If society continues along the path of devaluing the child, treating children as property to acquire or dispose of at will, might we not expect in the future to accept the horrible imitation?
END ABORTION WITH YOUR VOTE
Updated – Creepy Time at Occupy Portland: Meet the “Occubears”
Dateline Portland Oregon, January 18, 2011 - Lock up the kids honey, Occupy Portland is on the move again. I have been doing Citizen Journalism for about a year and a half now. File this one under whatever the heck you want: I have officially seen it all. In a bizarre creepy twist to the so-called “movement,” which has cost the city well in excess of $1.75M, Occupy Portland has formed a group called: ”Occubears.” (Hat Tip LexFlyingFish) From the Public Facebook Page For Occupy: Meet the …
Oh boy…
AbortionWiki Launch to Shine Light on Global Abortion Industry
WARNING: This site contains graphic images of severe injustice
ED. NOTE: Have yet to hear of anyone interested in “Occupying” these types of government-sponsored corporate monsters. Have you? Good job AbortionWiki, shine that light…
AbortionWiki Launch to Shine Light on Global Abortion Industry
Launching on January 19, 2012, AbortionWiki.org will serve as a comprehensive and impartial resource of all information relevant to beginning and end of life issues such as abortion, euthanasia and stem cell research.
“Sir Francis Bacon said it best when he wrote, ‘Knowledge is power,’” says AbortionWiki Director, Andy Moore. “AbortionWiki makes use of this power by documenting the U.S. and international abortion industry and lobby on one wiki-based website.”
AbortionWiki seeks to expose the abortion industry on an international scale. It will achieve this by making use of the powerful yet simple wiki software – the same software which powers Wikipedia.org. By connecting the dots between the various facets of the abortion industry and lobby, a clearer picture will be made visible.
“AbortionWiki will be powerful because it is people-powered. Thousands of people around the world will have the opportunity to log in and contribute their local and specialized knowledge.”
“What has the abortion industry got to hide?” Mr. Moore asks. “If there is nothing wrong with abortion, why is this industry so shrouded in secrecy? Why are the blinds down at every Planned Parenthood clinic you drive past?”
“In his letter to the Ephesians Paul writes, ‘Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them.’ That’s exactly our goal in launching this website,” Mr. Moore continues.
AbortionWiki will become a comprehensive and reliable turn-to reference point for all matters relating to abortion and other life issues. This will be achieved through stringent referencing and quality control, and by a network of moderators ensuring that only factual information is provided on the website.
Subjects covered will include abortionists, clinic workers, abortion methods, pro-choice groups, activists, the history of abortion, voting records of politicians, statistics and much more.
“Our research has shown that wiki-based websites are extremely search-engine friendly,” Mr. Moore says. “If you are involved in the abortion industry, you can look forward to your very own article on AbortionWiki, there for your children and grandchildren to see in years to come.”
Contact:
Andy Moore, Director
andy@abortionwiki.org
phone: 815-277-6244
What is your position on immigration?
According to my Archbishop, John Vlazny, we Catholics enter into National Migration Week (Jan. 8-14) with open arms and hearts. Yet, the layman below states within his own article that despite what the U.S. Bishops say, church doctrine is not pro-immigration. The Archbishop declares that immigration laws are unjust, and the layman puts forth a compelling argument that declares such laws are supported by the Catechism of the Catholic Church.
Okay. So which is it? And what’s your position? (I recommend reading both commentators. And remember, please be charitable in your comments, lest you force me to boot your electronic butt out of this part of the universe…)
Catholic Layman Says: Despite The U.S. Bishops, Church Doctrine Is Not Pro-Immigration!
By AW Morgan on January 10, 2012 at 10:59pm
Think about this:
If a fellow shows up at your door, penniless, starving and thirsty, and beaten by thugs, the Catholic Church says you have a normative Christian duty to help him. Consider the rancher in Arizona who gives drink to the thirsty illegals who cross his path in the desert.
