Vicar of Rome to Gay Priests: Come Out and Get Out
Published July 29, 2010 | 
By Peter J. Smith On July 28, 2010
With the Vatican reeling from another sex scandal, this time in the heart of the Eternal City, the Vicar of Rome is sending an unequivocal message to homosexual priests: come out of the closet, and get out of the priesthood.
Cardinal Agostino Vallini, the prelate in charge of administering the Rome diocese, the episcopal see of Pope Benedict XVI, made the statements in response to an exposé by Panorama. In an undercover investigation the journal alleged that it had followed a handful of Catholic priests who were part of a gay-subculture: saying Mass by day, and frequenting gay bars by night.
“No one is forcing them to stay priests, only getting the benefits,” said Vallini, who rebuked the priests for leading a “double life.”
“Coherence demands they should come out into the open,” he added. “They never should have become priests.”
But Vallini also had choice words for Panorama, which belongs to the media empire of Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, accusing the journal of sensationalism and “trying to defame all priests.”
He asserted that the “vast majority” of priests in the diocese of Rome “represent a model of morality for everyone.”
However, Panorama’s editor Giorgio Mule, disputed the notion that the journal was simply scandal-mongering or seeking to defame the Catholic Church.
“This was a two week investigation and was not aimed at creating a scandal but showing that a certain section of the clergy behaves very differently,” Mule stated, according [1] to the UK Daily Mail.
The Italian homosexual movement is not too happy with the Panorama exposé either. The revelations of priests engaging in casual anonymous sex on Rome’s gay scene tend to undermine the family-friendly portrait of homosexual relationships that the homosexualist movement has striven to implant in the public imagination for years.
Aurelio Mancuso, the honorary president of Arcigay, a homosexualist lobby, denounced the Panorama article, accusing it of ignoring priests living as a couple in a committed loving relationship.
The Panorama investigation delved into the lives of three priests – two Italian, one French – who were filmed attending gay nightclubs in Rome and engaging in casual sexual activity. The report, described as “deeply disturbing” by Panorama, revealed that one of the priests, “Carlo,” was filmed praying Mass the day after one of his nighttime escapades.
Carlo also alleged to Panorama’s undercover reporter that 98 percent of the priests of his acquaintance were fellow homosexuals.
In 2005 the Vatican issued a document in which it made clear that individuals with “deep-seated” homosexual tendencies should not be admitted to the priesthood.
States Seek Using Obamacare to Cover Abortions
Published July 29, 2010 | …Obamacare offers no statutory protection against taxpayer funding of abortions . . . for now, we must fight for permanent legislative language to prevent taxpayers from funding elective abortions. When it comes to protecting the unborn, there is no room for compromise…
By Rep. Doug Lambor, Human Events, 07/29/2010
As states roll out their newly mandated high-risk pools under Obamacare, a troubling trend is emerging. Pennsylvania and Maryland initially announced on their websites that their plans would cover elective abortions. Additionally, New Mexico posted a draft summary of its high-risk pool services that listed elective abortion as a part of its covered services.
The reaction from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the White House was complete silence. It was not until the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC) called out those states that a spokesperson for the HHS announced that abortions will not be covered in the federally funded high-risk pools, except in the cases of rape or incest, or where the life of the mother would be endangered.
It’s entirely possible that if the NRLC had not blown the whistle, HHS could have let states get by with federal funding of abortion. However, HHS has not issued any written guidelines in regard to abortion funding and this statement is not backed by permanent legislative language. A mere verbal directive from a bureaucrat is currently the only protection we have to protect taxpayers from paying for elective abortions under this portion of Obamacare.
Obama’s Weak Executive Order
This is the nightmare scenario that I and many of my colleagues in the House and Senate warned of during the healthcare debate. While states offering taxpayer-funded abortions may be compelled for now to back away from their initial proposals, the fact remains: Obamacare offers no statutory protection against taxpayer funding of abortions. This highlights the fragile nature of Obama’s executive order prohibiting abortion coverage under Obamacare. And you can be certain that this is just the first of many such “surprises” that will emerge from the bureaucratic quagmire that is Obamacare.
In an effort to ensure that Colorado does not try to follow the lead of some of these other states, I have sent a letter to the governor of Colorado and the state’s plan administrator asking to see the proposed healthcare policies. Though the plan is scheduled to begin coverage on September 1, they have yet to provide even a draft of the plan for public viewing. Given the problems in other states, Colorado should reassure its taxpayers that public money will not fund elective abortions.
To hold my state accountable, I am asking my constituents and all other interested citizens to contact the governor’s office to express their views on the matter. I am hoping that as more pro-life groups catch wind of this, our efforts will grow nationally. For now, this is all we can do.
