Praise God Almighty for the wonderful words of Archbishop Dolan. Read the full text of the Presidential Address given this morning by him. Either he’s got good writers or he is an extremely gifted man. I’m guessing both of those are true. Here’s a snip:
Our urgent task to reclaim “love of Jesus and His Church as the passion of our lives” summons us not into ourselves but to Our Lord. Jesus prefers prophets, not programs; saints, not solutions; conversion of hearts, not calls to action; prayer, not protests: Verbum Dei rather than our verbage.
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One thing both sides of the Catholic ideological spectrum at last agree upon is the answer to this question: who’s to blame for people getting mad at or leaving the Church? Their unanimous answer?
. . . nice to meet you! We’re the cause, they never tire of telling us.
Less shrill voices might comfort us by assuring us that’s not true. Nice to hear . . .
But we are still sincere in often praying “mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa” — and we don’t have to wait for the First Sunday of Advent to do it.
Also, for those who keep up with the daily readings, did the Old Testament passage strike you at all? I’d paste the text here, but I wouldn’t want to violate the copyright the USCCB has on the Bible. Perhaps +Dolan and his brothers might consider loosening their grip on it.
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I’ve heard it all before.
I’ll start believing when Catholic bishops and priests preach sexual ethics as related to birth control, homosexuality, abortion, pornography and premarital sex.
Until this happens, most of what they say is all smoke and mirrors, simply because they ignore the elephant in the living room.
I agree Richard, but I think the implication is that the tide is turning.
I have heard two explicitly anti-abortion homilies in the last year, and this does not count the imploring for March for Life last January.
I have nearly finished Fr. Barron’s Catholicism series. A few days ago I told my wife “pray for Fr. Barron, the Evil One certainly will be gunning for him”, recalling several priests with very successful recent public ministries but whom Pride has conquered or at least incapacitated (Frs Corapi, Pavone, Euteneur, etc). Yesterday I got home from work and she was watching his address on streaming video..she said, “remember what you said about Fr. Barron? I say the same for Abp Dolan, pray for him.” Amen to that.
God Bless the Archbishop. He certainly has enemies in
highlow placesI agree, Thinkling. It does seem as though things are changing. But I certainly sympathize with your skepticism, Richard. We keep hearing good stories from elsewhere. I’m still skeptical about western NY since heterodox is so entrenched here. Also, while I liked the snippet I posted, I never like terms like “both sides of the Catholic ideological spectrum”. Either you accept Church teaching or you don’t. I suppose for sake of theory there exist people out there who are too far to the right… people who don’t think the novus ordo is valid, who think there that unless you belong to the official Catholic Church you have no hope of salvation, etc… but I have yet to meet one of these people. If they truly do exist, they are rare. While on the other side I’ve met hundreds. So much so that when someone tells me they are Catholic, I just assume that they are a moralistic therapeutic deist.
You are right, Ben, I do need to remember that your diocese (my former) just simply does not have the Holy Spirit working through it’s ecclesiastical leadership with the same clarity as my diocese.
Sorry for the confusion, I can imagine you folks might think I sound gloating or something sometimes. I need to be more sensitive to that, although I hope we can all let our guard down in a few months.
ACTUALLY, Thinkling, Bp. Clark’s ad limina visit is (I believe) next week. Let’s see how this goes…
Thinkling said:
not all all! to the contrary, I think we all enjoy hearing it. It offers us hope.
Jim M. here: Just a question for Thinkling: What diocese are you in now?
Jim,
Brick by brick.
Indeed my avatar is a tribute to our seminary, which I support.
I wonder how much influence Dolan will have, if any, in the selection of the new bishops for Rochester and Buffalo?
A CAtholic: Just rremember, Dolan has an avid homosexually orientated parish right in his archdiocese of New York and he hasn’t done anything to break it up. I am skeptical of where he stands on the issues. Maybe more smoke and mirrors.
With the recent appointment of bishops like Morin, who oversees the Campaign for Human development, from the USCCB, I believe the appointment process for bishops is also corrupted.
Richard Thomas: Didn’t know about that. I guess we’ll just have to keep praying.
Jim M. here: Thinkling, given the question I asked you, you lost me…I don’t know what you’re talking about.
Jim M.: click on the words “our seminary” in Thinkling’s post.
Jim M. here: Thanks Mary-Kathleen…I wasn’t paying close attention. That seminary looks like a better place to be than our diocese!
http://www.realcatholictv.com/daily/?today=2011-12-01
It goes without saying that Archbishop Dolan proclaims Jesus Christ more faithfully, more articulately and more theologically precise than our brother Michael Voris. But it is Michael’s most recent THE VORTEX which reminds me of His Excellency’s call to arms.
“Our urgent task to reclaim “love of Jesus and His Church as the passion of our lives” summons us not into ourselves but to Our Lord. Jesus prefers prophets, not programs; saints, not solutions; conversion of hearts, not calls to action; prayer, not protests: Verbum Dei rather than our verbage.”
More than once Voris made me laugh in this video (http://www.realcatholictv.com/daily/?today=2011-12-01). Yet his point is well made. It is time for Catholics to become passionate about souls. How does one become passionate about souls? The Good Archbishop has told us.
This Advent I want to respond to God’s summons as summarized in the above excerpt taken from Archbishop Dolan’s Presidential Address to the USCCB.
Happy Advent.