******* The Catholic Church is the church founded by Jesus Christ, the Second Person of God, the Holy Trinity. Christ promised Saint Peter and his successors that the gates of hell will not prevail against the church.
******* Not all organizations which bear the name "Catholic" are abedient to the teaching of the church nor loyal to the pope. For example "Courage", a peer support group for Catholic men with same sex attraction accepts the teaching of the church on homosexuality while "Dignity", which is also a peer support group for Catholic men with same sex attraction does not accept the teaching of the Catholic Church on homosexuality.
******* As of this date, 07-02-03, this folder contains 3 items.
******* item 1 THERE'S GOOD REASON TO BAR GAY PRIESTS
******* item 2 FROM POSTMODERNISM TO FAITH
******* item 3 FINAL PRAYER OF JOHN-PAUL II - MAY 18, 1920 - APRIL 2, 2005
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******* item 1 THERE'S GOOD REASON TO BAR GAY PRIESTS - by Michael Coren
******* From: Robert A. Jason
******* Sent: Saturday, October 29, 2005
******* It is fascinating to watch all the Catholic-bashers come out of the secular or sectarian closet. Their pretext is that the Roman Catholic Church is codifying its position on potential priests who are homosexual.
******* With a mingling of ignorance, self-delusion and trendy cliches, the same sort of people who in the past often denied Catholics civil rights and employment have found another stick with which to beat their foe.
******* Nobody should be surprised why this happens. Catholicism is an immutable guide and guard, standing firm against moral decay and materialistic extremism. It's a mirror, reflecting the absurdity of the modern world. And the modern world doesn't like it one little bit.
******* Critics react when the Church stands up for social justice, calls for an end to the arms trade, champions the poor, denounces war and racism and exposes the appalling economic chasm between the developed and undeveloped world. Yet none of this provokes the same response as the Church's stance on homosexuality, because to speak out against that is to break the shining commandment of contemporary liberalism.
******* But the Church has good reason for its reluctance to admit homosexuals into the priesthood. It regards homosexuality as "objectively disordered" but also believes homosexuals must "be accepted with respect, compassion and sensitivity."
******* Pure Christianity. The nature of God's plan for creation, the exquisite beauty of the difference between those He made man and woman, the use of sexuality not merely as a means of gratification but also as a way to glorify God.
******* The Hebrew and the Greek texts are abundantly clear, the teachings of the early church and the traditions of Christianity equally so. Those who reject this are in a long line of alleged Christians through history who have preferred the praises of the times to the truths of God.
******* The other reason the Church is so determined is that the most extensive and objective study of the abuse issue, by the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York, concluded that 80% of the victims of Roman Catholic clergy in North America in the past 50 years were males aged between 11 and 17. Not girls, not pre-pubescent boys. (By the way, the rate of abuse among Roman Catholic clergy, vile as it may be, is similar to the rate in any other walk of life. It is just that the media give so much attention to sexual crimes within the Church.)
******* While it is comforting for some people to speak of the pedophilia crisis faced by Catholicism, the reality is that the Church, in fact, faced a homosexual crisis. Most gay men do not desire sex with 12-year-old boys and are repulsed by the idea. Also, some heterosexual men and some heterosexual priests abuse young women and pedophilia is a heterosexual as well as homosexual perversion. Gay people must be treated with love and protected by the same law and civility as anybody else.
******* But this must not obscure the truth. Even though some people would prefer the truth to merely fade away.
******* The origin of the problem is to be found in the Second Vatican Council. Vatican II in the 1960s introduced many fine reforms and was supposed to initiate certain necessary changes. Tragically, groups of zealots exploited the opportunity to twist Church teachings. Some seminaries became centres of homosexual recruitment and doors were opened that had previously been firmly shut.
******* Until, that is, the pontificate of John Paul the Great and now his successor.
******* Now that the Church is rectifying the situation, it is accused of, yes, homophobia, by people who seem to care more about fashionable political causes than about the well-being of young and vulnerable men.
