Not so very long ago a boring, sheltered, stuffy, regal, distant, conservative Pope who never ever did anything radical sat down for a book length interview and explained to the world that condoms are wonderful and their use should be urged.

Remember that one?

I do. Though I remember it slightly differently. I remember that Pope Benedict said that "in the intention" (e.g. not in the condom) there was "a first step in the direction of" (e.g. not an arrival at) "toward recovering an awareness that not everything is allowed". Note that the awareness is moved towards something.

This is a million miles from saying that the act itself is made good by the presence of a condom, or that adding a condom to the act is a good thing. In fact, to make himself extra clear, Pope Benedict added that condom use "is not really the way to deal with the evil of HIV infection" and that condoms were not to be regarded as "a real or moral solution".

Properly understood I thought that was quite reasonable, though it was a bit naive of Benedict to think he could say something so subtle without his words being abused.

Within hours, the BBC headline read "Pope condones condom use" and our friend Austen Ivereigh went on to say that "urging a promiscuous infected person to at least use a condom" was now "Catholic pastoral practice."

Note the contradiction - Pope Benedict said condom use was not "a real or moral solution". Austen Ivereigh heard those words and thought "ah, I get it - condom use must be Catholic pastoral practice". This is a man who, if you believe the rumours, can even tie his own shoelaces.

That didn't suprise me. What suprised me was that people believed him. All over the blogs I saw normally sensible Catholics wailing and saying "Benedict has said condoms ar okay, he must have done, because The Tablet and the BBC say so". Nobody seemed to be looking at what Benedict actually said in the first place.

Please guys, don't fall for it again.

I mention this because Ivereigh and the gang are once again in full spin mode with their stories of limousines "shunned" and thrones "ignored". Give me a break. I don't deny that Pope Francis rode on the bus with the other cardinals and chose to greet them standing.. but shunning? ignoring?

Those meanings were added by the man who took "not a real or moral solution" and turned it in to "Catholic pastoral practice".

Then they tell us Pope Francis "spontaneously" stroked a dog. Stroking a dog? Ooooh how down to earth, how radical. Because, as the fathers of the Birmingham Oratory will tell you - Pope Benedict never ever made spontaneous gestures toward animals. Or was tickling a cat behind the ears while saying "aren’t you pretty, aren’t you pretty?" not spontaneous enough?

If we are not careful, there is a real danger that everything Pope Francis does will be reported through a lens, so that what we experience through the media in England will not be the papacy of Pope Francis, but the papacy of Ivereigh, Pepinster and Mickens.

You have the internet - read Pope Francis's words directly. See what he is saying and please: Don't believe the lie that Pope Benedict was a stuffy, distant, regal Pope who always stuck to protocol. He wasn't and he didn't - but these people will re-write history if you let them.

Don't let them get away with it.

The phrase "tabula delenda est" employs a gerundative and I haven't studied gerundatives yet so I don't know about gerundatives but I do know about Carthage because the picture of Carthage in the history book I had as a kid was really cool and I remember it well.

Anyways, I've been asked to support a facebook group/event/campaign thingy in opposition to The Tablet and I am very happy to do so. Check it out...

Close the Tablet! - Tabula Delenta Est!

The 5th June edition of The Tablet attempts to justify abortion.

First Charles E Curran (Professor of Human Values in the Perkins School of Theology at the Southern Methodist University, Dallas, Texas) writes:

Killing is sometimes accepted in the Catholic tradition as in war and in self-defence. Thus killing thus is not a moral evil (which can never be done), but a “non-moral”, “pre-moral” or “ontic” evil, that can be done if there is a proportionate reason. Saving the life of the mother is a proportionate reason justifying the abortion.

The whole Church, the hierarchical Magisterium and theologians must listen to the Holy Spirit speaking in the lives of Christian people – the sensus fidelium.

In other words, he thinks that killing an innocent baby to save the life of the mother is morally equivalent to killing a man who has picked up a gun and attempted to invade one's country.

