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What Future For The Catholic Church In Scotland?

March 20, 2013 in bishops, Catholic newspapers, catholic schools, celibacy, Dissent, ecumenism, freemasons, homosexuality, inter-faith dialogue, Liturgy, Our Lady, priesthood, Scotland, Uncategorized, Vatican II by editor | 173 comments

There can be few people across the globe today who have not heard of the recent rush of scandals afflicting the Catholic Church in Scotland. Here’s a sadly typical Tabloid report

Apart from any vulnerable victims, my own sympathy goes out to the faithful priests who are thoroughly demoralised right now. One Irish priest told me that the only difference between the demoralised clergy in Ireland and their brother priests in Scotland is that the Irish cardinal hasn’t resigned.

Of course, those who have been reading our reports on Cardinal O’Brien – and his brother bishops – for the past fourteen years will know that the real shock is not that he resigned, but that Archbishop O’Brien was given the red hat in the first place.

The question we need to consider now is: what future, if any, lies ahead for the Catholic Church in Scotland? Christ’s guarantee to be with His Church until the end of time doesn’t preclude the possibility that the Church in any particular place will die out. That is manifestly not the case.

During a short meeting with a Vatican official in Rome some years ago, our then Treasurer and I pointed out that Scotland is a very small country, small enough to make it the ideal place to start to clear-out bad bishops. Since Pope Francis is, we’re told, determined to have the ecclesiastical equivalent of a clearance sale, I hope he bumps into that official. The other thing we (helpfully!) pointed out is that there is no need for eight bishops in such a small country. How many, though, DO we need? Two? Three? Four? No more than four surely? And can we think of priests who would make strong bishops? Bishops who will enforce Canon Law, enforce liturgical norms and generally set the heather on fire – i.e. begin the process of restoring the traditional Catholic Faith…

Now that we have a disgraced cardinal with dark warnings of more scandals involving other bishops to come, maybe we ought to draft some suggestions along the above lines to send to the Papal Nuncio. Or maybe you have better suggestions. Let’s hear them!

St Andrew, pray for us,

St Margaret of Scotland, pray for us!

St John Ogilvie, pray for us!

Catholic Schools – Approval System Broken…

February 5, 2013 in bishops, catholic schools, marriage, Morality, tradition, Uncategorized by editor | 50 comments

The relevant legislation on the management of denominational schools in Scotland states that: “A teacher appointed to any post on the staff of any such school by the education authority. . . shall be required to be approved as regards religious belief and character by representatives of the church or denominational body in whose interest the school has been conducted”.

To enable Councils to fulfil their statutory responsibilities, the Catholic Church requires to be assured that the personal “religious belief and character” of a teacher is appropriate to the duties associated with the teaching post for which he/she has applied.

When seeking approval, a teacher must demonstrate how his/her personal “religious belief and character” enables him/her to undertake the duties of the particular teaching post within the context of a Catholic school, with its particular mission, values and ethos, as outlined in A Charter for Catholic Schools in Scotland.

All teachers who seek approval must provide a reference from a suitable person who can testify to the teacher’s personal “religious belief and character”. The reference for a Catholic teacher should be provided by the teacher’s parish priest who should be able to testify to the teacher’s personal “religious belief and character”.

For those teaching posts which impact on the teaching of Religious Education, teachers will, in addition, be expected to have obtained an appropriate teaching qualification in Catholic Religious Education. Read more

The first thing to notice about the above statement from the Scottish Catholic Education Service is the claim that it is necessary to approve suitable teachers for employment in Catholic schools because such approval is required of local Councils by law: that is, the Church is seeking to help the local authority, not to ensure the integrity of Catholic teaching! The right way round, of course, is to point out that the Church requires to approve those seeking to teach in our schools, particularly in key positions, and to reject those who are unsuitable. Legislation has been passed in order to facilitate this right. Local Councillors don’t care whether those teaching in Catholic schools hold to Catholic doctrine and morals but the local Church authorities – the Bishop – certainly should.

