Jesuits Produce Film On St. Francis Xavier

'Xavier: Missionary & Saint' to Premiere on PBS Stations Nationwide
Contact: Stephen Janson, Janson Media, 201-784-8488

HARRINGTON PARK, NJ, Dec. 5 /Christian Newswire/ -- Janson Media today announced the broadcast premiere of the new one-hour documentary film, XAVIER: MISSIONARY & SAINT, on PBS stations nationwide. Narrated by Academy Award-winner Liam Neeson and filmed on location in the footsteps of the Jesuit missionary, XAVIER features stunning scenery from Rome, Spain, Paris, India, China, and Japan as well as interviews with world-renowned historians and theologians. The film commemorates the 500th anniversary of the birth of the most successful missionary since St. Paul. XAVIER was produced by Jeremy Zipple and Jeff Johnson for Fourth Week Films and the New Orleans Province of the Society of Jesus. The film was written by Johnson, directed by Zipple, and edited by Justin Ulbrich. The music was composed by Anthony Francis Rosado, and the role of Francis Xavier is played by Ron Garcia. "While there is some good historical scholarship on Xavier, there are not a lot of background stories," said Johnson. "We're trying to tell them." The experience of making the film and of hearing stories of Xavier from Jesuits around the world "was a grace-filled part of the experience," said Zipple. "I really felt his presence in a profound way.""This is the story of a missionary who died alone on a desolate island within sight of the land of his life's dream," says Liam Neeson in the film's introduction. "He was unaware that he had forever changed the face and the race of Christianity." The production of XAVIER was financed by the New York, Chicago, Maryland, and California Provinces of the Society of Jesus, as well as the Jesuit Conference and private donors. The documentary is distributed exclusively by New Jersey-based Janson Media for all media worldwide. The XAVIER: MISSIONARY & SAINT DVD, released by Janson Media in December 2006, includes such special features as an interview with Avery Cardinal Dulles S.J., the film's original trailer, a Behind the Scenes Photo Gallery, and The Making of… Xavier featurette. The documentary itself was filmed in widescreen, 16:9 format.

More information is available at the film's website, http://www.xavierfilm.com/, and at Janson Media's website, http://www.janson.com/.

Global Warming, Who's Right?

From December 2007

We are delighted that your government has so swiftly moved to ratify the Kyoto Protocol, given the serious ecological crisis facing the planet. The earth is the patrimony of all people. Our own institutions will seek to host sustainable pilot projects for new technologies. Link (here)

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Mark Raper SJ
Provincial of the Australian Jesuits
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Or maybe the Kyoto Protocal is meaningless.

The Italian historian Majolino Bisaccioni suggested that the wave of bad weather and revolutions might be due to the influence of the stars. But the Jesuit astronomer Giovanni Battista Riccioli speculated that fluctuations in the number of sunspots might be to blame, for he had noticed they were absent. Looking back through sunspot records reveals many periods when the Sun's activity was high and low and in general they are related to warm and cool climatic periods. As well as the Little Ice Age, there was the weak Sun and the cold Iron Age, the active sun and the warm Bronze Age. Link (here)

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Giovanni Battista Riccioli

17th century Jesuit astronomer

Jesuit In India

Little hope for Indian Muslims as Gujarat heads to polls
By Elizabeth Roche

Opinion polls suggest Modi and his Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party will cruise to victory MUSLIM victims of a pogrom that took place five years ago in the western Indian state of Gujarat say they have little hope for the future with Hindu hardliners blamed for the violence set for re-election. Gujarat witnessed a frenzy of destruction, rape and murder in 2002, with huge mobs targetting the Muslim community after Hindu pilgrims were killed in an alleged attack on a train. In all, at least 2,000 Muslims were massacred, and many survivors are still piecing together shattered lives - saying they remain marginalised and struggling to come to terms with the orchestrated killings. “We had good houses, a steady income, clean drinking water, electricity and cleaner surroundings where we were staying earlier,” said Khatoon Bibi, a woman in her mid-40s forced out of her neighbourhood after the bloodletting. “Now we have nothing. No source of livelihood, the (majority) Hindu community don’t want us to work with them or for them.“Our children don’t go to school any more and we live on a garbage dump,” she said, pointing to huge mounds of refuse, just metres from her house in the resettlement colony on the outskirts of Gujarat’s commercial capital Ahmedabad. Khatoon Bibi and her husband were among several thousand Muslims in Naroda Patiya neighbourhood when armed Hindu groups stormed the narrow lanes, hacking residents and torching their belongings on February 28, 2002.The riots in Naroda Patiya and other parts of Gujarat were triggered by the deaths of 59 Hindu pilgrims after their train carriage was set on fire - allegedly by a Muslim mob - in Godhra town the previous day. An inquiry by the state-run railway later said the blaze was accidental. Some 2,000 people were killed in what social rights activists said was a carefully planned and systematic massacre. The hardline chief minister of Gujarat, Narendra Modi, has been accused of turning a blind eye to the riots - a charge he has consistently denied. He is now campaigning for re-election in two phase elections on December 11 and 16, and opinion polls suggest Modi and his Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party will cruise to victory. Modi has been playing up what he says are his skills as an efficient administrator whose policies have brought an economic boom in Gujarat, one of India’s wealthier states which has drawn heavy international investment.But for riot victims such as Shah Bano, “when Modi says he has brought prosperity to Gujarat and that 55 million Gujaratis are his family, it is not us he is talking about.”

Cedric Prakash, a Jesuit priest working with the riot victims, said Gujarat’s Muslims who make up around 10 percent of the state’s population - were still suffering five years on. “Today Muslims are confined to ghettos. The healing process can take place if there are suitable conditions created by the state, but the state government itself is hostile to creating those conditions of reconciliation,”

he told AFP. Muslims also said they even felt abandoned by the Congress party, which governs India on a federal level. “Politicians only remember you at the time of elections,” said Abdul Majid, a 55-year-old man who witnessed the rape and murder of his eldest daughter during the 2002 riots. “We have had a parade of people - presidents, politicians, film stars and journalists - come here, look at us, hear our stories and go back. It’s almost like we are animals in the zoo,” said Mohammed Salim, who heads a riot victims’ forum for justice.“When we asked the police for help (during the riots), they said they had orders not to intervene. The state was supposed to protect us,” he said, shaking his head. “Our faith in the system is shattered.” afp

"Creationism Is Paganism", Says Jesuit Astronomer

Vatican astronomer likens creationism to superstition
Glasgow, Dec. 6, 2007 (CWNews.com) - A Jesuit astronomer from the Vatican Observatory has said that scientific creationism is a form of superstition. Speaking in Glasgow this week, Brother Guy Consolmagno said that scientists should protect against the tendency of religion to slide into superstition. In turn, he said, science needs religion "in order to have a conscience." In the case of creationism, he said, believers have constructed a theory that is not supported by scientific facts. "Religion needs science to keep it away from superstition and keep it close to reality," Brother Consolmagno said-- "to protect it from creationism, which at the end of the day is a kind of paganism." Brother Consolmagno speaks and writes frequently on the relationship between faith and science. He is the author of God's Mechanics: How Scientists and Engineers Make Sense of Religion. Link (here)

Interview With Superior General Peter-Hans Kolvenbach, S.J.

