by a vocal portion of the Catholic pro-life movement for deserting the cause, as if there was only one way to be pro-life.

A few weeks ago, a U.S. senator, a convert to Catholicism, sponsored a letter distributed by a supposedly Catholic think tank claiming that a number of his fellow Catholic senators -- whom the letter named -- could no longer be considered good Catholics because of their votes on issues on which the senator (or whoever the author of the letter was) claimed that there was only one orthodox Catholic way to vote.

There is even a Web site where American Catholics can sign a petition to the U.S. bishops to withhold the Eucharist from "prominent Catholics in public life" who don't vote on political issues as these Catholics think they should.

We all need to take a lesson from the Holy Father. Yes, one could malevolently interpret his lifting of Williamson's excommunication as support for the bishop's Holocaust denial. Or one could give the Holy Father the benefit of the doubt and think he had perfectly valid ecclesiastical reasons -- like ending a bothersome schism -- for what he did.

It is not moral relativism to say that the complex world of church schisms or American politics is not a world of either/or but a world of both/and. We live in a world of shadings and nuances. And when folks don't act exactly the way we are politically or ecclesially disposed to act ourselves -- even when it is the Holy Father, or especially when it is the Holy Father -- it is almost always a good idea, one might even say a Christian idea, not to presume the worst and jump to a personal attack on the person's motives and character. As Pope Benedict himself said to the priests of Rome, "Catholicism has always been considered the religion of the great 'et et' ['both/and']: not of great forms of exclusivism but of synthesis."

Fundamentalism, political or theological, has no place in the Catholic church, and when we use such standards to judge one another, we are simply being self-destructive. Or, as Pope Benedict concludes his letter to the world's bishops, quoting Galatians: "For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' But if you bite and devour one another, take heed that you are not consumed by one another."

Nicholas P. Cafardi is a civil and canon lawyer, and a professor and former dean at Duquesne University School of Law in Pittsburgh.

Bishop John Michael Botean

2009-03-30T12:57:00.002-05:00

Look him up! A spiritual leader we can admire and follow.

While our politicians beat their war drums, Bishop Botean wrote the only pastoral letter criticizing the impending war in Iraq.

SOME BAD NEWS

2009-03-27T08:03:00.002-05:00

The Pope is going to have to dig deeper.

Burke's 'Rule by fear' approach to church affairs is still news, and his Rush Limbaugh style is an embarrassment to us all.

There must be some bureau in Vatican City even more irrelevant than the court where Archbishop Burke has been banished. Perhaps he could be assigned somewhere The Grand Silence is observed.

And some good news!

2009-03-27T08:01:00.000-05:00

Orkney MP campaigning for death row man

Orkney MP, Alistair Carmichael, is visiting Tokyo this week, to campaign with Amnesty International in highlighting the case of a man on death row.

The man, Hakamada Iwao, has been in custody for almost 43 years, including 29 years in solitary confinement on death row.

While in Japan, Mr Carmichael is meeting with Judge Kumamoto Norimichi, Mr Iwao's sister, lawyers, politicians and justice department officials, to talk about Mr Iwao's case.

Mr Carmichael said: "I have been involved in a number of death penalty cases over the years. I have never, however, known one where one of the trial judges has been prepared to state publicly that he believed the accused to be innocent."

OOPS...

2009-03-25T08:32:00.003-05:00

Bishop D'Arcy's boycott of the Notre Dame graduation almost slipped by.

Of course no bishop should lend his presence to an event at a Catholic institution that supports war by hosting ALL BRANCHES OF ROTC!

Unfortunately, that is not his motive.

Finally... Jesus must be smiling!

2009-03-19T09:37:00.001-05:00

Dear Friends,

Today, March 18, 2009, is Death Penalty Abolition Day in New Mexico!

Just minutes ago, New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson signed into law the bill to repeal the death penalty in that state. New Mexico has become the second state since 1965 to legislatively abolish the death penalty. I know you will join me in applauding and congratulating Governor Richardson and the people of New Mexico for taking this important step.