But do they? Does he? I’ve been thinking a lot in the past few weeks about the approval system in Catholic schools because I’m hearing of various scandals: stories of Head Teachers and Heads of RE who are living in “relationships” at odds with Catholic morality keep dropping into my postbag. Who approved them for the job? And if their living arrangements post-dated their appointments, their contracts MUST allow for action to be taken against them, for them to be removed from post. In any case, if all else fails, there’s always that old chestnut “bringing the school into disrepute” … And a Head Teacher or Head of RE who shacks up with a divorced “partner” and kids, surely ranks as disreputable for any Catholic school.

Or is this all fuddy duddy pre-Vatican II (? pre-Trent) nonsense? Does it really matter what personal choices teachers make? After all, Cardinal O’Brien is on public record saying he had no problem with “gays” even if they happen to have a partner, teaching in Catholic schools, so what of it if the odd Head Teacher or Head of RE breaks the marital rules?

Questions for discussion…

Whatever happened to the approval system? Can it be fixed?

Don’t forget to explain your answers…

Keeping the Faith – How Can A Conference Help?

January 23, 2013 in brown scapular, Catholic newspapers, catholic schools, catholic social teaching, charity, Communion in the hand, Devotions, Dissent, doctrine, homeschooling, Liturgy, marriage, Morality, novus ordo Mass, Traditional Mass, Uncategorized by editor | 96 comments

Background

Catholic Truth conferences have always been happy and successful occasions. We’ve had a number of such meetings and always, without exception, we’ve had people praising the speakers and saying how much they’ve learned from the talks; we’ve had others asking to be added to our mailing list with some offering to participate in future events of various types, while yet others said they were happy just to have gained support from other Catholics in conversations throughout the day because they felt isolated in their parishes or puzzled by, and even uncomfortable with, the changes in the Church in recent years. The stalls selling books, pamphlets and religious objects have done very good trade, with thoroughly sound books on sale, plus lots of informative literature available either to purchase or take away, free of charge. Nobody, not once, has complained about any aspect of our conferences and almost everyone has left expressing enthusiasm, not to say anticipation, for the next one.

Well, the next one is scheduled for Saturday, 8th June, 2013 and is aimed, primarily, at the younger generation, their parents, grandparents and teachers - the clue being in the title: Keeping the Faith – A Guide For A New Generation…

Tickets

Admission is by pre-paid tickets only. No admission at the door, unless you turn up with Cardinal O’Brien or the Archbishop of Glasgow – two close friends of mine. Tickets cost £10 with an additional £15 payable if you wish to stay on for the evening meal. (Note:there will be a children’s menu available, £10). You may send cheques payable to Catholic Truth at 10 Sandyford Place, Glasgow, G3 7NB or you may use the PayPal facility on our website. Soup & sandwiches lunches may be purchased, reasonably priced at £6 per head. This is where the old adage - ”two heads are better than one” – is proved wrong – big time.

Speakers/Topics

For now, we will stick to publishing only bloggers’ names since, apart from Gerald Warner, a leading Scots journalist (a traditional Catholic who writes in the Scottish press, mostly on political matters) the majority of our speakers are drawn from the newsletter columnists and bloggers…

Gerald Warner will give an overview of the state of the Church and will have you rolling in the aisles in so doing. He spoke at one of our previous conferences and his talk was both rivetting and hilarious. Later, I came across enthusiastic reports of it on a blog in America where Gerald has quite a following.

Athanasius – prolific writer and blogger, published in several journals including The Scottish Catholic Observer, The Remnant and Catholic Truth, will speak on the history of devotion to Our Lady in the Church. Athanasius addressed this topic at one of our previous conferences and his talk was so magnificent that a gentleman I’d never met before, approached me afterwards to say he had just finished preparing his own talk on Our Lady, to be delivered at the parish RCIA meeting the following evening, but he was now going home to tear it up. He was seriously impressed. Me, too. I’ve heard loads of talks on Our Lady but never EVER heard one like that one.

Petrus – Catholic Truth columnist and blogger, will speak about how, as a young person, he struggled to “keep the Faith”. He will outline his journey out of, and back home to his Catholic Faith. He’ll explain how he was actively involved in his local parish, read Catholic Truth, and, appalled, wrote us off as heretics. Not to be missed!

