Is this the end of Women's Sports? Results of "transgender" activism

Today, LifeSiteNews (among others) reports that in next week's Boston Marathon men will be allowed to compete as women. Should prove instructive. The GenderTrender website has a long list of men who declare themselves women, and then, unsurprisingly,  go on to dominate women's sports.

Just one example: How does a 53 year old become the leading scorer and rebounder on a college basketball team? Easy: just be a man and claim you’re a woman! 

In 2013, ESPN profiled Robert Ludwig, a 52 year-old man playing on a woman’s College basketball team. How obtuse the ESPN writer is is illustrated by first reading paragraph 27:

“What some of the nastier adversaries seemed to dwell on when Ludwig first began playing was the notion that she somehow had an unfair advantage against her opponents, but even at 6-6 that was not the case both because of female hormones reducing her muscle mass as well as the unavoidable fact that she is 52.”

Then rereading it armed with the additional information from paragraph 39: 

“’She's the leading scorer and rebounder, and this team is somewhat built around her,’ (Coach Corey) Cafferata said.”

Emphasis added.

Pope Francis’s Disordered Exhortation

From Pope Francis's Apostolic Exhortation Gaudete et Exusultate:

101. The other harmful ideological error is found in those who find suspect the social engagement of others, seeing it as superficial, worldly, secular, materialist, communist or populist. Or they relativize it, as if there are other more important matters, or the only thing that counts is one particular ethical issue or cause that they themselves defend. Our defence of the innocent unborn, for example, needs to be clear, firm and passionate, for at stake is the dignity of a human life, which is always sacred and demands love for each person, regardless of his or her stage of development. Equally sacred, however, are the lives of the poor, those already born, the destitute, the abandoned and the underprivileged, the vulnerable infirm and elderly exposed to covert euthanasia, the victims of human trafficking, new forms of slavery, and every form of rejection...

102. We often hear it said that, with respect to relativism and the flaws of our present world, the situation of migrants, for example, is a lesser issue. Some Catholics consider it a secondary issue compared to the “grave” bioethical questions …

Emphasis added. The New York Times correctly noted that Francis’s argument here is: 

“consistent with a view articulated by Cardinal Joseph L. Bernardin, the archbishop of Chicago who died in 1996, and who called for a ‘consistent ethic of life’ that wove issues of life and social justice into a ‘seamless garment.’”

Before you can have a garment (seamless or otherwise) you have to have cloth. The right to life is not part of the seamless garment—it is the cloth from which the garment is made. To put the right to life on the same level as “the lives of the poor, those already born, the destitute, the abandoned and the underprivileged, the vulnerable infirm and elderly exposed to covert euthanasia, the victims of human trafficking, new forms of slavery, and every form of rejection” as Francis does, is disordered.

Bishop Paprocki Defends the Church!

Against what Pope Francis calls "cultural imperialism."

Bless his heart, Paprocki I mean, but Pope Francis too!

From Catholic Culture:


Bishop Thomas Paprocki of Springfield, Illinois, has instructed his pastors that they should not administer the sacraments to Catholics who are engaged in same-sex marriages.

That's Bishop Paprocki, top left, with Archbishop Cordileone, Bishop Barber,
and our wonderful 95 year-old Fr. Armand Oliveri after last year's Red Mass, here at Saints Peter and Paul.

In a formal decree circulated to the clergy of the diocese—which promptly leaked to the secular media—Bishop Paprocki said that since the government now offers legal recognition to same-sex marriages, the Church “has not only the authority, but the serious obligation, to affirm its authentic teaching on marriage and to preserve and foster the sacred value of the married state.”

Toward that end, the bishop said, Catholics should not participate in same-sex marriage ceremonies, nor should those events take place in churches or on parish property, the bishop said. Catholics who are legally married to same-sex partners should not be lectors or extraordinary ministers of Eucharist; they should not be admitted to RCIA classes or Confirmation programs; they should not be sponsors or godparents.

The bishop instructed his priests not to administer Communion to people who are engaged in same-sex marriages, nor to allow their funerals, unless there is an indication that the individuals have repented and accepted the Church’s teaching. If informed that a parishioner is involved in a same-sex union, Bishop Paprocki directed his priests to “address these concerns privately with the persons in such circumstances, calling them to conversion.”

Thanks, Holy Father....But....

Good Pope Francis (and not for the first time)  nailed the insanity of 'gender ideology' in his address to the Bishops of Poland at World Youth Day:

"In Europe, America, Latin America, Africa, and in some countries of Asia, there are genuine forms of ideological colonization taking place. And one of these - I will call it clearly by its name – is [the ideology of] 'gender'. Today children – children! – are taught in school that everyone can choose his or her sex. Why are they teaching this? Because the books are provided by the persons and institutions that give you money. These forms of ideological colonization are also supported by influential countries. And this terrible!

