New Year's Eve--Pauline Anniversary

Each New Year's Eve is spent on retreat--if you are a Daughter of St. Paul. It is the anniversary of the "night between two centuries." On December 31, 1900, James Alberione, a sixteen-year-old seminarian, spent the night in prayer. During that night Jesus gave him the first indication and call to do something for the people of the new century--to use the means of communication to make the world one great classroom where Jesus was the teacher of the way to the Father and to complete happiness. In 1914 and 1915 Alberione founded the Society of St. Paul and the Daughters of St. Paul and began to follow this divine dream.

To learn more about Blessed James Alberione and his vision visit www.alberione.com.

It's not too late to send Christmas Greetings to the Pope

At this link you'll find a Christmas Card from Benedict XVI as well as a link to send him your own Christmas Greetings by e-mail.

CEDICAM: An Alternative Future for a New Year

Maryknoll Lay Missioner Aaron Santiago is a designated campesino promotor for the Center for Integral Campesino Devepment of the Mixteca, CEDICAM, in one of the poorest and most eroded areas of southern Mexico. His work is to leave his own fields many hours of each month to go with a team to teach other villages about reforestation, rain water catchment and healthy ways to farm, incorporating the new and ancient methods they have found successful in their own small plots of land.

Aaron is part of a growing movement throughout Latin America. His idea of the link between the needs of his people and the needs of the environment and the planet are shared by indigenous and campesino communities from Chile to Brazil and from Ecuador to southern Mexico.

They recognize that their future, that their prosperity on the land does not depend on the next technological innovation that will be imported from the North. It depends on caring for their enviroment, for the "Mother Earth" whom they have respected for millennia.

They are beginning to recognize that the powerful of this world, those who set the political agendas of the globalized world, have created an economic and production system that the environment cannot sustain. In their rush toward economic domination and short-term profits, the powerful are blind to the face that they have put the human endeavor on this planet in danger of failure and extinction.

Indigenous communities are seeing tht their vision of an interdependent world of vast biodiversity calls for greater respect of all life species. It is both a more noble and a more practical vision than the vision of the powerful.

And these, the "powerless" ones of the world are, along with Aaron, offering us an alternative future.... Instead of an environmental culture of greed, instead of threatening endless 'resource wars,' they offer a vision of a peace based on intelligent conservation and a far-sighted sharing of limited resources of this jewel of a planet.

President Bush Signs Ethical Stem Cell Bill Over Democrat Objections

Following what amounted to a seven month filibuster on the part of Senate Democrats President Bush signed into law a bill establishing a national bank for stem cells derived from umbilical cords. Umbilical cord stem cells have been used to treat 67 different diseases including leukemia and anemia and obtaining them poses no ethical problems.

The bill first passed the House in May but was held up in the Senate by Democrats. The bill faced particularly stiff opposition from Iowa Democrat Sen. Tom Harkin and Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid both of whom had been preventing a vote using procedural tactics. They were demanding that a vote be held on a bill that would provide funding for embryo destructive research. The cord blood bill had wide support in the Senate and once brought to floor it passed unanimously.

The Stem Cell Therapeutic and Research Act of 2005 will provide $265 million for life saving stem cell therapy, cord blood and bone marrow transplant. Specifically, $79 million will be authorized for the collection and storage of cord blood stem cells with the goal of reaching a total inventory of 150,000 units. This would make them available to more than 90 percent of patients in need. A specific focus of the collection will be to provide more genetic diversity in available units.

The bill's author, New Jersey Republican Chris Smith, has worked to establish a national cord blood bank since 2001. "So many people don't realize that cord blood and adult stem cells are already treating patients, and have achieved remarkable breakthroughs over the past year," said Smith. "Now that President Bush has made my bill law, for the first time a nationwide stem cell transplantation system will be established."

Leading Senate efforts to pass the bill was Kansas Republican Sam Brownback. During debate over the bill Brownback noted that the cord blood bill was uncontroversial. He said it deserved immediate passage because patients are currently being cured using cord blood treatments. "Everybody supports cord blood research. It provides real cures today. I have two pictures of people who . . . have been treated. . . . The problem is, we don't have a big registry of it around the country. So it is real hit and miss. Some people are lucky enough to find it; others don't and die today," Brownback said.

Smith expressed a similar opinion following passage. "Thousands of Americans who might have otherwise continued to suffer or died will now be saved because larger and diverse inventories of umbilical cord stem cells will be available," he said.

Culture of Life Foundation
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Is Limbo Still Limbo

Since I have come across many interesting reports in the secular news regarding the meeting held in November 30 regarding limbo, I wanted to just post here some information on the subject from Catholic sources or more clear articulations of the complexity of the statement. As of yet there has been no conclusive document from the Vatican.

At the beginning of the month Catholic Online press reported:

Catholic theologians gathered in a closed-door meeting Nov. 30 to discuss a document that would eliminate as church teaching a concept that many Catholics accepted as an element of Catholic theology.

Limbo, never officially defined by the church, was a theological concept developed in the Middle Ages that said unbaptized babies would spend eternity in a state of "natural happiness," but would not enjoy the perfect communion with God that comes through baptism into Jesus Christ.

On October 7, 2004, Pope John Paul II asked the commission, headed by then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, to come up with "a more coherent and enlightened way" of describing the fate of such innocent infants.

The TimeOnline in England reported:

Vatican sources said yesterday that the commission would recommend that Limbo be replaced by the more “compassionate” doctrine that all children who die do so “in the hope of eternal salvation”.

There is little doubt that the Pope will agree. As Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger he presided over the commission’s first sessions. He is on record as saying that Limbo has no place in modern Catholicism. In 1984, he told Vittorio Messori, the Catholic author, that Limbo had “never been a definitive truth of the faith”.

He said: “Personally, I would let it drop, since it has always been only a theological hypothesis.” The commission is currently chaired by Archbishop William Levada of the United States, appointed by the Pope in May to be his successor as Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

In Christian doctrine, Heaven is a state of union with God, while Hell is separation from God. Christians have long wrestled, however, with the thorny question of what happened to those who died before Jesus, who “brought Man salvation”, as well as the fate after death of children who die in the womb.

Although there is no basis for it in Scripture the traditional answer is Limbo, from the Latin limbus, meaning a hem, edge or boundary

What the Catholic Church believes about the fate of babies who die without baptism is not an "isolated theological problem," but one that touches belief about original sin, the importance of baptism and God's desire to save all people, Pope John Paul II said Oct. 7, 2004, during a meeting with members of the commission.

The limbo of children, which alone became important in Christian tradition, is the place or state of infants or adults who never had the use of reason who, once Christ had come, did not receive baptism and the incorporation in the church that it brings.