The question can be simply answered. If my wife had a deadly disease which could only be cured by killing our toddler (perhaps my wife needs all of her bone marrow and several vital organs) would you say "Saving the life of Ella is a proportionate reason justifying the killing of a three year old girl?"

No. You wouldn't. Because you recognise that my little girl is a person with as much right to life as her mum.

So why do you think it okay to kill an unborn child to save the mother?

Next, Professor Tina Beattie (director of the Digby Stuart Research Centre for Catholic Studies at Roehampton University) writes...

So, a procedure could be performed with the intention of saving a mother’s life which indirectly caused the death of the foetus (for example, by removing the cancerous womb of a pregnant woman), but the direct, intentional killing of the foetus can never be condoned, even to save the mother’s life.

This kind of argument may appeal to those who value moral absolutes over ambiguity, but many of us regard dilemmas such as the one confronting Sr Margaret and her colleagues as being too complex for formulaic judgements.

The intention in this case was not to kill the child but to save the mother, and some may regard the distinction between directly and indirectly destroying the foetus as of little ethical relevance in situations of such tragic complexity.

Those who "value moral absolutes over ambiguity"...

She values ambiguity?

The distinction between directly and indirectly destroying a person is highly relevant. If I drive my car in to a person on purpose it is a very different thing to if I drive my car to work and accidentally hit a person on the way.

Given that in Christian theology the understanding of personhood is fundamentally relational because it bears the image of the Triune God, it is hard to see how an embryo can be deemed a person before even the mother enters into a rudimentary relationship with it.

Human beings are made in the image of God and this image is found in it's fullness in the way human beings relate to one another in love. "Let us make them in our image".

To use the beautiful way in which a human person made in the image of God is fulfilled by loving relationships with other human beings as an excuse to deny the humanity of a child is a disgusting and depraved act of evil.

You haven't met your mother so you are not a person.

This is what it comes to?

Did I mention that this magazine is being sold at the back of Westminster Cathedral under the watchful eye of Archbishop Vincent Nichols?

Who does...

Nothing!

I don't know if you've been following the adventures of "Stand Up For Vatican II"? Or should I say "Stand Up 4 Vatican 2" (so trendy). I've not blogged about them (much) because I hate drawing attention to these people who you probably wouldn't have even heard of if I hadn't mentioned it.

In short, they are a group of the usual suspects trying to bring us all back to the 1960's. They are all terribly worried about the new translation and all the other stuff Pope Benedict is encouraging. They held a huuuuge national meeting in London, only 200 people turned up. More people than that visit this blog every day.

An account of that meeting (saying how wonderful it all was) appeared in The Tablet. Somebody else who was there wrote a letter to The Tablet in response but The Tablet wouldn't print it (for some reason). Anyhow, it's found it's way in to my hands so I will print it...

Dear editor,

In his letter (Lack of nurtured Catholics, 6th February 2010) Frank Regan makes a number of claims about the Stand up for Vatican II meeting which don't tally with my memory, or the detailed notes I took of the event.

First, if Frank Regan thinks the meeting he chaired was a "significant experience of an inclusive church", he needs to get out more. In contrast to the multi-ethnic, socially-diverse reality which is the Catholic Church in the Britain, the meeting's attendees were all white, mostly aged over 70 and in the main middle class.

Secondly, when he claims that those present spoke "without rancour, with love for their church" he is being economical with actualité. One of the speakers, Sister Myra Poole, recently publically compared Pope Benedict XVI to BNP leader Nick Griffin. As an active anti-fascist whose great grandfather was murdered by Nazis in Dachau, I find that comparison contemptible. At the meeting she gave a vainglorious speech, much of which involved her praising herself. When she wasn't doing that she was delivered an paranoid Dan Brownesque rant about the supposed influence Opus Dei has at the Vatican, complaining that the Vatican caused a lot of trouble at the World Council of Churches, insisting that "misogyny is so deep in this church" and saying that she should tell her congregation that if they get anything from the Vatican "they should bin it". That's not my definition of speaking without rancour, with love for the Church.

It's true that the laity were spoken of in disparaging terms as "knowing nothing" at the meeting but such sentiments are a function of the fact that groups like Catholics for a Changing Church which organised the meeting have little, if any, grassroots support in British parishes.

