Francis’ rhetoric of redistributionism has warmed the heart of President Obama

On Monday, Pope Francis tweeted out his thoughts on inequality after Sunday’s canonization mass, which drew 800,000 people:

Inequality is the root of social evil – Pope Francis Via twitter feed.

This followed on his statements last year in which he ripped capitalism as a system promoting inequality, stating, “there was the promise that once the glass had become full it would overflow and the poor would benefit. But what happens is that when it’s full to the brim, the glass magically grows, and thus nothing ever comes out for the poor.”

Francis’ rhetoric of redistributionism has warmed the heart of President Obama, who profiled the Pope for Time’s list of 100 Most Influential People:

His Holiness has moved us with his message of inclusion, especially for the poor, the marginalized and the outcast….His message of love and inclusion, his regard for ‘the least of these,’ distills the essence of Jesus’ teachings and is a tonic for a cynical age. May we heed his humble example.

 

http://www.truthrevolt.org//news/pope-francis-inequality-root-social-evil

Unable to Oust Archbishop Myers Over Old Abuse Claims

Unable to Oust Archbishop Myers Over Old Abuse Claims, New Jersey Star-Ledger and Church Cranks Now Attack Him Over His Retirement Residence to Further Their Grudge Match

Archbishop John J. Myers (c) under attack from the usual suspects:
New Jersey Star-Ledger ace reporter Mark Mueller (l) and angry ex-priest Bob Hoatson (r)

 Bergoglio has said and done nothing. Why?? Where is the humility in the Catholic clergy today??

(The Media Report) –  Last year, the reporting from the New Jersey Star-Ledger about Newark Archbishop John J. Myers and his handling of decades-old abuse cases was so bad that the paper was forced toissue a correction and admit to its numerous errors.

Now, after the paper’s attempt to oust the Catholic bishop failed, the paper is desperately trying to roil up anger over renovation work at a residence in which Myers will eventually live during his upcoming retirement in 2016.

Just the facts, ma’am

The Star-Ledger would have you believe that food pantries and disadvantaged Catholic school children are being starved of money in order to build a purported “mansion” for the archbishop. In truth, a recent press release from the Archdiocese of Newark completely rebuts these claims. The facts:

• No parishioner funds or contributions to the Archdiocesan Annual Appeal have been used on the project;
• The renovations are being paid for by donations earmarked from individuals for that purpose and by the sale of an unneeded property that will also fund other ministries; and
• The Archdiocese will pay real estate taxes on the property.

Some take issue with the expenses of the project at a time when the Archdiocese has decided to close some of its schools. However, while $145 million has been poured into Archdiocesan schools over the past decade, enrollment has also dropped nearly 45% in Catholic schools in Newark in the past 15 years. Thus low enrollment has made the closure of four schools not only necessary but simply inevitable.

The Star-Ledger’s not-so-hidden agenda exposed – again

In a recent article, the Star-Ledger claims that “22,000” signatures have supposedly been collected in a petition demanding that the Archdiocese sell the disputed property.

Related see my post here – APRIL 15, 2014   Archbishop Myers, you don’t need a 7,500-square-foot house for your retirement!!!

Read more –  http://www.themediareport.com/2014/04/23/archbishop-myers-residence-nj-star-ledger/

 

 

 

Divorce, Even Without Remarriage, Can Be a Sin

A key point that’s been lost in the communion debate.

The discussion about marriage within Catholic circles has been heating up recently, more than usual. This time it’s not about contraception or homosexual ‘marriage’, but about divorce and remarriage. In the last few months, there were statements made by Cardinal Kasper, a group ofGerman Bishops, but then also many rebuttals such as Cardinal Raymond Burke and Dr. Ed Peters. For a review, read John V. Gerard’s article fromAleteia. Now, to add to the confusion and debate, we have the Pope’s infamous phone call to the Argentinean woman about being allowed to receive communion while living as married to a divorcee.

It is an important and complex debate. Many are on the edge of their seats, very anxious and impatient to see what will happen at the Synod in October. Some are applauding, while others are shaking their head in disbelief. While all this has been ensuing, there is a deeper question that should be gnawing at our Catholic consciences.

Almost every time a new opinion piece is written about the divorced and remarried receiving communion, there is a statement about divorce not being a prohibition to reception of the Eucharist, only remarriage is. This is likely to be even more central to the ensuing discussion about the claim that Pope Francis told the Argentinean woman that “A divorcee who takes communion is not doing anything wrong.” While, it is true that civil divorce, in and of itself, does not constitute a mortal sin, there is much more nuance to Church teaching that needs to be addressed.
 
