Feminism, a valid sign of the time

The prophetcic meets the instituional when the Vatican takes on the nuns. This is an old church story.The institution grows stale, moribund, starts doing things, business as usual, starts acting like a bloodless corporation, almost like WALMART. It gets hung up in the Age of Belief the period when the church ceased being a dynamic [...]

Justice in the World ignored by current bishops Signs 10

no-you-cant-have-faith-without-justice-so-you-cant-keep-faith-out-politics You can’t have faith without justice, so why has the 40th anniversary of this significant church statement, signed by almost every Catholic bishop around the globe, not been celebrated and lifted up at this time in our history when we desperately need to inspire the Catholic community and all people of goodwill to seek ways [...]

Billy Stock,Vatican ll priest

Billy Stock is being buried today. One of the great Vatican ll priests of those halcyon days Bill never stopped going, carried by a vision he saw betrayed. Like many priests of those years, Bill is being buried outside the walls of the Roman church. And irony of ironies, it is his friend Joanna Manning, [...]

The arrogance of Cardinal O’Brien

And this out of Great Britain as the pope touches down on Thursday. Cardinal Keith O’Brien of Scotland said liberalising Roman Catholic teachings on allowing women to join the priesthood “isn’t even considered by us” as it directly contradicted the church’s long held traditions that only men could be ordained.The good cardinal in defence of [...]

Papal chutpzah-or amnesia

Addressing the clergy of Rome in 2007, Pope Benedict told  his listeners that “new forms of life are being born in the church, just as they were born down the ages.” Yes, but a motherhood statement affirming the omnipresence of the Spirit. Then Il Papa zeroed in a painful truth. Benedict . maybe recalling Francis, [...]

Benny fesses up

Now the media is exonerated So now it turns out  it’s not the media who are persecuting Holy Mother Church over the clerical sex abuse and episcopal cover ups, the problem according to the Pope is “born from the sins within the church,” and not from a campaign by outsiders. So speaketh Josef Ratzinger on [...]

Leo Xlll wasn’t afraid

The “problem” the Catholic Church is facing today has been with us for a long time. In the early Chuch there were only Christians and disciples claiming Christ as their master. By the third century the bishop was still chosen by the people. Pope Leo the Great (440-461 CE) insisted that.”the one who is going [...]

The sensus fidelium

The secular media by focusing on the sex abuse particulars are missing the deeper story laid out in Hans Kung’s letter making waves across the Catholic world. KUng’s  letter to the bishops is a comprehensive catalogue of the failed attempt to reverse the democratic gains of the Vatican Council That story is the adamantine refusal of [...]

Suddenly lay input!

The Archbishop of Toronto suddenly wants lay input! He wants to hear from us! How strange is that, a bishop actually soliciting the sensus fidelium. And going on You Tube to prove how serious he is about strict protocols on sex offenders. Not impressed. Well that horse left the barn a long time ago.We know [...]

Mancini comes close

Anthony Mancini the archbishop of Halifax, of all the Canadian bishops, came close to striking the right pose regarding the latest round of Roman missteps on the abuse file. As a shepherd should, Mancini exhibited intelligence, compassion and forthrightness. Gone were the sad-making prredictable  and knee-jerk defenses of the Vatican imposed other Canadian bishops. In [...]