In a conversation with Pope Benedict, who is in good health and very perceptive, he said to me: 'Holiness, this is the age of sin against God the Creator'. He is very perceptive. God created man and woman; God created the world in a certain way… and we are doing the exact opposite."

Thank you, Holy Father, for introducing some sanity into our world. And you are right about the ideological colonization pushed around the world by wealthy and well-connected wackos.

BUT...that same colonization is taking place in Catholic schools. Holiness, these schools are under YOUR authority. The right guidance of those young souls is ultimatly YOUR responsibily. 

See here for just a few examples within the Archdiocese of San Francisco:

'Transgendered' Teacher not the Only Problem at Mercy

Gay Totalitarianism at Schools of the Sacred Heart, San Francisco

'Queer Bohemian' Chairs Theology Department at Woodside Priory School

LGBT Activist Leads Retreat at Notre Dame de Namur

'Our Mother who is within us'

Holiness, our good Archbishop is working to address this problem. You've identified the problem: I humbly beg you to assert your authority in solving it.

Your son in Christ,

Gibbons

The Supreme Court v. Reality

The American Supreme Court has repeated the error of Roe v. Wade: they have overruled tens of millions of citizens and have forced a non-reality upon an unwilling populace. And, like Roe v. Wade, the action guarantees ongoing conflict.

But God is writing straight with crooked lines. Many Catholics have left the faith, and the culture of the West needs to be Evangelized. Catholicism is about reality. Catholicism is Reality. By allowing the ongoing cultural embrace of non-reality, God is opening up an avenue for us to reach our brothers and sisters. As a non-Catholic cleric said "we must offer our views until the time comes when our friends and neighbours, their doctrines broken on the anvil of reality, are humbled enough to listen."

We have often referred to same-sex ‘marriage’ as ‘counterfeit marriage.’ That's insufficient. To counterfeit a thing requires a belief in the thing’s reality. We live in a time when our so-called ‘elites’ believe that reality itself is defined by the perceiver. Theirs may be the first culture in history using solipsism as a guiding principle.

It is suggestive that same-sex 'marriage' coincided with the waning of marriage to an unprecedented low point. The people who believe that same-sex 'marriage' exists do because they no longer believe in marriage.

It is also suggestive that same-sex ‘marriage’ coincided with the popularization of ‘virtual reality.’ Although the term only became widely used with the coming of computers, it was actually coined by the influential (and mentally ill) French dramatist Antonin Artaud in 1938. For Artaud, “imagination was reality.” Sound familiar?


This man imagines he’s a woman:

This woman imagines she’s black:

These guys imagine they’re married:

Our 'elites' accept these things as true. Normal people don't. If they weren’t so destructive, one could almost feel for the LGBT activists. Their ‘victory’ required the redefinition of reality, but they’re not the only ones who can play that game. Look at those pictures: all you can do is laugh.

Same-sex ‘marriages’ themselves will have little import: only a small portion of the 3% of Americans who are same-sex attracted will choose to avail themselves of it. The problem of course is the warping of society as misguided people try to twist others into accommodating the false reality

For us lay Christians, our job as always is to defend and preach reality, which is Christ: the Logos--the Way, the Truth, and the Life.

For our hierarchy, as Archbishop Cordileone has said, their job is to remain true to Christ, and above all to protect the reality of the faith from the heretics who are attempting to redefine it. That’s why his leadership in trying to re-Catholicize our schools is so important. 

Equality at the expense of sanity, epidemiology division, part 2

Yesterday, White House press secretary Josh Earnest said:

"There also are screening procedures in place at our border."

Our WHAT? Does the U.S. even have borders anymore? The southern border, which used to be the Rio Grande, is to a real border what counterfeit marriage is to marriage.

Today the New York Times reported:

"They said Wednesday that they believed 12 to 18 people had direct contact (with Liberian Ebola victim and carrier Thomas Duncan). On Thursday morning, a spokeswoman for Dallas County Health and Human Services said it was thought that 80 people had contact directly with Mr. Duncan or secondarily with his direct contacts. Then in an afternoon news conference, Dr. Thomas R. Frieden, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said that health workers were assessing 100 people — including hospital workers and emergency medical technicians — to determine whether they had been exposed. That number does not include secondary contacts, a spokesman for the agency said."

Equality at the expense of sanity, "transgender" division

The picture is of Martin Rothblatt, who changed his name to "Martine." Has anyone ever seen a real woman pose like that? Such a pose is male to the core.

The picture is from the GenderTrender website. Heaven knows we don't agree with them on many things, but they certainly get the insanity of the "transgender" movement. The authors over there chronicle the invasion of "women only" spaces by men pretending to be women. Because the two sides are somewhat remote from the average American's experience, and because the mainstream media, (progressive to the core), always sides with whatever the latest "oppressed group" is, it does not get the coverage that it should. 

