Saturday, November 22, 2008

West TN Catholic article

I read an interesting article today in the West TN Catholic regarding the Bishop of Little Rock, Bishop Anthony Taylor. He is issuing a Pastoral letter about the human rights of "undocumented immigrants". The article says that he "believes that being able to migrate to another country is an intrinsic human right." He says that because it's virtually impossible for immigrants, predominantly from Mexico, to come to the United States legally, "You can't be obligated to do what you can't do". (I beg your pardon???)

I will be VERY interested to see this document when it's released. Advocating breaking the law of the United States is an interesting interpretation of the Gospel. Don't get me wrong, it's important to be compassionate. That said, I have to obey the laws of Mexico if I go there--why should the people who want to come here not obey OUR laws. I'm not sure that's what Jesus meant when he said"render unto Caesar what is Caesar's....

Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Well, right after my October 28th comment/rant many individual bishops came out and said clearly that Catholics cannot continue to support politicians that support a culture of death. You cannot profess with your mouth one thing and VOTE another way.

Most notably, Bishop Emeritus Rene H. Gracida of Corpus Chrisi and the words of Bishop Martino of Scranton Pennsylvania-Bishop Martino arrived unannounced in the midst of a panel discussion on faith issues and the presidential campaign at St. John’s Catholic Church on Sunday. According to people who attended the event, the bishop chastised the group for holding the forum and particularly took issue with the discussion and distribution of excerpts from the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ position on voting issues. The document defines abortion and euthanasia, as well as racism, torture and genocide, as among the most important issues for Catholic voters to consider.“No USCCB document is relevant in this diocese,” he was quoted as saying in the Wayne County Independent, a Honesdale-based newspaper. “The USCCB doesn’t speak for me.” “The only relevant document ... is my letter,” he said at the forum, according to the Independent. “There is one teacher in this diocese, and these points are not debatable.”

According to participants, Bishop Martino expressed dismay that the panelists did not discuss the pastoral letter he directed all priests in the Diocese to read in place of their homilies on Oct. 4 and 5. In that letter, he called on Catholic voters to consider abortion above all other issues, except those he defined as having equal moral weight, like euthanasia and embryonic stem-cell research.

Pray for the bishops. Pray they have the spine to put the real truth before us and make us face the reality of what we do. Pray that we form men worth of thier calling-willing to make a statement to the faithful-and to the community at large-to instruct us on PRACTICAL matters of faith.