But if the same fellow shows up at your door with 25 relatives and demands food and water and threatens you if he doesn’t think you provided enough, then you bolt the door and grab your rifle.
You have a greater duty to protect your family. The Church says they are your primary obligation.
The latter, not the former, describes immigration, legal and particularly illegal.
Of course, to hear the Catholic Left tell it, Church teaching demands that you surrender your house to the mob—i.e. throw open the borders, regardless of the effect on the federal and state treasuries, crime rates and American cultural coherence. They quotebiblical texts, from the Infant Savior’s flight to Egypt with Mary and Joseph to the teaching of Christ on welcoming “strangers,” in a way that resembles the irrational fundamentalism of erroneous Protestant scriptural exegesis. And they ask the clichéd question:WWJD?
As a Catholic myself, I say: bunk. Whatever the radical left and their feminist nuns, collarless priests or mitred mandarins in the sexually corrupt Catholic chanceries may say, Catholic teaching does not demand, and has never demanded, that a country open its borders to limitless numbers of immigrants.
Nor does it confer upon “migrants” an unfettered right to travelwherever they wish, whenever they wish.
Far from suggesting that a nation must throw open its doors, the Church says political authorities can control and even stop immigration if they judge it necessary.
Here are the relevant passages in the Catechism—the official text of the Church’s teaching:
The more prosperous nations are obliged, to the extent they are able, to welcome the foreigner in search of the security and the means of livelihood which he cannot find in his country of origin. Public authorities should see to it that the natural right is respected that places a guest under the protection of those who receive him.
Political authorities, for the sake of the common good for which they are responsible, may make the exercise of the right to immigrate subject to various juridical conditions, especially with regard to the immigrants’ duties toward their country of adoption. Immigrants are obliged to respect with gratitude the material and spiritual heritage of the country that receives them, to obey its laws and to assist in carrying civic burdens. [Emphasis added]
Similarly, the U.S. Catholic bishops in their official teaching (as opposed to what they lobby for) outline three principles of immigration. The first is that “People have the right to migrate to sustain their lives and the lives of their families.” The third: “A country must regulate its borders with justice and mercy.”
But the second principle we don’t hear much about. Here it is:
‘While individuals have the right to move in search of a safe and humane life, no country is bound to accept all those who wish to resettle there. By this principle the Church recognizes that most immigration is ultimately not something to celebrate. Ordinarily, people do not leave the security of their own land and culture just to seek adventure in a new place or merely to enhance their standard of living.Instead, they migrate because they are desperate and the opportunity for a safe and secure life does not exist in their own land…
Because there seems to be no end to poverty, war, and misery in the world, developed nations will continue to experience pressure from many peoples who desire to resettle in their lands. Catholic social teaching is realistic: While people have the right to move, no country has the duty to receive so many immigrants that its social and economic life are jeopardized.
For this reason, Catholics should not view the work of the federal government and its immigration control as negative or evil. ‘[Emphasis added]
When was the last time you heard that “[m]ost immigration is not something to celebrate”?
But the U.S. Conference Of Catholic Bishops’ Justice for Immigrantscampaign website does not even mention “respecting the law”—let alone “the material and spiritual heritage of the country that receives them”. Nor do the bishops stress it in their endless public pontifications.
Authentic Catholic teaching on immigration is not leftist. Rather, it is rooted in human reason and reality, meaning the way things are versus the way we wish them to be —as is all Catholic teaching,which is conservative by its nature.
Indeed, in noting that “no country has the duty to receive so many immigrants that its social and economic life are jeopardized,” the U.S. bishops themselves acknowledge the right of a nation to defend itself—as well as the duty of the state to provide for the common good of its own citizens.
Thus, we may rightly and justly send illegal aliens home, not least because they have not obeyed American immigration laws.
Yet when the U.S. bishops discuss “justice,” they don’t often mention that—or this item in Catholic teaching on justice: the state’s duty “to protect its subjects in their rights and to govern the whole body for the common good.”
