2013 in review

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2013 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

A New York City subway train holds 1,200 people. This blog was viewed about 4,300 times in 2013. If it were a NYC subway train, it would take about 4 trips to carry that many people.

Click here to see the complete report.

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year

We will take the Christmas Season through the New Year off, so we’ll be posting again on Monday January 6, 2014.

Have a Wonderful Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Presenti, All Here

I just read a wonderful article, Presente!, by Fr. James Martin in America Magazine about the Ignatian Family Teach-In for Justice, associated with the annual School of the Americas Watch (SOAW) where the names of Jesuits martyred over the past few decades were read, and after each name was read, everyone said the Spanish “Presenti”, meaning Present, We are here.

This reminded me of the scene in the wonderful movie, The Good Shepherd, where during the annual get together by the members of the secret society Skull and Bones, before the opening prayer, they would all rise and acclaim “All Here”.

The Good Shepherd is about the beginnings of the American intelligence service, OSS and the CIA, and the central role played by members of Skull and Bones.

Secret societies are deeply interwoven in human history and in many ways; they are a good thing, generating passion and commitment to a grand cause.

With the Jesuits deep involvement in the SOAW, trying to shut down the US Military school training Latin American soldiers, and the Skull and Bones deep involvement in clandestine work in Latin America, trying to keep Communism at bay, we see some of America’s finest in conflict, but it is a healthy conflict, for the SOAW keeps pressure on tendencies to autocratic action and the CIA helps guarantee Americans the freedom to protest.

Modern & Traditional Catholics

While these are two of the terms describing Catholics who see their faith differently—liberal and conservative, pre and post Vatican II are a couple others—the only real term that matters is Catholic; and it is possible for a Catholic to be a mixture of opposites, and indeed, that is what, in my opinion and I think congruent, overall though not always in specifics, with the magisterium, is true Catholicism.

For instance, I believe, in company with many from the liberal wing of the Church that the time for women to become priests is upon us, has been upon us, and will become reality someday.

I also believe, with many on the conservative side of the Catholic Church, that the traditional Latin Mass with Gregorian Chant is the most beautiful and fulfilling of all forms of the Mass and nothing else in the Mass lexicon compares to it.

I believe, with a significant section of the Catholic community, in retaining the right to an abortion in the case of incest or rape or medical threat to the life of the mother.

I believe, with Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, that believing in God and evolution is not only not contradictory, but an absolutely necessary joining.

I believe, with most of the Church, in the power of ancient Catholic ritual, such as the praying of the Rosary.

I believe that God knows what is in the human heart, and how the human being acts throughout their lives, and though belonging to the Catholic Church is the shortest way to salvation, it is not the only way, for only God determines the way to heaven.

Women in the Church

Nowhere does the break between conservative and liberal elements within the Catholic Church appear more disastrous than when reflecting upon and acting upon this seminal issue.

Where the conservative popes proclaim women becoming priests as virtually not even any longer an item of discussion—an argument whose vacuity is chronicled in the excellent resource: “The Papal “No” : A Comprehensive Guide to the Vatican’s Rejection of Women’s Ordination”, by Deborah Halter, former executive director of the Women’s Ordination Conference, the oldest and most respected of the nonprofit organizations’ advocating for discussion on the issue—the liberal position seems in support of women as priests, with, reportedly, some bishops even ordaining women as priests and bishops secretly.

Historically there have been many such instances of papal intractability around social issues—such as the centuries of papal support for slavery—that eventually comes to accommodation with evolved thinking and I feel this too will occur with this issue; for it cannot continue as it is with the vast penetration of women into the highest levels of the American secular world, just this week a woman was appointed as CEO of General Motors, and the deepening realization within the Catholic Church that continued designation of women to secondary status is just not right.

Philanthropy & Communism

They do not go together as Communism sees government, the Communist Party, as the source of all gifts and independent nonprofit organizations as a source of dissent, which a recent article from Philanthropy Roundtable Magazine noted.

An excerpt.

Russian non-profits are in for a heap of trouble. A new law from Putin’s government says that all civic organizations receiving funding from abroad and involved in politics (vaguely defined) must register as “foreign agents”—a term that to many means “spies.” “We call it a shock and audit strategy,” said Douglas Rutzen, president of the International Center for Not-for-Profit Law. “They’re literally auditing hundreds of organizations in an attempt to close them down.”

Russia’s restrictions on giving merited the country a score of 2.5 out of 5.0 in a pilot analysis of philanthropic freedom from the Hudson Institute. Its scholars examined 13 nations and the way they treated civil organizations, tax deductions, tax exemptions, and the ease of giving to and from overseas. The United States scored 4.6 overall, with strong non-profit laws and relatively generous tax deductions for giving. The Netherlands earned the top spot at 4.8, and Sweden, Japan, and Australia tied for third at 4.3. Russia, Egypt, and China scored the worst. But even in the best countries for giving, there is room for improvement. Americans can’t get tax deductions if they give to a charity overseas. In Sweden, only gifts between $300 and $900 can earn a tax break. The Hudson Institute’s analysis is preliminary—more information needs to be collected from other countries—but its Center for Global Prosperity, which also created the invaluable Index of Global Philanthropy and Remittances, should be commended for another research innovation. As Lord Kelvin said, if you can’t measure it, you can’t improve it.

