Make It Happen, Lord

I was invited to witness the The Miracle of San Gennaro and had the privilege of standing very near to the Archbishop as the miracle was repeated when the blood of Naples' patron saint liquefied.A huge crowd of faithful, who had been pouring into the city's cathedral and the square outside from the early hours of the day, greeted the announcement of the miracle recurrence with warm applause. Cardinal Crescenzio Sepe, the Archbishop of Naples, held up a phial containing the blood of the 3rd-century saint. For religious and superstitious Neapolitans, the ritual's success is a good omen for the city.

The miracle takes place on the anniversary of the martyrdom of San Gennaro in September 305 AD. The dried blood of the saint is preserved in two glass phials and traditionally liquefies three times a year. The liquefaction process sometimes takes hours, even days, and on occasions fails to happen at all. When the miracle does not occur it is seen as a sign of impending disaster. In fact, disaster has struck on at least five occasions when the blood failed to liquefy.

A group of Italian scientists has analysed the contents of the phials, establishing that they do contain blood, but have been unable to explain the phenomenon. Some sceptics believe it is due to the shaking of the containers or the penetration of warmth from the holder's hands.

Sceptic that I was I walked away a true believer. No way it could have been done by the Archbishop’s hand. It was not a warm day; and one can shake dried blood all day and ever see the blood begin to flow!

Purpose of this blog? I am offering prayers for St Gennaro's intercession that, as Naples was relieved of many disasters, we too might be relieved of the horrors of our present US government. We cannot take another four years!

Romney Will Win in November

Why? Remember what happened in the last national election, 2010? That's the last hard data. The Republicans had a victory of enormous proportions. The entire election was a referendum on President Obama, and specifically on Obamacare. Has anything gotten better? NO. Not only that, the flaws in and objections to Obamacare have become more apparent.

The pointy-heads have lots of arguments for Obama, and the media are covering for him, but they are untrustworthy, and they are acting as if the 2010 tsunami never happened. Since then we have seen our ambassador to Libya murdered--the first American ambassador murdered in 30 years. Obama will certainly get a "bounce" when he directs our military to kill some terrorists in retaliation, but it will not be enough.

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Both Charles Krauthammer and especially former Democratic pollster Patrick Caddell have good articles on how the mainstream media has abrogated its responsibility when it comes to Obama. Caddell says that the mainstream media has become an enemty of the American People--something we said practically word for word back on September 13.

You can watch Caddell's speech below--remember, he worked for President Carter.

Posted by Gibbons J. Cooney

Nuns on the Bus

The National Review Online has the lollowing remarks I would like to share:

The  Sisters of Life were founded in 1991 by Cardinal John O’Connor and Mother Agnes Mary Donovan (a former Columbia psychology professor and clinician) as a new religious community of women dedicated to the defense of life at all stages and in all conditions. The Sisters of Life are wholly orthodox and wear the kind of modernized (and in their case, quite beautiful) religious habit envisioned by the Second Vatican Council. And unlike the religious orders represented by this summer’s “Nuns on the Bus” road show, which culminated in Sister Simone Campbell’s attempt to excommunicate Representative Paul Ryan at the Democratic National Convention (an effort that was, as President Obama might say, above Sister Simone’s pay grade), the Sisters of Life are growing, often attracting new recruits among highly educated and accomplished professional women.

Speaking at the Knight of Columus Mass @Red Mass@.Bishop Paprocki of Springfield made clear that recent letters from committee chairmen at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops — letters widely cited by the Catholic Left in its demonization of Paul Ryan — were exercises in prudential judgment that were binding on precisely no one, for “reasonable minds can come to different conclusions about more effective ways” to solve the social problems addressed in the letters, including hunger. Thus Sister Simone, in telling the Democratic Convention that the Ryan budget had been condemned by the U.S. bishops, was either woefully ignorant or willfully malicious. And so, by extension, is every Catholic politician or activist who, like Sister Simone, misreads both Catholic social doctrine and the authority of letters written by USCCB chairmen, who speak for themselves, period.