The “Catechism of the Catholic Church” does not use the word “limbo,” though does reference it in its index in the article devoted to “The Necessity of Baptism.”

“As regards children who have died without baptism, the church can only entrust them to the mercy of God, as she does in her funeral rites for them. Indeed, the great mercy of God who desires that all men should be saved, and Jesus’ tenderness toward children which caused him to say: ‘Let the children come to me, do not hinder them,’ allow us to hope that there is a way of salvation for children who have died without baptism. All the more urgent is the church’s call not to prevent little children coming to Christ through the gift of holy baptism,” the catechism notes (no. 1261).

Sister Antonio--ministry in prison

At 50 years of age, Sister Antonio (then Mary Clarke) left her dresses and her home in Laguna Beach, south of Los Angeles, put on a religious habit and in 1977 moved into the State Penitentiary in Tijuana, Mexico, just across the border from San Diego. She lives in a tiny cell that fits only her bed, a chair and a small desk. Each day she prays, counsels, and preaches to the inmates, her lovely smile giving them hope in God's love for them and in the possibility of becoming a better person.

She says: "Eveything eventually ends--your money, your sickness, your family, your time in jail. The only thing that won't end is Christ's love for you." --a message we all need to hear at Christmas.

Iraq Troops

To think about:

On a CNN.com special, Marine Corporal Kenny Noia, on his 3rd tour of duty in Iraq, states in a video segment: "I'm not afraid to die, if I can help someone else." He struggeles with his conscience and the moral issues of killing others, stating, that as he walks among the people where there is bound to be a flare up or confrontation, "we will be among those going home afterwards. Somehow our life here is worth more than theirs. There is something not right about that."

The Reign of Christ in Secular Society

The day was again marred by violence in Iraq. A young women our community new as a prospective vocation was killed Christmas Eve when her Humvee was bombed. This Christmas, in a more powerful way, we reflected on the Prince of Peace and his reign over the earth--the promise of the fulfillment of his kingdom at the second coming the longing for which Advent trains each year.

Prof. Louis Aldrich of Taipei presented in the teleconference series of the Congregation of the Clergy and clerus.org a speech on The Reign of Christ in Secular Society based on Pius XI's doctrine on the Kingship of Christ. His thoughts are pertinent to the struggle against terrorism and the search for peace that we find ourselves in today:

For, if authority is asserted, the true basis of a stable public authority is destroyed (On the Feast of Christ the King, 18). On the other hand, if secular governments "are persuased that they rule, not by their own right, but by the mandate and in the place of the Divine King, they will exercise their authority piously and wisely, and they will make laws and administer them, having in view the common good and also the human dignity of their subjects (On the Feast of Christ the King, 19)."

In the last forty years we see that as Catholic nations have more and more excluded the Divine King from secular affairs, the common good and human dignity have suffered catastrophic wounds; wounds so deep that even the long term survival of these nations is called into question. Nations such as Spain, Italy, France and Austria, having rejected theDivine King's clear teaching on the intrinsic evils of contraception and abortion, find their citizens increasingly unwilling or unable to marry and have children. In fact, only through a radical re-conversion to Christ the King, do these slowly dying secularized nations have any hope of a future that is secure, prosperous and peaceful."

Blessed Christmas!

From the message of Benedict XVI for Christmas:

He called for a united humanity: "A united humanity will be able to confront the troubling problems of the present time: from the menace of terrorism to the humiliating poverty in which millions of human beings live, from the proliferation of weapons to the pandemics and the environmental destruction which threatens the future of our planet," he said.

Benedict recalled the "immense" progress made in recent centuries in technology and science.

"But the men and women in our technical age risk becoming victims of their own intellectual and technical achievements, ending up in spiritual barrenness and emptiness of heart," he said.

Benedict believed that it is only by opening our minds and hearts to Christ that will find the light that will lead us through this void: "The modern age is often seen as an awakening of reason from its slumbers, humanity's enlightenment after an age of darkness," he said. "Yet without the light of Christ, the light of reason is not sufficient to enlighten humanity and the world."

A blessed Christmas from Pauline Books and Media to everyone!

Click here for Christmas movie: http://www.paulinecards.com/movies/movie6.html

Full Text of Benedict XVI dedicated to Vatican II, December 22

A selection that goes to the heart of his assessment of the crisis of Vatican II:

By defining in a new way the relationship between the faith of the Church and some essential elements of modern thinking, the Second Vatican Council revised and even corrected some past decisions. But in an apparent discontinuity it has instead preserved and reinforced its intimate nature and true identity. The Church is One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic both before and after the Council, throughout time. It “presses forward amid the persecutions of the world and the consolations of God,” announcing the cross and death of the Lord until he comes (cf Lumen gentium, 8).

Yet those who expected that with this fundamental “Yes” to the modern age, all tensions would melt away, and that this “opening up to the world” would render everything harmonious, underestimated the inner tensions and contradictions of the modern age. Given man’s new power over himself and over matter, these dangers have not disappeared; instead, they have acquired a new dimension. We can clearly illustrate this by looking at current history.

In our time too, the Church remains a “sign of contradiction” (Lk 2: 34) and for this reason in 1976 pope John Paul II, then a cardinal, gave it as the title to the spiritual exercises he preached to Pope Paul VI and the Roman curia. The Council could not abolish this Gospel contradiction in the face of the dangers and errors of mankind. What it did do was put aside wrong or superfluous contradictions in order to present to our world the requirements of the Gospel in all its greatness and purity.

The steps that the Council took toward the modern age – which in a rather imprecise manner has been presented as an “opening up to the world” – belongs decisively among the perennial problems of the ever changing relationship between faith and reason.

Free trade and human development--Message to the World Trade Organization

At a message delivered to the ministerial summit of the World Trade Organization, held in Hong Kong from December 13-18, Archbishop Silvano Tomasi stated:

"Free trade is not an end in itself but rather a means for better living standards and the human development of people at all levels," said the prelate in his address delivered in English.

"The universal destination of the goods of the earth requires that the poor and marginalized should be the focus of particular concerns," he added.

Given the objectives the conference set itself, Archbishop Tomasi said the Holy See was "confident that a sense of responsibility and solidarity with the most disadvantaged will prevail, so that the narrow interests and the logic of power will be set aside."

Benedict XVI's first encyclical

Benedict XVI will sign of his first encyclical on December 25th. The encyclical is believed to be entitled, God Is Love. The 40-page letter, according to sources in the Vatican, is a meditation on the indispensable role of Jesus Christ in the plan of salvation.