The real solution must come from Congress.
Since 1976, the Hyde Amendment, a legislative provision prohibiting the use of federal funds for abortion, has been attached to appropriations bills that fund HHS. Although the Hyde Amendment is not permanent law, it does reflect the will of Congress on the issue of federal funding of abortion. However, the Hyde Amendment does not apply directly to Obamacare and its massive bureaucracy.
Protect Life Act
Rep. Joe Pitts (R.-Pa.) has introduced the Protect Life Act (H.R. 5111), which would offer permanent restrictions on federal funding of abortion by guaranteeing that no tax subsidies can flow to plans that cover elective abortion. I am one of 119 co-sponsors of this legislation. Additionally, Rep. Chris Smith (R.-N.J.) has just introduced a bill, similar to the Protect Life Act, that would go one step further and offer protections to healthcare providers. The conscience clause would ensure that local, state, and federal agencies that receive federal healthcare dollars do not discriminate against healthcare providers, including doctors, nurses and hospitals, because these providers do not provide abortions.
While I am hopeful we will prevail on this occasion in protecting taxpayers from funding elective abortions, this debate underscores the larger problems with Obamacare. The bill is riddled with undisclosed costs and hidden problems, many that have yet to surface. For that reason, I have pledged to repeal and defund this government takeover of healthcare. But, for now, we must fight for permanent legislative language to prevent taxpayers from funding elective abortions. When it comes to protecting the unborn, there is no room for compromise.
Mr. Lamborn, a Republican, represents Colorado’s 5th Congressional District.
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=38291
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Let’s be clear! It’s no secret where Obama & other government officials stand on abortion!
Kathleen Sebelius, Secretary, Department of Health and Human Services. Pictured: Sec. Sebelius and late-term Wichita abortionist George Tiller together at a party she hosted for him at the mansion in 2007.
The New York Times, Billionaire Buffett and the Weeping Abortionist
Published July 29, 2010 | 
Ken Blackwell, Townhall, July 29, 2010
It can’t be news that the Gray Lady—the unofficial title of the New York Times—is militantly pro-abortion. It might even be called a house organ of the abortion lobby.
But a recent lengthy story in the Times (“The New Abortion Providers,” July 12, 2010) is a goldmine of information for pro-lifers about this execrable traffic.
Did you know that Warren Buffett has given $3 billion—yes, three billion dollars—to promote abortion here in the U.S. and around the world? Often, government officials in developing countries are under pressure to control population in order to qualify for international aid. So they pressure women in the villages to get abortions. Western Europe is especially strong in pushing for abortion in these developing countries.
The Times article quotes Buffett’s late wife telling interviewer Charlie Rose “Warren feels that women all over the world get shortchanged. That’s why he’s so pro-choice.” The article tells us after Susan Thompson Buffett moved from Omaha, Nebraska, to San Francisco in 1977, she and Warren remained close. She even introduced Warren to the woman he has lived with since 1978. This threesome would send out Christmas cards together, the Times informs us.
Warren Buffett strongly backed Barack Obama. On January 23, 2009, President Obama’s first official act was to open the sluice gates of taxpayer support for abortion worldwide. The U.S. has now joined those exerting pressure on women in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. We may be going broke, but Planned Parenthood is still making a killing.
Abortion promotion is a national security crisis for the U.S. Men and women in the Third World get it. They know that by pressing abortion on their countries—as Joe Biden has done recently in Kenya–the Obama administration wants fewer of them. These peoples will become fertile ground for anti-Americanism.
The Times also reports abortionists in this country are “startled by some poll numbers that for the first time, more Americans call themselves pro-life than pro-choice—a shift that includes young people.” The author of the article, a zealous pro-abortion writer named Emily Bazelon, noted that four of seven medical residents in one training program she witnessed chose not to take part in abortion.
All over the world, it seems, abortion traffickers are losing support. Abby Johnson, a former Planned Parenthood center director from Texas, quit and joined the pro-life side. Her story made headlines on FOX News, on cable shows, and on the talk show circuit.