The vitriol targeting any 'anti-transgender' feminists is astonishingly hate filled. I cannot think of a comparable case, offhand. Pretty much everyone has heard about athlete Ray Rice's altercation with his girlfriend. But how many know about Fallon Fox (a male boxer) beating up (female boxer) Tamikka Brents? Because Fox is "transgender" he was able to get into the ring with Brents. He beat the crap out of her: gave her a concussion and an orbital bone fracture in under three minutes. LifeSiteNews did a story on it. GenderTrender's article on Fox/Brents covers a number of other "Transgender" men who have entered women's sports.

Two NZ men marry for love, homosexual activists 'fuming'

From LGBTQNation:

"Gay rights groups in New Zealand are fuming over the legal, same-sex marriage between two heterosexual men in a radio station stunt in exchange for tickets to the Rugby World Cup to be held in the United Kingdom in 2015.

Self-described best mates since childhood, Matt McCormick, 24, married engineering student Travis McIntosh, 23, in a rugby stadium on Friday....
Gay rights activists have condemned the union, calling the stunt 'a mockery of the institution of marriage.'

Otago University Students’ Association Queer Support co-ordinator Neill Ballantyne, of Dunedin, said the wedding was an 'insult' because marriage equality was a 'hard fought' battle for New Zealand’s gay community,reports the New Zealand Hearald."

Don't be a hater, Neill. They obviously married for love. Love of rugby. Why do you sodomite activists oppose love?

Jennifer Roback Morse responds to Mr. Ballantyne:

"Sorry Neill. No go. You evidently did not realize that when you changed the law, you changed it for everyone. Two men can get married for any reason they want. The law does not require them to prove that they are actually 'gay,' or that they 'love each other,' however those terms might be defined in a legal context. (!)...

Gay activists and their wealthy patrons seem surprised that they do not get to control what everyone does and why they do it.

They have not really thought through what redefining marriage will actually mean for the whole of society."

Indeed. Actually, the fact is that people only believe in same-sex "marriage" when they no longer believe in marriage. That's why counterfeit 'marriage' only crept in as the U.S. marriage rate hit a 93-year low. In 2008, Bishop Allan Vigneron, then of Oakland, said that the fight over same-sex "marriage" was a wake-up call for our culture to relearn what marriage is. His Excellency was right. 

Valerie Schmalz's blockbuster series continues in Catholic San Francisco

Valerie Schmalz's must-read series describing the attack by homosexual activists on the Church continues in the September 19 issue of Catholic San Francisco. The digital version of the paper is already up. It's been on the paper's front page both last week and this week, and quickly reached #1 on the website's "Most popular news stories" list. This week's installment begins:


Faith the latest battleground for gay rights advocates
Faithful America targeting of Archbishop Cordileone showcases tactic

Don’t be surprised if same-sex partnered families are front and center in news coverage of the 2015 Catholic World Meeting of Families in Philadelphia – whether or not Pope Francis shows up.

A coalition of four dissident Catholic groups, calling itself Equally Blessed, is recruiting for what it calls a pilgrimage to “speak out for the holiness of LGBT families” at the World Meeting of Families, to which Philadelphia Archbishop Charles Chaput has invited Pope Francis.

The Equally Blessed coalition received a $200,000 grant in March from Michigan self-identified gay billionaire Jon Stryker’s Arcus Foundation. That brings Arcus funding of Equally Blessed since 2010 to $770,000.

In a press release, Arcus said the 2014 grant was to support “a coalition of pro-LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual,transgender) Catholic advocacy agencies which will amplify pro-LGBT voices within the Catholic Church in preparation for significant international gatherings planned by Catholic bishops and the Vatican.”

The Arcus Foundation’s grant-making is part of a strategy by a handful of nonprofit and private foundations to use the language of faith to challenge traditional sexual morality by directly attacking individual faith leaders, including Catholic bishops but also Protestants and Jews.

They fund dissidents in the Catholic Church, as well as other Christians and Jews who share their worldview opposing marriage as only between one man and woman. The financial grants help amplify the voices of dissident Catholics with the intention of making it appear as if the dissidents constitute a vigorous, loud, and committed contingent within ordinary Catholic parishes...."

It's a long and well-researched article, and, as noted, a must-read. You can read the whole thing here. 

Here is her chart of the foundations funding the faux-Catholic groups. Click the image for a larger version.