Confession?

"Let’s be clear. Crying is not the goal, either of a sporting event or of a sacrament. What is interesting though is what can happen to students on the affective and spiritual plane when they are both suitably prepared and then given an opportunity to encounter the sacrament of reconciliation by staffs that take it seriously themselves."

Being Catholic

By Jonathan Doyle

Even The Onion's Had Enough of Press Fawning over Obama

Media Having Trouble Finding Right Angle On Obama's Double-Homicide

WASHINGTON—More than a week after President Barack Obama's cold-blooded killing of a local couple, members of the American news media admitted Tuesday that they were still trying to find the best angle for covering the gruesome crime.

"I know there's a story in there somewhere," said Newsweek editor Jon Meacham, referring to Obama's home invasion and execution-style slaying of Jeff and Sue Finowicz on Apr. 8. "Right now though, it's probably best to just sit back and wait for more information to come in. After all, the only thing we know for sure is that our president senselessly murdered two unsuspecting Americans without emotion or hesitation."

Added Meacham, "It's not so cut and dried."

Read the whole thing.

Posted by Gibbons J. Cooney

Congressman West Hosts Forum on Abortion in the Black Community

Today, our friend Walter Hoye, Jr., and other black pro-lifers will bring their message to the halls of Congress.

At 1PM East Coast Time Congressman Allen West and the National Prolife Coalition will sponsor a forum to explore the horrific toll abortion is taking on the black community.

The forum will be held in the Rayburn Gold Room, Room 2168, of the Capitol.

In addition to Walter, presenters include: Ryan Bomberger, Founder of the Radiance Foundation; Stephen Broden, Sr. Pastor, Fairpark Bible Church; Dr. Freda Bush, MD; Catherine Davis, President, The Restoration Project; Day Gardner, President Black Prolife Union;  and Dean Nelson, Vice President, Underserved Outreach, Care Net.

Thank you, Congressman West for joining in this critical fight! Let us join in prayer:

"... The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much." (James 5:16)

New Bishop for Orange County: Kevin Vann

This morning in Rome the Holy Father named Bishop Kevin Vann, Bishop of the diocese of FT. Worth, Texas, as the new Bishop of the Diocese of Orange. Bishop Vann will replace Bishop Tod Brown, who has reached the mandatory retirement age of 75. Bishop Vann is 61.

The well-informed Rocco Palma gives a quick sketch of the new bishop:

"Over recent years, it’s hard to think of a national project on which Bishop Kevin Vann hasn’t been intimately involved. 

From serving on the three-member USCCB team that oversaw the Stateside implementation of Anglicanorum coetibus and mediating the bench’s oft-delicate relations with the nation’s Catholic hospitals, to filing suit against the Federal government over the contraceptive mandate of the Obama administration’s sweeping health-care reform, the 61 year-old prelate has cris-crossed considerably more ecclesial turf than the sprawling 28 counties of Northwest Texas he’s overseen since 2005."

Here are some examples of the Bishop's attitude in defense of life and the family:

On Abortion:

In October of 2008 Bishop Vann, along with his brother Bishop Kevin Farrell of Dallas, issued a joint statement clarifying the meaning of the USCCB's Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship document. The statement asserted the absolute centrality of legalized abortion to our culture. All emphases in the original.

Therefore, we cannot make more clear the seriousness of the overriding issue of abortion – while not the "only issue" – it is the defining moral issue, not only today, but of the last 35 years. Since the Roe v. Wade decision in 1973, more than 48 million innocent lives have been lost. Each year in our nation more than one million lives are lost through legalized abortion. Countless other lives are also lost through embryonic stem cell research. In the coming months our nation will once again elect our political leaders. This electoral cycle affords us an opportunity to promote the culture of life in our nation. As Catholics we are morally obligated to pray, to act, and to vote to abolish the evil of abortion in America, limiting it as much as we can until it is finally abolished.