Of course, not all abortionists are affected by these changing currents of opinion. The respected journal First Things carried this stunning item last January:
In stark and sad contrast to the story of Abby Johnson is the story of a doctor in the Midwest who wrote about her own moment of disillusionment. It came as she performed an abortion on a woman eighteen weeks pregnant while she herself was eighteen weeks pregnant. “I felt a kick—a fluttery ‘thump, thump’ in my own uterus. It was one of the first times I felt fetal movement. There was a leg and foot in my forceps, and a ‘thump, thump’ in my abdomen. Instantly, tears were streaming from my eyes—without me—meaning my conscious brain—even being aware of what was going on. I felt as if my response had come entirely from my body, bypassing my usual cognitive processing completely. A message seemed to travel from my hand and my uterus to my tear ducts. It was an overwhelming feeling—a brutally visceral response—heartfelt and unmediated by my training or my feminist pro-choice politics.” Horrifyingly, for this woman, unlike Abby Johnson, that was not the end of it. Her illusion was gone, but she continued to perform abortions. “Doing second trimester abortions did not get easier after my pregnancy,” she said. “In fact, dealing with little infant parts of my born baby only made dealing with dismembered fetal parts sadder.”
Thumb-sucking at 18 weeks….
First Things has long led in reporting important news about the Culture of Life. From this source, we learn that 78% of abortion facilities are located in or near minority neighborhoods in this country. Is it, therefore, any surprise to learn that Warren Buffett has joined the club of billionaires who pressure black and brown women around the world to kill their unborn children? Planned Parenthood is the favorite charity of many billionaires. The problem Buffett and others of his ilk have is the weeping abortionists. The law that is written on our heart tells us not to kill our own kind. Even if all the people on earth hardened their hearts to those kicks, those fluttery thump-thumps, the very stones would cry out.
HERITAGE: Surviving the Obama Assault on the Rule of Law (Giving into Bullies Only Encourages Their Behavior.)
Published July 29, 2010 | Heritage Foundation, Posted July 29th, 2010
Hours after yesterday’s decision by President Bill Clinton judicial appointee Susan Bolton to preemptively stop enforcement of Arizona’s immigration enforcement law, Thomas A. Saenz, president of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF), told The New York Times: “This is a warning to any other jurisdiction.” Just in case the message from the Obama administration and its leftist allies was not clear, Obama appointee U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke told The Associated Press: “Surely it’s going to make states pause and consider how they’re drafting legislation and how it fits in a constitutional framework.”
But no amount of pause by states and localities could ever possibly satisfy the Obama administration, its amnesty allies, and activist judges like Bolton. In a textbook case of judicial activism, Judge Bolton rewrote the Arizona law to her own needs, invented her own facts and ignored clear federal law.
President Jimmy Carter appointee and immigration law professor at Yale Law School Peter Schuck told The New York Times: “She rushed to judgment in a way I can only assume reflects a lot of pressure from the federal government to get this case resolved quickly.”
The Obama administration’s case against Arizona sought to preemptively stop enforcement of Arizona’s new immigration law. The legal term for this is a “facial challenge,” and federal precedent is clear that facial challenges “must be careful not to go beyond the statute’s facial requirements and speculate about ‘hypothetical’ or imaginary cases.” But that is exactly what Judge Bolton did. First, she ignored Section 2(B) of the law as written and completely ignored the section’s first sentence that required an officer to have “reasonable suspicion” that a person was in the country illegally before their immigration status should be checked. Then, she invented a completely hypothetical case about a Chilean dog walker detained by a completely fictional Sheriff Smith. Finally, despite the fact that 8 U.S.C. §1373 clearly requires the federal government to “respond to an inquiry by a…State, or local government agency, seeking to verify or ascertain the citizenship or immigration status of any individual,” Judge Bolton concluded that the Obama administration’s decision not to enforce this provision was as good as rewriting the law itself.
Taken alone, the White House’s behavior on this issue is troubling enough. But put into the broader context of the first 18 months of this Administration, a truly pernicious pattern emerges.
First, there was the Obama Justice Department’s decision to dismiss voter intimidation charges against the New Black Panther Party. Then there was the Obama administration’s use of TARP to bail out its union allies in what bankruptcy law scholars have called “so outrageous and illegal that until March of this year [2009], nobody even conceptualized it.” Then there was the Obama administration’s shakedown of BP in the White House’s Roosevelt Room. Less than a week later after a federal court found its first oil drilling ban to be “arbitrary and capricious,” the Obama administration issued a second oil drilling ban that was wider and killed even more jobs than the first.
Americans cannot be cowed by the Obama administration and its La Raza and MALDEF allies. Giving into bullies only encourages their behavior. Finally this lawsuit should be a permanent reminder to everyone who wants to call themselves a conservative that any and all claims about an amnesty deal are complete fiction. La Raza and MALDEF will fight every enforcement measure in any such deal tooth and nail while administrations like this one will simply choose not to enforce them. Meanwhile, the amnesty provisions would be instantaneous and permanent.
Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer (R) has vowed to fight this decision all the way to the Supreme Court, and she deserves support.