California: "Mother" and "Father" Too Discriminatory

One of our ongoing themes at A Shepherd's Voice is the flight from reality that is central to contemporary society. We've even created the blog post tag "Equality at the expense of sanity" to categorize posts covering this pathology. The flight expresses itself in many ways, but no group is more guilty than homosexualist activists. That particular aspect of the flight is covered extensively in Robert Reilly's new book "Making Gay OK," which I have not yet finished. Reilly explores how the acceptance of homosexuality inevitably becomes a war on the family and requires the upending of society.

Here's a recent example, from Breitbart News:

"In the most recent California effort to 'modernize' family convention, the state Assembly on Thursday passed AB 1951, a new bill that would allow all California parents to list themselves as 'mother,' 'father,' or 'parent' of a child in order to reflect same-sex marriages, according to a report from the Associated Press.

The bill passed by a vote of 51-13, with several Republicans voting in favor. No Republicans spoke in opposition."

Equality California describes the bill as "...allowing parents to choose to self-designate as 'father,' 'mother' or 'parent, eliminating inaccurate designations and confusion for same-sex parents."

We see the wholesale lying required to maintain the fantasy world:"eliminating inaccurate designations and confusion" when the truth is the precise opposite. Also the Satanic attempt to dominate reality:"Self-designate." And of course, while the adults in these households fool themselves, the children will see through it soon enough.

Mark Steyn: The Popes versus the "Empire of Lies"

On Saturday, in preparation for the canonization of Pope John XXIII and Pope John Paul II, Mark Steyn published this excerpt from his book Mark Steyn's Passing Parade. The "empire of lies," as Mr. Steyn indicates was not only the Soviet Union, but any totalitarian regime, such as the totalitarian liberalism that now dominates the West.

Truth and Consequences

"How many divisions has the Pope?" sneered Stalin of Pius XII. Uncle Joe's successors lived long enough to find out. John Paul II's divisions were the Poles who filled the streets to cheer him on his return as pontiff to his homeland in the summer of 1979, and the brave men who founded the Solidarity union 18 months later, and began the chain of events that within a decade swept the Communists from power in Central and Eastern Europe and finally Mother Russia itself. One day we will know the precise combination of Bulgarian Secret Service, East German Stasi and Soviet KGB that lay behind the 1981 assassination attempt on the Holy Father. But you can see why they'd be willing to do it. By then the sclerotic Warsaw Pact understood just how many divisions this Pope had.

Twenty-six years ago, one young physics student summed up the hopes he and his compatriots had invested in that Papal visit in this simple declaration: "What I want to do is to live without being a liar." The Soviet Union and its vassals were an empire of lies, and, while you can mitigate (as many Poles and Russians did) the gulf between the official version and grim reality with bleak jokes, living an epic lie day in day out is corrosive of human dignity. That Polish physics student had identified instinctively what would be the great over-arching theme of John Paul II's papacy: to quote the title of his later encyclical, Veritatis Splendor – the splendor of truth.

Too many western politicians of a generation ago – Schmidt, Mitterand, Trudeau – failed to see what John Paul saw so clearly. It requires tremendous will to cling to the splendor of truth when the default mode of the era is to blur and evade.

And in that respect, across a turbulent half-century, there's more continuity between John Paul II and John XXIII than you might expect, and, indeed, with the intervening papacy of Paul VI. Shortly after John XXIII's death, Pope Paul's Humanae Vitae predicted that artificial birth control would lead to "conjugal infidelity and the general lowering of morality," the objectification of women, and governments "imposing upon their peoples" state-approved methods of contraception. You might conceivably claim that the collective damage they have done does not outweigh the individual benefits they have brought to many, but you can't argue that Pope Paul's summation wasn't right on the money - or that either his "liberal" predecessor or his "conservative" successor (after John Paul I's interlude) would have disagreed with him. It fell to John Paul II to defend veritatis splendor not only, politically, in the eastern bloc, but, culturally, in the western world, where it proved a tougher sell:

As The New York Times reported upon his death:

Among liberal Catholics, he was criticized for his strong opposition to abortion, homosexuality and contraception…

Shocking: a Pope who's opposed to abortion, homosexuality and contraception; what's the world coming to? The Guardian's assertion that Karol Wojtyla was "a doctrinaire, authoritarian pontiff" at least suggests the inflexible authoritarian derived his inflexibility from some ancient operating manual – he was doctrinaire about his doctrine, dogmatic about his dogma – unlike the Times and The Washington Post, which came close to implying that John Paul II had taken against abortion and gay marriage off the top of his head, principally to irk "liberal Catholics". But, either way, the assumption is always that there's some middle ground a less "doctrinaire" pope might have staked out: he might have supported abortion in the first trimester, say, or reciprocal partner benefits for gays in committed relationships.

The root of the Pope's thinking – that there are eternal truths no-one can change even if he wanted to – is completely incomprehensible to the progressivist mindset. There are no absolute truths, everything's in play, and by "consensus" all we're really arguing is the rate of concession to the inevitable: abortion's here to stay, gay marriage will be here any day now – it's all gonna happen anyway, man, so why be the last squaresville daddy-o on the block?