Torkay – Catholic Truth columnist and blogger offered to fly over from the U.S.A. to say a few words to Conference – an offer we just couldn’t refuse. Again,Torkay addressed a previous Catholic Truth conference and a religious Sister in the audience held me captive over lunch, while she enthused about his talk. Like Petrus, Torkay took some time to reach the traditional Catholic Faith. He’ll give us some examples of practices that help him keep the Faith in the current crisis in the Church – a ”must-hear”!

And Finally – our attempts to book a female speaker have not succeeded. Bernadette, one of our younger bloggers, had agreed to address the Conference but unfortunatley has had to withdraw from the event due to unforeseen circumstances, not least the arrival of a new baby! Therefore, the Editor of Catholic Truth will speak briefly on the reasons for lapsation from the Faith among young people.

Audience Participation

We’ve always prided ourselves on the enjoyable Question & Answer sessions which have featured at our conferences so we hope to include opportunities for your questions and comments on 8th June as well - mind you, we’ve never had quite so many speakers before so time will be tight, but we’ll work something out. None of the speakers will be hogging the microphone for long, so we should be able to fit in our usual Q & A / comments slots. Lunch time and evening meal time also afford plenty of opportunities for chatting. Everyone of our speakers is friendly and approachable and they will be delighted to speak to anyone with questions or comments throughout the day.

Aim of Conference

Well - here’s the plan, folks: bring a group of ordinary Catholics together to speak about our beloved Faith, in the hope of helping the younger generation – and those responsible for educating them, both at home and at school – to appreciate what is key in Catholicism, what is desirable and spiritually helpful and what is… well … not on!

We’d like this thread to be used primarily to allow bloggers to offer ideas on how to make best use of the forthcoming conference. Can a conference like this really make a difference? We think so. Can it really help people – especially young people – to learn more about the Faith – help them to come to love it? We think so.

What do you think? You in?

The Frankfurt School: Changing the Culture…

December 5, 2012 in catholic schools, catholic social teaching, culture, discrimination, ecumenism, freemasons, homosexuality, marriage, parliament, the theory of evolution, Uncategorized by editor | 80 comments

Basically, the Frankfurt School believed that as long as an individual had the belief – or even the hope of belief – that his divine gift of reason could solve the problems facing society, then that society would never reach the state of hopelessness and alienation that they considered necessary to provoke socialist revolution. Their task, therefore, was as swiftly as possible to undermine the Judaeo-Christian legacy. To do this they called for the most negative destructive criticism possible of every sphere of life which would be designed to de-stabilize society and bring down what they saw as the ‘oppressive’ order. Their policies, they hoped, would spread like a virus—‘continuing the work of the Western Marxists by other means’ as one of their members noted. To further the advance of their ‘quiet’ cultural revolution – but giving us no ideas about their plans for the future – the School recommended (among other things):

1. The creation of racism offences.
2. Continual change to create confusion
3. The teaching of sex and homosexuality to children
4. The undermining of schools’ and teachers’ authority
5. Huge immigration to destroy identity.
6. The promotion of excessive drinking
7. Emptying of churches
8. An unreliable legal system with bias against victims of crime
9. Dependency on the state or state benefits
10. Control and dumbing down of media
11. Encouraging the breakdown of the family

One of the main ideas of the Frankfurt School was to exploit Freud’s idea of ‘pansexualism’ – the search for pleasure, the exploitation of the differences between the sexes, the overthrowing of traditional relationships between men and women. To further their aims they would:

• attack the authority of the father, deny the specific roles of father and mother, and wrest away from families their rights as primary educators of their children.
• abolish differences in the education of boys and girls
• abolish all forms of male dominance – hence the presence of women in the armed forces
• declare women to be an ‘oppressed class’ and men as ‘oppressors’ Munzenberg summed up the Frankfurt School’s long-term operation thus: ‘We will make the West so corrupt that it stinks.’