Today marks the culmination of a campaign that started more than ten years ago in New Mexico. To everyone who had a hand in today's success, we at the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty offer our thanks and our congratulations.

While we celebrate this important victory for human rights, let us not forget that ours is an issue rooted in tragedy, pain and suffering. Please take a moment to reflect on or pray for the families who have lost loved ones to murder, for the families of those accused and facing punishment for the crime of murder, for the members of law enforcement who must deal with the aftermath of murder, and yes, for those condemned to death, guilty or not.

Today, I ask you to take two important actions.
#1: Please take a few minutes to mail a hand written note of thanks to Governor Richardson. What he did was both just and proper, and he needs to know that his action is appreciated.

Governor Bill Richardson
Office of the Governor
490 Old Santa Fe Trail, Room 400
Santa Fe, NM 87501

#2: There is so much more work to be done. Thirty-five states still have the death penalty. As we did in New Mexico, the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty is working to ensure that effective and strategic campaigns are in place across the nation. With your help, we can do more. Please make a generous contribution today to help NCADP continue to be a useful partner to the efforts of our affiliates, the folks who are on the front lines every day in this struggle. Your support makes it happen.

A few additional thoughts....

Visit our web page (http://www.ncadp.org) to see NCADP's official statement on Abolition in New Mexico.

Visit NCADP's blog at http://www.ncadp.org/blog.cfm to see related posts, including the comments NCADP Director of Affiliate Support, Abe Bonowitz, who worked very closely with our New Mexico affiliate in the work that culminated in today's events.

Check out NCADP on Twitter and Facebook

And finally,

Thank you.

Diann Rust-Tierney
Executive Director

Another rogue bishop!

2009-03-17T10:13:00.000-05:00

Our church speaks about justice for workers, but has no policies to protect its own church workers. Ruth Kolpack, a pastoral worker for 26 years, was fired by Bishop Morlino of Madison yesterday because she would not renounce her seminary degree's master's thesis on inclusive language!

Please write to the Papal Nuncio today! See address at right.

Support Ruth and the more than 30,000 other Catholic lay ministers in our country who can be fired at any time by a priest or bishop without due process!

We are pursuing options for Ruth but in the meantime, our canon lawyer has encouraged us to send hundreds of letters to the Papal Nuncio, the Vatican's Representative in the U.S. He keeps files of the letters he receives and passes the information along to the Vatican. In the long term, this raises the issue of church worker justice in the eyes of the Vatican. Please see the information at right for his address.

If you live in Wisconsin, please consider joining CTA/Madison at local protest vigils this weekend to show your support for Ruth and the thousands of men and women like her who give their lives to our church.

With hope for the rights of church workers,

Call To Action Staff

P.S. Don't forget to write the Papal Nuncio or attend one of the local vigils! See info. at right.

2009-03-16T20:21:00.001-05:00

“Stations of the Cross” of Racism
• Sunday, April 5th, Palm Sunday, from 1 PM until 4 PM
• Meet at the Evangelical UCC parking lot, 204 East Lockwood, St. Louis, MO 63119
• This will be a prayerful bus tour of places in and around St. Louis associated with slavery and segregation. We can call these places the “footprints of racism.” These tell-tale places will be opportunities for us to prayerfully recall the events that happened there and to pray and recommit ourselves to the Reign of God, where the dignity of each person is acknowledged.
• I will be leading the tour and would be grateful if you accompanied me.
• There are enough spaces for over 30 people. I am asking for an offering of $10 per person to cover the expenses of the bus (a little over $300). Please don’t let this be an obstacle to your coming if you cannot afford it. Please come and give what you can.
• Thanks. Your brother, Frank Krebs, Pastor, Sts. Clare & Francis.
• Please RSVP your intentions at fekrebs@msn.com .

Perhaps bishops should be seen... not heard.

2009-03-16T13:00:00.002-05:00

Church credibility harmed by 'hasty' excommunication
Vatican official says girl who had abortion should have been defended

Mar. 16, 2009
By Carol Glatz, Catholic News Service

Brazilian Archbishop Jose Cardoso Sobrinho said an abortion performed on a 9-year-old girl raped by her stepfather was "a crime in the eyes of the church." (CNS photo)
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VATICAN CITY -- A 9-year-old Brazilian girl and the doctors who performed the girl's abortion needed the Catholic Church's care and concern, not its condemnation, said a leading Vatican official.