Two Interpretations of the Documents of Vatican II

Today Benedict XVI met with the Roman Curia to exchange Christmas greetings. In his speech, he spoke at length of the legacy of Vatican II, stating that the crisis that followed was due in part to the two interpretations that confronted each other. Although the speech is available only in Italian at this point on the Vatican's website, Zenit ran the following:

The first interpretation is the one the Pope called "hermeneutics of discontinuity and rupture" "between the pre-conciliar and post-conciliar Church."

According to this view, what is important about the Council is not its texts but the spirit of renewal brought to the Church, the Holy Father said. This view, he observed, "has often been able to make use of the media's liking, and also of a part of modern theology."

Of reform

The other interpretation is "the hermeneutics of reform," which was proposed by the Popes who opened and closed the Council, John XXIII and Paul VI, and which is bearing fruits "in a silent but ever more visible way," said Benedict XVI.

According to this view, the objective of the Council and of every reform in the Church is "to transmit the doctrine purely and fully, without diminutions or distortions," conscious that "our duty not only consists in guarding this precious treasure, as though we were concerned only with antiquity, but in dedicating ourselves with a firm will and without fear to the work that our age calls for," the Pope said.

"One thing is the deposit of faith, that is, the truths contained in our venerated doctrine, and another [is] the way in which they are enunciated, preserving however the same meaning and fullness," he said, echoing John XXIII.

In this way, the Council presented a "new definition of the relationship between the faith of the Church and some essential elements of modern thought," Benedict XVI pointed out. He insisted that "the Church, both before as well as after the Council, is the same one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church, journeying through time."

"Today we can look back with gratitude to the Second Vatican Council," he added. "If we read and receive it, guided by an appropriate hermeneutic, it can be and will be increasingly a great force for the always necessary renewal of the Church."

Christmas--Sacred and Secular

Rev. Robert A. Sirico, president of the Acton Institute, has a wonderful article on Christmas in America. He based his argument on a point made by Benedict XVI in 1977.

He noted in a 1977 essay that “nowadays a theologian or a preacher is all but expected to heap more or less sarcastic criticism on our popular way of celebrating Christmas ... Christmas, we are told, has been commercialized irredeemably and has degenerated into a senseless marketing frenzy; its religiosity has become tacky.”

“Of course,” he continued, “such criticism is largely justified, even though it might too readily forget that, behind the facade of business and sentimentality, the yearning for something purer and greater is not entirely extinguished; indeed, that the sentimental framework often provides the protecting shield behind which hides a noble and genuine sentiment that is simply reluctant to expose itself to the gaze of the other.”

He is speaking about the core of good and virtuous intentions behind much of what is assailed as “commercialism.” Much of what people buy is for others. But what people do to commemorate Christmas reflects an inner sense that something extraordinary is occurred and continues to occur on the night of Jesus’ birth. All this fuss would not take place over a fat man in the red suit; it takes more than that to create the astonishing display that Christmas has become.

“The hectic commercialism is repugnant to us,” wrote Cardinal Ratzinger, “for it is indeed utterly out of place as a commemoration of the hushed mystery of Bethlehem, of the mystery of the God who for us made himself a beggar (2 Corinthians 8:9). And yet, underneath it all, does it not originate in the notion of giving and thus the inner urgency of love, with its compulsion to share, to give of oneself to the other? And does not the notion of giving transport us directly into the core of the mystery that is Christmas?”

This is why this holiday can be so secular and yet remain so sacred. There is a distinction between the two but not always a battle between the two.

“The concept of gift-giving is squarely anchored in this liturgy of the Church,” writes the Pope, “and, at the same time, we are made aware of the primal mode of all giving at Christmas: that God, on this holy night, desired to make himself into a gift to mankind, that he turned himself over to us.

“The one genuine Christmas gift to mankind, to history, to each one of us, is none other than Jesus Christ himself. Even those who do not believe him to be God incarnate will have to admit that he has enriched and gifted the inner existence of generations upon generations.”

So let us put aside our tendency to dismiss and put down our culture’s embrace of this holiday. Let us participate with joy and generosity, bringing gifts to others just as we have been given so much by awesome fact that Eternity became Time to dwell among us.

Keeping low-income homes warm this winter--Citgo

During the holidays you can give an anonymous gift to the poor who will find it hard to keep the heat on during the cold of winter by supporting Citgo's efforts to reach out to our less fortunate neighbors

Citgo is selling heating oil at discounted rates to poorer communities in Massachusetts and the Bronx, NY, and working on deals to keep low-income homes in Rhode Island and Vermont warm, too.
So while you're out on the road this month, you can help some fellow Americans by filling your tank with Venezuelan gas. Here's a link to find the nearest one of the 14,000 Citgo gas stations in the U.S.:
Find the Citgo station closest to your home address.

Korean Cloning Scientist Admits Faked Evidence

Although this is beginning to be reported on more completely in the news I thought to post here Austin Ruse' Research in Culture and Cosmos:


Notorious Korean Cloning Scientist Withdraws Paper Because of Faked Evidence Woo Suk Hwang, the South Korean cloning scientist who publicly admitted in late November to having obtained human egg cells unethically, has now also moved to have his initial paper withdrawn because many of the scientific achievements claimed within it are false.

Hwang has now admitted that the paper he co-authored had "fatal errors" in it, and that the prestigious journal Science should withdraw it. The cloning of human embryos is intended by such scientists to create embryos whose stem cells are genetically nearly identical to a prospective patient who presumably could use the stem cells as a kind of regenerative therapy. Even if the stem cells are not used as a therapy, they can be researched upon so as to increase knowledge of the cloning process so that future acts of cloning can result in therapies. Each cloned embryo, a distinct member of the human species, is killed in producing a stem cell line from it.

Hwang now admits that only eight stem cell lines existed when he submitted the article to Science, while the article claimed that 11 existed. Sung il Roh, the chairman of the board at Mizmedi Hospital where some of the cloned stem cell lines are supposed to have been stored, has stated that only two stem cell lines may have actually existed. Roh and scientists at his hospital are now planning to perform tests to determine if those two are also fake.

Roh, who was one of the co-authors of the paper in Science, has now also admitted that he was not even aware of the paper until it appeared in the journal. Roh justified the fact that he authored a paper he was not aware of by stating that "security concerns" demanded such secrecy even within the group of authors.

Princeton University moral philosopher and Culture of Life Foundation board member, Robert P. George, told Culture & Cosmos that while "it is true that all fields have their bad apples, what is worrisome" is that "from the very beginning there has been a widespread tendency amongst defenders of human cloning to engage in semantic sleights of hand." Hwang's repeated attempts to make his research look like something that it is not would only be more examples of such "semantic sleights of hand."