Theological dialogue with Islam 'impossible,' top Jesuit says
Dec 5 2007
By JOHN L. ALLEN JR
Covering a church with more than 2,000 years of history, one doesn’t get the chance to use the word “unprecedented” very often. In early January, however, something will happen in Rome that is (almost) a complete novelty: The Society of the Jesus, the largest and most influential religious order in the Catholic church, will elect a successor to its Father General while the current occupant of the office is still alive and in good health.
When Dutch Fr. Peter-Hans Kolvenbach, 79, was elected to the position in September 1983, he too replaced a living Father General, Pedro Arrupe. The difference, however, is that Arrupe had suffered an incapacitating stroke in 1981 and was unable to continue leading the society; Kolvenbach, on the other hand, remains as alert and agile as ever, and is stepping down in order to allow new leadership to take the reins.
While handicappers from around the world speculate about who might emerge as the new “black pope,” the traditional title of the Jesuit leader, Kolvenbach took a rare step into the public spotlight this month with a lengthy interview in the Jesuit journal Popoli, looking back at his 24 years at the helm. The following are brief excerpts from that interview, translated from Italian by NCR.
Of particular interest are Kolvenbach’s comments on Islam at the end of the interview. It’s an area in which he has special expertise; not only are many of the Catholic church’s leading experts on Islam members of the Society of Jesus, but Kolvenbach spent long years living in Lebanon, where he served as Jesuit provincial during that nation’s civil war.
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In recent years, the Society of Jesus has seen a drop in candidates for the novitiate. What are the reasons?
Sometimes we forget that a religious family is, in a happy expression of the Second Vatican Council, ‘a gift of the Spirit to the church.’ The church can’t be the church without clergy and laity, but it can be church without religious life in its present form. The church lived for centuries without the Jesuits! … Religious families are born and they disappear, not because they did something wrong, but because the church requires other gifts to meet other needs of the people of God. The simple fact that today a young man who wants to put himself at the service of the church doesn’t necessarily have to choose between the seminary and the novitiate, but can also find his mission in one of the new ecclesial movements that are also a gift of the Spirit, changes the whole context of consecrated life.
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What do you see today for the church in Europe?
I think about something Robert Baden-Powell, the founder of the Boy Scouts and a man who wasn’t himself particularly religious, once said: ‘I like my religion the same way I like my tea – boiling.” If the parish, ecclesial life, isn’t strong, fervent, and warm, it won’t generate vocations to the religious life or the priesthood. This is evident not only in Europe, but also in Latin America, where the shortage of priests is tremendous. On the other hand, in areas where only priests and religious were once active, today laity are assuming new responsibilities.
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Is there a risk of the laity becoming simply a remedy for the lack of Jesuits?
No, the change of perspective is radical: the laity aren’t just an indispensable form of help or a solution for ensuring the future of our works, but the Society of Jesus puts itself at the service of a shared mission with the laity, uniting itself with them in a kind of apprenticeship, serving together and learning from one another, discerning together the apostolic objectives of a common mission at the service of the church.
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What ‘flash’ of insight are you hoping for from the General Congregation that will open in a few weeks?
The ‘flash’ will be the quest for the greater glory of God, for apostolic service to the other which is ever more generous and complete, because mediocrity has no place in the worldview of Ignatius.
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How would you define today the mission of the Society of Jesus?
As servants of the mission of Christ, the Jesuits desire to continue that mission among the men and women of our time, above all where Christ and his gospel are not know or are only poorly known. That implies a presence on frontiers which were at one time the geographic borders of Christianity, but which today are increasingly the frontiers between faith and culture, between Christian faith and science, between the church and human society, and between the ‘good news’ and an anguished and tormented world.
In addition to being ‘men of the frontier,’ Jesuits are also known for their ability as mediators. That’s an increasingly difficult challenge in world more known for polarization and superficiality.
It’s true, this capacity for mediation is rooted in the very composition of the Society: we’ve been international from the beginning, with a great respect for the different cultures. … This openness creates a vocation of not being at one extreme or the other, but to help people follow the path that leads to God. It can be said, I think, that an extremist could never become a Jesuit. This doesn’t mean, however, that a Jesuit is a diplomat. He seeks the absolute, but the absolute is God alone, and everything else is relative to God, to the human person, and to creation. … (pauses) … That’s a truly Jesuitical response!
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Over the years, you’ve handled delicate relationships between some Jesuit theologians and the Vatican. What are the necessary limits, and what’s the space for welcoming a plurality of theological reflection in the Society?
[Theology] unfolds today in a nervous atmosphere of conflicts and polarization, in which everything is immediately classified as either ‘right’ or ‘left,’ as conservatism or progressive thought. Even a constructive critique by a theologian, based on deep competence, pastoral concern and discernment born in prayer, runs the risk of being taken up by the mass media in a partial fashion (either unwittingly or deliberately) in order to turn it into front-page news. On the other hand, the church can’t renounce its right, and its duty, to protect the faithful against errors or possibly erroneous interpretations of a given theological work, even if it’s valid in itself. In this context, which at first blush can seem discouraging, it’s important to be grateful for so many theologians – among them, not just a few Jesuits – who provide the church the indispensable service of positive, clear and creative theological reflection, which serves the greater good of the whole church in its socio-cultural diversity.
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China is a priority for the church today. How does one offer a Chinese ‘reading” of the gospel, and not just a transliteration?
The intuition of St. Francis Xavier remains valid today: China, in his vision, was the key for the evangelization of East Asia, including Japan. Today, China is important for the entire world. Fifty years after the death of Xavier, Fr. Matteo Rici succeeded in arriving at Canton, in the court of Peking. He didn’t transliterate the gospel, but created a Chinese reading of it. … We have to return to the path of Matteo Ricci, in order to understand the material and spiritual needs and aspirations of the Chinese people today. The hope, as well as the new element in the evangelization of China, lies in the numerous Christian communities that are already there. They themselves, the Chinese faithful, can craft a Chinese reading of the gospel much better than all the foreign missionaries. The recent letter of Pope Benedict XVI was intended precisely to prepare the church in China for this evangelizing role.
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What’s the role of the Society of Jesus in Latin America today?
If our apostolic works – whether specifically social, or educational and pastoral – are faithful to the missions of faith and justice, if they’re able to transmit the preferential love for the poor which is the patrimony of the church, which was confirmed by the meeting of Latin American bishops in Aparecida in May – and if we try to form honest and competent people who aren’t interested only in making themselves rich, but who are motivated to improve their country according to the social doctrine of the church, we’ll be able to make our own small contribution. … My impression is that at this moment in Latin America, the priorities of the Jesuits are programs of political formation for leaders, in strict collaboration with the universities, social centers and grassroots apostolates.
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In Africa, what efforts is the Society making in theology in order to present the faithful with a message that knows how to inculturate the gospel in local traditions?
Despite so much conflict and suffering, theological research goes on in Africa … these theological interests haven’t neglected the composition of liturgical music, for example, as in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, or of works inspired by traditional African art, such as the Via Crucis by the late Fr. Engelbert Mueng. There’s also a theological interest in realities such as illness, healing and witchcraft.
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Islam is awakening in many Europeans fears of being overrun…
First of all, we have to clarify something: we speak too glibly of ‘Muslims,’ as if they’re all the same. In reality, there are fanatical Muslims and there are Muslims convinced that once they arrive in Europe they no longer need to follow the Koran because they’re outside the land of Islam. Islam is not monolithic: think about the difference, for example, between the Sunnis, the majority and the major pillars of Islam, and the Shi’ites, a minority (although today to mention the Shi’ites is to talk about many ‘hot spots,’ such as Iran, Iraq and south Lebanon.) We also can’t forget that Islam has always had its mystics, the Sufis. Much also depends upon nationality: a Muslim in Pakistan – a word that means “nation of the pure” – is very different from a Muslim in Algeria, which has lived for so long with the French.
That said, I can talk about the experience of Beirut, which is my city. The Jesuits there have chosen to be a bridge between Muslims and Christians. In part, the reason is geographical: the largest houses of the Jesuits in Beirut are on the so-called ‘Green Line,’ the border between the majority Christian area and the Muslim neighborhood. Our university is also there, because we always wanted everyone to be welcome. That’s cost us a lot. We’ve often been hit by bombardments. When I was the provincial in Lebanon, during the war, I couldn’t open the windows because there were snipers across the street. But the cost isn’t only material: some Christians say that our approach is wrong because we’ve trained Muslim lawyers, Muslim engineers, and so on. Some would prefer that the Muslims stay in a kind of ghetto, including an intellectual ghetto, in order not to lose control of the country.
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On the strictly religious and theological level, is dialogue with Islam possible?
I’m afraid that at a theological and dogmatic level, dialogue with Islam is impossible. Often in Beirut, Muslims would ask me: ‘How is it possible that an educated person, a professor, believes in three gods?’ Obviously, they were referring to the Christian dogma of the Trinity. That’s an example of the difficulties of dialogue. Some who are favorable to theological dialogue with Muslims forget that at a certain point, you have to choose. For Muslims, it’s very clear: God is one. They chant it five times every day.
At a personal level, however, it’s not only possible but beautiful to have Muslim friends. Indeed, in a climate of general religious transformation, especially in Europe, it’s important that truly believing Christians and truly believing Muslims meet one another. On so many points that touch us all – suffering, prayer, death – dialogue is possible. I believe, as the pope has often said, we have to promote a dialogue of life, partly to resist a temptation that’s so strong in the Middle East: the ghetto, separation.
Moreover, we have to make common cause for the good of humanity. Many Muslims today are sensitive to the theme of peace, and very committed. After September 11, everyone talked about Islam in terms of jihad, holy war, and violence. It’s true, one can find this in the Koran, but the Old Testament is likewise not all that peaceful in some passages … Today, many Muslims are firmly committed to the cause of peace. It’s a good opportunity to work together, in the interests of the entire human community.