He is very serious about this. In the runup to the 2004 elections, while serving as a Monsignor in Chicago, he said he would deny Communion to John Kerry and other pro-abortion politicians. The "Pro-Life" webpage of the Ft. Worth diocese has a full page devoted to exposing the evil of Planned Parenthood.

Their Excellencies go on to say:

"Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship, in paragraphs 34-37, addresses the question of whether it is morally permissible for a Catholic to vote for a candidate who supports an intrinsic evil – even when the voter does not agree with the candidate's position on that evil. The only moral possibilities for a Catholic to be able to vote in good conscience for a candidate who supports this intrinsic evil are the following:

a. If both candidates running for office support abortion or "abortion rights," a Catholic would be forced to then look at the other important issues and through their vote try to limit the evil done; or,

b. If another intrinsic evil outweighs the evil of abortion. While this is sound moral reasoning, there are no "truly grave moral" or "proportionate" reasons, singularly or combined, that could outweigh the millions of innocent human lives that are directly killed by legal abortion each year.

To vote for a candidate who supports the intrinsic evil of abortion or "abortion rights" when there is a morally acceptable alternative would be to cooperate in the evil – and, therefore, morally impermissible."

On Marriage:

His Excellency is equally clear on what marriage is, and what it is not, and what it cannot be.  In a letter to the Catholic Association of Latino Leaders, Bishop Vann wrote:

"Marriage is possible only between a man and a woman because it is only between them that the full expression of marital love is possible. In creation there is a unique complementarity between man and woman. Implicated in it is what Pope John Paul II called a “nuptial meaning”---a capacity for mutual self-giving which is total, extending to the depths of each person. The nuptial meaning of the body and of the person does not exist between persons of the same sex---they cannot have intercourse---and therefore a marital communion between them is not possible. It is thus that God’s will for man and woman to come together in a communion of love in marriage is written in the very nature of human beings. Such a union between persons of the same sex is impossible because human nature intrinsically does not allow for it."

His Excellency also expressed gratitude that the TLM was celebrated in his (now former) diocese of Ft. Worth.

Welcome to California, Bishop Vann!

"If I Could Have a Beer With Jesus"

How talented our young people are. A nice and moving song by a young man named Thomas Rhett.

Sebelius Ignores Church & Federal Law, too

Kathleen Sebelius, the pro-abortion Catholic head of the Department of Health and Human Services, not only ignores her Church--she ignores Federal law as well.

On September 12, the Daily Caller reported:

"President Barack Obama’s Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius violated the Hatch Act, the U.S. Office of Special Counsel said Wednesday.

Sebelius violated the law, the office said, when she publicly endorsed President Barack Obama’s re-election during a taxpayer-funded public event on Feb. 25, 2012.

Special Counsel Carolyn Lerner wrote to Obama that the OSC found Sebelius “violated the Hatch Act by making extemporaneous political remarks in a speech delivered in her official capacity” on Feb. 25."

The violation took place at a fundraiser for the "Human Rights Campaig" homosexual activist group. The comprehensive report sent to President Obama by Carolyn  Lerner of  his own Office of Special Counsel, notes that twice during her speech Sebelius violated section 5 U.S.C. § 7323(a)(1).

"Secretary Sebelius appeared at the HRC gala in her official capacity as HHS Secretary. As explained above, twice during the speech, Secretary Sebelius diverged from her prepared remarks. First, she endorsed the gubernatorial campaign of North Carolina Lieutenant Governor Walter Dalton and stated that it is “hugely important” to elect a Democratic Governor in North Carolina. Although Secretary Sebelius testified that she “had not intended to endorse him,” her words had that effect. Because she made this endorsement in her official capacity as HHS Secretary, she violated the Hatch Act."