From the Culture of Life Foundation: www.culture-of-life.org

Andy Warhol's Nativity

A more sophisticated reflection from The Tablet on "Christmas Present" through the lens of Andy Warhol's Nativity. To see the picture, click on the link above.

Warhol’s Nativity lacks the ambiguity of his later works, and yet there is vulnerability as well as childlike joy in the painting. It is an image which evokes the innocence of the infant Christ, and of the Incarnation itself. Mary and Joseph incline tenderly towards the child, in whose presence the cat and the sheep find a space of sweet contentment. Behind them, the halo is a bright flowering of colour, a visual Gaudete that evokes the wings of the angels and the dawning of the light. Unlike many great works of art, this is a Nativity which is not yet overshadowed by the Cross. For a moment, it invites the adult viewer to set aside the knowledge of what is to come, and to enter into that child’s world where the present can be fully present, and joy can be a vivid illumination of the world around us.

Perhaps, if we find ourselves longing for the Renaissance Nativity scenes that frequently grace the Christmas cover of The Tablet, we might bear in mind that all art is to some extent a misrepresentation of the event. Indeed, the less authentic an image tries to be, the more it might remind us that no work of art can capture the birth of Christ, and the more it appeals to our aesthetic sensibilities, the less likely it is to give us a glimpse of the human reality. There were no choirs of angels and gilded halos. Mary was not wearing an opulent velvet robe, nor even a virginal white shift as in some paintings. The manger in which she laid Jesus may not have been in a stable – in poor homes, the animals were probably brought indoors for warmth and security, so this may have been a simple family dwelling which had offered shelter to the pregnant mother and her bewildered husband. (Warhol’s Joseph is depicted as an old man, in keeping with the beliefs of the early and medieval Church that he was an elderly widower entrusted with the protection of the Virgin and her child). The air in that birthing place would have been thick with the sounds and smells of animals and of childbirth. Mary would have been exhausted, sweaty and bedraggled with the effort of giving birth after the long journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem. Only those who had ears to hear and eyes to see would have heard the angels’ song and recognised the God of all Creation in the crumpled newborn baby before them. It is still so today. The incarnation shimmers just beneath the surface of all that is, but it does not intrude upon us or force us to acknowledge Christ’s grace in the world. It is the loving vulnerability of a God whose glory is hidden within all the ordinariness of everyday life. If we want to see what the birth of Christ was really like, we need to go not to an art gallery but to a village where women still give birth without access to hospitals and health care.

Amy Wellborn on the Narnia Film

An excerpt from an insightful analysis on the Narnia film, from a well-known Catholic blogger:

It was okay. I agree with most of the reviews I've read on the major points: the little actress who played Lucy was a charmer, the other child actors, not so much. It is always startling to see British child actors who are just a little beyond wooden. Tilda Swinton has just the right, naturally blank look to play a frozen, evil White Witch. Mr. Tumnus was marvelous. The scene in which Lucy first enters Narnia is a magical marvel.

But what the adaptation, with its choices, additions and omissions has done, in the end, is left the film without a clear sense of why. We know that this is about a struggle of sorts between good and evil, but the bigger picture is lost to us. White Witch: bad; Aslan: good, and there is a sacrifice of a good creature for a sinner, but...why? As one critic noted in one of the links I'm going to give you in a minute, the bigger picture is restoration, but the importance and weight of this is just not clear in the film, and it all ends up being less lastingly memorable because of it.

The Vatican and Allied Troops in Iraq

Benedict XVI said in his World Day of Peace message for 2006 that he is close to "the many soldiers engaged in the delicate work of resolving conflicts and restoring the necessary conditions for peace." Sandra Magister on chiesa.com summarized the Holy See's favorable expression toward the presence of allied troops in Iraq saying that it was for two reasons: to combat terrorism and to support the construction of democracy.

The history of relationships between Christianity and Islam has been intense, complex, and at times bloody. On the same day that the World Day of Peace Message was released, Angelo Sodano sponsored a meeting at the Pontifical Lateran University on a topic crucial for the Church's geopolitics: "Christianity and Islam, Yesterday and Today."

The topic was explored by an authoritative specialist in Church history, monsignor Walter Brandmüller, president of the Pontifical Committee for Historical Sciences.

While Christianity spread during its first three centuries in spite of persecution and martyrdom, and in many ways in opposition to Roman domination, introducing a clear separation between the spiritual and political spheres, Islam was imposed through the power of political domination.

It therefore comes as no surprise that the use of force occupies a central place in Islamic tradition, as witnessed by the frequent use of the word “jihad” in many texts. Although some scholars, especially Western ones, maintain that jihad does not necessarily mean war, but instead a spiritual struggle and interior effort, Samir Khalil Samir again clarifies that the use of this term in Islamic tradition – including its usage today – is essentially uniform, indicating warfare in the name of God to defend Islam, which is an obligation for all adult Muslim males.

Those who maintain that understanding jihad as a holy war constitutes a sort of deviation from the true Islamic tradition are therefore not telling the truth, and history sadly demonstrates that that violence has characterized Islam since its origin, and that Mohammed himself systematically organized and led the raids against the tribes that did not want to convert and accept his dominion, thus subjecting the Arab tribes one by one. Naturally, it must also be said that at the time of Mohammed warfare was part of the Bedouin culture, and no one saw anything objectionable about it.

The interpretation that Muslims today try to make of the crusades – an interpretation that finds many followers among Western historians – also fails to correspond to historical reality. According to this representation, Western Christians were invaders in a peaceful region that was respectful of the different religions – the Holy Land, which back then was part of Syria – using religious motives to disguise imperialist ambitions and economic interests. But the idea of the crusades emerged, above all, as a reaction to the measures that the Fatimid caliph Hakim bi-Amr Allah took against the Christians of Egypt and Syria. In 1008, al-Hakim outlawed the celebrations of Palm Sunday, and the following year he ordered that Christians be punished and all their property confiscated.

In that same year of 1009, he sacked and demolished the church dedicated to Mary in Cairo, and did not prevent the desecration of the Christian sepulchers surrounding it, or the sacking of the city’s other churches. That same year saw what was certainly the most severe episode: the destruction of the Constantinian basilica of the Resurrection in Jerusalem, known as the Holy Sepulcher. The historical records of the time say that he had ordered “to obliterate any symbol of Christian faith, and provide for the removal of every reliquary and object of veneration.” The basilica was then razed, and Ibn Abi Zahir did all he could to demolish the sepulcher of Christ and any trace of it.

Looking at Iraq today, particularly in Iraqi society, Khaled Fouad Allam made the following remarks:

All this is undoubtedly a success, both for the Iraqi people and for the United States, in the face of those who disputed, and still dispute, the exporting of democracy, a question that is feeding a philosophical debate that will mark all the geopolitical transformations of the twenty-first century.