During your 24 years as Father General, what aspects of the legacy of your predecessor, Fr. Pedro Arrupe, did you especially emphasize?
To tell the truth, I didn’t really have to do anything to keep the legacy of Fr. Arrupe alive. It’s impossible to forget Arrupe, who was so committed to the Second Vatican Council, especially in the area of religious life. He’s part of the Society today spontaneously, without having to try! That’s not something one could have predicted: it wasn’t the case, for example, with the two generals before him, Fr. Janssens and Fr. Ledochowski. Today the Society of Jesus, in its spirituality, simply ‘is’ Fr. Arrupe.

Screwball Former Jesuit Writes Stupid Book

“Three liberation theologians who look like terrorists”
In recently published novel, LA’s archbishop is kidnapped, tried in Mexico and returned to US with radical vision for American Church
Robert Blair Kaiser, a veteran religion writer who covered the Second Vatican Council for Time magazine, has written a curious new novel about Cardinal Roger Mahony. The book, Cardinal Mahony, tells the story of “a new Cardinal Mahony,” who works, says a blurb on Kaiser’s web site, “to give Catholics a voice, a vote, citizenship in the Church.” But only after the cardinal undergoes a harrowing experience. A Jesuit for 10 years, Kaiser left the order before ordination to become a journalist. After covering the Second Vatican Council, he worked as a religion writer for the New York Times and Newsweek. He has also has worked as a news commentator for various television networks, and has written eight other books not dealing with the Catholic Church. Besides his latest, Kaiser has written three other books on Catholic subjects: Pope, Council and World, The Politics of Sex and Religion; Clerical Error; and A Church in Search of Itself. A Church in Search of Itself, subtitled “Benedict XVI and the Battle for the Future,” offers vignettes of six cardinals Kaiser “believes can lead Roman Catholicism back toward the light," says a 2006 Los Angeles Times review. One of the cardinals is Roger Mahony, who Kaiser praises "for his emphasis on tending to the poor (along with some rightful condemnation for Mahony's atrocious handling of the archdiocese's priestly sex-abuse scandal)." Another is Cardinal Francis Arinze, who, says the Times, earns Kaiser’s “acclaim for allowing Nigerian tribes to synthesize their traditions with the Westernized Mass." In Clerical Error, Kaiser takes on Malachy Martin (deceased when the book was published). Jesuit Fr. Martin, Kaiser claims, seduced his wife in Rome in the 1960s. Kaiser portrays Martin as not only venal but also as a destroyer of reputations and careers, according to a review in the March 8, 2002 National Catholic Reporter. The book claims that, because of Martin’s machinations, Kaiser ended up for a time in a mental institution. But the book itself reveals something about Kaiser. The Reporter said that, as a Time correspondent covering Vatican II, Kaiser, “by his own admission… was trying to … play God of the council.” Cardinal Mahony is the only work of fiction among Kaiser’s Catholic books. It tells the story of how LA’s archbishop “gets kidnapped outside his cabin in the High Sierras one snowy morning in November 2008 by three liberation theologians who look like terrorists,” according to Kaiser’s web site. These cardinal captors “take him off to southern Mexico in his own helicopter and put him on trial for his sins in front of an international television audience. A jury of his peers, six retired Latin American bishops, find him guilty, and give him a surprising sentence.” Mahony “falls in love with his kidnappers and leads the American Catholic Church into a radical new way of being, still Catholic but aggressively accountable to the people, which is to say, aggressively American,” says the web site book promo. In an interview found on his web site, Kaiser gives his vision of the American Catholic Church. It is to be “loyal to the pope,” but locally controlled, with its own married clergy and its own liturgies. The Church, he said, “could follow a U.S. constitutional model,” with an elected executive and bicameral legislative branch (bishops and commons). The judiciary could be “appointed with the advice and consent of both houses,” said Kaiser.

From the best online Catholic newspaper, that writes truely great pieces of journalism, The California Catholic Daily. Read the original article (here)

The Jesuit And Nicole Kidman

Jesuit priest guiding Nic's "spiritual homecoming" A close religious confidant to Nicole Kidman, Jesuit Fr Paul Coleman, says the actor has returned to the Church on the eve of her marriage to country singer Keith Urban."For Nicole, you know, this is a spiritual homecoming, coming back to the church and her faith in her old parish," he said.The Sydney Morning Herald reports that Fr Coleman is chaplain at Mary MacKillop Chapel in North Sydney. The church has reportedly been chosen as the venue for the nuptials on 25 June.It is also where Kidman attended Easter Mass with her parents, Anthony and Janelle, last year.Since her split from Tom Cruise in 2001, Kidman has returned to her Catholic roots, attending Mass regularly. She abandoned her faith when she married Cruise in a Church of Scientology ceremony at his isolated estate in Colorado in 1990. Kidman has since been granted an annulment on the basis that her first marriage did not conform to the requirements of the Church. Fr Coleman was instrumental in advising Kidman's family on the annulment. But the priest said the family's wish was that "everything stays under wraps". He said no booking for the wedding had been made at the chapel.Speculation that the ceremony could be held in the chapel at Monte Sant'Angelo College, North Sydney, was doubtful, he said."I don't believe either chapel is large enough to accommodate such a social wedding." The wedding will be a star-studded affair. Guests are said to include Baz Luhrmann and Catherine Martin, Naomi Watts, Hugh Jackman and Deborra-Lee Furness, Russell Crowe and Danielle Spencer, and Lachlan and Sarah Murdoch, as well as Rupert Murdoch and wife Wendi Deng. Guests have reportedly been contacted to confirm the date, and told to wait for a second secretive communique to confirm the location and time. The wedding is likely to be held under the cover of nightfall to reduce photographic interest. Helicopter pilots, photographers, chefs and stylists retained at great expense have all signed confidentiality contracts. In lieu of wedding gifts, the couple has provided guests with a list of charities and asked them to donate.

Link to original article (here)

Jesuits Fr. John Harden and Fr. Leonard Feeney In The Middle Of Unam Sanctum And Lumen Gentium

Just Exactly Where is the Church?
Mark Shay
December 5, 2007

Unam Sanctam is the sort of document that gives our Protestant brothers and sisters a real jolt, primarily because it looks at first blush as though it teaches that Catholics cannot have Protestant brothers and sisters. Written by Pope Boniface VIII in 1302, this papal bull concludes with this shocking dogmatic definition: "We declare, say, define and pronounce, that it is absolutely necessary for the salvation of every human creature to be subject to the Roman Pontiff." The average modern reader concludes these words mean: "We know exactly where the Church both is and is not. It's in the visible Catholic communion and only members of the visible Catholic Church go to Heaven." After this basic assumption has been made, most people go on to assume it is simply a matter of deciding what you think about that proposition.

Generally, people fall into one of the following groups:
1. Those nice people who say hopefully, "That statement was not dogma, but just Boniface's opinion."
2. Those Progressive Dissenting Catholics who say, "That statement used to be narrow-minded Catholic dogma but Vatican II thankfully contradicts all that. How the Church has grown!"
3. Those anti-Catholics who say derisively, "That statement used to be unbiblical Catholic dogma but Vatican II reversed all that. How the supposedly infallible Church has flatly contradicted the Bible and itself!"
4. Those Reactionary Dissenting Catholics who say, "That statement used to be glorious Catholic dogma but Vatican II betrayed all that. How the Second Vatican Council has corrupted the One True Faith!"
5. Those orthodox Catholics who say, "Unam Sanctam's definition is still dogma and the teaching of the Second Vatican Council does not contradict it or the Bible. Rather, the Council develops the Faith of the Church infallibly taught since the apostles, a faith which has never demanded we believe that "The Church is found solely in the visible Catholic communion, nor that only members of the visible Catholic Church can go to Heaven."

Let's look at these five views of Unam Sanctam.
First things first, I must disappoint Group #1 by making clear that the Faith does not allow us the easy out of denying the dogmatic nature of Unam Sanctam any more than it allowed Arius to fudge the difficult and seemingly contradictory proposition that God is One, yet Three.

As John Hardon, S.J. points out in his Catholic Catechism, the passage cited
above was "solemnly defined and represents traditional Catholic dogma on the
Church's necessity for salvation."