The School believed there were two types of revolution: (a) political and (b) cultural. Cultural revolution demolishes from within. ‘Modern forms of subjection are marked by mildness’. They s it as a long-term project and kept their sights clearly focused on the family, education, media, sex and popular culture. Read rest of this article here and another very interesting article entitled Gramsci’s Grand Plan here…

Well? Is there much left to do, thinkest thou, or has the cultural revolution just about been achieved?

Catholic Education With A Difference…

July 26, 2012 in catholic schools, charity by editor | 33 comments

An Irish school principal who refused to enroll a teenage girl because she was pregnant is now refusing to apologize. Padraig O’Shea, now the school manager of Saint Joseph’s College in County Tipperary, has disputed the girl’s version of events and vowed he would do the same again. Read more

Well, is this what’s missing in Catholic schools in the countries of the UK? Does this Principal have a hard heart – or a truly Catholic heart?

Canada: “Gay” Friendly Catholic Schools …

June 7, 2012 in catholic schools, Dissent, homosexuality, Politics by editor | 36 comments

Toronto, Canada, Jun 7, 2012 / 04:10 am (CNA).- Catholic schools in the province of Ontario will abide by a law requiring them to allow “Gay-Straight Alliance” clubs, despite concerns about the loss of religious freedom……Proposed as an effort to stop bullying, the Accepting Schools Act was eventually amended to force Catholic schools to allow “gay-straight alliance” groups.

“Right from the beginning, when this bill was introduced, we were working together with the government, to try and come up with solutions that would be best for all students in Ontario,” recalled Marino Gazzola, president of the Ontario Catholic School Trustees’ Association. “The amendment came unexpectedly,” Gazzola told CNA on June 6.

“But it’s now passed. We want to focus on ensuring that all our students are safe, are protected, and get the support that they require. And if these groups are formed, the legislation says they’re allowed to be called ‘Gay-Straight Alliances.’”

“We’re encouraging our boards, our schools, and our administrators to comply with the law,” the president said.

Despite the religious freedom concerns that accompanied its consideration and passage, Gazzola said civil disobedience of the law “was never considered.” He also confirmed that the Ontario Catholic School Trustees’ Association is currently “not considering a legal challenge” to the statute. Read more

The alleged Catholic educators in Canada – led by their cowardly bishops – have betrayed Catholic parents and pupils, not to mention wider society who now have their false beliefs about sexual morality affirmed by the very bishops who, to paraphrase the English martyr, Bishop John Fisher, should NOT have betrayed the truth in this way.

Or are these bishops right to insist on obeying civil law, even when it contradicts God’s law? Is it more important to protect allegedly “gay” pupils from alleged “bullying” than to protect them from being led into a sinful lifestyle?

Is this sort of approach to “gay bullying” likely to come to the UK? Is it already happening, without publicity, in UK Catholic schools?

Why Is The Pro-Life Movement So Weak?

May 30, 2012 in abortion, Bible, bishops, catholic schools, catholic social teaching, conscience, doctrine, infallibility, Media, Morality, Papacy, Uncategorized by editor | 74 comments

Radio Scotland phone-in ‘Call Kaye’ this morning devoted some time to discussing the shocking rise in women having repeat abortions

The show is available to listen to for the next seven days (takes a few minutes to begin the abortion discussion)

Anne Scanlan (LIFE spoke very well at the beginning of the discussion: “Without the right to life, no woman would have the right to choose.” Spot on.

Later, however, when challenged, she weakened. Her argument – initially rightly focused on the objective reality of the humanity of the unborn child – deteriorated into focusing on the woman’s “feelings.” Anne wanted women not to be shown images of aborted foetues, but to see the scan of their own unborn child. When asked by Kaye Adams “Why?” (What was she trying to do to these women?) Anne spun her line about helping them face their “feelings.”

Not surprisingly, women then rang in who’d already had children, didn’t want this latest nuisance and so had gone ahead with abortion. No problem with “feelings” of guilt/remorse.

Anne’s response was to accept that this was “their choice”! As long as they KNOW what they’re doing, that’s “great”.

Listen for yourself – hear what the “refused” Catholic, Margaret from Stonehaven, has to say about “papal infallibility and all of this cr*p” and note that there’s nobody trying to appease Anne Scanlan. They say it how it is. Shoot straight from the hip. Prolifers should mind their own business and let them get on with their killings.