That should surely be the last nail in the coffin of Stand Up 4 Vatican 2. They are an irrelevance and a nasty one at that. Can it be true... did a Nun, Sister Myra Poole really compare Pope Benedict to the leader of the BNP?

From Sister Myra Poole SNDdeN

Sir, — I am deeply ashamed and personally dissociate myself from the actions of Pope Benedict XVI, supported by the Archbishop of Westminster, the Rt Revd Vincent Nichols, over the proposal of Personal Ordinates for those An­glicans who convert to Rome on the question of women Bishops.

I know I speak for many others as well. The papacy has shown scant courtesy to the members of its sister Church, and publicly insulted the Archbishop of Canterbury.

The situation of women in the RC Church is dire, but in spite of that we have run Catholic Women’s Ordina­tion for nearly 20 years, and with some considerable success.

Many people may not know that Archbishop Nichols was the Church’s representative on the National Board of Catholic Women (NBCW) in the 1990s, and it was he who suggested the title of a booklet published by the NBWC, Do Not Be Afraid, on the position of women in Church and society. If only he had taken this title to heart, as many of us have done, women would now be in a much better position.

The details of this proposal have yet to unfold; but I think this action could backfire badly on the reputa­tion of the papacy and the RC Church, especially in England. The idea that this Pope is determined to work towards Christian unity is a myth. This proposal did not come from the Council for Christian Unity in Rome, who, I understand, were not in favour of this action, but from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, headed by Cardinal Levada.

The only unity Pope Benedict XVI and his advisers want is the unity with those who are “right-wingers”, to use a political term. If the Pope had to appear on the BBC’s Question Time, he would get an even worse reception than the British National Party leader.

The question now for RCs who have a much greater understanding of what Church should and could be is openly to call these present actions of this papacy to account in the light and spirit of Vatican II. With others, I wait to see how this situation will unravel.

MYRA POOLE
Catholic Women’s Ordination
210 Compass House
Smugglers Way, London SW18

[link]

So there you have it. It's not quite as bad as the Nun who was operating as an escort at an abortion clinic but it's leaning in the same direction. Do the SNDdeN have nothing to say?

While we're on the subject of Stand Up 4 Vatican 2, don't forget to check out Mullier Fortis' post on one of the ways they operate...

I have seen an email from Bernard Wynne calling for members of the group to send letters and petitions to their diocesan bishops, giving suggested wording. Particularly interesting was the instruction to have about 10 names actually on the letter to the bishop, with a statement to indicate that several other people had also appended their names - and to have these extra names recorded separately. This is, I am told, a popular political manoeuvre, as these extra names have not necessarily seen the exact wording of the letter being sent...

[link]

It's all done with mirrors...

In just under a weeks time I will be interviewing Bishop Terence Drainey, the Bishop of Middlesbrough for the Catholic Herald. I've never interviewed a Bishop before and I've been keeping an eye on the various interviews that have been published lately with various figures in the Church. This week the front cover of The Tablet is a huge picture of Archbishop Vincent Nichols because they have an interview with him by Catherine Pepinster (the editor of The Tablet). I know that people in glass houses shouldn't throw stones but I have to say that it is possibly the worst interview I have ever seen.

The full "interview" (if we can call it that) is 2000 words long, yet it takes Catherine Pepinster a full 470 words before she even quotes the Archbishop once. Quotes, it seems, are not her forte. She prefers to write things like "What Nichols seems anxious to avoid is any risk to relations between Catholics and Anglicans in Britain" leaving the reader with little idea of what the Archbishop actually said. If he seems anxious, why not ask him? How hard is it to say "are you a bit anxious about this?" and then the Archbishop can respond "yes" or "no" or "a bit" and we can find out what he actually has to say instead of relying on this lady's interpretation.

I wondered quite how bad it was, so I pasted it in to word and highlighted the Archbishop's words. Here's an overview...

To make the effect clearer, I did a bit of copying and pasting to put his and her words together in groups...