When a Pope declares, pronounces and defines, he is using the formula to make crystal clear that he is delivering, not his personal opinion, but the dogmatic teaching of the Catholic Church. The fact is then, Pope Boniface VIII committed the Church to this proposition for the rest of her history. We cannot dodge this with a convenient "that was then, this is now." If it was dogma once, it still is. However, neither can we dodge another fact of Catholic history: the Second Vatican Council. At that Council, the Church formulated Lumen Gentium in which, 660 years after Unam Sanctam, she declared, "The Church knows that she is joined in many ways to the baptized who are honored by the name of Christian, but do not profess the Catholic faith in its entirety or have not preserved unity or communion under the successor of Peter."
To Groups 2, 3, and 4, this sounds like a flat contradiction. For all these folk make the fatal error of placing one or other of the Church's teachings in opposition to (and superiority over) the other. Thus, Progressive Dissenting Catholics, Anti-Catholics, and Reactionary Dissenting Catholics all assume that Unam Sanctam was simply vetoed by a newly-coined doctrine in Lumen Gentium which essentially declared that our relationship to the successor of Peter doesn't matter one iota. If we agree about this, all that remains for us to do is to decide whether to cheer along with Progressive Dissenters (for the Church's "deepened maturity") to gloat along with anti-Catholics (over the alleged collapse of the Church's infallibility) or to grumble along with Reactionary Dissenters (about those damned modernists who hijacked the Church at Vatican II). The problem with this assumption is simply this: it's not true. First, the Church, centuries before Vatican II, regarded Orthodox sacraments as valid, which is awfully hard to do if you don't think Christ can be found anywhere but in the Catholic Church. Similarly, it has always regarded the Baptism of non-Catholics as valid — and a valid Baptism means you are, in some sense, in union with Christ.

Still more recently and most plainly, (but still well before the Council) Fr. Leonard Feeney, S.J. was excommunicated for insisting that only people in visible communion with the Catholic Church could be saved. So this simplistic "We're in, you're out" reading of Unam Sanctam (and the corollary that Lumen Gentium "cancelled" it) doesn't fly.

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So is there a more balanced picture that reverences both Unam Sanctam and Lumen Gentium as authentic magisterial teaching?

Read Mark Shay's full article (here)

19th Century Jesuit Priest Was "Tarred and Feathered" By A Protestant Mob

Why science needs history
By RICK CASEY

12/04/07

A recent flap at the Texas Education Agency demonstrates why we need to teach history better so we can teach science better. After nine years as the Texas Education Agency's science director, Chris Comer resigned after being suspended for appearing to oppose the "intelligent design" theory of the origins of the universe. TEA officials say other factors were involved in her firing, but e-mails obtained by the Austin American-Statesman make clear that Comer's scientific orthodoxy and apparent political heresy were a major factor. Her mortal sin was that in October she sent an e-mail to an Austin online community announcing an upcoming lecture by Barbara Forrest, a Southeast Louisiana University philosophy professor and co-author of Inside Creationism's Trojan Horse. 'Creationism relabeled' Forrest is hardly alone in her notion that "intelligent design," which argues that gaps in evolution theory means that a Creator must be responsible for the universe, is itself the creation of biblical creationists. Two years ago a federal judge in Pennsylvania, after listening to six weeks of expert testimony and legal arguments, ruled a school board could not require the teaching of "intelligent design," which he called "creationism relabeled." Apparently the first call for Comer's firing came from TEA staffer Lizzette Reynolds who had been sent a copy of the e-mail. Reynolds served as a legislative director for then-Gov. George Bush and went on to serve in his U.S. Department of Education. She was hired as the TEA's "senior adviser on statewide initiatives" last January. A Christian nation Reynolds e-mailed Comer's bosses, saying Comer's apparent recommendation of the lecture "is an offense that calls for termination or, at the very least, reassignment of responsibilities." So a science educator should be fired for promoting a lecture by a supporter of science? What kinds of "statewide initiatives" does this senior adviser promote? One possibility: The State Board of Education soon will review our schools' science curriculum. Promoters of creationism and intelligent design sometimes suggest that the biblical account deserves a special place in our schools (as opposed to, say, Hindu or Hopi creation stories) because the U.S. was founded as a Christian nation.
Here are some historical incidents that prove that we were, indeed, founded as a Christian nation:

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•In the early 17th century, Sam Maverick, an English immigrant to Boston and an ancestor of the famous Texas Mavericks, was jailed for repeatedly missing church.
•About the same time, Baptist preacher Roger Williams came to Massachusetts to escape religious persecution in England. After being quoted as saying local Puritan authorities "cannot without a spiritual rape force the consciences of all to one worship," he was secretly warned by Gov. John Winthrop that he was in peril.
He fled to live with a group of Native Americans, then purchased what is now Rhode Island from them, setting it up as a colony that honored religious freedom.

•In 1844, a Jesuit priest in Maine advised Catholic families to go to court to block a school board order that required their children to read the Protestant King James version of the Bible in school. The priest was grabbed by a mob while hearing confessions on a Saturday evening, stripped of his clothes, tarred and feathered.

•In 1859, 11-year-old Tom Wall refused to recite the Protestant version of the Ten Commandments in his Boston public school. After consulting with his principal, Tom's teacher hit the boy across the knuckles with a 3-foot rattan stick. The boy again refused. The punishment was repeated. The boy still refused. After half an hour of the painful punishment, he relented despite fearing that he was betraying his God. His father filed assault charges and went to court to challenge the reading requirement. He lost.

•In 1869, the Cincinnati school board voted 22-15 to honor the request of Catholic parents to end the reading of the Bible in school. Protestant parents filed suit. A three-judge panel ruled 2-1 for the Protestants, saying the reading of the Bible was necessary for good government. The doctrine of separation of church and state is not found in the Constitution. It evolved through the courts and through public consensus based on painful experience. It was not a sop to Jews or Muslims or ACLU atheists

. It was developed to keep some Christians from ruling the consciences of other Christians, just as for centuries they had attempted to do in Europe. Its logic was most forcefully stated by the Christian judges of the Ohio Supreme Court, who overturned the above ruling with these words: "When Christianity asks the aid of government beyond mere impartial protection, it denies itself. Its laws are divine and not human. Its essential interests lie beyond the reach and range of human governments. United with government, religion never rises above the merest superstition; united with religion, government never rises above the merest despotism; and all history shows us that the more widely and completely they are separated, the better it is for both."
Link to original article (here)

Hoya Student, Points To Weak Theology At Georgetown, Go Get'em Tiger

GU Liberal Education Needs a Liberal Dose of Change
With its Jesuit history, Georgetown has a strong tradition of providing its students with a liberal education and preparing them for a life of intellectual inquiry and moral understanding, but unfortunately, these goals are not completely reflected by the current core curriculum. Students and faculty at Georgetown should welcome the provost's recent announcement of the formation of a committee to review the university's curriculum. In light of the provost's announcement, I have a few suggestions about where the core curriculum needs improvement that I hope the committee will consider. The theology requirements, for example, should be more specific. The two semesters of theology that every Georgetown student is required to take truly sets our university apart from other elite institutions. As Cardinal Newman noted in "The Idea of a University," a university must teach theology so that it can live up to its mission of seeking the truth. When a university disregards theology, it risks ignoring the spiritual side of human nature. Additionally, theology is necessary for understanding the relationship between academic subjects and a transcendent order of things. Georgetown's recognition of theology's importance reveals its commitment to providing a truly liberal education and gives the university a unique perspective in academia. But Georgetown can improve its treatment of theology by requiring at least one course in Catholic theology specifically. Georgetown was born from the Catholic and Jesuit intellectual tradition, and this tradition remains at the heart of the university. Many students, however, graduate from Georgetown without any exposure to the religious dimension of a Catholic education.

As a Catholic institution, Georgetown has a responsibility to educate both Catholic and non-Catholic students in Church doctrine and morals. A requirement of one semester of Catholic theology would meet the bare minimum of Georgetown's obligations to share its faith. It might also spark more interest from the Georgetown community in the intellectual tradition of the Church, the Jesuits and Georgetown. The philosophy requirement could be improved with a stronger commitment to the classics. Fr. James Schall, S.J., often says that a person who has not read Plato cannot consider himself educated.

The existing two-semester philosophy requirement would be greatly enhanced by a requirement of some type of study of the Greek and Roman classics. Not only are these works intrinsically beneficial to students, but reading them also helps students see the development of Western philosophy in the correct perspective. It used to be the norm for students of a liberal education to be well-versed in the discipline of logic. The provost should consider mandating a classics and a logic course for all students, as this is such an important component of scholarship in any academic discipline. Furthermore, the university changed the history requirement only a few years ago, but I think these changes were ill-conceived. Although my sentiment goes against current attitudes about multiculturalism, the core curriculum should require students to fulfill the history core with European history courses. I hasten to add that my position does not flow from any disrespect toward other regions histories. As a history major, I have benefited enormously from professors and courses focused on aspects outside my region of study. However, we cannot truly understand ourselves, our culture or our values without understanding our past. Western civilization is grounded in the history of Europe, and understanding of modernity becomes a huge muddle when a student lacks an understanding of European history. And that brings me to the current humanities and writing requirement, which is far too broad; a very large number of courses that do not satisfy the other core requirements could conceivably be used for fulfillment of the humanities and writing credits. The provost needs to reintroduce English literature into the core.