When Governor Jim McGreevey announced he was stepping down, he told the people of New Jersey: "My truth is that I am a gay American." That's a very contemporary formulation: "my" truth. To John Paul II, there was only "the" truth. To the moral relativists, everyone's entitled to his own – or, as the Governor continued, "one has to look deeply into the mirror of one's soul and decide one's unique truth in the world." Among liberal "Catholics" in Manhattan and Boston, the pontiff may be a reactionary misogynist homophobe condom-banner but, beyond those stunted horizons, he was a man fully engaged with the modern world and shrewder at reconciling it with the splendor of the eternal truth than most politicians. Western liberals claim the Pope's condom hang-ups have had tragic consequences in Aids-riddled Africa. The Dark Continent gets darker every year: millions are dying, male life expectancy is collapsing, and such civil infrastructure as there is seems likely to follow. But the most effective weapon against the disease has not been the Aids lobby's 20-year promotion of condom culture in Africa but Uganda's campaign to change behaviour and to emphasise abstinence and fidelity – ie, the Pope's position. You don't have to be a Catholic or a "homophobe" to think that the spread of Aids is telling us something basic – that nature is not sympathetic to sexual promiscuity. If it weren't Aids, it would be something else, as it has been for most of human history. What should be the Christian response? To accept that we're merely the captives of our appetites, like a dog in heat? Or to ask us to rise to the rank God gave us – "a little lower than the angels" but above "the beasts of the field"? In The Gospel Of Life, the Pope wrote:

Sexuality too is depersonalized and exploited: …it increasingly becomes the occasion and instrument for self-assertion and the selfish satisfaction of personal desires and instincts. Thus the original import of human sexuality is distorted and falsified, and the two meanings, unitive and procreative, inherent in the very nature of the conjugal act, are artificially separated…

Had the Pope signed on to condom distribution in Africa, he would have done nothing to reduce the spread of Aids, but he would have done a lot to advance the further artificial separation of sex, in Africa and beyond. Indeed, if you look at The New York Times' list of complaints against the Pope they all boil down to what he called sex as self-assertion.

Thoughtful atheists ought to be able to recognize that, whatever one's tastes in these areas, the Pope is on to something – that abortion et al, in separating the "two meanings" of sex and leaving us free to indulge in one while ignoring the other, have severed us almost entirely and possibly irreparably from traditional impulses, like societal survival. Given what Aids has done to African mortality rates and what abortion has done to European demographics, John Paul II's eternal truths look a lot more rational than those of the hyperrationalists at The New York Times. John Paul II championed the "splendor of truth" not because he was rigid and inflexible, but because he understood the alternative was a dead end in every sense. To Karol Wojtyla, truth was not just splendid but immutable: he proved his point in the struggle against Communism; one day the west will recognize that he got it right closer to home, too.

Vive La France! (cont.)

Here's an excerpt from an article posted at Gallia Watch. The Gallia Watch post links to an article in La Salon Beige (in French), about a mother who had received an award from the French Government. The award honors families. The mother returned the award following the French governement redefinition of the family through its legalization of counterfeit "marriage."

An interesting article posted at Le Salon Beige in May 2013 tells of one woman's decision to return the medal she received on June 6, 1993, during the presidency of François Mitterrand. In a long letter addressed to François Hollande, she explains that the Taubira law legalizing homosexual marriage denatures the institution she and her husband valued and dedicated their lives to, as they raised eleven children.

The Gallia Watch author then translates excerpts from the very well written and thoughtful letter:

"In the recognition that a nation grants to its families there is the consideration of a service. It is a simple service, natural but demanding, of a mother and a father who bring into the world the children born of their love. Because of this love, they raise them, not only for themselves and their right, but to build the civilization of tomorrow....

Here you have, Mr. President, a profound contradiction between the concept of the family advocated by the Republic until now, and what you are implementing in your policies. In truth, marriage and raising children, in your ideology, are nothing more than 'rights' that justify the modification of natural concepts in order to adapt to individual practices. But this individualistic vision that you place above all else is to the detriment of a truly socialist concept of our country. Through your reform, the family is no longer in the service of the nation, it is no longer the nation of tomorrow; it is the expression of individual rights and is subject to the forms that each person chooses.

Of course, we have always been aware of the life styles of some people. If we found them strange, we did not question their freedom. But what an absurd idea to try to group them under the name of the family: filiation is not a poker game where the one who cheats best wins! At the official website, I see that the law passed by your parliament reproduces the same identical provisions as the preceding law on the Medal of the Family. Will you decorate them when they have purchased a sufficient number of children on these new slave markets that already exist in certain foreign countries?..."