What is the mechanism by which, in wartime, a people feels called so urgently to the polls? In reality, we have undervalued the fact that, even though the tanks entered into Iraq, the premise of this was a precise American plan for the reformulation of the Iraqi nation, which most Europeans probably did not realize. And they also did not understand that this reformulation of the Iraqi nation – meaning the significance that the notion of Iraqi identity can assume – no longer passes through the equation of Iraqi identity with belonging to the Arab nation, but rather through the possibility granted to the Iraqi to be an integral part of the Arab nation, this time through community membership: Shiite, Sunni, or Kurdish.

From the beginning, the Americans have kept in mind the fact that the Iraqi mosaic is a patchwork of ethnic-national communities – as, for example, the Kurds, who find their identity in the formation of a national Kurdish community – and confessional communities (Shiite, Sunni, and Christian) which can be multiethnic, because there are, for example, Christian and Sunni Kurds.

The problem is structuring this communitarian universe through political construction, through the creation of new relationships, knowing that the nationalist Arab system, in the name of the Arab nation, made a “tabula rasa” of all the other forms of membership, marginalizing the most important of these, beginning with the Shiites.

The new constitution completely overturned the Iraqi political perspective, asserting in chapter 1, article 3, that Iraq is a multiethnic and multireligious country, that it is part of the Islamic world, and that its Arab population is part of the Arab nation.

The last sentence is the most important for gaining perspective on the change taking place in Iraq, and it explains in part the Iraqis’ enthusiastic participation in the vote. The difference in comparison with the past is noteworthy: in reality, Iraq ceases to be an Arab nation or part of the Arab nation, but the Arabs of Iraq reserve the right to belong to this community even beyond Iraq’s borders. ...

There remains a fundamental problem: the situation in Iraq, if it does work, will work only in the context of a homogeneous Middle East. If this new democracy remains surrounded by countries governed by antidemocratic forces, the risk is a weakening of what has just been constructed.

Opus Dei

The Word from John Allen this week is an interview about John Allen's latest book: Opus Dei: An Objective Look Behind the Myths and Reality of the Most Controversial Force in the Catholic church (Doubleday).
It is an informative interview, offering objective information about some of the most popular myths surrounding Opus Dei, especially after its inclusion in the Da Vinci Code.
If you don't read the book, read through the interview. It won't be wasted time!

http://www.nationalcatholicreporter.org/word/word121605.htm

Advent Visual Meditation

I found this so moving. You might also want to send it on to your friends.

Come, Give Him Your Gift

http://www.paulinecards.com/movies/movie6.html

Advent

We wait for the Light
that will come and shine on us on Christmas day,
rescuing us
from the great darkness and hopelessness
we experience in our daily lives
and in our world.

Benedict XVI's first lesson on peace, war, and terrorism

The complete text of Pope Benedict XVI's message for the World Day of Peace, January 1, 2006 was just released. Benedict XVI ties peace to truth, and not simply an absence of armed conflict. Thus he is tying social justice to truth: the truth of the transcendent order, the truth of the universal moral law written on human hearts, and the truth of the integral development of the person and the protection of fundamental rights.

3. The theme chosen for this year's reflection – “In truth, peace’ – expresses the conviction that wherever and whenever men and women are enlightened by the splendor of truth, they naturally set out on the path of peace. The pastoral constitution “Gaudium et Spes,” promulgated forty years ago at the conclusion of the Second Vatican Council, stated that mankind will not succeed in “building a truly more human world for everyone, everywhere on earth, unless all people are renewed in spirit and converted to the truth of peace.” (2) But what do those words, “the truth of peace,” really mean? To respond adequately to this question, we must realize that peace cannot be reduced to the simple absence of armed conflict, but needs to be understood as “the fruit of an order which has been planted in human society by its divine founder,” an order ''which must be brought about by humanity in its thirst for ever more perfect justice.” (3) As the result of an order planned and willed by the love of God, peace has an intrinsic and invincible truth of its own, and corresponds “to an irrepressible yearning and hope dwelling within us.” (4)

4. Seen in this way, peace appears as a heavenly gift and a divine grace which demands at every level the exercise of the highest responsibility: that of conforming human history – in truth, justice, freedom and love – to the divine order. Whenever there is a loss of fidelity to the transcendent order, and a loss of respect for that “grammar” of dialogue which is the universal moral law written on human hearts, (5) whenever the integral development of the person and the protection of his fundamental rights are hindered or denied, whenever countless people are forced to endure intolerable injustices and inequalities, how can we hope that the good of peace will be realized? The essential elements which make up the truth of that good are missing. Saint Augustine described peace as “tranquillitas ordinis,” (6) the tranquility of order. By this, he meant a situation which ultimately enables the truth about man to be fully respected and realized.

CNN: Gang killer's lawyer file last appeal

Tonight lawyers for condemned killer Stanley Tookie Williams today filed a last-ditch appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court in hopes that justices would stay his execution, scheduled for early Tuesday. I found a recent reflection by spiritual writer: Ron Rolheiser, OMI on the death penalty:

http://www.ronrolheiser.com/currentcolumn.shtml

If we're honest, we have to admit there's something inside of us that wants the death penalty, needs it, and cannot help but feel a certain vindication and glee when a murderer, especially one who is cold and unrepentant, receives the death penalty. The itch for justice is too deeply written into our DNA. That's why so many popular movies and novels end not just with the triumph of good over evil, but with good crushing and killing evil. Something inside of us feels vindicated and whole again when evil is crushed and brought to its knees by sheer force so that the playground bully can be arrogant no longer and must finally eat his own violence. We want that and feel a deep release whenever it actually happens.
And so there's always an argument for the death penalty: It's necessary as a deterrent, it brings a needed closure to the families of the victims, it's a demand of justice itself.
But, in the end, those arguments are more emotional than logical. This is feeling, not faith, speaking.

The Conversation around the Chronicles of Narnia

I found three interesting articles about the Chronicles of Narnia released in film over the week-end. C.S. Lewis' work invites discussion and deepened reflection on the meaning of his work.

Why Tokien Says the Lord of the Rings is Catholic (National Catholic Register)
http://www.ncregister.com/articulo.php?artkod=MTE5

Chronicles of Narnia: A Classic Tale Re-imagined for Film
http://journals.aol.com/rosepacatte/MyMovies/

The Chronicles of Narnia Quiz
http://www.ashleylangford.com/archives/2005/12/chronicles_of_n.html

Civil Partnerships Act--Britain

This week Britain brought the Civil Partnerships Act into force. The act grants same-sex couples almost identical rights to those of heterosexual married couples. Civil partnerships however cannot be registered on religious premises. Though the government doesn't support "gay marriage," the rights and responsibilities of homosexual and heterosexual couples are almost identical under the Act. England will see its first wave of partnership ceremonies on December 21.