No university worth the name has any business conferring a degree upon a student
who has not read the seminal works of the canon. All Georgetown students should
be pushed to spend time studying Shakespeare, Milton, Austen and Dickens.

If the students do not have a grasp of the literary past of the English-speaking world, they become, as Mark Steyn recently described it, a "culture unable to refer to anything beyond itself." The purpose of a core curriculum is to give each student for the rest of his life a body of knowledge necessary for participation and leadership in that society. Students do not come to a university equipped to define that body; therefore, it is the university’s responsibility to take a stand and offer its guidance. Georgetown prides itself in giving its students diverse course offerings and an international perspective in all areas of study. These are certainly positive attributes that I would not want to disturb. Nevertheless, aside from being a politically involved university,

Georgetown is also a religious institution, and I cannot escape the conclusion
that many Georgetown students are strangers to foundational elements of a
Catholic and liberal education. That is why the time has come to reinforce the
traditional core curriculum, not impair it further.

Georgetown can remain a prestigious research university while still maintaining a liberal education for its students. The two are not mutually exclusive. We must remember that the highest priority of the Georgetown administration should be the types of students its education produces. I would hope that Georgetown continues to value the virtues that a liberal education challenges students to find. I commend the provost for recognizing the need to reform our core curriculum, and I hope that future changes will preserve the quality of liberal education at Georgetown.
Stephen Kenny is a senior in the College. He can be reached at kenny@thehoya.com. AGAINST THE WIND appears every other Tuesday.

Boston College To Spend 1.6 Billion Dollars! Yes That's Right 1.6 Billion Dollars!

Boston College makes plans for church land
By G. Jeffrey MacDonald, Special for USA TODAY
For nearly six years, Boston-area Catholics have asked what good, if any, could come of the devastating clergy sexual abuse crisis that began there. Today,

Boston College announced its $400 million answer. That's how much the school intends to spend to develop 65 acres and 14 buildings acquired in deals with a cash-strapped and scandal-weary Archdiocese of Boston. The archdiocese got $172 million from the sale, more than enough cash to finance its $84 million settlement with abuse victims; the college got a key parcel for advancing a $1.6 billion, 10-year strategic plan to be announced Wednesday.

As dioceses around the country weigh how to pay settlement debts in the tens and hundreds of millions, some observers are pointing to what's playing out in Boston as a model worth emulating: The new owner of the archdiocese's former headquarters and adjacent grounds is a Catholic institution (a Jesuit university) with ambitious plans. An ornate mansion, which became a symbol of clerical aloofness when Cardinal Bernard Law lived there, will find rebirth as a conference center; there will be new playing fields, an athletic complex, dormitories and offices. "We're learning a lot from Boston," says Chuck Zech of Villanova University, an expert on Catholic Church finances. "In the long run, the Catholic Church is best served by keeping these properties in the family." Not everyone sees Boston College's grand plans as a silver lining to a dark episode. "That property was the seat of so many decisions where priests were protected and children were put at risk. It would have felt like better justice to me if they had to sell it to Boston University or another non-Catholic college," says Ann Hagan Webb, New England coordinator for the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, an advocacy and support group. Around the country, dioceses are facing the unwelcome prospect of selling real estate to cover debts stemming from clergy sexual abuse. The Archdiocese of Los Angeles is selling a Santa Barbara convent and its high-rise office space, among other properties, to finance a $660 million settlement with victims. Dioceses in Davenport, Iowa; Spokane, Wash.; and Providence have all either sold properties or announced intentions to sell. Last month, a judge declined to give bankruptcy protection to the Diocese of San Diego on the grounds that the church could cover its settlement debts by selling real estate. But selling real estate can be risky for dioceses. Just 38% of 787 regular Mass-attending Catholics in a 2005 Zogby International poll said they support selling assets to pay settlements, Zech says. What's more, dioceses depend on real estate investments to provide revenue for pensions, ministries and overhead. "People are living longer, and that includes priests and nuns," says Timothy Liam Epstein, a Catholic Chicago lawyer who has written on the issue of financing religious retirements. "There certainly is the danger of the church mortgaging away its future." Perhaps other dioceses will now see the wisdom in rethinking what they need and getting more value from underused real estate, says Boston College president William Leahy, a Jesuit priest. "The Catholic community will never forget the past involving sexual abuse," he says, "but it can't live there, either. It has to move forward."

17th Century Jesuit Debunks Man Made Global Warming Myth

Ray of hope: Can the sun save us from global warming?
Could the Sun's inactivity save us from global warming? David Whitehouse explains why solar disempower may be the key to combating climate change
05 December 2007
Between 1645 and 1715 sunspots were rare. It was also a time when the Earth¿s northern hemisphere chilled dramatically Something is happening to our Sun. It has to do with sunspots, or rather the activity cycle their coming and going signifies. After a period of exceptionally high activity in the 20th century, our Sun has suddenly gone exceptionally quiet. Months have passed with no spots visible on its disc. We are at the end of one cycle of activity and astronomers are waiting for the sunspots to return and mark the start of the next, the so-called cycle 24. They have been waiting for a while now with no sign it's on its way any time soon. Sunspots – dark magnetic blotches on the Sun's surface – come and go in a roughly 11-year cycle of activity first noticed in 1843. It's related to the motion of super-hot, electrically charged gas inside the Sun – a kind of internal conveyor belt where vast sub-surface rivers of gas take 40 years to circulate from the equator to the poles and back. Somehow, in a way not very well understood, this circulation produces the sunspot cycle in which every 11 years there is a sunspot maximum followed by a minimum. But recently the Sun's internal circulation has been failing. In May 2006 this conveyor belt had slowed to a crawl – a record low. Nasa scientist David Hathaway said: "It's off the bottom of the charts... this has important repercussions for future solar activity." What's more, it's not the only indicator that the Sun is up to something. Sunspots can be long or short, weak or strong and sometimes they can go away altogether. Following the discovery of the cycle, astronomers looked back through previous observations and were able to see it clearly until they reached the 17th century, when it seemed to disappear. It turned out to be a real absence, not one caused by a lack of observations. Astronomers called it the "Maunder Minimum." It was an astonishing discovery: our Sun can change. Between 1645 and 1715 sunspots were rare. About 50 were observed; there should have been 50,000.
Ever since the sunspot cycle was discovered, researchers have looked for its rhythm superimposed on the Earth's climate. In some cases it's there but usually at low levels. But there was something strange about the time when the sunspots disappeared that left scientists to ponder if the sun's unusual behaviour could have something to do with the fact that the 17th century was also a time when the Earth's northern hemisphere chilled with devastating consequences. Scientists call that event the "Little Ice Age" and it affected Europe at just the wrong time. In response to the more benign climate of the earlier Medieval Warm Period, Europe's population may have doubled. But in the mid-17th century demographic growth stopped and in some areas fell, in part due to the reduced crop yields caused by climate change. Bread prices doubled and then quintupled and hunger weakened the population.

The Italian historian Majolino Bisaccioni suggested that the wave of bad weather and revolutions might be due to the influence of the stars. But the Jesuit astronomer Giovanni Battista Riccioli speculated that fluctuations in the number of sunspots might be to blame, for he had noticed they were absent. Looking back through sunspot records reveals many periods when the Sun's activity was high and low and in general they are related to warm and cool climatic periods. As well as the Little Ice Age, there was the weak Sun and the cold Iron Age, the active sun and the warm Bronze Age.