Equality at the Expense of Sanity: Women in the USMC Can't Do Pull-ups so USMC Changes Rules

From CNSNews:

Female Marines Not Required to do One Pull-Up

"Females in the Marine Corps currently are not required to do even a single pull-up, and a deadline mandating that by Jan. 1, 2014, they be able to do at least 3 pull-ups as part of their training has been delayed for at least a year, the Corps quietly announced on social media....

Currently, “women aren’t able to make the minimum standard of three pull-ups,” Marine spokesman Capt. Eric Flanagan told CNSNews.com. Fifty-five percent of female recruits tested at the end of boot camp were unable to do three pull-ups (1 percent of male recruits also failed)...."

Emphasis added. At the end of USMC boot camp they can't do three pull-ups. That's amazing. I'm 56 and can do eight pull-ups, and could do plenty more with a little practice.

"Pull-ups have been used to test Marines’ upper body strength for over 40 years. The ability to pull-up one’s own body weight over a bar shows the upper body strength that, in combat, is needed to lift fallen comrades, pull one’s self over a wall, and carry heavy munitions. Combat Marines also carry a pack that weighs around 90 pounds, with gunners carrying an additional 50 or 60 pounds."

Again, emphasis added. I've spoken with Marines. They know the rules for women in the Corps are absurd and very dangerous.

Bishop Paprocki's Supplication and Exorcism in reparation for the sin of same-sex "marriage"

John White, over at CatholicVote has a series of excerpts from the homily given by Bishop Thomas Paprocki of Springfield this past Wednesday. Bishop Paprocki began:

"We are gathered here today in the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception for a special Holy Hour before the Real Presence of Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament to participate in "Prayers of Supplication and Exorcism in Reparation for the Sin of Same-Sex Marriage." I wish to preface my reflections by saying that I am conducting this prayer service and am speaking to you now with great reluctance. I did not seek to enter any controversy and I don't relish being part of one. But I have given this matter a great deal of thought and prayer, which has led me to the conviction that God is calling me to speak out and conduct these prayers."

The homily is so good (as Mr. White says) that one might as well just excerpt the whole thing. I do note His Excellency makes the same point we made here on November 14, where we highlighted the identical positions of Pope Francis and Archbishop Cordileone, that same-sex "marriage" comes from the devil:

"The deception of the Devil in same-sex marriage may be understood by recalling the words of Pope Francis when he faced a similar situation as Archbishop of Buenos Aires in 2010. Regarding the proposed redefinition of civil marriage in Argentina, then-Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio wrote on June 22, 2010, 'The Argentine people must face, in the next few weeks, a situation whose result may gravely harm the family. It is the bill on matrimony of persons of the same sex. The identity of the family, and its survival, are in jeopardy here: father, mother, and children. The life of so many children who will be discriminated beforehand due to the lack of human maturity that God willed them to have with a father and a mother is in jeopardy. A clear rejection of the law of God, engraved in our hearts, is in jeopardy. . . . Let us not be naive: it is not a simple political struggle; it is an intention [which is] destructive of the plan of God. It is not a mere legislative project (this is a mere instrument), but rather a ‘move’ of the father of lies who wishes to confuse and deceive the children of God.' The Pope’s reference to the 'father of lies' comes from the Gospel of John (8:44), where Jesus refers to the devil as 'a liar and the father of lies.' So Pope Francis is saying that same-sex 'marriage' comes from the devil and should be condemned as such."

But there is much, much more:

"Same-sex marriage is contrary to the plan of God, as described in the Bible, when Jesus cites the Book of Genesis in asking the Pharisees, 'Have you not read that at the beginning the Creator made them male and female and declared, 'For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and cling to his wife, and the two shall become as one?' Thus they are no longer two but one flesh. Therefore, let no man separate what God has joined.'

Since the legal redefinition of marriage is contrary to God's plan, those who contract civil same-sex marriage are culpable of serious sin. Politicians responsible for enacting civil same-sex marriage legislation are morally complicit as co-operators in facilitating this grave sin. We must pray for forgiveness of these sins and deliverance from this evil which has penetrated our state and our Church. The Church stands ready to extend God's mercy to those who confess their sins with true repentance and a firm purpose of amendment in the Sacrament of Reconciliation.

His Excellency's closing paragraphs show the love of the Church for all her children, including her same-sex attracted children, as well as reminding all of us, same-sex attracted Christians included, that we will have to carry our individual crosses:

We must also affirm the teaching of the Catholic Church that homosexual persons 'must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided. These persons are called to fulfill God's will in their lives and, if they are Christians, to unite to the sacrifice of the Lord's Cross the difficulties they may encounter from their condition.' The Church loves homosexual persons and looks upon them with compassion, offering assistance through support groups such as the Courage Apostolate to live in accord with the virtue of chastity. Indeed, all people all called to chastity, which for a man and woman united in matrimony means for the husband and wife to be faithful to each other.

