Intermission

I am going on holiday, first of all to Verona, then onto Rome for Aaron Spinnelli's ordination to the diaconate.
THERE WILL BE AN INTERMISSION UNTIL 18TH JULY,
if you comment, it will have wait until I return unless I can get to a computer.

pray for Aaron and all who are or have been ordained recently

Bonfire of Erotica and Eric Gill

The zeal of converts is very impressive. One of the people I instructed some years ago invited me to a bonfire party, prior to his first confession, his wife and I were the only guests. He asked me to bless the fire. He had a serious addiction to pornography, he and his wife threw his entire collection into flames, piece by piece. His collection wasn't just the top shelf magazine kind but the nineteenth and twentieth century etchings and lithographs, they were on his study wall and there books as well and early photographs, all went into fire, thousands of pounds worth of it in todays money. I was edified by the firmness of his purpose of amendment.
At the end he asked me to put up a print of the Sacred Heart where these had been.

Among the things that were destroyed that day were some of Eric Gill's erotic etchings.

Since the revelations of Gill's incestuous relationships, I have felt uneasy about his work, his sense of line is enticing but I can't seperate the man from the art. With the first revelations of child abuse by Catholic clergy about 8 or 9 years ago there was a call to remove the Gill stations of the Cross from Westminster Cathedral, I really can't seperate the life of the artist from the art he produced. The same hands and mind that wrought these works also thought and acting in such a way that Christianity regards as mortally sinful. In Gill's case there was no firm purpose of amendment. When I look at Gill's Stations it is not the passion of Christ I see but the suffering of Gill's victims and of others who have been abused. I think they should be removed.

Daniel of the Lion and the Cardinal in a post entitled "On Art and the Artist", questions the relationship of the artist and his work, and Gill in particular.

Those 99 Names

Monsignor Langham has at last put up a post on his blogsite on the 99 Names concert, and to be fair to him pictures of the protest outside the Cathedral.

Zimbabwe: archbishop calls for overthrow of government

Bulwayo, Jul. 2, 2007 (CWNews.com) - Archbishop Pius Ncube of Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, has openly called for the overthrow of the government led by President Robert Mugabe.
In an interview with the Sunday Times of London the archbishop said: "I think that it is justified for Britain to raid Zimbabwe and remove Mugabe."
Archbishop Ncube later told BBC that while he suggested intervention by Great Britain, the former colonial ruler of the African country, he could justify action by any other power to ease the suffering of the people of Zimbabwe. Some action is required, he said, to oust "a government which is ready to sacrifice the lives of its people."
"We have to choose between two evils," the archbishop explained. He said that Zimbabwe is facing a desperate situation, with widespread crop failures aggravating an economic disaster that has seen the annual inflation rate rise toward 15,000%.
Archbishop Ncube, the most outspoken critic of President Mugabe, places the blame for the economic disaster squarely on the government. He notes that the Mugabe regime is spending millions on domestic surveillance programs to monitor political opposition, and drawing millions more from the impoverished financial system in graft. The Catholic bishops' conference of Zimbabwe has denounced the regime for pervasive corruption.
Archbishop Ncube has said in the past that he is prepared to face death in order to bring about change in his country. Now he told the Sunday Times, "I'm ready to lead the people, guns blazing."
However, the archbishop admitted that the people are not prepared to rise up against the incumbent regime. He argued that public apathy is the result of Mugabe's successful efforts to intimidate political opponents. "You can't mobilize when one out of every 10 Zimbabweans is a spy for Mugabe," he told BBC.

The Cult

Raymond Blake -- [noun]: A person of questionable sanity who starts their own cult 'How will you be defined in the dictionary?' at QuizGalaxy.com

sat/tip Mac for this piece of amusing trivia

I am a bit worried about the cult business, one needs a degree of insanity to be a city centre priest but I am worried The Cult.

One or two of my female parishioners have pictures of me, not a cult I started or encouraged. I am worried that there has been a spate of "lost" cats locally, I fear it all started with the blogpic of me. I refused to put a picture up for ages and then found a dreadful one someone had posted in a magazine for Brighton's unemployed and thought better to make one available.