Scientists cannot readily explain how the Sun's activity affects the Earth but it is an observational correlation that the Sun's moods have a climatic effect on the Earth. Today's climate change consensus is that man-made greenhouse gases are warming the world and that we must act to curb them to reduce the projected temperature increase estimated at probably between 1.8C and 4.0C by the century's end. But throughout the 20th century, solar cycles had been increasing in strength. Almost everyone agrees that throughout most of the last century the solar influence was significant. Studies show that by the end of the 20th century the Sun's activity may have been at its highest for more than 8,000 years. Other solar parameters have been changing as well, such as the magnetic field the Sun sheds, which has almost doubled in the past century. But then things turned. In only the past decade or so the Sun has started a decline in activity, and the lateness of cycle 24 is an indicator. Astronomers are watching the Sun, hoping to see the first stirrings of cycle 24. It should have arrived last December. The United States' National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration predicted it would start in March 2007. Now they estimate March 2008, but they will soon have to make that even later. The first indications that the Sun is emerging from its current sunspot minimum will be the appearance of small spots at high latitude. They usually occur some 12-20 months before the start of a new cycle. These spots haven't appeared yet so cycle 24 will probably not begin to take place until 2009 at the earliest. The longer we have to wait for cycle 24, the weaker it is likely to be. Such behaviour is usually followed by cooler temperatures on Earth. The past decade has been warmer than previous ones. It is the result of a rapid increase in global temperature between 1978 and 1998. Since then average temperatures have held at a high, though steady, level. Many computer climate projections suggest that the global temperatures will start to rise again in a few years. But those projections do not take into account the change in the Sun's behaviour. The tardiness of cycle 24 indicates that we might be entering a period of low solar activity that may counteract man-made greenhouse temperature increases. Some members of the Russian Academy of Sciences say we may be at the start of a period like that seen between 1790 and 1820, a minor decline in solar activity called the Dalton Minimum. They estimate that the Sun's reduced activity may cause a global temperature drop of 1.5C by 2020. This is larger than most sensible predictions of man-made global warming over this period. It's something we must take seriously because what happened in the 17th century is bound to happen again some time. Recent work studying the periods when our Sun loses its sunspots, along with data on other Sun-like stars that may be behaving in the same way, suggests that our Sun may spend between 10 and 25 per cent of the time in this state. Perhaps the lateness of cycle 24 might even be the start of another Little Ice Age. If so, then our Sun might come to our rescue over climate change, mitigating mankind's influence and allowing us more time to act. It might even be the case that the Earth's response to low solar activity will overturn many of our assumptions about man's influence on climate change. We don't know. We must keep watching the sun.
Dr David Whitehouse is an astronomer and the author of 'The Sun: A Biography' (John Wiley, 2004)

Link (here)

"Joe Pa" Went To A Jesuit High School

Hall beckons Lions’ JoePa

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BY DONNIE COLLINS
12/04/2007
Someday, Joe Paterno insists, he’s going to bring his family back to New York City.He’ll take them down to Sheepshead Bay. They’ll walk around Brooklyn, and they’ll tour the streets of the Bedford-Stuyvestant section. They’ll see where their father’s long, unlikely journey started.
Someday, Joe Paterno insists, he’s going to bring his family back to New York City. He’ll take them down to Sheepshead Bay. They’ll walk around Brooklyn, and they’ll tour the streets of the Bedford-Stuyvestant section. They’ll see where their father’s long, unlikely journey started. They’ll see the literal road he took to get from meager beginnings to the head of a college football empire. “I think that would be fun,” the 80-year-old Nittany Lions coach smiled. Tonight, Paterno again will be in the city where it all began. This time, he’ll be in Manhattan to be inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame, an honor bestowed upon the second-winningest coach of all time by the game he says he is “endebted to.” Only two other coaches — Florida State’s Bobby Bowden and St. John’s (Minn.) John Gagliardi — have been inducted into the Hall when they were still active on the sidelines. He doesn’t get back to the Big Apple much. Only in important times, Paterno says.But the city is still as much a part of him as State College has become embodied by him. This city, his upbringing, are the root of his unlikely story. Radio daysHe remembers the game like it took place yesterday, he said with a grin. It happened in 1935. It was the first meeting between Notre Dame and Ohio State, and a 9-year-old Paterno sat on the floor, listening to the game on the radio. CBS Radio carried it. Red Barber had the call. Notre Dame was a considerable underdog against the unbeaten Buckeyes, but with a half minute left, Bill Shakespeare came in to play quarterback after the starter was injured.On Shakespeare’s third play, he faked a run and lofted a pass to receiver Wayne Millner for a game-winning 19-yard touchdown.“Maybe it was the drama of that game, sitting there listening to Shakespeare come back,” Paterno reminisced. “I don’t know. I don’t know what gets you.”Something about football did, though. Brooklyn, back then, was decidedly a baseball town.Football was a game played on pavement in the busy streets, pass patterns designed to be run around parked cars. This was a baseball town, stickball in the streets and the Brooklyn Dodgers in the hearts. Paterno was an usher for two years at Ebbetts Field. His family’s apartment was a mere block away from the high school where Frank and Joe Torre took their math and science classes.

However, he also grew up near the parish where Vince Lombardi and his family worshipped. And while his parents had visions of law school for him, Paterno always had football on his mind. “My dad, who never owned a house, somehow came up with 20 bucks a month to send me to Brooklyn Preparatory School for Young Men, which was a Jesuit High School,” Paterno said.

“Because I wanted to play football.” Would he call himself a great player? Not exactly. But Paterno’s scouting report on himself was one of a player who could anticipate things before they happened, someone with enough of a feel for the game that he ran a no-huddle offense as Brooklyn Prep’s quarterback in 1944.It was there that he got his first informal taste of coaching from a religious brother by the name of Lenehan, a Notre Dame graduate who showed him the intricacies of the Notre Dame Box — the shift-heavy variation of the single-wing offense that Knute Rockne invented in the 1910s and Curly Lambeau brought to the Green Bay Packers in the 1930s. “I got caught up in it,” Paterno said. “And I was pretty good.” The big decisionAngelo Paterno, Joe’s father, died in 1955. His son, a fifth-year assistant at Penn State at the time, missed the Oct. 1 game against Army.Over the next 52 years, there would only be two Penn State football games played without Paterno on the sidelines: Oct. 15, 1977, against Syracuse after his son, David, was injured in a trampoline accident; and Nov. 11, 2006, against Temple after he broke his leg and tore knee ligaments during a sideline collision with tight end Andrew Quarless the week before against Wisconsin. Not a bad string of attendance for a guy who said he never considered coaching as a profession before Rip Engel hired him as a backfield coach, a 23-year-old fresh out of Brown University in 1950.It took three or four years, by his own estimation, for Paterno to decide that he would be putting off law school forever. Coaching football was his career calling, his avenue to making a difference. And letting his family know the news wasn’t easy. “I enjoyed the coaching part of it. I knew I was going to like that,” Paterno said. “But my dad had such a strong influence on me. He didn’t see me being a coach. I called him up and said I was going to coach, and he said, ‘Are you sure that’s what you want to do? I always thought you were going to be president of the United States.’ “That’s a long cry from being an assistant coach at Penn State.” Soul searching when Penn State promoted Paterno to head coach after Engel retired more than 40 years ago, he made $20,000. He didn’t even work under a contract until 1971, when he signed one after the New England Patriots offered him $1 million a year. Last week, when his annual salary of just more than $500,000 a year was announced, even his harshest of critics touted it as a bargain. Asked why money never meant much to him, Paterno responded quickly and matter-of-factly: “Because I had everything else.” Penn State provided Paterno with family, home and a livelihood. The only place that has been able to offer Paterno as much is Brooklyn, though. Speaking to a small gathering of reporters about his Hall of Fame induction last week, Paterno candidly admitted he had just one regret in his career: The 1978 Sugar Bowl. Unbeaten Penn State lost to Alabama that day in what Paterno called “one of the greatest defensive football games ever played.” The Nittany Lions had a chance to get the ball back inside the Crimson Tide’s 30 after a poor Alabama punt, with a chance to win. But the Nittany Lions had 12 men on the field on that punt. Penn State’s first national championship would have to wait — four seasons, as it turned out. But it nearly never came with Paterno on the sidelines. “I almost quit,” Paterno admitted, the rock of a coach choking up as he looked back. “I went home, said I was going to resign. Then I went to New York and walked around Brooklyn. I went to my parish. I was all set to quit. I didn’t feel it was right for me to stay. I spent three days in Brooklyn.” Making an impact He decided to stay, to honor a commitment to the players he recruited and the university that gave him the only chance to coach that he’d ever need.

There was the famous offer from the Patriots. Boston College also offered Paterno more money to coach there, and there were a few other opportunities he didn’t even care to mention, almost like they didn’t even matter.

There is chance, and there is destiny, and who knows what it was that not only brought Joseph Vincent Paterno to football, but brought him from New York City to State College, and, ultimately, back to New York City and the Hall of Fame. Only one coach, Bowden, has won more games at the Football Bowl Subdivision level. None has led more teams to the postseason. None has won more bowl games.Seven times, he has led a Penn State team to an unbeaten record. Twice, his teams won national championships. When he was 79 years old, his Nittany Lions went 11-1, and he was the consensus National Coach of the Year. Beaver Field was a 20,000-seat stadium on the west side of Penn State’s campus when Paterno and Engel — who originally wanted a man by the name of Bill Doolittle to be his backfield coach — made their first drive to State College from Providence, Rhode Island. Now, Beaver Stadium seats more than 107,000 on the east side of campus. A bronze statue of his likeness stands outside Beaver Stadium today, and his family name is on a massive, state-of-the-art wing of the Patee Library, funded largely by donations from the Paterno family. His charity to the university is legendary in the college football community. “Deep down,” Paterno said, “I feel I’ve had an impact. I don’t think I’ve wasted my 56 years here.” That’s the way his parents would have demanded it, and the way he tries to continue to lead his life.