In conclusion, I quote from a homily given in the second century: 'Let me say also that when we are given a warning and corrected for doing something wrong, we should not be so foolish as to take offense and be angry. There are times when we are unconscious of the sins we commit because our hearts are fickle, lacking in faith. Futile desires becloud our minds. We need to pull ourselves up, therefore, because our very salvation is at stake. Those who keep God's commandments will have reason to rejoice. For a short time in this world they may have to suffer, but they will rise again and their reward will endure for ever. No one who holds God in reverence should grieve over the hardships of this present time, for a time of blessedness awaits him. He will live again in heaven in the company of all those who have gone before him; for all eternity he will rejoice, never to know sorrow again.'

May God give us this grace. Amen.

Belgium Debates Whether to Euthanize Children

An all too believable article from the the Washington Post:

"Should children have the right to ask for their own deaths?

In Belgium, where euthanasia is now legal for people over the age of 18, the government is considering extending it to children — something that no other country has done. The same bill would offer the right to die to adults with early dementia.

Advocates argue that euthanasia for children, with the consent of their parents, is necessary to give families an option in a desperately painful situation. But opponents have questioned whether children can reasonably decide to end their own lives.

Belgium is already a euthanasia pioneer; it legalized the practice for adults in 2002. In the last decade, the number of reported cases per year has risen from 235 deaths in 2003 to 1,432 in 2012, the last year for which statistics are available. Doctors typically give patients a powerful sedative before injecting another drug to stop their heart.

Only a few countries have legalized euthanasia or anything approaching it.

In the Netherlands, euthanasia is legal under specific circumstances and for children over the age of 12 with parental consent. (There is an understanding that infants, too, can be euthanized, and that doctors will not be prosecuted if they act appropriately.) Elsewhere in Europe, euthanasia is only legal in Luxembourg. Assisted suicide, where doctors help patients to die but do not actively kill them, is allowed in Switzerland."

And the justification is (what else) the elevation of equality above all other considerations:

John Harris, a professor of bioethics at the University of Manchester. “It’s unfair to provide euthanasia differentially to some citizens and not to others (children) if the need is equal.”

Counterfeit Marriage Requires Counterfeit Reality

We've said it before.

On October 15, the great Matthew J. Franck, at Public Discourse, continues to explore the irrationality that is the inevitable result of calling black white, up down, and same-sex unions marriage:

Same-Sex Marriage Makes Liberal Judges Irrational

"A New Jersey judge’s contorted and nonsensical decision that the state is responsible for the federal government’s failure to recognize same-sex marriage highlights the irrationality that permeates the campaign for “marriage equality.”

One of the most striking features of the campaign for same-sex marriage has been the prominence of its assault on reasoning itself. The logical relations of legal categories with one another, as those categories represent persons, their interactions, and their rights and duties, are at the heart of all legal decision-making and ideally inform legislative and administrative policymaking as well. But the impulse to redefine marriage so that it is no longer understood as the conjugal union of a man and a woman has been consistently heedless of logic and the rational relations of legal categories.

Begin with the steadfast refusal of same-sex marriage advocates even to define what “marriage” is now supposed to mean....

 Rather than say what marriage is—which anyone can see is an absolute prerequisite to saying whether “equality” demands its availability to partners never before thought capable of marrying—these advocates simply shout “marriage equality” ever more loudly, point to an array of “government benefits” linked to marital status, and make their desire for the thing substitute for an argument about what the thing is that they want."

Read the whole thing.

Cardinal Burke Teaches it: Nancy Pelosi Must Be Denied Commuion

The great Cardinal Raymond Burke, Prefect of the Apostolic Signatura stated in no uncertain terms that my Congresswoman, Nancy Pelosi, MUST be denied Holy Communion. The Cardinal made the statement in an interview with The Wanderer, parts of which were reprinted in LifeSiteNews. From the LSN article:

"Asked about Pelosi, he said, 'Certainly this is a case when Canon 915 must be applied.'

Canon 915 states that those who are 'obstinately persevering in manifest grave sin are not to be admitted to Holy Communion.'

'This is a person who obstinately, after repeated admonitions, persists in a grave sin — cooperating with the crime of procured abortion — and still professes to be a devout Catholic,' the cardinal said. 'I fear for Congresswoman Pelosi if she does not come to understand how gravely in error she is. I invite her to reflect upon the example of St. Thomas More who acted rightly in a similar situation even at the cost of his life.'