******* • You can e-mail Michael Coren through his website, http://www.michaelcoren.com
******* • Have a letter for the editor? E-mail it to [email protected]
******* http://www.torontosun.com/News/Columnists/Coren_Michael/2005/10/29/1283393.html
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******* item 2 FROM POSTMODERNISM TO FAITH - by Chuck Colson
******* From: Robert A. Jason
******* Sent: Friday, November 25, 2005
******* A Christian perspective on today's news and culture
http://www.pfm.org/AM/Template.cfm?Section=BreakPoint1&Template=/CM/ContentDisplay.cfm&ContentID=17381
******* Can human beings live with meaninglessness? For a long time, leading postmodernists have been telling us that we not only can, but that we have to. Their view is that there is no truth, no standards, no objectivity, and no purpose, so we make the most of the hand we have been dealt. At root, it’s spiritual and intellectual nihilism.
******* Well-known author Joan Didion wrote about this recently in The Year of Magical Thinking, her book about her husband’s death and her daughter’s illness. As Didion explains it, the idea of meaninglessness had haunted her from childhood. She says, “That the scheme [of things] could destroy the works of man might be a personal regret but remained . . . a matter of abiding indifference. No eye was on the sparrow. No one was watching me.�? She was left to try to find what little meaning she could in nature and “the repeated rituals of domestic life,�? as she put it.
******* The problem with that despairing approach, of course, is that the imago Dei, the image of God, is in every one of us. You can tell people life has no meaning, but they know that just isn’t true. And eventually the most ardent postmodern advocate bumps into reality—like Wallace Stevens, leading postmodern poet whose story I tell in my new book, The Good Life. Six months before he died, he was baptized a Christian.
******* One of the most dramatic cases is Antony Flew, whom I met this summer when I was lecturing in Oxford. Flew was perhaps the leading atheist philosopher in the world. But at 81, he was introduced to the intelligent design movement and the works of Dr. Michael Behe, who found that the human cell structure is irreducibly complex—and therefore could not have arisen by evolution and gradual natural selection. Flew also realized that some of the things that the early writers of the Scripture had written could not have been humanly known at that time, but have subsequently been vindicated by scientific discovery. Flew was a man of integrity, and rather than just changing his mind and going away quietly, he announced to the world that he was now a deist, believing that there was an intelligence in the universe that created this world.
******* And now another prominent figure has experienced a similar conversion. After writing twenty-five novels steeped in the occult, Anne Rice has returned to Catholicism, the faith of her childhood, and has promised that she will now “write only for the Lord.�? She’s written a book, Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt, which I have not read, but reviewers say is a faithful account of the one she calls “the ultimate supernatural hero.�? Anne Rice, writing about Jesus instead of vampires? It’s what Newsweek calls a “startling public turnaround�?—and that’s putting it mildly.
******* Rice explains that her previous works were written from the perspective of someone “lost in the darkness, striving to find meaning.�? Anne Rice has now found that meaning, just as Wallace Stevens did, and Antony Flew did, and countless others. I’ve long argued that postmodernism can’t survive because deep inside, we know it can’t be true. We know there is meaning and purpose to life. And as these and others are discovering, it’s found ultimately only in one place: as Anne Rice puts it, in Christ the Lord.
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******* item 3 FINAL PRAYER OF JOHN-PAUL II - MAY 18, 1920 - APRIL 2, 2005
******* Date: Sun, 3 Apr 2005
******* From: "Catholic Online"
The following warning is a prophetic message given to me, Frank Wagner, in November of 1974.
******* LISTEN TO THE CRY OF THE ABORTED CHILDREN. THEIR CRY IS NO. THEIR CRY IS A CRY OF TERROR. HEED THEIR CRY.
******* This prophecy is now being fulfilled.
******* For details about the source, meaning and fulfillment of this prophetic message go to
******* http://ca.geocities.com/fwagner4/index.html
******* email me at *** [email protected] ***
Links to other sites on the Web
(A2b1a) Catholic organizations loyal to the pope
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