That segues into the duties of citizens, where I have recourse to the Catechism again:
Those subject to authority should regard those in authority as representatives of God, who has made them stewards of his gifts… “Be subject for the Lord’s sake to every human institution. . . . Live as free men, yet without using your freedom as a pretext for evil; but live as servants of God.”[Pet 2:13,16]Their loyal collaboration includes the right, and at times the duty, to voice their just criticisms of that which seems harmful to the dignity of persons and to the good of the community.
It is the duty of citizens to contribute along with the civil authorities to the good of society in a spirit of truth, justice, solidarity, and freedom. The love and service of one’s country follow from the duty of gratitude and belong to the order of charity. Submission to legitimate authorities and service of the common good require citizens to fulfill their roles in the life of the political community.
Submission to authority and co-responsibility for the common good make it morally obligatory to pay taxes, to exercise the right to vote, and to defend one’s country. [Emphases in original].
Upshot is, citizens are enjoined to be patriots. They must love and defend their country, and are obliged to pay taxes, vote and rectify unjust laws and living conditions.
That raises a few questions about the millions of Mexicans who simply abandoned their country, not because they didn’t have work but because they wanted to improve their living standards, and even worse, endangered the lives of their children by dragging them across the desert.
Were they not obliged by Catholic teaching to stay in Mexico—to become active politically and to fight for economic justice from the ruling kleptocracy?
What of the Mexican authorities who never cease lecturing Americans about their duties to illegal aliens? Is the Mexican president and his legislature governing the country for the “common good” in surrendering to the depredations of the drug cartels?
Certainly, Mexican political authorities sin in permitting citizens to live in squalor, thus encouraging them to cross the border in defiance of American law. Certainly, they sin when they provide instructional manuals on how to evade the authorities. Certainly, they sin by instructing Mexican-Americans that they are Mexicans no matter what their citizenship.(“You’re Mexicans — Mexicans who live north of the border,” President Ernesto Zedillo told Mexican-American politicians in Dallas in 1995..[Mexico Woos U.S. Mexicans, Proposing Dual Nationality, by Sam Dillon, NYT, December 10, 1995]
All these acts, whether by omission or commission, violate Catholic teaching.
As for the duties of illegals who are here, apropos of the Catechism and the teaching Pope John Paul II, they are obliged to obey the law—which just might mean surrendering to authorities and returning home.
Catholic teaching does not entitle them to stay forever as illegals. Catholic teaching mandates obedience to the law.
Most American Catholics, regardless of what they think of immigration, are unaware of these fine distinctions because of the way the U.S. bishops and their leftist allies systematically misrepresent Catholic teaching on immigration. (A notableexception, to my mind, is Catholic apologist blogger Jimmy Akin)
Which brings us back to Christ.
WWJD? He would tell the alien: Render unto Caesar. Obey the law. Go back home and work in your own country. If you wish to come here, get in line with everyone else.
And, if Americans decide that they don’t need even legal immigration, respect that decision too.
A.W. Morgan [Email him] is fully recovered from prolonged contact with the Beltway Right. He now lives in America.
The Archdiocese of Occupy Portland? (Part 1)
In its December 18, 2011 issue, the Catholic Sentinel featured an odd story promoting Occupy Portland, a satellite of the Occupy Wall Street movement.
In her article, ‘Should the church connect with the Occupy movement?’, St. Francis of Assisi Pastoral Administrator Valerie Chapman, whom at least one local journalist erroneously identifies as “pastor” of the Southwest Portland parish, attempts to convince readers that Catholic Social Teaching tends to support the work(s) of Occupy Wall Street.
I doubted that. And decided to look into it a bit.
With the exception of our archdiocesan paper promoting the new faction, it remains unclear what the position of the archdiocese actually is when it comes to identifying Catholic Social Teaching with the OWS movement, much less promoting our involvement. As of this writing, I’m unaware of Archbishop Vlazny having ever commented publicly on the the subject. I may be wrong, of course, and welcome input from any reader with information I may have missed.