Archbishop Rino Fisichella, president of the Pontifical Academy for Life, criticized what he called a "hasty" public declaration of the excommunication of the girl's mother and the doctors who aborted the girl's twins.

The girl "in the first place should have been defended, hugged and held tenderly to help her feel that we were all on her side" he wrote in the Vatican newspaper, L'Osservatore Romano, March 15.

"Before thinking about excommunication, it was necessary and urgent to protect her innocent life and bring her back to a level of humanity of which we men of the church should be expert witnesses and teachers," he said.

"Unfortunately, this is not what happened and it has impacted the credibility of our teaching, which appears in the eyes of many as insensitive, incomprehensible and devoid of mercy," he said.

Doctors at a hospital in Recife, Brazil, performed an abortion March 4 on the girl, who weighed a little more than 66 pounds and reportedly had been raped repeatedly by her stepfather from the time she was 6 years old. Abortion in Brazil is illegal except in cases of rape or if the mother's life is in danger.

After the abortion, Archbishop Jose Cardoso Sobrinho of Olinda and Recife said it was "a crime in the eyes of the church" and that human laws can never override the laws of God.

He told a Brazilian newspaper that, while it was true the child ran health risks if she continued the pregnancy, "the end does not justify the means. The good aim of saving her life cannot justify the killing of two other lives."

The Vatican's prefect of the Congregation for Bishops, Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, said excommunication against those responsible for the abortion was legitimate.

In an interview with the Italian newspaper La Stampa March 7, the cardinal underlined that according to canon law anyone who procures an abortion incurs automatic excommunication, meaning there is no need for an official decree from church authorities.

However, canon law indicates several conditions -- for example, not yet having turned 17 years old -- that would render an individual exempt from the penalty of excommunication.

The church officials' statements puzzled Brazilian Catholics and were criticized in the media. Many priests were called upon by their parishioners to explain the church's position. Nongovernmental organizations criticized the fact that the stepfather would not be excommunicated.

Fisichella criticized the way Archbishop Sobrinho handled the situation.

"Only because the archbishop of Olinda and Recife hastily declared the excommunication of the doctors" did this story of despicable, yet all too common, violence against girls and women make newspaper headlines, he said.

Fisichella said that because of the Brazilian girl's young age and her "precarious state of health her life was in serious danger" by continuing the pregnancy.

"How should one act in these cases?" he asked, underlining that the girl's case represented an "arduous decision for doctors and moral law itself."

Doctors deserve respect for the difficult decisions they must often grapple with, he said, adding that no one nonchalantly makes life-and-death decisions and to even suggest it "is unjust and offensive."

He said the Catholic principle that upholds the sanctity of life is unshakeable and "abortion has always been condemned by moral law as an intrinsically evil act."

However, because excommunication is incurred automatically at the moment a direct abortion is carried out, "there was no need to declare with such urgency and publicity a fact that occurred automatically," he said.

Fisichella said the church can still be firm with its moral principles and at the same time reach out and show mercy toward others.

He told the young girl in his written article: "We are on your side. We feel your suffering and we would like to do everything that would help you restore the dignity that you have been deprived of and the love that you will still need.

"There are others who deserve excommunication and our forgiveness, not those who have allowed you to live and who will help you regain hope and trust despite the presence of evil and the wickedness of many people," he said.

At a press conference at the Brazilian bishops' conference headquarters in Brasilia March 12, church officials seemed to backpedal on Archbishop Sobrinho's comments.

Sobrinho "did not excommunicate anyone," but simply cited the norms that exist in canon law, said Auxiliary Bishop Dimas Lara Barbosa of Rio de Janeiro, secretary-general of the Brazilian bishops' conference.

Archbishop Geraldo Lyrio Rocha of Mariana, president of the bishops' conference, said to reduce the issue to a simple question of excommunication was to push to the back burner the issue of violence against children, which needs to be discussed by the country. This year the bishops' annual Lenten fraternity campaign, "Fraternity and Public Security," addresses domestic violence as a source of insecurity among Brazilian women and children.