The report contained Sebelius response, in which she admitted violating the law,

Lerner's report concludes: 

"Congress has determined that violations of the Hatch Act by such officers be referred to the President “for appropriate action.”  See 5 U.S.C. § 1215(b).  Accordingly, OSC hereby submits this Report of Prohibited Political Activity, together with a response from Secretary Sebelius, to the President."

The New York Post reported:

"According to the OSC, the 'great majority' of Hatch Act violaters — about 100 a year — usually end up getting punished with a suspension."

As of this writing, President Obama has not disciplined Sebelius in any way.

Posted by Gibbons J. Cooney

"I will do everything I can to help people make an intelligent choice, but whatever the people decide, they have decided, and I will be their instrument of execution," he said.

Sound high-minded, but he did not respect that principle when the constitutional amendment against same-sex "marriage" was passed by the voters.

Fine Young Catholic Artist!

This painting is by a talented young man named Jaime Longa, a faithful Catholic and friend.  Jaime's paintings are of religious themes and and also scenes of city life. This one, of a family at prayer, I found particularly striking.

You can see more of Jaime's work at http://jaimelonga.com.

As America Sleeps

There have been over *900 Executive** Orders* put forth from Obama, and he is not even through his first term yet. He is creating a martial law 'Disney Land' of control covering everything imaginable. Some of the executive orders he has signed recently have been exposed thanks to 'Friends of Conservative Action Alerts.' They have compiled a choice list of 'Emergency Powers, Martial law executive orders': Get your headache medication out while you still can without a prescription.

** Executive Order 10990* allows the Government to take over all modes of transportation and control of highways and seaports.

** Executive Order 10995* allows the government to seize and control the communication media.

** Executive Order 10997* allows the government to take over all electrical power, gas, petroleum, fuels, and minerals.

** Executive Order 11000* allows the government to mobilize civilians into work brigades under government supervision.

** Executive Order 11001* allows the government to take over all health education and welfare functions.

** Executive Order 11002* designates the Postmaster General to operate a national registration of all persons.

** Executive Order 11003* allows the government to take over all airports and aircraft, including commercial aircraft.

** Executive Order 11004* allows the Housing and Finance Authority to relocate and establish new locations for populations.

** Executive Order 11005* allows the government to take over railroads, inland waterways, and public storage facilities.

** Executive Order 11049* assigns emergency preparedness function to federal departments and agencies, consolidating 21 operative Executive Orders issues over a fifteen-year period.

** Executive Order 11051* specifies the responsibility of the Office of Emergency Planning and gives authorization to put all Executive Orders into effect in times of increased international tensions and economic or financial crisis.

** Executive Order 11310* grants authority to the Department of Justice to enforce the plans set out in Executive Orders, to institute Industrial support, to establish judicial and legislative liaison, to control all aliens, to operate penal and correctional institutions, and to advise and assist the President.

** Executive Order 11921* allows the Federal Emergency Preparedness Agency to develop plans to establish control over the mechanisms of production and distribution of energy sources, wages, salaries, credit, and the flow of money in U.S. financial institutions in any undefined national emergency. It also provides that when the president declares a state of emergency, Congress cannot review the action for six months.

*It is more than clear that Obama is planning for the total control and* *takeover of America via Martial Law.* Food, energy, transportation, work, banking, and health. He has it covered.

While Obama is busy pulling executive orders out of the sky to control everything inside our country, he has been issuing executive orders to force us to submit to international regulations instead of our
Constitution.
Sher Zieve exposed this in one of her recent articles. "Damn the U.S. Constitution, damn the American people and damn U.S. sovereignty."

May God bless America .

"The Obama administration is waging war on the Catholic Church while appeasing the most extreme elements of Islam"

So says former Presidential candidate and Congressman Newt Gingrich, and he is exactly right. His analysis of the administrations response to the attacks on our embassies, and the murder of our citizens, can be read here.

Seventeen Martyrs per Hour!