There is an excellent article on the NARTH website offering advice for parents who are struggling with a child's homosexuality: http://www.narth.com/docs/tips.html

Professionals who belong to NARTH comprise a wide variety of men and women who defend the right to pursue change of sexual orientation.

Today, children from kindergarten through college are being taught that homosexuality is a normal, healthy lifestyle option with no disadvantages other than society's disapproval. Sexually confused teenagers are encouraged to investigate homosexual relationships when they are too young to make critical lifestyle decisions. If they seek counseling, they are told that change from homosexuality is impossible.

Gender-disturbed children are no longer helped to become more comfortable with their own biological sex, or with the same-sex peers they have been avoiding. Instead, counselors tell their parents, "Your child is fine--the only problem is with society."

It is NARTH's aim to provide a different perspective. Particularly, we want to clarify that homosexuality is not "inborn," and that gays are not "a people," in the same sense that an ethnic group is "a people"--but instead, they are (like all of us) simply individuals who exhibit particular patterns of feelings and behavior.

When gay advocates reframed the public debate as a discussion about "who one is" rather than "what one does," they successfully intimidated dissenters by casting them as personally bigoted and hateful. As a result, most people who defend the reality of male-female design have been embarrassed into public silence.

NARTH stands ready to advise government, educational, and mental-health agencies as well as the media and religious groups on issues pertaining to homosexuality.

"The multicultural project will never fully succeed if 'diversity' is defined as one's own preferred ideologies and political groups."
--Richard E. Redding, "Grappling With Diverse Conceptions of Diversity,"American Psychologist, April 2002, p. 301.

Indulgences

Catherine Smibert reported on Zenit.org an interview with Cardinal James Stafford that explores what Pope Benedict's purpose is in offering the faithful the opportunity to receive plenary indulgences. Indulgences have a bad rap among many today so it was refreshing to read the theological foundation for what the Pope is doing:

Cardinal James Stafford, the Church's major penitentiary, told me he believed that the decrees are indicative of the Pope's deep roots in the great tradition of the first millennium of the Church and his seeking ways to bring ecclesiastical renewal through the sacrament of reconciliation.

"One of the best ways to do that is through a recovery of the true understanding of indulgences within the Church," the cardinal said. "And that teaching is profoundly rooted in the teaching of the Church Fathers." The first millennium, he told me, "is very much taken up with an understanding of everyone's need for the mercy of God through the redemptive washing of our sins through the blood of Christ."

Cardinal Stafford, 73, said the Pope "is very aware that we need to return to a consciousness of the deep gratitude that we owe to Christ for the great price he has paid for us in our sinfulness. And one of the ways to do that is to recapture the original meaning of the exercise of the power of the keys of Peter." The early Church laid much emphasis on those words of Jesus to the first Pope -- "I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven."

The cardinal said that they saw the "primary exercise of these keys as relieving persons of the terrible burden of their own sinfulness through forgiveness, and the guilt that is due to their sins."

"So the Holy Father is perceiving that it's important to recapture the experience of the first millennium and to some degree of the second also … as we see in the reform of the Catholic Church with the Council of Trent, especially in its Sixth Session dealing with justification, or how one is justified as a sinner before God," Cardinal Stafford said.

The prelate described how, through these indulgences, the Pope helps us to reflect on our Church as a throne of grace and mercy, as well as the great community of God's people which is the "mediation of God's mercy and forgiveness here upon earth." Those interested in learning more could see Pope Paul VI's apostolic constitution "Indulgentiarum Doctrina."

It's only human!

Sometimes a statement unexpectedly changes your life. I came across just such a remark today in an article about Pope Benedict's homily marking the anniversary on the Dec. 8 feast of Mary's Immaculate Conception. Pope Benedict said the traces of original sin are seen in the common assumption that being holy is boring and that sinning occasionally is what makes one human.

A common excuse for our mistakes and sins is: "It's only human." But is sin the benchmark of what we can expect of ourselves since we are "only human"? The Pope is saying definitely not. It is Mary who shows us what it is to be truly human.

Stem Cell Therapy--Misinformation and Confusion

Rebecca Taylor on her blog at the website "Mary Meets Dolly" posted an important piece of information regarding Don Ho's experimental stem cell procedure:

Wednesday, December 7. 2005Don Ho gets adult stem cell therapy for his heart.The singer Don Ho has received a stem cell therapy for his heart. Read the whole article.
The company providing this therapy is called TheraVitae. Read my previous entry on TheraVitae. What is conspicously missing from the headlines on Don Ho's treatment is that he was treated with his own adult stem cells. Of course the media would omit that crucial point to make sure the average joe is still confused about the potential of adult stem cells versus embryonic stem cells.

Mary Meets Dolly is a website that helps shine a Catholic light on contemporary happenings in genetics, genetic engineering, and biotechnology.

Why “Mary Meets Dolly”? Dolly the sheep was the first mammal cloned from adult tissue (specifically, from a mammary cell of a grown ewe). Before Dolly, cloning an adult organism was thought to be impossible. With her birth came all the possibilities and ethical implications of cloning humans. Mary Meets Dolly is, literally, the meeting of the world of genetics and genetic engineering, represented by Dolly, “mother” of modern biotechnology, and the teachings of the Catholic Church on the sanctity of life, represented by Mary, mother of Christ and the Church. So, while “Mary Meets Dolly” may sound glib, its subject matter is definitely not.

At this site, Catholics can find information to better understand stem cell research, therapeutic and reproductive cloning, genetic testing, and much more. The Topics section has articles covering various technologies; what is moral, what is immoral. It also has articles on pertinent topics by other authors. The Books section has a reading list for those who want to do their own research. The Links page has a list of websites through which one can keep up to date in this rapidly changing field. The Glossary page lists important terms and their definitions. The Church Teaching page has official Catholic Church teaching on reproductive issues and the sanctity of human life. The Blog has my daily thoughts on new developments and a chance for you to respond. And my favorite, the Quotes section, has all the verbal gems I have found that say it all.

Quote of the Week
"Given that embryos are human beings, they have a right to self and a right to life. Exploiting their parts (ie, cells) or killing them for research is moral trespass that society should not allow. Even if the research might, and let’s be clear, might benefit others, this trespass is not justified."
--James Sherley, Ph.D. associate professor of biological engineering at MIT

A Vatican II Primer

Pope Benedict has for years made it clear that the way in which persons have extracted Vatican II from the living history of the Church has done the Church and the world a disservice.