What is clear from my own study, however, is the presence of darker more sinister organizations either involved with or having shown support for OWS/OP. A fact that should certainly lead proper authorities within the archdiocese to give pause and discern carefully before allowing further promotion of the group to nearly 400,000 Oregon Catholics via its official newspaper.
I found Valerie Chapman’s positive spin for the cause of our supporting public disorder in the streets as shallow as the superficial statements made by President Barack Obama in the early days of the Occupy Wall Street movement 3 months ago.
It was his contention at the time that Occupy Wall Street protesters were simply ‘giving voice to a wider more broad-based frustration as to how our financial system (i.e. capitalism) works’. For Chapman, there is a “sense of betrayal by the system and growing desire for change.” Neither, however, go into any great depth explaining or even mentioning the leaders, supporters, sponsors and sympathizers by name–and probably, wouldn’t care too…
Here’s a partial list:
 |
Communist Party USA
|
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American Nazi Party
Media Matters, American Nazi Party, White Honor, Sunshine State News |
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Ayatollah Khamenei, Supreme Leader of Iran
|
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Barack Obama
|
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The government of North Korea
Korean Central News Agency (North Korean state-controlled news outlet), The Marxist-Leninist,Wall Street Journal, Times of India |
 |
Louis Farrakhan, Nation of Islam
video statement (starting at 8:28), Black in America, Weasel Zippers, Philadelphia Weekly |
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Revolutionary Communist Party
Revolutionary Communist Party, Revolution newspaper, in-person appearance |
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David Duke
|
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Joe Biden
|
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Hugo Chavez
|
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Revolutionary Guards of Iran
|
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Black Panthers (original)
|
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Socialist Party USA
|
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US Border Guard
White Reference, www.usborderguard.com, Gateway Pundit, Just Another Day blog |
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Industrial Workers of the World
|
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CAIR
|
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Nancy Pelosi
Talking Points Memo, video statement, ABC News, The Weekly Standard |
 |
Communist Party of China
People’s Daily (Communist Party organ), Reuters, chinataiwan.org, The Telegraph |
 |
Hezbollah
almoqawama.org, almoqawama.org (2), almoqawama.org (3), wikipedia |
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9/11Truth.org
|
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International Bolshevik Tendency
|
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Anonymous
|
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White Revolution
|
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International Socialist Organization
|
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PressTV (Iranian government outlet)
|
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Marxist Student Union
Marxist Student Union, Big Government, marxiststudentunion.blogspot.com |
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Freedom Road Socialist Organization
|
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ANSWER
|
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Party for Socialism and Liberation
Liberation News (1), pslweb.org, The Daily Free Press, Liberation News (2) |
All this above goes to show that in making her case for marriage between the Catholic Church and Occupy Portland it’s what Chapman hasn’t said within her piece that is more important than what little has been said. It’s not enough for us to fall for resort to authority arguments or follow empty propaganda-laden cheerleader phrases such as, “something new is happening” so that we might lend support. That’s not logical. “Something new” is happening all the time in the world, but that doesn’t necessary make everything happening in the world virtuous. Does it? Especially, when it comes to crowds of malcontent people taking it to the streets.
My guess after looking over this list, is that no properly catechized Catholic loyal to the magisterium of the Church, with even a rudimentary knowledge of recent Cold War history and the Church’s ongoing persecution and struggles under Atheistic Communism (see: China), would desire an OWS/OP solution to this so-called broad based discontent with the American financial system. I tend to agree with this OWS commentator:
"Funny Jesus": Found on the "Occupy Christmas" Facebook page, a link from the Occupy Portland page...
“This movement has fooled a lot of folks… And [...] it’s “an anti-Christian, anti-capitalist, anarchist movement bent on the destruction of America and other free societies.”
For instance, something new did happen last month within the OWS/OP movement. The hacker coalition known as ANONYMOUS [mentioned above] publicly published the email, physical addresses and home phone numbers of thousands of law enforcement officers from around the country in retribution for police evictions of OWS protest camps.