The father of five, grandfather of 16, and winner of 371 career games knows he
won’t be coaching forever. Three, four, maybe five more years, as he put it.

Don’t count the Hall of Fame induction and his latest return to the Big Apple as the beginning of the last chapter, he’ll warn. And if history is a lesson, it’s a good warning to heed.“I think the perfect ending is, you drop dead at the end of the game after you kick the winning field goal,” he said, before breaking out in laughter. “They carry you off the field.“Everybody’s singing, ‘So long, Joe! You’ve been wonderful!’ ”

Link to Times Tribune article (here)

18th Century Chinese Missionary Fr. Giuseppe Castiglione, S.J. On Exibet

Forbidden City treasures showcased in Rome

The masterpieces from China's Forbidden City on display in Rome have received about 5,000 visitors from its opening day, one of the exhibit organizers Chiara Perazzoli said on Monday. "Now, the museum received about 5,000 visitors from Italy and other countries' tourists for the Chinese 18th-century attractive treasures," Perazzoli, an official of Museum of Corso said. The exhibition, which opened on November 20, features over 300 items from the Emperor Qianlong's (1711-1799) court, including art, jewelery and weapons. While many of the items reflect the general splendor of the court in the Forbidden City, the majority are linked to the figure of Qianlong himself, she explained. These include a decorated table created to celebrate his 80th birthday, a massive gold throne, and his personal armour. The exhibit also recreated his private study and spiritual room, while a number of the artworks are by the emperor himself, a keen artist, poet, musician and calligrapher. Other artworks include pieces by the

Italian Jesuit missionary and painter Giuseppe Castiglione, who traveled to China in 1715. Castiglione remained there until his death 50 years later, working as a court painter for Qianlong and designing, among other things, a summer palace for the emperor. Considered one of the greatest court painters of all time in China, Castiglione played a key role in teaching local artists Western techniques relating to color, perspective and human anatomy.

Qianlong, the fourth emperor in the Qing Dynasty, took over the throne in 1735 and reigned until 1796, when he officially retired but continued to run the show behind the scenes. In addition to his military conquests, Qianlong was a major patron of the arts, a prolific poet and a collector of ceramics. Entitled "Masterpieces from the Forbidden City. Qianlong and his Court," the exhibit was organized by the Chinese Imperial Palace's Museum and the Italian Foundation of Rome, Museum of Corso. The showcase will remain in Rome's "Museo del Corso" (Museum of Corso) until March 20, 2008, Perazzoli said.

Link to original article (here)

Catholic Conversion Linked To Jesuits In New Orleans

I next tried out Immaculate Conception Jesuit Church, on Baronne St., which also had a homeless ministry. Now THIS was a church. It looked like one, and the people seemed like a real community. The pastor, Fr. Harry Thompson, S.J. (+ may perpetual Light shine upon him) was something of a local legend, and with good reason. In the "day center" of the homeless ministry there were a great many Catholic books available for reading, and I dove in headfirst. One of the books I was into was an account of the apparitions of Our Lady at Lourdes; I had come to believe that this was a true event, and as I puzzled over what it meant for my faith, I read about who she said she was : "I am The Immaculate Conception." Those five words literally started my path back to union with the Church. It is difficult to relate how dramatic that revelation was for me. If the apparitions were real, then the Church's teaching on Mary was true. But...the teaching was a function of the Pope's infallible magisterial authority. And if the Pope is who he says he is, and Mary is who the Church says she is, then...what else is there ? It wasn't quite that quick or easy, but that was the thought process.

Link to the full blog post at Deep in History

Saint Francis Xavier, SJ

Feast of St. Francis Xavier, S.J. Patron of the Missions

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Prayer of St. Francis Xavier

My God, I love thee;

not becauseI hope for heaven thereby,

nor yet because who love thee notare lost eternally.

Thou, O my Jesus, thou didst meupon the cross embrace;

for me didst bear the nails and spear,

and manifold disgrace.

And griefs and torments numberless and sweat of agony;

even death itself --

and all for oneWho was thine enemy.

Then why, O blessed Jesus Christshould I not love thee well?

not for the hope of winning heaven,or of escaping hell.

not with the hope of gaining aught, nor seeking a reward,

but as thyself has lovèd me, O ever-loving Lord!

Even so I love thee, and will loveand in thy praise will sing,

solely because thou art my God,and my eternal king. AMEN.

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Today, the universal Society of Jesus celebrates the feast of Saint Francis Xavier, S.J. St. Francis Xavier was among the first companions of St. Ignatius Loyola. He professed with St. Ignatius the vows of poverty and zeal for souls in the Holy Land in the chapel of St. Denis at Montmartre on 15 August 1536. And together with St. Ignatius and the other first companions, he was ordained to the priesthood on 24 June 1537 at Venice. Upon the requests of King John III of Portugal, he was sent by St. Ignatius to Goa to evangelize the natives. St. Francis Xavier has great zeal and fervor for missions, the same zeal and passion that led him to Malacca, Japan, and finally to Sancian Island, facing Mainland China. Sick and consumed totally by the demands of missionary work, he died on 3 December 1552. He was canonized in 1622 by Pope Gregory XV, and in 1927 was proclaimed Patron of the missions by Pope Pius XI.

Hat Tip and thanks to Sentire Cum Ecclesia

Avery Cardinal Dulles, S.J. And Jesuit Educated Frank Beckwith On The Counter Reformation

Francis Beckwith erupts in a fit of...
... thanksgiving for the many fine Evangelical theologians and apologists writing and teaching today, and, in a column on the Catholics United for the Faith site, invites Catholics to learn from them: My faith in Jesus, as well as my intellectual development as a Christian scholar, was nurtured, deepened, and sustained by a body of literature and a tapestry of resources largely unknown to the Catholic world, even though there is much in Evangelical literature and ministry-life that can benefit Catholics and strengthen their faith. There are, of course, real disagreements between Catholics and Evangelical Protestants on issues of theological importance such as justification, church authority, apostolic succession, and the sacraments. For this reason, some Catholics may be hesitant to explore Evangelical authors and ministries. This would be their loss, for outside of these disagreements there is so much that we have in common. And in those areas of commonality, Evangelicals have much to offer Catholics. Dr. Beckwith refers to a 2004 First Things article by

Avery Cardinal Dulles, who wrote: All over the United States there are signs of a revival.

Evangelical Protestants are taking the lead. Apologists of the stature of Norman L. Geisler, William Lane Craig, and J. P. Moreland are publishing scholarly works on natural theology and Christian evidences.

Unlike the liberal Protestants of an earlier vintage, these Evangelicals insist on orthodoxy; they uncompromisingly maintain the fundamental Christian doctrines of the Trinity, the Incarnation, the Atonement, and the bodily resurrection of Jesus.

And their method succeeds. The churches that combine a concern for orthodoxy with vigorous apologetics are growing. Their seminaries attract large numbers of enthusiastic students. A similar revival is occurring, albeit more slowly, in Catholic circles. Many of the leading proponents are converts from other Christian denominations, especially

former Evangelicals. Peter Kreeft, at Boston College, plies an apologetics not far removed from that of the Evangelicals mentioned above. Scott Hahn and several colleagues at the Franciscan University of Steubenville, Ohio, confidently proclaim that the Protestant Bible points to the truth of the Catholic faith. EWTN, the network founded by Mother Angelica, broadcasts very successful programs of popular apologetics. Karl Keating, who runs the “Catholic Answers” institute in San Diego, has done much to stem the tide of Hispanics defecting to fundamentalist Protestant sects.

There is also a renewal of interest in English Catholic converts of the last century, including G. K. Chesterton, Ronald Knox, and Arnold Lunn. Many recent converts are publishing their own stories of faith.

Beckwith writes: Although some of the Protestant authors and ministries I have mentioned here have been critical of aspects of Catholic teaching, these criticisms are rare and usually minor or tangential to the author or ministry’s overall mission. For example, STR has published a few articles critical of Catholic theology, although they are offered with charity and a spirit of respect.

As long as the Catholic is discerning and well-grounded in Catholic theology, he or she need not be worried about the possibility of such incidental distractions. At the end of the day, our Protestant brothers and sisters offer too many wonderful insights to pass up. These are insights that will not only help deepen our Catholic faith but also offer to us a model of how we can duplicate these sorts of works and ministries in our own dioceses and parishes. By encouraging mutual dialogue and respect, it could also, perhaps, lead us closer to the unity for which Jesus prayed: “And now I am no more in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to thee. Holy Father, keep them in thy name, which thou hast given me, that they may be one, even as we are one” (Jn. 17:11).