Canon Lawyer Ed Peters, who since 2010 has been a Referendary of the Apostolic Signatura has been making the same point for years. In March of 2010, he wrote:

"Now, I suggest that there is no US Catholic politician whose conduct at the national level is more stridently and widely pro-abortion (to name just one area in which Pelosi's machinations are gravely objectionable) and whose scandalous rhetoric is more overtly Catholic (many of her bizarre assertions the bishops have had to stop and refute) than is Nancy Pelosi's. If her prolonged public conduct does not qualify as obstinent perseverance in manifest grave sin, then, in all sincerity, I must admit to not knowing what would constitute obstinent perseverance in manifest grave sin."

And of course my old boss, Fr. Malloy (may he pray for us!) called out Pelosi back in 2007.

The Cardinal's full interview is well worth reading. He also discusses the Holy Father, the benefits of the increased celebration of Mass in the Extraordinary Form, the diabolical attack on the family, the deline in Mass attendance, and the increasingly totalitarian direction of the U.S.

Equality at the Expense of Sanity: A Case Study

"Equality at the Expense of Sanity" has been one of our post tags here at A Shepherd's Voice for quite a while now. Here's a classic example, from a column by Karla A. Erickson who is an associate professor of sociology at Grinnell College. We first encountered it in a post by Laura Wood, at The Thinking Housewife, who was referencing Simcha Fischer reply to Erickson at the National Catholic Register.

Mrs. Erickson's column is called "Explaining why, next time I won't breastfeed"  It's so bizarre it seems like a hoax, but it must be read in its entirety. She writes:

"Every time I got to breast feed him I was holding my son, singing, whispering, touching, and loving on my sweet little boy.

If I had not breastfed I would have missed all those beautiful quiet times with my son. Fewer people would have seen my breasts, which would have been nice. I would have felt less like a cow, which also would have been nice. But I wouldn’t give up breastfeeding for those minor humiliations. The time with my son was too important. I had never known what it was like to be that close to another human.

Sounds good, no? But read the next sentence:

If we really want to address and redress the ongoing inequalities around the work of making life — the work of raising the next generation — then we have to look at breastfeeding. It’s one thing our bodies do that reinforces the social differences between men and women, moms and dads, and boys and girls...."

"If we really want to address and redress the ongoing inequalities around the work of making life..." Who wants to? Who says inequality is so bad? Bad enough to override a mother's bonding with her child? Erickson is obviously confusing inequality with injustice.

"Next time I won’t breastfeed because it sets up a gendered division of who does what early into parenting. It provides an infrastructure for an unequal distribution of the work (and rewards) of parenting."

See why I said it reads like a hoax? There's more:

Over the years, my husband and I will work to unwind this preliminary advantage, but we could have avoided solidifying it if we had decided to use formula, or to pump and bottle feed our son....

Sometimes we have to do a runaround our bodies to ensure equity....

You can call me a bad woman, bad mother, and you can say that it’s easy to speak in future tense. Perhaps there is something deeply selfish in me or incurably cruel...

Not bad or cruel, just stupid and ideological. "Ideology" is the logic of an idea. Erickson starts by positing inequality as the summum malum, and logically is forced to reject the most natural thing in the world, breastfeeding, because the male half of humanity can't do it.

Abortion without Euphemism

The video above shows the American Sign Language symbol for abortion. In a LifeSiteNews story about the symbol a couple of commenters made these excellent points:

"I think the 'brutally honest' perception stems from the fact that, as a visual language, ASL is relatively immune to efforts to infuse it with 'political correctness' as the spoken and written English language have so thoroughly been."

"This is so true! ASL doesn't have euphemisms. It's insane, I know: a language that prioritizes communication. Hard to imagine!"

Vive la France...and now Estonia Stands for the Family, too!

As the French people continue their fight against th imposition of counterfeit marriage, they have inspired and are being joined by, the people of Estonia. From today's LifeSiteNews:

"The founder of Estonia’s pro-family movement said in an interview with a Polish Catholic television program that the country’s draft law on same-sex marriage will not go forward after his group presented the government with nearly 40,000 signatures defending traditional marriage. Law professor Varro Vooglaid (left) told Polonia Christiana that presentation of the petition from the Estonian Foundation for Defense of Tradition and Family will not allow the homosexualist ideologues to frame the issue in terms of “human rights”.

Last month, the group presented a petition of 38,000 signatures to Estonia’s parliament to oppose all plans that may be put forward to re-define marriage to include same-sex partnerings. This, Vooglaid said, has shown the homosexualist lobby that there is going to be serious and organised opposition to their plans. The petition form was delivered to 580,000 households, in a country with a total population of 1.2 million.

Vooglaid called the petition, the largest in the country’s history since emancipation from the Soviet Union, an 'historic event in Estonian politics'. Homosexualists had become used to having the only voice heard in public, but now, he said, 'We have really managed to change the rules of the game.'”