Now, it doesn’t take much to connect-the-dots here and figure out that these actions could seriously endanger not only the lives and well being of the officers involved, but their families and homes as well. One has to wonder too, what might be the percentage of Catholic officers and families placed in harms way by this foul act.
If this type of violent fruit coming from the movement isn’t enough to turn common sense against it, the movement also reveals as one faithful Catholic Sentinel commenter has recently noted, “cursing, disobedience to the law, drug use, rape, defecating on the American flag, filth, as well as public nudity.” Each and all, verifiable through various news and media outlets. Here’s a current leader of Occupy Portland at a recent family friendly event:
+++
So, should the church connect with the movement?
Apparently Chapman has answered that question for us and the archdiocese with this surprising announcement to St. Francis of Assisi parishioners found within the 12.18.11 parish bulletin:
“I want to let you know that Occupy Portland now has an office in our building. Metanoia Peace Community is renting the space on behalf of Occupy Portland until the new group has its own non-profit status. Occupy will be having some larger gatherings in the Dining Hall as it is available in the evenings.”
She goes on to note that,
“The energy of the movement and the younger folks who are participating has been very positive. I hope more of you will have the opportunity to participate…”
No thanks, Valerie, no thanks…
In concluding part 1, I have to wonder at the wisdom, (not to mention the authority(?)), behind allowing Occupy Portland Headquarters to be planted within an archdiocesan parish. This apparent lone action by Chapman seems problematic in other more serious areas as well—as in possible archdiocesan legal liability issues that may arise from future OWS/OP protest actions…
More on this in ‘The Archdiocese of Occupy Portland? (Part 2)’….
To voice your charitable objections…
+++++++++++++
ARCHDIOCESE OF PORTLAND – WESTERN OREGON
838 E. Burnside St.Portland, OR 97214-1895
http://www.archdpdx.org/
Most Reverend John G. Vlazny
rjohnson@archdpdx.org (AB secretary)
Mary Jo Tully – Chancellor
503-234-5334 Fax 503-234-2545The Archdiocesan Pastoral Council (western Oregon)
HAT TIP/MKJ Colozzi, The Blaze
END OF POST
Feast of Holy Mary, Mother of God 2012 : Preparation for Total Consecration to Our Lady
1st January 2012
Because on this feast that the Church declares a day dedicated to prayer for world peace, we find that the world needs it. To Jesus through Mary is the way…
From Le Blog Monfortain:
Everything else pales into insignificance before these three words: “Mother of God”. They are the thread which, from age to age, binds into one piece of cloth the whole tradition of the Church.
“The mother of my Lord,” says Elizabeth. “The child with his mother,” writes St Matthew. “Born of a woman,” adds St Paul. “Mary Theotokos”, that is: “Mother of God”, the inhabitants of Ephesus would cry out in the year 431, when the Council of Ephesus proclaimed the dogma. “Born of the Virgin Mary,” the Creed sings. For Jesus is only truly a man if you are truly his mother. The reality of the Word of God made flesh implies just this.
Jesus, “having loved those who were his in the world, loved them to the end,” St John says, speaking of the Passion; but this “to the end” was true right from the day that God took flesh in you, from the moment of your “yes” to the angel.
“Mother of God”: I would never have enough silent time to contemplate these three words. Like plants in the desert, that wait for days, perhaps even years, for a drop of rain in order to germinate, we must say them over and over again until your Son brings them to fruition in us.
All ages are amazed! “The one that the universe sings about but can never contain, is present in your womb,” Virgin Mother, “daughter of your Son, humble yet raised high more than all creatures.” You who fashioned the Christ, create his image also in me, holy Mary, Mother of God.
(Jacques Loew, o.p., Mon Dieu dont je suis sûr, Fayard-Mame, 1982, pg. 177)
ST. LOUIS DE MONTFORT’S formula for total consecration to Jesus through Mary….
For the benefit of those desiring to make the complete preparation recommended by the Saint, the Montfort Fathers in the United States have assembled in one book the various prayers and meditations conducive to an adequate preparation for total consecration to Jesus through Mary.