At the press conference, Archbishop Rocha said: "Rape is such a repugnant act that the church does not need to call attention to it. Abortion, however, is not seen as such by some, and that is the reason for excommunication: not only to punish but to show those who practiced the act the gravity of their deeds."

(Contributing to this story was Lise Alves in Brazil.)

2009-03-14T09:52:00.001-05:00

Is Homophobia More Prevalent than Racism?

by Michael A. Jones

Published March 09, 2009 @ 07:18PM PST

Racism and homophobia

Do people harbor more negative feelings toward LGBT people than they do toward people of specific races or ethnicities? According to the British Psychological Society’s Division of Occupational Psychology, the answer is yes.

But is this a destructive question to ask? I think the answer is yes. More on that in a paragraph or two, but first, here are the findings of the study.

* 35 percent of those surveyed revealed negative attitudes toward gay men;

* 41 percent held prejudicial attitudes toward lesbians;

* 28 percent held negative attitudes toward Asians;

* 25 percent held negative attitudes toward Black populations;

* 18 percent held negative attitudes toward Southeast Asians

These conclusions led one of the researchers, Pete Jones (no relation!), to say: "Without detracting from the seriousness of the prejudice that still exists against people because of their ethnic origin, the results of our study suggest that being gay or lesbian could be ‘the new black' when it comes to being a victim of prejudice."

It's certainly worthwhile to survey the prejudices and stereotypes that exist regarding sexual orientation and race. But isn't it slightly destructive to compare the two (racism and homophobia), and to label homophobia "the new black"? To me, that seems dismissive of the racist attitudes and behavior that people of color face in a myriad of ways, and suggests that racism is a bit easier than homophobia.

LGBT rights should certainly be considered part of the civil rights struggle. But homophobia and racism shouldn't be in a competition to outdo the other. Both deserved to be condemned equally.

Vatican lipservice to women in Women's History Month

2009-03-11T15:53:00.003-05:00

Roy Bourgeois with Aisha S. Taylor and Erin Saiz Hanna

from NCR Mar. 11, 2009

By Aisha S. Taylor and Erin Saiz Hanna

In an infuriating combination of events, the Vatican rang in Women’s History Month by once again paying lip service to women’s equality while showing its true colors. The day before Pope Benedict XVI called for increased commitment to women’s dignity, a Vatican official announced his support for the excommunications of the mother and doctors of a nine-year-old girl who had an abortion after being raped by her stepfather.

In Brazil, abortion is illegal except in cases of rape or when a woman’s life is in danger, and both stipulations were fulfilled in this heartbreaking case. The doctors determined that the girl, who weighed only eighty pounds, would not survive this pregnancy. The girl’s 23-year-old stepfather admitted to sexually abusing her for several years, and he is also suspected of abusing her physically disabled 14-year-old sister. He has since been arrested and placed in protective custody.

Last Saturday, Cardinal Giovanni Battista, prefect of the Congregation for Bishops and president of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America, defended the excommunications first announced by Archbishop Jose Cardoso Sobrinho, the girl’s local archbishop. The very next day, on March 8—International Women’s Day—Pope Benedict stated, “Today's date invites us to reflect on … our commitment that always and everywhere every woman can live and fully manifest her particular abilities, obtaining complete respect for her dignity."

How can this egregious hypocrisy even be possible?

Excommunicating this child’s mother and doctors, who, in good conscience, saved this girl’s life is the exact opposite of displaying “complete respect for her dignity.” It is inexcusable and appalling. The church had the opportunity to show pastoral care to a family torn apart by violence. Instead, they intensified the pain, trauma and injustice in what can only be called spiritual violence.

This is a prime example of the devastating impact that the hierarchy’s cultural influence often has on women. When it comes to women’s issues, this type of hypocrisy – on a less horrific scale – is the norm in the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church.