Out of 2000 words only 508 belong to the Archbishop. That's not an interview, that's a lecture.

If you are the sort of person who enjoys train wrecks then you can read the whole awful thing here but if you would like to see real excellence in interviewing then compare that with Luke Coppen's excellent interview with the same man here.

I'm grateful to Catherine Pepinster really. I might have been a bit nervous about interviewing Bishop Drainey but not now. Even if I burst in to tears and he spends the full hour reading a book while I sob uncontrollably on the floor.. there's no way my interview can end up as badly as this one.

I don't read The Tablet because frankly, it's pretty dull. It's like listening to children trying to justify petty theft on the grounds that, well, they wanted some chocolate and it was mean of mummy not to let them have it. The explanations go on and on and round and round in circles in the apparent hope that sheer number of words will overcome the unchangeable truth that they are wrong.

Every now and then though, somebody flags up an article or in this case and editorial that is worth commenting on. This time it's an editorial entitled The problem with men...

Conservative thinkers on marriage, present at the Malta gathering and at a second conference in Gdansk, tend towards the view that a return to traditional values might strengthen marriage. But they have failed to describe convincingly how to put the clock back, even if it was agreed that that was desirable.

...

Evidence given at the Gdansk conference, also reported on page 14, appeared to show that it is the male failure to adapt to the way women have moved away from traditional female roles that causes tensions in many relationships, even leading to their eventual collapse. Rather than live with a man who refuses to adjust, and despite the difficulties where there are children, many women have chosen to become single again. Men are the problem after all, it seems. So the fundamental question is how they can become part of the solution.

[link]

Pretending for a moment that this caricature is true and it is even possible to paint in such broad brush strokes across entire genders - how is it possible men's "fault" that women "have moved away from traditional female roles" and caused "tensions"? You started it...

I remember now. Everything is men's fault.

The truth is, as Fr Dwight Longenecker puts it:

What kind of kooks are these Tabletistas?

...

What they really mean is that men are supposed to spoil them even more, indulge their little feminist whims, kow tow to their ideologies, be bullied by their emotional swings and march behind their bandwagon.

My view? Marriage is collapsing because most people don't know what it is. To understand what it is, you would need to know what love is - self sacrificing, dead on a cross type love. You don't have to be capable of it, but the whole point of the exercise is to try.

The "women going to work" thing is a red herring. Marriages don't break down because a woman expects a career any more than they break down because a man expects his shirt to be ironed.

Obviously there are notable exceptions, mental health problems, when people turn violent, when there is emotional and sexual abuse, when children are placed in danger. But on the whole, in the majority of cases:

Marriages break down because partners expect to have, when they should be expecting to give.

Archbishop Vincent Nichols has written a foreword for a booklet which will be given to participants at a forthcoming Marriage Care (formerly Catholic Marriage Advisory Service) Conference. The following excerpt is taken from the editorial in this weeks The Tablet...

Terry Prendergast put in his place

His message is unambiguous, and may not please some of those hoping to attend the conference. First, he has insisted that the conference is officially sponsored by the Diocese of Westminster, “in conjunction with Marriage Care”, thereby keeping it under his control. In church teaching and canon law, he states, bishops are responsible for the pastoral care of married people.

...

Conference participants “will wholeheartedly learn about authentic Catholic teaching on Marriage”, he instructs them bluntly, adding: “The view that cohabiting parents are just as good for children as married ones finds no place here.” People who hold that view are “inexorably distancing themselves from the Church”, he says.

...

This timely display of clear leadership from the new president of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales bodes well.

No wait...

I seem to have misread it.

Archbishop Vincent Nichols was actually writing a foreword for a booklet to be given to priests at a training conference for priests learning the extraordinary form of the Mass.

Here's what The Tablet article really says...

The old rite put in its place

His message is unambiguous, and may not please some of those hoping to attend the conference. First, he has insisted that the training conference is officially sponsored by the Diocese of Westminster, “in conjunction with the Latin Mass Society”, thereby keeping it under his control. In church teaching and canon law, he states, bishops are responsible for the oversight of the liturgy.

...