Tony Perkins, Family Research Council, July 29, 2010
Published July 29, 2010 | Behind DISCLOSEd Doors
To the surprise of few, the Democrats’ DISCLOSE Act failed to proceed in the Senate, falling short of the needed 60 votes. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) knew the effort to influence this year’s elections would fail, but brought it up anyway to further appease the liberal base that the Democratic Leadership has been trying to keep in line since they took over Congress four years ago.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who has become an unmatched champion of free speech in the Senate, put it best when he pointed out,
“A yes vote on this bill will send a clear message to the American people that their jobs aren’t as important as the jobs of embattled Democrat politicians… If the Founding Fathers were here, they’d remind us. They’d hold up the Constitution and remind us of the oath we took to support and defend it.”
While last night was a victory for those who believe in the First Amendment, there is little doubt that President Obama and Sen. Reid will try to bring up the legislation again and again before the November elections in their attempt to silence their opponents. One day they may finally learn–the more they try to shut us up, the louder those of us who believe in democracy will get.
Defense Authorization Bill: Question of the Day
If Congress acts to overturn the ban on open homosexuals serving in the military, how could this impact recruitment? Watch today’s video clip with Sergeant First Class Benjamin Ratcliff (U.S. Army, Ret.) for his first-hand experience as a recruiter and his discussion of the challenges this policy change may create.
Q: “What might be the impact on recruiting should Congress overturn the current ban on open homosexuals serving in the military?”
The all-volunteer force will likely face tougher recruiting. Last year, the Pentagon met 103 percent of its fiscal year recruiting goal in part because of high unemployment and generous enlistment bonuses. But the pool of eligible candidates is shrinking, because nearly three-quarters of today’s high school graduates go on to college, compared to 50 percent in the 1980s. Other factors such as obesity, which affects one-in-four American youth, make finding fully qualified recruits difficult. Repeal the homosexual ban and there will be some candidates, with the encouragement of significant others like parents, who remove themselves from the military’s pool of eligible candidates. Conversely, there is no evidence that qualified homosexuals–a fraction, barely two percent of the American public–will flood into the military to make up any shortfall.
Judge Deserves a Doctorate in Indoctrination
Yesterday we wrote about a lawsuit filed against Georgia’s Augusta State University by a counseling student, who was told she must submit to a program of indoctrination to change her disapproval of homosexual conduct. The piece was written before we received word that a decision had been handed down in a similar case in Michigan, Ward v. Wilbanks, about a student who was dismissed from the counseling program at Eastern Michigan University for attempting to refer a homosexual client to another counselor because she could not affirm the client’s homosexual behavior.
The record clearly showed that such referrals based on “value conflicts” are a legitimate part of counseling practice. Yet U.S. District Court Judge George Carem Steeh ruled that the blatant violation of Julea Ward’s freedom of speech and of religion constituted “an integral part of the curriculum.” Alliance Defense Fund has announced their intention to appeal this misguided ruling.
http://www.frc.org/get.cfm?i=WU10G19&f=PG07J01
COLSON: The Victory of Reason
Published July 29, 2010 | By Charles Colson, Catholic Exchange, July 29, 2010
When you hear the word “globalization,” you probably think of Chinese factories or customer service centers in India. What you probably don’t think about is Christianity. Yet globalization and Christianity are linked in ways you may never have imagined.
Globalization is about more than markets and technology. It’s also about the spread across national boundaries of ideas and values—in other words, culture. While the spread and exchange of culture flow in many different directions, the ideas and values most associated with globalization are those of the West.
And this is where Christianity comes in. In his marvelous book, The Victory of Reason: How Christianity Led to Freedom, Capitalism, and Western Success [1], Rodney Stark writes that “Christianity created Western Civilization.” Without Christianity’s commitment to “reason, progress, and moral equality, today the entire world would be about where non-European societies were in, say, 1800.”
This would be a world “with many astrologers and alchemists but no scientists. A world of despots, lacking universities, banks, factories, eyeglasses, chimneys, and pianos.” The “modern world,” to which globalization aspires, “arose only in Christian societies. Not in Islam. Not in Asia. Not in a ‘secular’ society—there having been none.”
Needless to say, Stark’s conclusions aren’t popular with academics and other intellectuals and have been savaged by liberal reviewers. These folks are all too happy to blame Christianity for some of the darker episodes in Western history, but they’re not about to give the faith credit for the Western success.
No matter. Non-Westerners see the connection. For example, Chinese scholars were asked to “look into what accounted for the success, in fact, the pre-eminence of the West all over the world.” After considering possible military, economic, political and cultural explanations, they concluded that the answer lay in what the Chinese scholars saw as the “heart” of the West’s pre-eminent culture: Christianity.