Pagan priestesses and witchcraft are very Brighton thing.

I think Mac is wise with the back view, especially if one cares for cats: no picture, no cult and the pussy cat sees another day.

Whoever belongs to the truth shall never be slave to any power

Fulfilling God’s will, in Benedict XVI’s words, “filled freedom with content, which would otherwise just be an ‘empty’ possibility to do or not do something.” The Holy Father appeals for the release of those held captive as he reflects upon the fate of the regional lawmakers killed in Colombia.

(AsiaNews) – “The truth shall set you free,” John Paul II’s most evangelical and dearest sentence, sounded again today in the words Benedict XVI spoke when he addressed 40,000 or so faithful who had gathered for the Angelus to remember all those who whilst suffering persecution remain free because “whomever belongs to the truth shall never be slave to any power.”
A day after the publication of his Letter to the Church of China with the Pope making no reference to it, those who heard him speak knew that it was about that country that he was talking when he mentioned those who suffer or have suffered for their faithfulness to Jesus.
Starting with the readings for Sunday mass, Benedict XVI before the Marian prayer dedicated his thoughts to man’s freedom, especially religious freedom.
Commenting Luke’s words “When the days for his being taken up were fulfilled, he resolutely determined to journey to Jerusalem” (Lk 9:51), the Pope stressed how in “the expression ‘resolutely’ we can see Christ’s freedom. He knows that death on the cross is waiting for him in Jerusalem but in obeying the Father’s will he offers himself out of love. And it is in this act of obedience that Jesus realises his own freedom as a conscious choice that was moved by love. Who is freer than him if not the Almighty? He has not lived his freedom as will or dominion but as service. This way he ‘filled’ freedom with content, which would otherwise be just an ‘empty’ possibility to do or not do something. Like man’s own life, freedom makes sense from love. Who is freer? Who keeps all the possibilities for fear of losing them as opposed to devoting himself ‘resolutely’ to serve others and so is full of life because of the love he has given and received?”
“Christian freedom is the opposite of arbitrariness,” the Pope said. “It is to follow Christ by giving oneself till the sacrifice on the Cross. It might seem a paradox, but the Lord experienced his utmost freedom on the Cross, as the summit of love.”
“Many other witnesses to the truth have shared this experience,” he added; “men and women who have shown that one can remain free even in a prison cell or under the threat of torture. ‘The truth shall set you free.’ Whoever belongs to the truth shall never be slave to any power, but shall always freely know how to serve his brothers.”
After the Angelus, Benedict XVI spoke about the “sad news of the barbaric murder of 11 regional lawmakers in Colombia’s Valle del Cauca department, who were in the hands of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia for more than five years. Whilst I raise prayers to intercede for them, I join in the deep sorrow felt by their families and the beloved Colombian nation, once more touched by fratricidal hatred. I renew my heartfelt appeal that abductions be stopped and that all those who are currently victims of such inadmissible forms of violence be returned to the affection of their beloved.”

Traditional Mass:reaction

This rather shocking German woodcut, which I think is Lutheran origin, appeared in the Jerusalem Post in an article on the restoration of the Traditional Mass.

What is being restored is 1962 the Missal of the Blessed John XIII. Pius XII had alredy removed the one prayer in the whole Missal which might have been understood as being anti-Semitic. It occurred on Good Friday, and used the word "perfide" when speaking of the Jewish people meaning, unbelieving or resillient to belief, it spoke of Jews not believing in Christ and therefore being in darkness. Pope Pius changed the prayer to speak about praying for the Jewish people, who first believed in the one God, which is what we use in both the Traditional and Modern forms today.

It seems extremely odd and dishonest that Anti-Semitism is being used to attack the forthcoming Motu Proprio. I understand the wretched Tablet did that last week. It seems to be something Cardinal Walter Kaspar raised a month or so ago, was he the first?

Can any shed light on the origin of this story? It seems pretty disgraceful and lacking in any foundation except for ignorance and poor research.