Conference participants “will wholeheartedly celebrate the Mass in each of these forms”, he instructs them bluntly, adding: “The view that the ordinary form of the Mass, in itself, is in some way deficient finds no place here.” People who hold that view are “inexorably distancing themselves from the Church”, he says.

...

This timely display of clear leadership from the new president of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales bodes well.

[link]

So...

It seems Archbishop Vincent Nichols is more than willing to get his hands dirty and use his authority as a Bishop to keep things "under his control".

It's just a pity he only seems willing to do it against a minority group in the Church who he knows do not necessarily enjoy widespread support.

To oppose the comments of Terry Prendergast would be counter-cultural and would involve widespread criticism from the media as well as dissident Catholic pressure groups (also known as diocesan curial offices) across the country.

To take oppose the comments of Terry Prendergast would take courage and resolve, in the absence of such resolve, his move to get the Latin Mass Society "under his control" looks a lot like cowardly bullying.

I just can't believe how "cool" and "with it" the front cover of The Tablet is this week. They are definitely down with the kids...

Rainbow people in a circle around planet earth, it's like the 1960's never ended!

The lovely rainbow people at The Tablet are gushing with praise for Pope Benedict after his recent Encyclical. One of them writes...

This remarkable and intelligent man, now in his eighties, seems to have regained the originality of mind that once made him one of the most innovative voices at Vatican II. Half a century later he still has new things to say, well worth hearing, well worth waiting for. And no stereotype could even begin to describe him.

[link]

Here's a stereotype for you: Ageing hippies getting all carried away with excitement because the Pope said something about global warming while studiously ignoring everything else he's had to say about, like, everything.

Have they even read the Encyclical?

Pope Benedict quotes Evangelium Vitae (When a Pope quotes a Pope it's Pope²) saying...

"a society lacks solid foundations when, on the one hand, it asserts values such as the dignity of the person, justice and peace, but then, on the other hand, radically acts to the contrary by allowing or tolerating a variety of ways in which human life is devalued and violated, especially where it is weak or marginalized."

[link]

Is that not basically the Catholic Church in England and Wales in a nutshell?

We assert "values such as the dignity of the person, justice and peace", oh yes, we're very good at that. Cafod, LiveSimply, Reclaim the Future... Hooray!

But then, on the other hand, "we tolerate a variety of ways in which human life is devalued and violated"...

Archbishop Vincent Nichols with his approval of outrageous sex education materials. Our very own Diocesan Youth Service with it's deafening silence on anything that's not Ubuntu. Most disgustingly of all, Catholic Education Service (Archbishop Vincent Nichols again) with it's arms wide open to welcome Connexions advisors to come in to Catholic schools and help teenagers arrange abortion and contraception without parental knowledge or consent.

I don't think it's an exaggeration to say that the Catholic Church in England and Wales "lacks solid foundations".

Update: Mark points out in the comments (not sure how I missed it) the headline "You can blog but you cannot hide".

Which is funny because while the majority of Catholic blogs are not anonymous at all, the majority of iffy priests and lay pastoral people are very quick to insist that their very public office is a private matter when I blog about their dodgy doings...

In the interests of getting the largest possible audience for their ineffective liberal propaganda machine, the clever folks at The Tablet have asked Fr Tim Finigan to remove his fisk of their article from his website.

The trouble is, Fr Tim just can't help himself. He's a hardned compulsive criminal. Just look at this photo he put on his website...

We should all pray for him.

Anybody who has ever criticised my blog for publicaly criticising parishes and priests by name has a moral duty to complain to The Tablet who have published an article criticising Fr Tim Finigan by name.

From now on I will consider any priest that chooses to distribute The Tablet in his parish to be fair game for blogging, since they obviously approve.

Not fair?

I suppose the difference is that The Tablet are reporting only good things about Fr Tim Finigan...

Haw Haw...

No but seriously, now that you've played the "draw attention to it" card what comes next? The thing about people who are not trying to undermine the Church is that they don't mind if people find out about it.

Unlike those who are...

"Shhhhhh... We're not doing anything wrong or anything but don't tell anybody!"