For example:

Speaking with Chilean bishops in Santiago in 1988, cardinal Joseph Ratzinger spoke of an “obscure singling out of Vatican II”, saying:

“Some descriptions give the impression that everything was different after Vatican II, and that nothing that came before it could still be considered relevant, or could be relevant only in the light of Vatican II. Vatican II is not treated as a part of the greater living tradition of the Church, but as a totally new beginning. Even though it did not issue a single dogma and wanted to be considered a humble pastoral Council, some recount it as though it had been a kind of superdogma which makes everything else irrelevant”. But “we can render Vatican II worthy of more faith if we call it what it was: a part of the single and whole tradition of the Church and its faith”.

Tomorrow, on December 8, the 40th Anniversary of Vatican II, Pope Benedict's homily during the Mass of celebration will be an important one that people will be listening to. "There are conflicting interpretations within the Church of this event and its consequences. One wide-spread idea is that Vatican II marked a “new beginning” in Church history, and that thanks to it – its “spirit” more than the words of its actual texts – the dogmas, laws, structures and traditions of the Church entered a phase of permanent reform. However, Joseph Ratzinger has shown on a number of occasions that he does not share this reading of the facts" (Sandro Magister, chiesa.com, December 7th).

The Pope's homily has been prepared for by a short but dense writ by the president of the Pontifical Committee for Historic Sciences, the current pope’s fellow countryman monsignor Walter Brandmüller. Published in the November 29th issue of the Italian bishops’ conference’s daily newspaper “Avvenire”, Brandmüller’s article underlines the “totally unprecedented” elements which distinguish Vatican II from other Councils coming before it.

The English translation of this presentation follows. It is an excellent review of the Church's Councils, their nature, their reception, their aftermath, their similiaries and differences. In short for anyone still wondering what's going on, it is a difficult but rewarding read:

This perspective was already covered several days ago in a short but dense writ by the president of the Pontifical Committee for Historic Sciences, the current pope’s fellow countryman monsignor Walter Brandmüller. Published in the November 29th issue of the Italian bishops’ conference’s daily newspaper “Avvenire”, Brandmüller’s article underlines the “totally unprecedented” elements which distinguish Vatican II from other Councils coming before it.



Vatican II in the History of Church Councils

by Walter Brandmüller

The II Vatican Council (1962-1965) was the Council of superlatives. Never before in the history of the Church had a Council been prepared with such intensity. Of course, Vatican I (1868-1870) was well-prepared, and the theological quality of its plans was actually better. But the number of proposals and inputs sent in from around the world, and their incorporation in Vatican II, exceeded anything previously seen.

Vatican II gave visible proof of being the Council of superlatives even simply with the enormous number of 2,440 bishops who entered Saint Peter’s basilica. While Vatican I, with its 642 fathers, had found room in the right transept of the basilica, this time the Council’s meeting hall was the entire central nave. In less than one century, the Church had become truly global. Never before had it happened, as it did in 1962, that one thousand journalists from all over the world had registered for the Council. Thus Vatican II also became the best-known Council of all times, becoming a first-rate global media event. Finally, of the 1,135 pages which cover the decrees of all twenty ecumenical Councils, Vatican II in itself takes up 315, well over one quarter.

Other distinguishing attributes of this Council are less obvious. Councils fulfill supreme magisterial, legislative and judicial functions “under and with the pope”, who holds these duties even without the Council. However, not all Councils exercise all of these powers. While the first Council of Lyons (1245) formulated laws and acted as a court, with the excommunication and deposition of emperor Frederick II, Vatican I did not pronounce judgments or codify laws, instead concentrating exclusively on issues of doctrine. The Council of Vienne (1311-1312), on the other hand, judged, passed laws and made decisions of faith issues, as did the 15th-century Councils.

By contrast, Vatican II did not pass sentences, nor pass laws, nor did it deliberate in any definite way on questions of faith. It really became a new type of Council – a “pastoral” Council with the purpose of bringing the Bible and the modern world closer together.

Specifically, it did not express doctrinal condemnations, as John XXIII emphasized in his opening speech: “The Church has always opposed heresy, and has often condemned it very harshly,” while this time “the Church prefers to make use of the healing powers of pardon,” because “it believes this to be better suited to the needs of this era, and because it prefers to show the validity of its doctrines rather than expressing condemnation.” Nevertheless, with historic hindsight it is clear that Vatican II would have been wiser to follow the lead of Pius XII, finding the courage to expressly condemn communism.

The fear to pronounce doctrinal condemnations and dogmatic definitions actually led to wide contradictions amongst the texts produced in the Council. Thus the dogmatic constitution “Lumen Gentium” on the Church and “Dei Verbum” on divine revelations have all the characteristics and style of doctrinal documents, but without any concrete definitions. And according to the canon law expert Klaus Mörsdorf, the declaration “Dignitis Humanae” on religious freedom “takes a position without having a clear legal standpoint”. The documents of Vatican II therefore have a very different level of obligation, and this too is a new feature in Council history.

Comparing II Vatican Council with the first Council of Nicaea (325), the Council of Trent (1545-1563) and Vatican I, and bearing in mind their respective consequences, it becomes clear that a schism took place after both Vatican Councils. First, in 1871, there were the “old Catholics” protesting against the definitions of the primacy and the infallibility of the pope; then in 1988 there were Archbishop Lefebvre and his supporters. As ideologically opposed as these two movements appear, they both represent the rejection of legitimate developments in the doctrine and life of the Church – a rejection based on a distorted relationship with history. After the Nicaean Council began religious battles that were to grow in bitterness and violence for over a century until the Nicaean doctrine was imposed at the Council of Chalcedon (451). This comparison can also be drawn with the Council of Trent, which produced an extraordinary growth spurt in the missionary, religious and cultural life of those parts of Europe that had remained Catholic – the “miracle of Trent” of which Hubert Jedin spoke. This growth did not come suddenly, however: after the Council ended, more than a century passed before its dogmatic and reforming decrees would show results on a significant scale.

Practically every Council, including Vatican II, has unique elements in its structure, development and content; what they all have in common is the collegial wielding of supreme doctrinal and pastoral authority. From the content perspective it is the presentation, interpretation and application of traditions to which each Council makes its specific contribution. This obviously does not mean an addition of new content to the faith of the Church, nor an elimination of doctrine that until that point was fundamental. Rather, it s a process of development, clarification and distinction, which takes place with the help of the Holy Spirit. Through this process every Council with its definitive doctrinal announcement takes its place as an integral part of the greater tradition of the Church. This is why Councils always look forwards, to a doctrinal announcement that is wider, clearer and more in touch with the times, and never backwards. A Council cannot contradict its predecessors; it can only integrate, clarify and move forwards. The situation is different when the Council is a legislative organ: legislation can and must always fit into the concrete needs of a given historical situation, and so – always within the framework set by the faith, it is subject to change.