Hat tip to Insight Scoop
Read his entire column.
Posted by Carl Olson Permalink

Picture Of A North American Jesuit Missionary

Father Garnet's Murder/Martyrdom At The Hands Of The Anglicans

Father Garnet's last prayers were in Latin, the language of the "One" Church into which he had been born and in whose service he had spent his life. The priest crossed his arms over his breast---it had not been thought necessary to bind his arms---and "so was cast off the ladder". His arms remained cross, for he made no struggle against death.

He hung motionless at the end of his rope. At that moment a strange change in mood gripped the crowd. Many of the spectators had deliberately made their way to St. Paul's in order to see a gruesome spectacle which culminated with the bloody axing and quartering of a still living human body.

A great number of those present---they cannot all have been Catholics---surged forward. With a loud cry of "hold, hold", they stopped the hangman cutting down the body while Garnet was still alive. Others pulled on the priest's legs, something which was traditionally done by relatives in order to ensure a speedy death. As a result Father Garnet was "perfectly dead" when he was finally cut down and taken to the block. In their compassion they refused to see him butchered alive; and when he was cut up, his bowels cast into the fire, and his heart held up aloft with the cry, "Behold the heart of a traitor!" it met with no applause, not even the usual response, "God save the king." "He died like a saint," "he looked not like a contriver of treason," were comment heard among the crowd. Even ministers were heard to say that without doubt his soul was in Heaven.

Hat tip to the Laudem Gloriae

First Catholic, Then Jesuit, Now Transitional Deacon, Soon To Be Jesuit Priest

Deacon ordained at UMass
December 02, 2007
By ALEX PESHKOV
AMHERST - About a hundred people gathered yesterday in the Our Lady Seat of Wisdom Chapel at the Newman Center at the University of Massachusetts, where the Most Rev. Timothy A. McDonnell, bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield, ordained Sean Todd O'Mannion of Northampton as a transitional deacon. The term "transitional" signifies O'Mannion's preparation for the priesthood. "It's a wonderful day for all of us, and this is a very special place," McDonnell said. "Out of this place, out of this chapel, a tremendous number of vocations came over the years." The order of deacon dates back to the earliest days of the Catholic church. Deacons are ordained to serve in three areas: proclaiming the Gospel; assisting at the altar; and by works of charity. "Now you are not only a carrier of Gospel, but also its minister," McDonnell said. "It's a beautiful day. I am so thankful that everyone came and I am glad that (the ordination) happened here, at the Newman Center," said O'Mannion, 44, who earned his undergraduate and master's degrees in French at UMass. "We've got a lot of vocations out of here and also I came here ... So, in a way, it's all going full circle." It was at UMass some 10 years ago that O'Mannion converted to Catholicism, receiving the sacraments of initiation at St. Mary of the Assumption Parish in Northampton. He worked as an associate editor at Merriam-Webster before entering the Novitiate of Society of Jesus in 2001. During his time with the Jesuits he ministered to addicts in prison and worked on the Rosebud Sioux Reservation in South Dakota. In 2004 he was accepted as a seminarian in the Springfield diocese and attended Blessed John XXIII National Seminary in Weston. He has served pastoral assignments at St. Joseph, Pittsfield, St. Anne, Chicopee, and currently at St. John the Baptist, in Ludlow. Two other diocesan seminarians were ordained as transitional deacons at St. Peter's Basilica in the Vatican last month. Jonathon Reardon of North Adams and Mark Glover of Hampden, both students at the Pontifical North American College in Vatican City, were ordained by Cardinal John P. Foley. The Springfield diocese anticipates that they, along with O'Mannion, will be ordained to the priesthood on June 28 at St. Michael's Cathedral in Springfield.
©2007 The Republican © 2007 MassLive.com Link (here)

Maltese And Jesuits In Brussels

Pastoral mission in Brussels

The Maltese Church has launched its first pastoral mission in Brussels catering for the spiritual needs of the local community there. On the initiative of Fr Alfred Vella who is responsible for the Emigrants Commission, the first foundation stone of this pastoral mission in Brussels was laid last week. Gozo Bishop Mario Grech celebrated Mass at a Jesuit-run centre in the heart of Brussels. Several Maltese turned up for the occasion, which is expected to become a regular event, as Fr. Vella said that the intention is to organise Mass in Maltese at least once a month.

Link to The Times Of Malta (here)

Treasure Chest of Fun & Fact

About This Collection
The Treasure Chest of Fun & Fact was a Catholic comic book published by George A. Pflaum of Dayton, Ohio, and provided to Catholic parochial school students between 1946 and 1972. The digital collection is a project that includes the first eighteen volumes running from 1946 to 1963. (Some issues in Volume 4 are missing.)
Additionally, illustrator and writer Frank Borth was interviewed by American Catholic History Research Center archivists Maria Mazzenga and Jordan Patty at Borth's home on May 10, 2006. This was recorded on two audio cassette tapes that were digitally transferred to a compact disc and transcribed. In the interview, Borth discusses how he became a professional illustrator, the creation of original characters, and collaboration with Treasure Chest of Fun & Fact writers and editors.

Hat tip to Kevin Jones

Historic Black Parish Celebrates With Liturgical Dancers, The Opening Of New Jesuit Parish Building

Holy Cross Catholic finds beauty in simplicity

Picture is of old parish church building

Flo Johnston, Correspondent
Parishioners of Durham's Holy Cross Catholic Church, a fixture on Alston Avenue since 1952, will dedicate a new church building on Sunday at 10 a.m. in a festive ceremony.
It will begin when the keys to the new building are presented at the front door to Bishop Michael Burbidge, who will lead the processional into the new structure.

Singers and liturgical dancers will join representatives from the Catholic Diocese of Raleigh and the Maryland Jesuit Province along with members of the church, former pastors and city leaders.

Inside, Burbidge will anoint the walls of the church and the altar, and will offer special prayers. "The amazing thing," said Etheldreda Guion, parish council president, "is that not many people have ever been to a church dedication before. Catholic churches sort of have always been there. Even the church priest [Father Frank O'Connor, 83] has never been to one."

Holy Cross was founded in 1939 when the Maryland Province of the Society of
Jesus established it as a mission to Durham's black community.

The congregation remains predominantly black and has maintained a special character even though it now includes people from diverse cultural and ethnic backgrounds. Over the years, its pastors have been Jesuit priests on loan to the Diocese of Raleigh. Leaving the beautiful little stone church at 1400 S. Alston Ave. has not been easy for this congregation of about 300 families. The decision to build and move came slowly and was helped along by the fact that N.C. Central University, located next door, was looking to spread out at the same time the Holy Cross congregation was studying how it might expand. The new church is about one mile south of the old one on a 20-acre parcel at 2424 S. Alston. The old sanctuary seated only 85; the new one has pew room for 425 worshippers and can accommodate overflow crowds of up to 600. "The new building is gorgeous," Guion said. "When you walk in you have a feeling of awe." A round stained-glass window over the entrance to a large gathering space ("Almost as big as the old church sanctuary," said parishioner Charles Bynum) features the acacia tree, an ancient symbol mentioned in the Old Testament. The tree, native to Africa, has deep roots and is noted for its ability to survive drought and famine. Another significant symbol is that of the Jesuit order of priests. It is defined in Italian tile on the floor of the gathering space. Bynum, who served as the liaison between the church, the architect and contractor -- and who served as a tour guide this week -- pushed open the door to the Carolina Room, a gigantic fellowship hall with an adjoining kitchen. The room features one Carolina blue wall and a floor pattern created with blue and white tile. "And this is our 'famous kitchen,'" he said. "We all cook in this church, the men as well as the women." The sanctuary is striking in its simplicity. Windows are tall clear glass, admitting much natural light. The wall behind the altar area is faced with stone from the old church. The cross from the old church is being used, but a new corpus has been commissioned. The vaulted ceiling draws the eyes upward and the Stations of the Cross are mounted on the outside walls. The oak pews were made in Burlington. Durham architect Doug Griffin said his first and most important plan was to use stone from the old church in such a way that members of the congregation would feel they were still coming home. In addition to its use in the altar area, the same stone is used around the exterior of the baptismal font. Also reminiscent of the old church are the exposed beams of the new sanctuary. Outside, the congregation has plans to add a children's play area, a gazebo with a statue of Mary inside and a meditation space in a rose garden. The roses in the old church's garden are being dug and stored until the proper time for planting. The cost of the new building is $3.3 million. The contractor is L.A. Downey of Durham.

Link to original article (here)