Here’s the Link from Knights of Divine Mercy.
END OF POST
Social Justice — List of Catholic Social Encyclicals
List of Social Encyclicals
By Yvonne Bontkowski in Catholic Tea Party ·
Pope Leo XIII
- Rerum Novarum: On the Condition of Workers
- Issued on the fifteenth of May 1891. Literally “Of New Things,” on capital and labor and the condition of the working class. This was the most significant of all the encyclicals before or since.
Rerum Novarum
- broke down the barriers that separated the church from the worker. Never before had the church spoken on social matters in such an official and comprehensive fashion**.
Pope Pius XI
- Quadragesimo Anno: On the Reconstruction of the Social Order
- Issued May 15, 1931. Literally “In forty Years,” commemorating the fortieth anniversary of
Rerum Novarum
- . This encyclical repeated many of the themes of
Rerum Novarum:
- the dignity of labor, the rights of workers to organize, etc.
Quadragesimo anno
- also emphasized the immorality of keeping economic control in the hands of a few. It recognized the principle of
subsidiarity
- , which held that higher levels of authority should act only when lower levels cannot deal with a problem. **
Pope John XXIII
- Mater et Magistra: Mother and Teacher
Issued May 15, 1961. Literally “Mother and Teacher,” on Christianity and Social progress. This encyclical gave an updated interpretation of the classic theme of private property and introduced the notion of private initiative as an extension of private property. While Rerum Novarum and Quadragesimo Anno left responsibility for social justice with the individual, Mater et Magistra placed some in the hands of the state. (this encyclical needs to be read in conjunction with Pacem in Terris, literally “Peace on Earth,” Pope John XXIII’s other great encyclical.) **
Pope Paul VI
- Populorum Progressio: On the Development of People
Issued March 26, 1967. Literally “On the Progress of Peoples.” A vigorous endorsement of Mater et Magistra, Populorum Progressio presented Catholicism as no longer tied to a social system based on natural law, but rather as a proponent of a pluralistic, decentralized approach to economic problems. **http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/paul_vi/encyclicals/documents/hf_p-vi_enc_26031967_populorum_en.html
Pope John Paul II Laborem Exercens: On Human Work
Issued on September 14, 1981. Literally “On Human Work.” Laborem Exercens focused on the themes that work is central to the social question and that work has potential not only to dehumanize but also to be the means whereby the human person cooperates in God’s ongoing creation.**http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/encyclicals/documents/hf_jp-ii_enc_14091981_laborem-exercens_en.html
- Sollicitudo Rei Socialis: On the Twentieth Anniversary of Populorum Progressio
Issued on December 30, 1987. Literally “On Social Concerns,” commemorating the twentieth anniversary of Populorum Progressio. Solicitudo Rei Socialis presented an overview of modern social problems with some guidelines for action. It dealt with authentic human development and adopted a critical attitude toward both capitalism and communism. Sollicitudo Rei Socialis warned that economic development alone may not set people free but only enslave them more. **
- Centesimus Annus: The Hundredth Anniversary of Rerum Novarum
Issued on May 1, 1991. Literally, “The Hundredth Year,” commemorating the one hundredth anniversary of Rerum Novarum. Centesimus Annus brought Rerum Novarum up to date and tied it to “the preferential option for the poor.” done in the context of the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, Centesimus Annus still criticized both capitalism and communism. **http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/encyclicals/documents/hf_jp-ii_enc_01051991_centesimus-annus_en.html
Pope Benedict XVI
- Caritas in Veritatae: Charity in Truth
- Pope Benedict’s third encyclical, is a call to see the relationship between human and environmental ecologies and to link charity and truth in the pursuit of justice, the common good, and authentic human development. In doing so, the pope points out the responsibilities and limitations of government and the private market, challenges traditional ideologies of right and left, and calls all men and women to think and act anew.
END OF POST/ MUCH THANKS TO Y.B.
The ‘Fat Cats Lose, Babies Win!’ Amendment to the U.S. Constitution
"...we’ll dump the fat cats for you, if you give us back our babies."