All of this also applies to Vatican II. It is no more or less than a Council amongst many others, next to and after others, not above or beyond them but within the series of general Councils of the Church. This is based on the concept that at the heart of the Counciliar institution is the essence of tradition. This genuinely Catholic concept is reflected in this definition from the II Nicaean Council (787): “Since this is the way things are, we have in a certain way chosen the higher road and followed the doctrines of our fathers, inspired by God and the traditions of the Catholic Church, which as we know has its origins in the Holy Spirit which lives within it”. The last of this Council’s four condemnations is particularly important: “Anyone who rejects the entire ecclesiastic tradition, be it written or not, shall be excommunicated”.

Vatican II is no different in recognizing its place within the foundations of tradition. The number of references to tradition in Vatican II texts is noteworthy. The Council widely embraced tradition, quoting previous Councils and especially the Council of Florence (1439-1442), Trent and Vatican I, the encyclicals of numerous popes, the Church Fathers and great theologians, first and foremost Thomas Aquinas.

Speaking with Chilean bishops in Santiago in 1988, cardinal Joseph Ratzinger spoke of an “obscure singling out of Vatican II”, saying:

“Some descriptions give the impression that everything was different after Vatican II, and that nothing that came before it could still be considered relevant, or could be relevant only in the light of Vatican II. Vatican II is not treated as a part of the greater living tradition of the Church, but as a totally new beginning. Even though it did not issue a single dogma and wanted to be considered a humble pastoral Council, some recount it as though it had been a kind of superdogma which makes everything else irrelevant”. But “we can render Vatican II worthy of more faith if we call it what it was: a part of the single and whole tradition of the Church and its faith”.

In the years after the Council it was en vogue to compare the Church to a building site on which there were demolitions, new constructions and reconstructions. Very often in sermons, God’s order to Abraham to leave his country was interpreted as an exhortation to the Church to abandon its past and traditions.

On the contrary: it must be clearly stated that trying to interpret II Vatican Council outside of tradition would go against the essence of faith. It is tradition, not the spirit of the times, which defines the scope of its interpretation. Of course the situation of the times must be considered – there are current problems which need answers. But these can only come from divine revelation, through the Church. This tradition represents the criterion against which any new answer must be conformed, if it is to be true and valid.

Against this backdrop, the fashionable distinction between “pre-Vatican II” and “post-Vatican II” is of dubitable theological and historic basis. A Council is never a point of origin or destination against which the history of the Church or salvation can be measured. A Council is a link in a chain, the end of which no one knows except the Lord of the Church and of history. A Council can never break the continuity in the actions of the Spirit.

Continuity implies continuation. So will there be a Vatican III? It comes as no surprise that a request for this has been put forward – actually from opposing sides.

Some believe that a new Council should meet to finally carry out the democratization of the Church, allowing those who after a failed marriage find a new partner access to the sacraments, opening the door to marriage for priests and female clergy, and bringing about the reunification of divided Christians.

Others think that the confusion and crises of the tumultuous post-Vatican II period necessitate urgently a Vatican II to reestablish order and provide guidance.

One thing is certain: this possible new Council – perhaps in Nairobi or Moscow, Nairobean or Muscovite – would find its place within the framework of tradition and would be just one part in this venerable series.

Vatican II was neither the beginning nor the end of Council history, and we have to grasp this before we can speak of the future.

Gregorian Chant on the Return?

Since the election of Pope Benedict XVI there has been a great deal of discussion (and speculation) regarding the liturgy and the state of liturgical music. This is an opportunity for us to look into the Church as she reflects on herself, on the worship that she gives to God, on the dignity of the liturgy after a 40 year period of change and experimentation, of new paths that have been blazed which seem to be considered harmonious with the heritage of sacred music accumulated through the centuries, and of situations that are considered inadequate expressions of the dignity of the liturgy. It is an opportunity to "look in" and "contemplate" the development of the Church's reflection on sacred music at the beginning of the new millennium. Sandro Magister at chiesa.com reports two articles regarding sacred music. From the first: Gregorian Chant Is Returning From Exile. Maybe:

As on other occasions in the past, this year on December 5 the Vatican Congregation for Worship dedicated one day to the study of sacred music, on the anniversary of the Second Vatican Council’s constitution on the liturgy, “Sacrosanctum Concilium.”

The previous days have never produced any significant results. But now there is a pope, Benedict XVI, who is highly competent in the area of sacred music, is severely critical of the degradation of music following the council, and has written on a number of occasions what he thinks and what he wants: to restore to the Catholic liturgy the great music that “from Gregorian chant passes through the music of the cathedrals and polyphony, the music of the Renaissance and the Baroque, to Bruckner and beyond.”

Benedict XVI sent a message to the participants at the congress, gathered in the New Synod Hall, encouraging them “to reflect upon and evaluate the relationship between music and the liturgy, always keeping close watch over practice and experimentation.” The pope’s encouragement was addressed to an assembly composed of musicians and liturgists from many nations, some of whom were in disagreement with him over the matters at hand.

...

Musicians and liturgists of the postconciliar “new direction” found themselves constrained to justify themselves before an audience mostly oriented toward reviving traditional liturgical music, and Gregorian chant in the first place.

One could gather this from the strong and confident applause that greeted the addresses delivered by Dom Philippe Dupont, abbot of Solesmes and a great cultivator of Gregorian chant, by Martin Baker, choirmaster of the cathedral of Westminster, and by Jean-Marie Bodo, from Cameroon, “where we sing Gregorian chant every Sunday at Mass, because it is the song of the Church.”

But one could gather this above all from the applause that punctuated and concluded the address by monsignor Valentino Miserachs Grau, president of the Pontifical Institute of Sacred Music in Rome, the liturgical-musical “conservatory” of the Holy See, which has the task of training Church musicians from all over the world.

For the complete text of Monsignor Grau's talk click here and scroll down to the bottom half: http://www.chiesa.espressonline.it/dettaglio.jsp?id=43246&eng=y.

Antidote to intellectual ills

Wonder, rather than doubt, is the root of knowledge.

Abraham Joshua Heschel, "Man Is Not Alone"

Official text of Vatican document

The above link is to a copy of the new Vatican document on the priesthood and homosexuality. This link is to an official translation of the text.

Advent Resources

This link leads to a page that has a thorough list of all kinds of resources for Advent.