These non-Christian and non-Western scholars had “no doubt” that “the Christian moral foundation of social and cultural life was what made possible the emergence of capitalism and the successful transition to democratic politics.”
Apparently, many of their countrymen agree. Whereas there were approximately 2 million Christians in China when Mao came to power in 1949, today there are upwards of 100 million. What’s more, Christianity is especially popular among the “best-educated” and most modern Chinese.
Why? Because like people everywhere, except, ironically, in the West, they see Christianity as “intrinsic to becoming modern.” For them, Christianity is an alternative to a way of life that bred misery and oppression. They understand Christianity’s role in the rise of the West, even as Western elites deny the connection.
Of course, this isn’t the primary reason that Christianity is “becoming globalized far more rapidly than is democracy, capitalism or modernity.” That is due to the proclamation of the Gospel and the work of the Holy Spirit.
Still, it’s a powerful reminder of how Christianity transforms not only individual lives but entire societies as well.
God Is Not Mocked!
Published July 29, 2010 | - Galatians Chapter 6: 7-8
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Make no mistake: God is not mocked, for a person will reap only what he sows, because the one who sows for his flesh will reap corruption from the flesh, but the one who sows for the spirit will reap eternal life from the spirit.
Michael Voris: Sex, Lies and Videotape – Part II
Published July 29, 2010 | The Archdiocese of New York’s answer to the gay goings-on at St. Francis Xavier parish stretches belief.
In a time when Catholics want and need clear and unambiguous statements from their leaders, artfully crafted “official responses” only serve to hurt the Church. Please watch this episode of the Vortex and pass it along to as many friends and family as possible.
WATCH ONLINE: http://www.realcatholictv.com/free/index.php?vidID=vort-2010-07-28
This program is from RealCatholicTV.com
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New York: Jesuit Run St. Francis Xavier Parish; Their Website
Groups and activites Latest News
Catholic Lesbian Group
Practicing Catholics and non-practicing, the religious and not-so-religious—all are welcome. Our mission is to provide a safe place for gay women to come together and discuss issues related to spirituality, identity and community. Led and organized by parishioners, we have been meeting at the Church of St. Francis Xavier for more than twelve years on the second Friday of every month at 55 W. 15th St., West Room, second floor.
- Find information on Current happenings please see the Catholic Lesbians page.
- Contact SFXWomen@aol.com or (917) 297-6804.
Gay Catholics Men’s Group
Men meet monthly on the first and third Fridays in a welcoming, affirming environment to address gay Catholic life and how best to live authentically our commitment to the Gospel.
Regular meetings are held in the Mary Chapel at 7PM. Please enter at 55 W. 15th Street.
NOTICE: There will be NO meeting in August.
Our next meeting will be held on: Friday Sept. 17th at 7:00 PM in the Mary Chapel.
our guest at that time will be our oastor, Fr. Joe Costantino, S.J.
“Happy Summer To All!”
Please see our Gay Cstholics page or contact SFXGCGroup@gmail.com for more information.
Peace and Justice Committee
Seeking to proclaim the living Gospel, examining root causes of injustice.
Meetings are scheduled for 6:30 pm on the 3rd Tuesday of the month.
Read about our current events here.
Contact Sylvia Picard Schmitt or John Karle at xavierpeaceandjustice@gmail.com for more info.
Young Adult Group
Xavier Young Adults is an outreach to and by parishioners in their 20s and 30s at the Church of St. Francis Xavier. We strive to engage young seekers with social and spiritual programs that reflect our dynamic experiences, parish community, Catholic faith, and city. Single, married, gay, straight – all are welcome!
- The groups meets the 1st and 3rd Sunday of each month.
- Read more on the Young Adults Page
Zen Meditation Group
Meets every Monday at 7 pm. Newcomers are welcome. Introductory instruction available.
Contact Peggy & Paul Schubert at 212-260-2486 or schubertnyc@gmail.com
Catholic Lesbians: “Being Catholic Now”
Friday, August 13, 7:00 PM ~ 9:00 PM West room
A meeting for Catholic lesbians ~ This evening we will discuss what “Being Catholic Now” means, about change in the church and our quest for meaning. Please bring a beverage or snack to share.
LGBT Pride March
Each year a group of us gather to March in the Parade. We join in that section of the parade reserved for religious congregations. Through our efforts at handing out flyers about our welcoming parish, a number of people find their way to St. Francis Xavier and back to the Catholic Church.
If you have any questions, please contact us using the contact information above. We look forward to spending this day of celebration together as a parish.