The National Catholic Reporter in a recent article, by  John L Allen, Jr., has this revealing citation:

Playing Politics with the Global war on Christians

"Most people, most of the time, are fundamentally decent. Hence if they knew that there's a minority facing an epidemic of persecution -- a staggering total of 150,000 martyrs every year, meaning 17 deaths every hour -- there would almost certainly be a groundswell of moral and political outrage.

There is such a minority in the world today, and it's Christianity. The fact that there isn't yet a broad-based movement to fight anti-Christian persecution suggests something is missing in public understanding.

In part, of course, the problem is that unquestionable acts of persecution, such as murder and imprisonment, are sometimes confused with a perceived cultural and legal "war on religion" in the West, a less clear-cut proposition. In part, too, it's because of the antique prejudice that holdsthat Christianity is always the oppressor, never the oppressed."

The Mainstrem Media's Disgraceful Coverage of the Embassy Attacks

Glenn Reynolds says the mainstream media "...defend Obama like crazed Muslims defend the Koran. No criticism can be seen as legitimate, because they have invested everything."

They really are enemies of America. One does not need more evidence, but this clip of the  shills at Romney's press conference today just adds to the pile. They did not realize the microphone was on, and you can hear them conniving with one another to go after Romney, istead of accepting the legitimate criticism of our laack of a foreign policy.

 You can listen and read the transcript at The Right Scoop.

SF Democrat: Government will Decide What is Family

Jennifer Roback Morse has an excellent essay on Mark Leno's (D-SF) insane Senate Bill 1436. SB 1436 would allow three (or more) adults to have a legal claim to being a child's parent. SB 1436 is now on Governor Brown's desk, awaiting his signature or veto.

"Can a child have three parents? If California State Senator Mark Leno has his way, children in California will be able to have three legal parents. Before we dismiss SB 1476 as another example of California Weird, we had best look into it more closely. After all, the bill has passed both houses of the California Assembly and is awaiting Governor Brown’s signature or veto.

I believe this development was inevitable, more inevitable in fact than the much-vaunted inevitability of gay marriage. Once we started trying to normalize parenting by same-sex couples and redefine marriage to remove the dual-gender requirement, we had to end up with triple-parenting.

A deeper look at the whole picture surrounding SB 1476 reveals that not only should the three-parent law fail, same-sex “marriage” should fail as well. As we will see, embedded in this bill is an appalling power-grab by the state, and a grotesque misrepresentation of the facts by the bill’s authors."

We have spoken before of the totalitarian nature of the move to redefine marriage. Because it is the attempted redefinition of nature, the enshrinement of a lie, it cannot allow truth to stand. Redefining marriage requires redefining the family--and that is exactly what is happening. We hope our fellow citizens in Maine, Maryland, Minnesota, and Washington, who will vote on whether or not to recognize counterfeit "marriage" in November, are watching.

Once again, we will add a clip from the 2008 "Marriage Matters to Kids" video. This clip, the final portion of the video, features especially chilling and prophetic observations. It is called "What is the Danger of Redefining Marriage?"

Posted by Gibbons

"Mothers Matter. Fathers Matter."

Here's a juxtaposition of excerpts from two articles.  Both point up the importance of fathers, and by implication, mothers, too. Each sex brings special gifts to a child that can never be replaced by a second adult (I will not say parent) of the same-sex, living in the household.

The first is from a widely-reproduced recent article by Robert Oscar Lopez called "Growing Up With Two Moms: The Untold Childrens View":

"My peers learned all the unwritten rules of decorum and body language in their homes; they understood what was appropriate to say in certain settings and what wasn’t; they learned both traditionally masculine and traditionally feminine social mechanisms.