One problem in this discussion is that divorce and remarriage, without an annulment, is basically black and white. It is adultery and thus, if you have the understanding and have chosen it freely, a mortal sin. Divorce alone though, is a large area of grey. No one can judge another based on a decree of divorce alone. Does this mean that divorce is never a mortal sin though?

The Church understands that in our human weakness, there are problems in marriage that are unlikely to be resolved. Married couples realize quickly that there are going to be many issues that arise in which neither will both be fully satisfied with the outcome. Marriage takes dying to self, loving even when it hurts, and a lot of compromise.
 
Sometimes though, the differences are so great and harmful, that a separation is prudent for the sake of spiritual, physical, or psychological well-being. The Church allows for this when duly needed. If one is in immediate grave danger, they can separate from their spouse without prior permission from their Bishop (CIC 1153). Here still, permission must be sought to continue separation though (CIC 1151 §3), and the goal is always towards reconciliation of the marital union (CIC 1152;Familiaris Consortio, 83). When not in immediate danger, separation may be allowed, but the permission is to be sought beforehand. The same goal of reconciliation applies here as well. Even if reconciliation never happens, husband and wife are called to strive for it and to have hope, even when by worldly standards, all seems hopeless.

Canon law allows for civil divorce too, but when it is the only means by which to gain civil protection for the children or financially (CCC 2383). Because marriage is also governed by the state, it might be that the only way to get proper custody for one’s children is via divorce proceedings. There are many circumstances where one spouse is obstinately making the protection of children difficult or is withholding financial assets from the other as punishment. These are considered entirely excusable reasons to seek the civil decree. 

Continue reading –  http://www.aleteia.org/en/religion/article/is-divorce-even-without-remarriage-still-a-sin-5791895166910464

 

Cardinal Schönborn: John Paul II was ‘the Great’

Archbishop of Vienna: Saints on Sunday creates “two good friends in heaven” – human dignity, God’s mercy and value of the family as the central concern of the Polish Pope 

Vienna (kath.net / KAP) Pope John Paul II was in the eyes of Cardinal Christoph Schönborn a “rock” and “man of God” who deserved the nickname “the Great”: Looking at the life and work of Wojtyla-Pope, the dimensions of his pontificate, and influenced by his world-historical changes is not so exaggerated, writes the Cardinal in the current issue of the Vienna church newspaper “Sunday”. With the canonization of John Paul II and Pope John XXIII. would get the faithful on Sunday “two good friends in heaven.” 

Three key points he saw in the life’s work of the Polish pope, declared Schönborn: “The defense of the immeasurably high dignity of every human being, an awareness of God’s mercy, which we must bear witness to Christians, as well as the central value of the family as Grundort of human dignity and the Mercy. “ He himself was the future saint often met them for the first time. Yet as editor of the Catechism in one of the first Papal Audiences after the assassination of 1981, and later as Archbishop of Vienna

The Pope from Poland just in Austria desired interface between East and West a place of theological, philosophical and social foundations of the family, recalled Schönborn. Why go to John Paul II and his belief that the future of the world depended on the family, the foundation of the International Theological Institute for Marriage and Family (ITI) in Trumau back. 

No stopping on errors 

Did John Paul also “like every pope certainly not always done everything right,” he was nevertheless have been grateful for the open and honest communication also of unpleasant things. At his first audience as the new Archbishop of Vienna in 1995, he had the Pope “un the problems of the Church in Austria and among the bishops” announced, Schönborn recalled. “That’s it then probably with his benevolence, I thought to myself -., But three weeks later he invited me to give him the retreat” He had been very pleased with this latest mark of confidence, so the cardinal. 

In his column in the free newspaper “Today” (Friday) Schönborn went to the credibility of John Paul II: he was by many people as’ very credible Christian “was worshiped, whereupon the already loud become the funeral of the Pope in 2005” santo subito “calls were due for a rapid canonization. Even saints have had errors and committed sins, they are but it has not stood the Cardinal. 

Furthermore raised Schönborn – back in the “Sunday” – the humor and cheerfulness out that John Paul II had never lost despite his difficult life path. “One of my favorite memories of him is his peals of laughter as I once told him an anecdote about the Polish philosopher and Dominican Joseph Bochenski,” said the cardinal. 

Impressed but have it especially the “incomparable” praying the Pope. “Once I was after a dinner with him in his chapel for evening prayer as he is literally immersed there in God, without any bias by the presence of another human being -. I’ll never forget,” Schoenborn said. It was true here a saying of St. John XXIII also starting Sunday. “Man is never so great as when he kneels.” 