Women in the church
Click on small image to enlarge
Photo by: Joan Morris/Dorothy Irvin
This archaeological photograph of a mosaic in the Church of St. Praxedis in Rome shows, in the blue mantle, the Virgin Mary, foremother of women leaders in the Church. On her left is St. Pudentiana and on her right St. Praxedis, both leaders of house churches in early Christian Rome. Episcopa Theodora, “Bishop Theodora” is the bishop of the Church of St. Praxedis in AD 820.
Gay Ministries
Gay Catholics Men’s Group
Men meet monthly on the first and third Fridays in a welcoming, affirming environment to address gay Catholic life and how best to live authentically our commitment to the Gospel.
Regular meetings are held in the Mary Chapel at 7PM. Please enter at 55 W. 15th Street.
NOTICE: There will be NO meeting in August.
Our next meeting will be held on: Friday Sept. 17th at 7:00 PM in the Mary Chapel.
our guest at that time will be our pastor, Fr. Joe Costantino, S.J.
“Happy Summer To All!”
- Contact SFXGLGroup@aol.com for more information.
Citing New Memo, Senators Urge HHS to Restrict Abortion Funding in High-Risk Pools
Published July 29, 2010 | 
Washington D.C. (CNA/EWTN News) – Responding to a new report that the 2010 health care law lacks restrictions that prohibit states from using federal funding to pay for abortions in the new high risk insurance pools, 13 Republican senators have written to the head of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to urge regulatory action.
“We request your immediate assistance to ensure that federal dollars will not be used to pay for elective abortions,” the Senators’ July 28 letter to HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius read. They asked Sebelius to identify specific actions to be taken and to set a timeline for them by July 30.
The letter cited a July 23 memo from the Library of Congress’ Congressional Research Service (CRS). The Senators said abortion funding restrictions in the health care legislation and in President Barack Obama’s executive order “fail to address high risk pools and the $5 billion in funding provided for their operation.”
CNA spoke with Janine D’Addario of the Congressional Research Service (CRS) who confirmed the authenticity of the memo, pointing to the Senate Health Committee’s website for the “authoritative version.”
According to the CRS memo, the executive order does not “specifically” address the question of high-risk pools but directs the Director of the Office of Management and Budget and the HHS Secretary to develop guidelines segregating federal funds from abortion funds. Continue reading
Two Opposing Views: The Church & the State
Published July 29, 2010 | 
Gov. Brewer: Judge Told Feds They Don’t Have to Do Their Job
July 28, 2010 at 3:57 pm – CNN
Dateline: Arizona
Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer makes a statement to the press after a temporary injunction against part of the anti-illegal immigration law in her state.
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Ariz. Catholic bishops praise ruling against immigration law measures
PHOENIX, ARIZ., Jul 28, 2010 (CNA).- After a federal judge blocked certain parts of the controversial Arizona immigration law – which is slated to go into effect tomorrow – the Catholic bishops of Arizona lauded the move, saying they “commend” the judge for prohibiting the “more problematic provisions” of the law……….
Sen. Sessions: Kagan ‘Dangerous’
Published July 29, 2010 |
Sessions argued that Ms. Kagan is a legal progressive and stated that the American people do not want Senators to confirm a Supreme Court nominee who would impose their own social or political views from the bench, and that such a philosophy is contrary to our legal heritage.
Dennis Prager: From Karl Marx….
Published July 29, 2010 | Patriot Post, Chronicle, Wednesday, July 28, 2010
“From Karl Marx to today, the Left has always hated people on the Right, not merely differed or been angry with them. The question is: why? Here are three possible answers. First, the left thinks the right is evil. … Second, when you don’t confront real evil, you hate those who do. … Third, the left’s utopian vision is prevented only by the right. … Hatred of conservatives is so much part of the left that the day the left stops hating conservatives will mark the beginning of the end of the left as we know it.”
–columnist Dennis Prager
http://patriotpost.us/edition/2010/07/28/chronicle/
LifeSiteNews.com Headlines: July 29, 2010
Published July 29, 2010 | 
Wed Jul 28 17:40:12 EDT – “The inclusion of legalized abortion … would be unjust to the littlest humans, intellectually dishonest, and counterproductive to these successful efforts,” said Rep. Chris Smith. Full Story
‘In God We Trust’ Again Upheld by Federal Appeals Court
Wed Jul 28 20:04:09 EDT – A U.S. court of appeals has unanimously ruled that the National Motto, “In God We Trust,” is constitutional and does not violate the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. Full Story
Archbishop Urges All to Oppose Opening of New Planned Parenthood
Wed Jul 28 12:47:32 EDT – “Make your voice heard in opposition to the efforts of Planned Parenthood to expand the culture of violence and death in Omaha,” urged Archbishop George Lucas of Omaha. Full Story
Protest to be Held at Catholic Hospital that Employs Planned Parenthood Abortionist
Wed Jul 28 12:58:13 EDT – “A Catholic Hospital that grants full privileges to a Doctor who brutally murders babies every week is NOT a Catholic Hospital,” stated Joe Scheidler, National Director of the Pro-Life Action League. Full Story
Do It Anyway
Published July 29, 2010 | SOURCE: A Good Choice Blog…..