And listen for the absolutely furious man who accuses Anne Scanlan of being “angry” and “aggressive” – he’s a hoot! If only she were “angry” and “aggressive” – as angry and aggressive as she blankety blank should have been!

Overall, I was left wondering if there are ANY prolifers out there who will call the abortion “spade” a spade. In his encyclical, Evangelium Vitae (The Gospel of Life) Pope John Paul II said that “now, more than ever, we need to call abortion by its proper name – murder.” Yet, even the new religious order in Glasgow named after this Encyclical (Sisters of the Gospel of Life) were published some years ago saying that we must stop calling abortion “murder” or the media would think we were “nutters”. We reported it at the time in our newsletter. Is it because of the two missing words: “murder” and “God” that prolifers are, generally speaking, weak and ineffectual in debate? Let’s conclude with the following extract from paragraph 58 of Evangelium Vitae - then tell us your views on why the pro-life movement is so weak – or maybe you think it’s doing a great job?

Among all the crimes which can be committed against life, procured abortion has
characteristics making it particularly serious and deplorable. The Second
Vatican Council defines abortion, together with infanticide, as an “unspeakable crime”.⁵⁴

But today, in many people’s consciences, the
perception of its gravity has become progressively obscured. The acceptance of
abortion in the popular mind, in behaviour and even in law itself, is a telling
sign of an extremely dangerous crisis of the moral sense, which is becoming more
and more incapable of distinguishing between good and evil, even when the
fundamental right to life is at stake. Given such a grave situation, we need now
more than ever to have the courage to look the truth in the eye and to call
things by their proper name, without yielding to convenient compromises or
to the temptation of self-deception. In this regard the reproach of the Prophet
is extremely straightforward: “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil,
who put darkness for light and light for darkness” (Is 5:20).
Especially in the case of abortion there is a widespread use of ambiguous
terminology, such as “interruption of pregnancy”, which tends to hide abortion’s
true nature and to attenuate its seriousness in public opinion. Perhaps this
linguistic phenomenon is itself a symptom of an uneasiness of conscience. But no
word has the power to change the reality of things: procured abortion is the
deliberate and direct killing, by whatever means it is carried out, of a human
being in the initial phase of his or her existence, extending from conception to birth.

The moral gravity of procured abortion is
apparent in all its truth if we recognize that we are dealing with murder and,
in particular, when we consider the specific elements involved. The one
eliminated is a human being at the very beginning of life. No one more
absolutely innocent could be imagined. In no way could this human being
ever be considered an aggressor, much less an unjust aggressor! He or she is
weak, defenceless, even to the point of lacking that minimal form of
defence consisting in the poignant power of a newborn baby’s cries and tears.
The unborn child is totally entrusted to the protection and care of the
woman carrying him or her in the womb. And yet sometimes it is precisely the
mother herself who makes the decision and asks for the child to be eliminated,
and who then goes about having it done. (#58)

Read the entire encyclical here

***************************************************************

Rangers: is this the end of Scottish sectarianism?

February 15, 2012 in Bigotry, catholic schools, discrimination, Reformation, Scotland, Uncategorized by editor | 34 comments

FORMER Rangers director Paul Murray is masterminding a bid to take over the crisis-torn club. Read more and then tell us if you think the end of Rangers would be the end of sectarianism. Or do we need to see off Celtic Football Club as well?

Catholic Schools blamed for bigotry in Scotland…

February 5, 2012 in Bigotry, bishops, catholic schools, Scottish independence by editor | 24 comments

THE public face of the country’s top lobbying group for charities has been criticised for launching an outspoken attack against faith schools.

John Downie, a director of the Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations (SCVO), said one of the “key causes” of sectarianism was the existence of denominational education. He added that “getting rid of faith schools” would help eradicate the blight of religious hatred north of the border.

Bishop Joseph Devine, the President of the Scottish Catholic Education Commission, last night told the Sunday Herald the opinions were “reckless” and “offensive”. Read more

So, Catholics should vote for Scottish independence? You reckon?

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