At a time when the pope endangered 40 years of Catholic-Jewish dialogue by lifting the excommunication of a bishop who is a Holocaust denier, and amid revelations that the founder of the Legion of Christ, Fr. Marcial Maciel Degollado, was not only a pedophile but also the father of at least one child, the Vatican decided to launch an “apostolic visitation” to investigate women’s religious communities in the US.

These recent developments are part of an all-too-familiar pattern. In the past year, women and men who publicly support increasing women’s roles in the church have been penalized and excommunicated, under the same automatic and self-imposed penalty that the mother and doctors in Brazil supposedly incurred.

Fr. Roy Bourgeois’ threat of excommunication is still pending for his participation in a woman’s ordination. Sr. Louise Lears, a Sister of Charity who has dedicated her life to serving the church, was penalized by Archbishop Raymond Burke of St. Louis for attending the ordination of two Roman Catholic women.

Last May, on the feast of Joan of Arc, the Vatican excommunicated over 60 Catholic women for prophetically obeying their calls to ordination and being ordained by bishops who claim apostolic succession. The hierarchy is using the Sacraments as a weapon, and it is not working.

We have heard many of these brave people tell their story, and it is clear that their communities embrace them, and their message is coming across loud and clear: they cannot work for justice in society without also working for justice within their church.

While ordained men obliterate their only remaining shred of moral credibility, the Catholic women who run soup kitchens, schools, hospitals, homeless shelters, and numerous social justice ministries face investigation or excommunication. It is contrary to the gospel itself to excommunicate people who are doing good works and responding to injustice and the needs of their communities. While the hierarchy prattles on about excommunication, Catholic women are working for justice and making a positive difference in the world.

While the problems of the hierarchy are complex and there are numerous issues that need to be addressed, it is hard to imagine that the current situation would be possible if women were included in the decision making structures of the church. Because women are banned from ordination to the priesthood, they are excluded from most church governance positions.

If Catholic women were fully included in the leadership of the church at all levels, we truly believe the hierarchy would not be able to shield sexual predators in its own ranks, while shaming and condemning the victims of sexual abuse on the other side of the pulpit.

At a time when there is a specific and intentional focus on promoting women’s equality, with the International Women’s Day just last weekend and the 53rd United Nations Commission on the Status of Women taking place in New York right now, it would have been a welcome change to see the Vatican demonstrate the increased commitment to the dignity of women for which it called.

Unfortunately, in the case of the young girl in Brazil, even remaining silent would have been more decent than the chosen response of the local bishop and senior Vatican cleric. Going further, the girl, her mother and Catholic women everywhere should be able to count on their spiritual leaders to provide pastoral care and to work toward ending violence against women and sexual abuse of children in their communities.

If the Vatican put its considerable resources behind its statements about women—and modeled equality within its own structures—perhaps then the hierarchy would actually be able to contribute to promoting dignity for women. Until this happens, their inability to understand the realities of women’s lives will continue to shine a bright light on the fact that the hierarchy is much more versed in hypocrisy.

Aisha S. Taylor is the Executive Director and Erin Saiz Hanna is the Assistant Director of the Women’s Ordination Conference (WOC). For more information, visit the: Women's Ordination Website

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French archbishop scoops 'Macho of the Year' award

2009-03-11T13:33:00.002-05:00

Fri Mar 6, 10:37 am ET
French archbishop scoops 'Macho of the Year' award AFP/File – A French feminist group awarded its "Macho of the Year" award Friday to the archbishop of Paris …

PARIS (AFP) – A French feminist group awarded its "Macho of the Year" award Friday to the archbishop of Paris for his remark that women needed not just a skirt but "something between your ears as well".

Les Chiennes de garde (literally "The Guard Bitches"), one of France's most outspoken women's groups, made the award two days ahead of International Women's Day.

Cardinal Andre Vingt-Trois made his prize winning remark about the difficulties of recruiting women to jobs in the Roman Catholic Church last November on a radio programme, sparking a string of protests.

"The hard part is finding women who are properly trained. It's not enough to have a skirt, you have to have something between your ears as well," he said.

He later apologised for the comments, explaining that what he had meant was "that people are not accepted into the Church depending on their gender but on their personal ability".