Two Highly Principled Servants of God
Mother Teresa hung a copy of this poem on the wall of Shishu Bhavan, the Children’s orphanage, in Calcutta she founded in Calcutta. Its source is unknown. She dedicated her life to caring for the poor of Calcutta, India. Her exceptional dedication to the poor was widely recognized, including the reception of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979 . . . Mother Teresa died September 5, 1997.
People are often unreasonable, irrational, and self-centered. Forgive them anyway.
If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives. Be kind anyway.
If you are successful, you will win some unfaithful friends and some genuine enemies. Succeed anyway.
If you are honest and sincere people may deceive you. Be honest and sincere anyway.
What you spend years creating, others could destroy overnight. Create anyway.
If you find serenity and happiness, some may be jealous. Be happy anyway.
The good you do today, will often be forgotten. Do good anyway.
Give the best you have, and it will never be enough. Give your best anyway.
In the final analysis, it is between you and God. It was never between you and them anyway.
-this version is credited to Mother Teresa
President Ronald Reagan and Mother Teresa each embodied and lived out much of this poem. He was optimistic and persevered despite great obstacles. She was totally dedicated to helping the poor despite or in spite of apparently insurmountable obstacles.
http://agoodchoice.blogspot.com/2007_05_01_archive.html
Editorial Exegesis
Published July 29, 2010 | Patriot Post, Chronicle, Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Nancy Pelosi has it backward on deficits
Nancy Pelosi has it backward on deficits “A major poll just gave Congress a favorability rating of 11% — lowest in history. Never, it seems, have our representatives in Washington been so disconnected from the people they purport to serve. The disconnect was most evident in separate comments made by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid at a conference of the far-left group Netroots Nation last weekend in Las Vegas. Both weighed in on vital topics. Both revealed why they’re so out of touch with reality. Pelosi told the audience she adamantly opposes raising the retirement age for Social Security and said the Depression-era program shouldn’t be cut to help reduce the deficit. ‘When you talk about reducing the deficit and Social Security, you’re talking about apples and oranges,’ she said. She has it exactly backward. The No. 1 problem facing this nation is the massive deficit we face over the next 75 years, due almost entirely to the expansion of Social Security and Medicare. The only way to address the deficit is to address entitlements. …
Meanwhile, the speaker had the chutzpah — or maybe it was twisted humor — to tell the Netroot folks that Democrats are ‘moving on all fronts to reduce the deficit.’ …
Reid’s comments, made to the same Netroot group, were equally absurd — and no doubt offensive to voters. After his party insisted during more than a year of debate over the health care overhaul that they did not want a single-payer public option, Reid gloated to the Netroot gathering: ‘We’re going to have a public option.It’s just a question of when.’ …
Nor does Reid, like Pelosi, get that Social Security is in a deep crisis. He called it ‘the most successful social program in the history of the world.’ Successful? A program that socks future generations with trillions in higher taxes and lower standards of living? A program that’s already running in the red and whose unsustainable finances promise to push the U.S. to the verge of bankruptcy? The arrogance of Reid’s and Pelosi’s remarks underscore the problems that the Democrats have with the electorate. They promised moderation and fiscal responsibility. Instead, we got a radical expansion of government power.”
–Investor’s Business Daily
http://patriotpost.us/edition/2010/07/28/chronicle/
Founder’s Quote Daily
Published July 29, 2010 | 
“[T]he States can best govern our home concerns and the general government our foreign ones. I wish, therefore … never to see all offices transferred to Washington, where, further withdrawn from the eyes of the people, they may more secretly be bought and sold at market.”
—Thomas Jefferson, letter to Judge William Johnson, 1823
GOSPEL & MEDITATION: Yes, I Believe
Published July 29, 2010 | July 29, 2010
Saint Martha
Father Alex Yeung, LC
John 11: 19-27
And many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to comfort them about their brother. When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went to meet him; but Mary sat at home. Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that whatever you ask of God, God will give you.” Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise.” Martha said to him, “I know he will rise, in the resurrection on the last day.” Jesus told her, “I am the resurrection and the life; whoever believes in me, even if he dies, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?” She said to him, “Yes, Lord. I have come to believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one who is coming into the world.”
