Catholicism--Now I Get It!

Great review in The Catholic Standard, here is a snippet:

“Catholicism: Now I Get It!” by Havertown native Claire Furia Smith, captures it all. From the maroon jumpers and knee socks of St. Louis school in Yeadon to religion class at Archbishop Carroll High School, this is the story of a girl’s journey from mythical Catholicism to the real thing.

“Everyone hears the same old myths,” Smith said. “That the Church is anti-science, and all these other simplistic mottos about our beliefs.”

A graduate of Yale with a master’s in journalism from Columbia, the 37-year-old Smith was raised Catholic but admits her practice of the faith was lacking.
“Even though I always went to church on Sundays, the rest of what I did was the bare minimum,” she said. “Prayer was something I did when someone got sick. I wasn’t fasting except what was required in Lent. It was the bare minimum. It was exactly what people make fun of Catholics for.”

It wasn’t until she reached young adulthood and was questioned about her beliefs by agnostic and non-denominational friends that she realized how little she understood Catholicism.

Feast of Saint Batholomew

From the Catholic Encyclopedia:

No mention of St. Bartholomew occurs in ecclesiastical literature before Eusebius, who mentions that Pantaenus, the master of Origen, while evangelizing India, was told that the Apostle had preached there before him and had given to his converts the Gospel of St. Matthew written in Hebrew, which was still treasured by the Church. "India" was a name covering a very wide area, including even Arabia Felix. Other traditions represent St. Bartholomew as preaching in Mesopotamia, Persia, Egypt, Armenia, Lycaonia, Phrygia, and on the shores of the Black Sea; one legend, it is interesting to note, identifies him with Nathaniel. The manner of his death, said to have occurred at Albanopolis in Armenia, is equally uncertain; according to some, he was beheaded, according to others, flayed alive and crucified, head downward, by order of Astyages, for having converted his brother, Polymius, King of Armenia. On account of this latter legend, he is often represented in art (e.g. in Michelangelo's Last Judgment) as flayed and holding in his hand his own skin.

Almost 21 Months Old

His birthday is a few days from mine and I'm a long ways from 21 months...

Snakes + Theater = Not a Good Thing

Moviegoers in Phoenix were treated to the real thing...

From the NJ Ledger:

Life imitating art is all very well. Unless, that is, it's a movie about
deadly snakes on the rampage.

Movie chain AMC Entertainment Inc. said pranksters at one of its
Phoenix theaters released two live diamondback rattlesnakes during a showing of
the film "Snakes on a Plane" last Friday. No one was injured.

Pope: Come Lord Jesus!

Explains the book of the Apocalypse at his Wednesday Audience....

From Asia News Italy:

But speaking then about the one of the symbols of the Apocalypse (the scroll no one could open that drove the apostle to tears, Apoc.5:4), he adds: “Probably this cry expressed the bewilderment of the Asian churches about the silence of God in the face of persecutions they were subject to then. It is a bewilderment that could well reflect our dismay in the face of serious difficulties, misunderstandings and hostilities that the Church still suffers today in several parts of the world. They are sufferings the Church certainly does not deserve, just as Jesus himself did not merit his torment.”

Speaking off the cuff, the pope continued: The “meaning of the history of mankind”, “the destiny of history” is in the hands of Jesus Christ, who the Apocalypse reveals as the “slaughtered Lamb, defenceless, wounded, dead, but upright, alive, participating in the divine power of the Father”. “Jesus, although he was killed by an act of violence, instead of collapsing to the ground, paradoxically remains firmly on his feet, because the resurrection has definitely won over death”.

The meaning of victory over persecution was affirmed by Benedict XVI when he explained the symbol of the “Woman who delivers a male Son, and the complementary one of the Dragon who has by now fallen from the heavens. Although active in the persecution of the Woman and her other children, he has now been overcome at the core and his ultimate defeat will be unmistakably manifested.” Here too, the pope talked off the cuff for a while, explaining that the Woman is Mary, but also the church “that gives birth with great suffering in every age, defenceless, weak. While she is persecuted by the Dragon, she is protected by the consolations of God. It is this woman who triumphs in the end, not the dragon.” The pope continued spontaneously: “The Woman who is persecuted appears at the end like a Bride, the new Jerusalem, where there are no more tears and everything is light, because her light is the Lamb.”

“For this reason,” continued Benedict XVI, “the Apocalypse of John, although it is pervaded by continual references to suffering and tribulations – the obscure face of reality – is just as much permeated by frequent hymns of praise that sort of represent the luminous face of history... We are faced here with a typical Christian paradox, according to which suffering is never perceived as the last word, but is rather seen as a point of passage towards happiness, and even it [suffering] is already mysteriously soaked with joy that springs from hope.”

The pope ended his reflection by explaining the last words with which “the Seer of Patmos” concludes his book, the invocation, “Come Lord Jesus”, “pulsing with anxious expectation”. Here too, the pope added a reflection on impulse, saying that this waiting had three dimensions: that of the “definitive victory of the Lord who comes and transforms the world”; the “Eucharistic, of now, in which He anticipates his final coming”; the eschatological, in which the Church says: You have already come, it is a joy for us, but come fully.” And nearly as if to express the impatience of this wait, Benedict XVI ended with a prayer: “Come Lord Jesus, come and transform the world, and may your Peace triumph. Amen.”

By Chance or Design?

Vatican lets go of astronomer...

From LifeSite:

The Jesuit priest-astronomer who vocally opposed the Catholic understanding
of God-directed creation, has been removed from his post as head of the Vatican
observatory.

Fr. George Coyne has been head of the Vatican observatory for 25 years
is an expert in astrophysics with an interest in the interstellar medium, stars
with extended atmospheres and Seyfert galaxies. He also appointed himself as an
expert in evolutionary biology and theology last summer in an article for the
UK’s liberal Catholic magazine, The Tablet.

Fr. Coyne was writing against Christoph Cardinal Schonborn, a principal
author of the Catholic catechism, who said that an “unplanned process of random
variation and natural selection,” both important parts of evolutionary thinking,
are incompatible with Catholic belief in God’s ordering and guiding of
creation.

Coyne, retiring after 25 years of service for the Vatican observatory,
said, “The classical question as to whether the human being came about by
chance, and so has no need of God, or by necessity, and so through the action of
a designer God, is no longer valid.”

August 22nd: Queenship of the Blessed Virgin Mary

But fears of terrorism for another reason...

From The Blotter:

While no extra safeguards are in place, U.S. law enforcement are not ignoring the possible significance of tomorrow's date, August 22, a date that marks an important historic event on the Islamic calendar.

Internet websites have been full of speculation that it could be a target date for terrorists in commemoration of the return of the 12th imam, a supposed day of reckoning for Shiites.

August 22 was rumored by intelligence experts to be a possible date that the London plotters would blow-up passenger planes headed towards the United States, though it is not known if the suspects were Shiite extremists.