The “papa buono” 

About John XXIII. wrote Cardinal Schönborn, he must have been a “wonderful person” and have all a “papa buono” – want to be – a good father. The Archbishop of Vienna, reported experiences of a Protestant friend who opened while bathing on a concrete slab and was paraplegic admitted to hospital in Rome 1961 graduation trip in Italy. Its appeal to the Catholic hospital chaplains to host the Pope greetings was, in fact complied with: Pope’s secretary Monsignor Capovilla had been sent a total of four times by the pope as his representative to the hospital. John XXIII.had also received the parents of the affected person’s private audience and comforted them. 

http://www.kath.net/news/45735

 

 

Muslims Crucify Two Christian Teenagers For Refusing To Convert To Islam

 

Muslims in Syria crucified two Christian teenagers for refusing to convert to Islam. The story was reported on a Croatian Catholic website.

According to Sister Raghida, former head of the Christian school in Damascus, the Muslims came to the two youths and said:

So you want to die as a teacher in whom you trust? Please choose: either to renounce ( faith ) or you will be crucified!

One of them was crucified in front of his father, who was afterwards killed. The jihadists entered the city of Maaloula and started killing men, women, and children. They did not just kill, but played football with their heads. They took pregnant women, pulled out the babies from the womb and hung them from the tree umbilical cords.

https://shoebat.com/2014/04/23/muslims-crucify-two-christian-teenagers-refusing-convert-islam/

Aborted Babies Could Reduce Greenhouse Gases, Fight Climate Change!!!

Absolutely sickening!!! 

One possibly redeeming (or exacerbating) feature of the shocking story that aborted fetuses have been burned at an Oregon facility that converts biomedical waste into municipal energy is that the babies may have helped combat climate change. According to thewebsite of Covanta, the energy company that operates the Oregon facility, the energy-from-waste (EfW) process “offsets greenhouse gases to combat climate change.”

The alternative, the company points out, is depositing organic waste in landfills, where it will convert into methane and other hydrocarbons. Methane, which forms a three-dimensional, tetrahedral molecule, is a far more powerful greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide, trapping far more heat per unit volume than the carbon dioxide that results from controlled combustion in an environmentally sensitive energy facility. 

Other Covanta facilities provide formal carbon offsets to companies looking to reduce their impact on climate change. These facilities, both in Florida, generate “voluntary credits” that can be bought on the open market “by companies and organisations interested in voluntarily reducing greenhouse gases.” A compulsory cap-and-trade system, such as exists in California, could place new market value on incinerated medical waste, including fetuses.

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2014/04/24/Aborted-Babies-Reduce-Greenhouse-Gases-Fight-Climate-Change

Would-be papal assassin decries canonization of John Paul II

 (ANSA) – Rome, April 24 – Pope John Paul II is not a saint, because only God can be considered holy and attempts to “deify a human being” are sinful, Ali Agca, the man who tried to assassinate the pope in 1981, said Thursday in an interview with ANSA.
    His comments come days before Sunday’s double canonization of Polish-born John Paul II, pontiff from 1978 until his death in 2005, and Italian John XXIII, who was pope from 1958 to 1963.
    Agca, who was released from jail in 2010, said that he “definitely wanted to kill” John Paul II so it’s a “miracle” the pontiff survived the St. Peter’s Square attack, which shocked the world. “I have seen with indisputable evidence that on May 13, 1981, God performed a miracle in St. Peter’s Square,” said Agca, who has claimed at various times that his attempted murder of the pontiff was ordered by Ayatollah Rhollah Khomeini of Iran and the Soviet-era Bulgarian Secret Police.
    The Turkish national added that he feels no remorse because his act was part of a “divine plan”. “There’s an immeasurable difference between a divine miracle such as my assassination attempt and a psychopathic, unjustifiable crime,” said Ali Agca. “I’m extremely happy to have been at the center of a divine plan that’s cost me 30 hellish years in solitary confinement”. After serving almost 20 years of a life sentence in prison in Italy, Agca was pardoned in 2000 and deported to Turkey.

http://www.ansa.it/english/news/vatican/2014/04/24/foiled-killer-said-sinful-to-deify-men_82b8c93c-3cf1-44b9-80a8-834bbe643a52.html

    Following the extradition, he was imprisoned for the 1979 murder of a left-wing journalist in Turkey and for two bank robberies.

Obama Sends Pro-Abortion Delegation to Vatican

White House Special Advisor John Podesta, the chairman of a progressive pro-abortion group, is leading the U.S. delegation for the dual papal canonizations in the Vatican. 

The three-person American delegates to the Holy See for the sainthood mass of Pope John XXIII and Pope John Paul II on Sunday also includes staunchly pro-abortion Democratic Rep. Xavier Becerra and White House aide Katie Beirne Fallon, who has led the fight to force employers to include contraceptive coverage in their healthcare packages.