Even if my peers’ parents were divorced, and many of them were, they still grew up seeing male and female social models. They learned, typically, how to be bold and unflinching from male figures and how to write thank-you cards and be sensitive from female figures....
I had no male figure at all to follow, and my mother and her partner were both unlike traditional fathers or traditional mothers. As a result, I had very few recognizable social cues to offer potential male or female friends, since I was neither confident nor sensitive to others. Thus I befriended people rarely and alienated others easily. Gay people who grew up in straight parents’ households may have struggled with their sexual orientation; but when it came to the vast social universe of adaptations not dealing with sexuality—how to act, how to speak, how to behave—they had the advantage of learning at home. Many gays don’t realize what a blessing it was to be reared in a traditional home."

Emphasis added. I think that statement is probably true of many people of any sort reared in a traditional home. 

The second is by a lady named Rebecca Hamilton, writing on the website "Public Catholic":

"My Daddy was what pundits condescendingly refer to as 'blue collar' or 'working class.' What that means is that he was a highly skilled person who could pull an engine out of a car, take it apart, rebuild it like new, put it back in the car, test drive the car to see if all was right and still be home in time for eight hours sleep before he had to get up for work the next day.

The men I grew up around never worried about being man enough. The very notion of worrying about a thing like that was as foreign to them as worrying about being American or Oklahoman enough....

Daddy was teaching more than how to ride and care for a horse, more even than not to steal. He was teaching me a whole set of values. He was also, though neither of us was aware of it, teaching me about men. There wasn’t a plan in this. I feel confident that my daddy never read a single book on how to raise kids. He didn’t make dates to 'have a talk' with me or attempt to manipulate me. He just talked to me as part of our daily interactions."

This deliberate refusal to acknowledge the different and non-exchangable roles of men and women, mothers and fathers, may be the most disastrous consequence of the attempted redefinition of marriage. The question is explored by our new Archbishop, Salvatore Cordileone (and others) in the "Mothers Matter. Fathers Matter" segment of the "Marriage Matters to Kids" video:

 

The full "Marriage Matters to Kids" video may be seen here.

Posted by Gibbons J. Cooney

Democrats Ram "God" Back into Their Platform Over Delgates Opposition

You have to see this to believe it.



The full story is here.

Injured Firefighter Frank Ryan Regains Conciousness

Thanks be to God. The young man, injured in fighting the St. Patrick's fire,  is awake & teasing his buddies--normal fireman's behavior!

"A 16-year San Jose firefighting veteran who suffered a cardiac arrest after fighting a church fire last week awoke Tuesday morning to the delight of his crew and community.

A security guard at Regional Medical Center in San Jose came rushing up to firefighter Russ Davis and said: 'He's calling for you.'

The 'he"'refers to Francis 'Frank' Ryan, who had been in a coma since Thursday after he and crews battled a three-alarm fire at Saint Patrick Cathedral near downtown. Ryan suffered a cardiac arrest and was put into a medically induced coma.

He opened his eyes Tuesday about 8 a.m.

Davis, who rides the fire truck with Ryan, asked his friend why he was in the hospital, and at first, Ryan couldn't remember why. Later, Ryan was joking with his friends, gently mocking colleagues who ride the truck with him, Davis told NBC Bay Area."

Some Good News About Injured Firefighter

The AP reports that Frank Ryan, injured in fighting the fire at San Jose's St. Patrick's proto-cathedral, is making a little progress:

"Colleagues say a veteran San Jose firefighter who suffered a heart attack while battling a fire at a downtown cathedral remains in critical condition, is making progress.

San Jose fire spokeswoman Capt. Mary Gutierrez said Monday that doctors are pleased with the progress that Frank Ryan is making as the firefighter's family and friends remain at the hospital around the clock.

KTVU-TV reports that colleagues visiting Ryan at Regional Medical Center of San Jose say he is moving, but has not spoken yet."

Let us pray for Frank's continued improvement. Mary Help of Christians, pray for us!

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/2012/09/03/4782812/sj-fireman-who-had-heart-attack.html#storylink=cpy

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/2012/09/03/4782812/sj-fireman-who-had-heart-attack.html#storylink=cpy