After reading here, that Portland Mayor Sam Adams has issued a proposed resolution of the Portland City Council supporting an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that makes clear that corporations are not people and money is not speech, I had an idea.
In fact, I believe it to be a brilliant idea whose time has come, if I do say so myself. (And no doubt, probably will…)
Yet, here it is:
We Pro-Life nuts scattered about the country promise to support non-personhood status for all corporations, if you Occupod nut-job types promise as well to support personhood status to all unborn children.
In a nutshell, (so to speak), “we’ll dump the fat cats for you, if you give us back our babies.”
MIC CHECK!
I propose here…
with you…,
to occupy together…
a common ground moment…
most American’s say they’ve long-yearned for…
by a shared initiative dubbed…
‘The ‘Fat Cats Lose, Babies Win!’
Amendment to the United States Constitution.
The only requirement of both sides is to work together equally hard in passing one amendment with language that will satisfy each of our goals, these two premises:
–corporations are not people and money is not speech.
and,
–define personhood as beginning at conception and that the purpose is to protect all life, regardless of age, health, function, physical or mental dependency, or method of reproduction.
That’s it. Whose with it, or why not?
Signed,
Me, the Cynical,
Me, the People,
Me, the Serious,
We, the 99%?
His-2-Reap — Controversy in Middle Ages over ‘real presence’
CREDIT: REUTERS/Stefano Rellandini
Just discovered for the first time over on Alive! the origins of the word ‘transubstantiation’.
Controversy in Middle Ages over ‘real presence’
By Bro. Stephen Brackett
During the Middle Ages a major controversy about the Blessed Eucharist was stirred up by a French priest called Berengarius. Eventually it led to a big development in Eucharistic devotion, including adoration of the Blessed Sacrament.
Born at Tours in 999, Berengarius studied theology in Chartres and in 1029 took charge of the theology school in his home city of Tours.
Soon his reputation for learning was spreading throughout France and attracting some of the best minds of the time to his school. But already his views were causing concern.
In a much earlier controversy, in the 830s, the monk Radbert Paschasius had maintained that at the consecration of the Mass the bread is converted into the real body of Christ and the wine into the real blood of Christ.
Another monk in the same abbey, Ratramnus, denied this, saying that Christ was present in a spiritual way in the Eucharist, but there was no conversion of the bread and wine.
Berengarius sided with Ratramnus,but his views were condemned as false and heretical at a council being held in Rome in 1050.
The condemnation was repeated at several local councils, such as Paris and Tours, in the coming years. In 1059 Berengarius retracted his views at a council in Rome and signed a profession of faith.
On his return home, however, he attacked the formula he had signed. At this point his supporters began to desert him.
It was in this controversy that the word ‘transubstantiation’ was first used to stress the true and full presence of Jesus in the Eucharist.
It was a bid to make sure that the meaning of the Lord’s words when he said, “This is my body, this is my blood,” would not be watered down in any way.
Coined by the theologian Hildebert of Lavardin in 1079, transubstantiation meant that the whole substance of the bread and of the wine were changed into the body and blood of Christ.
The important theologians at the time were united in opposing the views of Berengarius, but the controversy continued for decades. Finally, in 1080, he was reconciled with the Church.
Pope Gregory VII gave instructions that no penalty should be imposed on him nor that he should be called a heretic.
The turmoil and confusion he had caused, however, continued for many years to come and were recalled at the time of the Protestant reformation.
On the other hand, the dispute led to a more explicit presentation of Catholic teaching on the Eucharist and to new devotion.
In time, to protect Catholic faith in the Eucharist, the Church instituted the feast of Corpus Christi.
The custom of raising the host and the chalice after the consecration of the Mass was also introduced, allowing the faithful to profess their faith in the real presence of Christ.
END OF POST
Poll: On ‘The Beatbox Nativity’
Not sure that The Beatbox Nativity doesn’t act to minimize the profundity of the season, Catholicism, or for that matter the cause of Christ in the world. What say you?