Podesta, who served as White House chief of staff from 1998-2001, is the founder and current chairman of the liberal Center for American Progress (CAP), a liberal pro-choice think tank.

The organization has opposed the No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act, and on its website CAP staff have highlighted their views against anti-abortion supporters.

Breitbart.com reported in December that a panel discussion sponsored by CAP concluded that Christian conservatives use religion as a justification for discriminatory behavior, particularly when it comes to abortion rights and same-sex marriage.

Sally Steenland, director of CAP’s Faith and Progressive Policy Initiative, said, “It sets up a false equation of ‘my religious liberty versus same-sex marriage, reproductive rights’ — as if those two are inherently opposed and you’ve got to choose one versus the other. And we know that’s not the case.”

Podesta, who started his White House job in January, has turned CAP into the Democrat Party’s policy and politics center.

Over the centuries, including the tenures of Pope John XXIII and Pope John Paul II, the Vatican has never changed its strong stance against abortion, artificial contraception and homosexual acts. 

Becerra’s voting record shows that he’s a pro-abortion advocate and voted against a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage in 2004.
 
The California Democrat, who is chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, was given a top rating by the pro-abortion organization NARAL and was given a 100 percent grade by the Human Rights Campaign, an LBGT agenda organization.

According to a Vogue profile, Fallon has been leading the push to get support for the mandate in Obamacare that directs most employers to provide free contraception, sterilization, and abortion-inducing drugs to their employees through health insurance plans.

For years, the Obama administration has been accused of promoting anti-Catholic policies for its positions on abortion and same-sex marriage.

The White House was also recently criticized for its plan to move the U.S. embassy to the Vatican into the Italian embassy in Rome. Five former ambassadors to the Holy See called the move “a slap in the face” to Catholics.

And former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush has suggested that Obama’s shutdown of the embassy may be “retribution” against Catholics who oppose his signature healthcare law.

 http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/Podesta-pro-abortion-Vatican-delegation/2014/04/25/id/567779#ixzz301DVaV4f 

Woman Says She Is Virgin Mary’s Cousin 65 Times Removed

Mary Beth Webb, from Murrysville, Pennsylvania, is making  some tall claims about her ancestry. She considers herself to be the 64^th great-granddaughter of Saint Joseph Ben Matthat Arimathaea, who is considered to be Virgin Mary’s paternal uncle. So that makes her the Virgin Mary’s cousin, 65 times removed.

Mary has been looking into her ancestry since 2010, and it has taken her two years to spot her connection to Saint Joseph. Saint Joseph of Arimathaea is credited in the Bible for providing the tomb in which Jesus Christ’s body was placed after his execution on the cross.

The idea to research her ancestry came from her other bizarre ritual – speaking to the dead. When she lost her brother to cancer in 1999, she started communicating with him and also with her dead parents. Mary’s cousin was always the medium for these conversations – she conveyed messages from Mary’s parents that included details she could never have known about. Mary herself admitted that there was no way her cousin could have known some of the stories.

“My cousin and I have always had, like, this intuitiveness of being able to talk to people beyond Earth,” Mary said. She has thousands of notes to back up her story, recording every conversation she has ever had with her dead family. “We would ask questions about heaven, what it was like when you crossed over. I’ve gotten a really detailed account of what happened to my brother when he passed. I always asked them what it was like, and they said it was beautiful. Imagine the most beautiful place that you can, a beautiful garden.”

Mary has written a book about her experiences of talking to people from the great beyond. She said that her objective is not to make money but to help other people who also lost their loved ones. “I know a lot of people are skeptical and want proof and all that. I can only share what happened to me and hope they can learn from it,” she said.

Read more – http://www.odditycentral.com/news/woman-says-she-is-virgin-marys-cousin-65-times-removed.html

IS SUOR CRISTINA CATHOLIC?

 

When Suor Cristina made her first appearance on The Voice of Italy, she squealed in a very high pitch while giving the hand sign of the devil’s horns.  Promotional material from The Voice of Italywith Suor Cristina has recently come out with her paying homage to the Indian goddess of Kali. Kali is the goddess of empowerment and time & change.  She is also, the mother goddess and the consort of Shiva.  Sticking one’s tongue out became popular due to the logo of the Rolling Stones.  The logo is known as the “Tongue and Lip Design” and was created by graphic designer John Pasche.  It is, 

“an ovation to the Hindu goddess Kali, the goddess of everlasting energy, and glorifies the strength of free expression in rock ‘n’ roll music. The Rolling Stones logo stands out from the rest of the rock band logos due to its mirth, uniqueness, and the way it brings out the emotions while listening to the music.” 

Read more  –  http://callmejorgebergoglio.blogspot.ca/2014/04/is-suor-cristina-catholic.html