Introductory Prayer: Heavenly Father, once again I renew my faith in your plan for my life. I trust in your loving providence, and I know that no one can snatch me from your hands. You know well that I love you. I wish to be more open and docile to your plan and action in my life. Take this time that I now set aside for prayer. Take my mind, will and heart; take my gifts and talents. I lay them at your feet through this prayer. Do with me today according to your holy and loving plan. Amen.
Petition: Lord Jesus, deepen my faith in your resurrection.
1. Do You Believe This? This is the fundamental question in our life of faith: do we, in fact, believe it all? Do we really believe that the human race was mysteriously subjected to the catastrophic consequences of our first parents’ disobedience to the divine will? Do we really believe what we say in the Creed every Sunday? Do we believe that Jesus of Nazareth died and rose from the dead to conquer sin, and now lives to draw all people to himself as their savior? The great challenge for the Christian in our thoroughly post-modern, post-Christian, technical age is to unabashedly say “Yes!”
2. Keep it Simple One of the greatest challenges in the Christian life is to keep our faith simple. Our tendency is toward sophistication and complication. While certainly the ability to think and reason well is a gift and has its place in the Christian life, we must be equally aware that the in-born tendency to rationalism can be a non-starter for a genuine life of faith. We cannot afford to fall into today’s error of trying to size God down according to our meager perceptions and self-centered attitudes. Christ is much more; God ways are far more sublime than what our limited vision can create. A simple faith is so pleasing to God because then he has leeway for his supernatural action. Then he can do something within us and through us.
3. Spiritual Finess Training This simple faith can and must launch us upward and outward in the task of bringing Christ’s love to every soul. Our simple faith can rapidly ignite and convert us into relentless apostles of the Kingdom, like St. Paul. We need to make his words our own: “What will separate us from the love of Christ? Will anguish, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or the sword? (…) No, in all these things we conquer overwhelmingly through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor present things, nor future things, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:35-39).
Conversation with Christ: Lord Jesus, give me strength to bear the burden of drawing others closer to you. Let me feel, with St. Paul, the sting of “Woe to me if I do not preach the Gospel!” And when I do set out to give others reasons for my faith, accompany me with your Holy Spirit to give success to my poor efforts.
Resolution: For love of Jesus, I will renew, refresh and invigorate the act of faith with which I begin every day in my morning offering.
http://www.regnumchristi.org/english/articulos/articulo.phtml?se=363&ca=975&te=735&id=20302
TODAY’S SAINT: ST. MARTHA
Published July 29, 2010 | CATHOLIC NEWS AGENCY, JULY 29, 2010
“Jesus loved Martha, and her sister Mary, and Lazarus” (John 11:5).
Saint Martha is mentioned three Gospel passages: Luke 10:38-42, John 11:1-53, and John 12:1-9, and the friendship between her and her siblings Mary and Lazarus with the Lord Jesus is evident in these passages.
In Luke, Martha receives Jesus into her home and worries herself with serving Him, a worry that her sister Mary, who sat beside the Lord’s feet “listening to Him speak,” doesn’t share. Her complaint that her sister is not helping her serve draws a reply from the Lord who says to her, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things. There is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part and it will not be taken from her.”
The overanxiousness she displays in serving is put into the right context by Jesus who emphasizes the importance of contemplating Him before all things.
Yet she is seen next in John, outside the tomb of her brother Lazarus who had died four days earlier, as the one who receives the Revelation from the Lord that “I am the resurrection and the life; whoever believes in me, even if he dies, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.”
When asked by the Lord if she believed this she said to Him, “Yes, Lord. I have come to believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one who is coming into the world,” displaying her great faith which is confirmed by Jesus’ subsequent raising of her brother Lazarus from the grave.
In the third and last instance, we see Martha, again in John, at a house in Bethany where Jesus was reclining at table with her brother Lazarus after he had raised him from the dead. During dinner, John’s Gospel tells us, “Martha served.” She is revealed here performing the same task as when we first saw her, but now her service is infused with her faith, and the brevity of the description suggests the silence and peace in which she serves as opposed to the nervous anxiety she displays earlier. Martha, who we have seen serving, in Luke, and then believing, earlier in John, is now seen expressing her belief in the action of serving the Lord. “Martha served,” and in doing so teaches us the way of Christian life.
Saint Martha is the patron of housewives, servants, waiters and cooks.
http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/saint.php?n=528
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