Catholic Culture Nostalgia

A recurring theme in writings about the Church (as in this recent article from Our Sunday Visitor) is the fond memories of the Catholic Culture during the 1940s, 1950s and early 1960s—before Vatican Council II—and bemoaning the current Catholic “cultural crisis”.

As I was not Catholic then, I cannot really share in that fondness as I was being taught, by the Mormonism I was raised in, that the Catholic Church was the Whore of Babylon.

Though I was only converted and baptized in the Church ten years ago, my study of my new spiritual home has convinced me that the most wonderful time for the Church is the past, present, and future, all of it for all of it is the very manifestation of the pilgrim Church sailing through stormy seas, trekking over perilous mountains, and through windswept valleys; but through it all, evolving towards the Teilhardian future described by a future saint and Doctor of the Church—a status I believe Fr. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin will eventually be raised to.

Where every single thing, all the workings of human beings and earthly matter within the Church and without but revolving around the axis of the Church evolves into the intended finale of God’s creation, co-created by human beings.

Women as Priests

This issue—unresolved and handled irrationally by the Vatican—is hurting the Church, and this article in the New York Times advances the arguments why.

An excerpt.

Like Pope Francis’s humble, pastoral nature, much of his 84-page document, Evangelii Gaudium, will win over the hearts of many Catholics. In this exhortation, which lays a clear blueprint for his papacy, Pope Francis calls for reform of the curia and global economic justice. As I read the document, I found myself really rooting for Francis when he said: “How can it be that it is not a news item when an elderly homeless person dies of exposure, but it is news when the stock market loses two points?” Yes. This is what Jesus would say. This is being Catholic.

But where Francis lost me is on the role of women in the church, where once again women are seen as a separate entity and unworthy of priestly ordination. Pope Francis reiterated we’re not even allowed to discuss the issue. In the document, Francis states, “The reservation of the priesthood to males, as a sign of Christ the Spouse who gives himself in the Eucharist, is not a question open to discussion, but it can prove especially divisive if sacramental power is too closely identified with power in general.”

Where Francis misses the mark is suggesting that women are seeking ordination simply as means to gain power. While women’s decision making and leadership is certainly vital, the fact of the matter is women are called by God to serve alongside their brother priests. For a pope who seems so in tune with the marginalized, how does he not see that women are weeping and yearning for justice in the church? How can his sense of social justice not extend to the women of the church and their capacity for ordained ministry?

Halfway Houses

The purpose of halfway house use in the criminal justice system is a reasonable one; to provide a half in/half out status to prisoners during a pre-release period to better facilitate the transition from prison to freedom, rather than the abrupt release from prison to the streets.

Traditionally, halfway houses have certain programs in effect which help with the transition: counseling, job interview help, educational/vocational counseling, housing help, etc.; but lately most of their work has been simply brief housing, though they are still expected to help in the reduction of recidivism.

In Pennsylvania, that help has failed so badly that being sent to a halfway house has shown to actually increase the odds of recidivating over simple prison to street release, as the Wall Street Journal (subscription required) reports; with the result being that those facilities who do better will get paid more, a long overdue strategy.

The study results have been added to our rehabilitation evaluation page , #12 on our website.

An excerpt from the Wall Street Journal article.

Six out of 10 inmates paroled from Pennsylvania prisons were arrested again within three years, a recent state study found. And parolees who were released to the streets were re-incarcerated less frequently than those who first spent time in halfway houses—institutions whose goal is preventing such recidivism.

Those findings prompted Pennsylvania officials to demand better results from halfway houses and other facilities for ex-inmates by linking outcomes to payments.

Peace & Justice

This wing of the Catholic Church continues to perplex with its disconnection with reality regarding the capability of evil to act in the world—though they are right on with the women priest issue—and its own “success” in negotiating with evil; which is so well exemplified in this recent story from America Magazine by a former Catholic Worker reminiscing about JFK, Dorothy Day & Nikita Khrushchev.

He writes: “How can we understand that moment? The two most heavily armed leaders in history, on the verge of total nuclear war, suddenly joined hands against those on both sides pressuring them to attack. Khrushchev ordered the immediate withdrawal of his missiles in return for Kennedy’s public pledge never to invade Cuba and his secret promise to withdraw U.S. missiles from Turkey—as he would in fact do. The two cold war enemies had turned; each leader now had more in common with his opponent than with his own generals.”

And in the rest of the article, nor any place in it does he seem aware of the reality—that JFK gave the Communists everything they wanted in exchange for removing missiles illegally placed in Cuba, kind of like a robber demanding all your money and you say, no way, but, you can have my car.