Modern(ish) Ultramontanes

picture from here

I was struck by the thought: those who call for women's ordination are shockingly ultramontane.
I mean they think the Church is the Pope's fiefdom, as if he invents 2000 years of Tradition, as if the demand of something being believed "always and everywhere" could exist in the Pope's head.
The Pope is the servant of Tradition and the Church not its master.

Geopolitical epicentre of the culture of death

Google "hedonistic wasteland" and you get 6,500 entries, most of which are a reaction to Edmund Adamus's interview on Zenit. The purveyors of the hedonistic wasteland are objecting strongly.
Adamus is the director of pastoral affairs in the diocese of Westminster and the pastoral adviser to the Archbishop of Westminster, apparently His Grace is distancing himself from Adamus' remarks, well as they used to say in Brum, "You have to take the smooth with the smooth with Vin". I am not criticising, an adviser is there to advise and after taking advice Bishops should make their own statements.

Adamus blamed Parliament for allowing the country to become "the geopolitical epicentre of the culture of death".
Here are some quotes:

"Whether we like it or not, as British citizens and residents of this country ... Britain, and in particular London, has been and is the geopolitical epicentre of the culture of death."

"...the most permissively anti-life and progressively anti-family and marriage, in essence one of the most anti-Catholic landscapes, culturally speaking – more even than those places where Catholics suffer open persecution."

The Church needs to "exhibit counter-cultural signals against the selfish, hedonistic wasteland that is the objectification of women for sexual gratification".

He said "permissive laws advancing the 'gay' agenda" were one example of how Britain had become such a "wasteland".

Dull ol' Liberals like Ma "P" might go round suggesting that the default position in most parishes is quiet acquiescence to the status quo but I find it exhilarating that the diocese of Westminster employs people like Adamus, not every employee of the Bishop's of England and Wales is an Oona Stannard or a Greg Pope.

Redemptorist Publications Promote Women's Ordination

Redemptorist Publications has brought pressure on The Bones to remove quotations from Celebrating the Papal Visit Your spiritual companion, one of their publications which contains a very odd piece about a woman's experience of sex education -or lack of it- in a Catholic School and then talks about women's ordination,  the article then gives a link to the Women's Ordination website.

Pope John Paul II taught quite conclusively that there can be no open debate about the ordination of women because the Church does not have authority to ordain women, it is not a power which Christ has given his Church. In fact the Church sees the attempted ordination of women such a threat to the Church's unity that those who take an active part in any such ceremony are cut off from communion with the Church.

I have asked Redemptorist Publications to explain why it is promoting the ordination of women and so far received a reply, why don't you try?
You could even contact Father Joseph P. Dorcey, C.Ss.R., The Secretary General of the Redemptorists  seg.gen@cssr.com and ask: why are the Redemptorists promoting women's ordination and why this publication has been sent to every parish in the country.

Britain Can Benefit from Benedict

Here is a tiny extract of a George Weigael article "Britain Can Benefit from Benedict" in Standpoint.

The Catholic Church, Benedict XVI believes, can be one of those "creative minorities" in 21st- century Europe and indeed throughout the West. To be that, the Church must regain a clear sense of its own identity, primarily through a resacralisation of its worship. It must recover a firm grasp on the truths it proposes, putting behind it the "liberalism" in religion that John Henry Newman deplored. It must raise up a generation of bishops and priests who are persuasive evangelists and witnesses, according to the model established by John Paul II. It must demonstrate, not so much by argument as by sanctity and beauty, that it offers the men and women of today a path on which they can encounter "that which holds the world together."

And to do all of that, the Church must purge itself of its corruptions, a point on which Pope Benedict has been insistent for years, most recently in regard to the appalling defaults of Irish Catholicism. This will take some time, given the density of clerical culture and the fact that popes are not, pace media distortions, absolute monarchs who can effect massive institutional change at the click of a finger. It will probably take more time than Anglophone cultures will like, given the still-languid, Italianate ways of the Vatican. No one should doubt, however, that Benedict XVI understands that, for the Church to become the "creative minority" of his imagination, it must be a credible minority that lives the truths it proclaims and deals decisively with those in its midst who betray the trust given them.

Naughty but nicer

Vincenzo has come up with an alternative sanctuary design for Crofton Park. I am sure I'll get in trouble for saying it but I think I prefer Vincenzo version.

The Evil of Conservatism

The reputation of  Godfried Cardinal Danneels lies in ruins - read this from Reuters.

Paedophilia is one thing, cover up is another. The problem seems to be bishops thinking of the Church of Jesus Christ in the same way as the directors of Enron on Lieberman Brothers.

As a young bishop Daneels was a lion of the left, pushing everything that was liberal and fashionably innovative, the trouble is that those who marry the fashionable find themselves a widow in the morning. The young liberal Daneels became the old conservative Daneels protecting with a passion the structures he had created.

The big problem in the Church today is "conservatism" which always tends to be about protecting the image of the Church the conservatives have created. We see it in the various magic circles of self selecting Episcopal Conferences throughout the world, or in bishops with a very fixed notion of a "diocesan profile" which excludes priests and others with a passion for radical orthodoxy. We see this sort of conservatism in those elderly groups who want to "Stand-up 4 V2", their own interpretation, or promote a "We are Church" agenda that of course excludes any concept of the Church that might contradict their own narrow and conservative construct.

One of the great problems with this type of conservatism is that is rootless, it has no depth, it is also deeply anti-intellectual, it talks continually about Church but rarely about Christ, it chatters about theology but never penetrates its depths, it is always anthropocentric and rarely theocentric. It is essentially Godless, it is neither bouyed up by the joy of the Resurrection nor fears Judgement.

No wonder the Pope seems to distance himself from the agenda of the conservative factions in the Curia and seems to promote those with some grasp or yearning for Radical Traditionalism.

St Raymond Nonnatus

Though they closed his mouth with iron, still he spoke.

Born of noble but poor family, he showed early traits of piety and great talent. His father ordered him to tend a farm, but later gave him permission to take the habit with the Mercedarians at Barcelona, at the hands of the founder, St. Peter Nolasco.
Raymond made such progress in the religious life that he was soon considered worthy to succeed his master in the office of ransomer. He was sent to Algiers and liberated many captives. When money failed he gave himself as a hostage.
He was zealous in teaching the Christian religion and made many converts, which embittered the Mohammedan authorities. Raymond was subjected to all kinds of indignities and cruelty, was made to run the gauntlet, and was at last sentenced to impalement. The hope of a greater sum of money as ransom caused the governor to commute the sentence into imprisonment.
To prevent him from preaching for Christ, his lips were pierced with a red-hot iron and closed with a padlock.
After his arrival in Spain, in 1239, he was made a cardinal by Gregory IX. In the next year he was called to Rome by the pope, but came only as far as Cardona, about six miles from Barcelona, where he died.
His body was brought to the chapel of St. Nicholas near his old farm. In 1657 his name was placed in the Roman martyrology by Alexander VII. He is invoked by women in labour and by persons falsely accused.