Christmas Warmth Between Orthodox and Catholics

Present of St. Nick Brings Churches in Russia Together

KEMEROVO, Russia, DEC. 22, 2008 (Zenit.org).- A Catholic bishop in Russia presented a relic of St. Nicholas to a Russian Orthodox bishop during a solemn liturgy in celebration of the saint, as an expression of brotherhood between the Churches.

The Russian feast of St. Nicholas on Dec. 19 was celebrated with special enthusiasm in Kemerovo, as a relic of the saint was presented by Catholic Bishop Josef Werth of the Diocese of the Transfiguration of the Lord in Novosibirsk to Russian Orthodox Bishop Aristarch of Kemerovo and Novokuznetsk, reported Aid to the Church in Need.

The Orthodox cathedral of St. Nicholas overflowed with people in attendance at the solemn liturgy, including the apostolic nuncio in the Russian Federation, Archbishop Antonio Mennini.

In an address at the liturgy, Bishop Aristarch spoke of the veneration of many saints that the two Churches share, and called the relic a "a true sign of love and esteem between the Russian Orthodox and the Catholic Church."

Bishop Werth, who recognized Bishop Aristarch as his "brother in the episcopate," affirmed that "Orthodox and Catholic bishops, priests and faithful are meeting with one another and praying to the same Lord. I am certain that in future the same kind of cordial relationships will also develop in other cities and towns of Siberia."

Benedict XVI personally requested that the relic be given to the Orthodox bishop and faithful of Kemerovo, Archbishop Mennini explained, as a "gesture of fraternal love." He underlined the importance of using every opportunity to further dialogue between the Catholic and Orthodox Churches.

さよなら "Sayonara, 'Global Warming'!"

From the Telegraph.
2008 was the year man-made global warming was disproved
By Christopher Booker
Last Updated: 5:51PM GMT 27 Dec 2008

The first, on May 21, headed "Climate change threat to Alpine ski resorts" , reported that the entire Alpine "winter sports industry" could soon "grind to a halt for lack of snow". The second, on December 19, headed "The Alps have best snow conditions in a generation" , reported that this winter's Alpine snowfalls "look set to beat all records by New Year's Day".

Easily one of the most important stories of 2008 has been all the evidence suggesting that this may be looked back on as the year when there was a turning point in the great worldwide panic over man-made global warming. Just when politicians in Europe and America have been adopting the most costly and damaging measures politicians have ever proposed, to combat this supposed menace, the tide has turned in three significant respects.

First, all over the world, temperatures have been dropping in a way wholly unpredicted by all those computer models which have been used as the main drivers of the scare. Last winter, as temperatures plummeted, many parts of the world had snowfalls on a scale not seen for decades. This winter, with the whole of Canada and half the US under snow, looks likely to be even worse. After several years flatlining, global temperatures have dropped sharply enough to cancel out much of their net rise in the 20th century.

Ever shriller and more frantic has become the insistence of the warmists, cheered on by their army of media groupies such as the BBC, that the last 10 years have been the "hottest in history" and that the North Pole would soon be ice-free – as the poles remain defiantly icebound and those polar bears fail to drown. All those hysterical predictions that we are seeing more droughts and hurricanes than ever before have infuriatingly failed to materialise.

Even the more cautious scientific acolytes of the official orthodoxy now admit that, thanks to "natural factors" such as ocean currents, temperatures have failed to rise as predicted (although they plaintively assure us that this cooling effect is merely "masking the underlying warming trend", and that the temperature rise will resume worse than ever by the middle of the next decade).

Secondly, 2008 was the year when any pretence that there was a "scientific consensus" in favour of man-made global warming collapsed. At long last, as in the Manhattan Declaration last March, hundreds of proper scientists, including many of the world's most eminent climate experts, have been rallying to pour scorn on that "consensus" which was only a politically engineered artefact, based on ever more blatantly manipulated data and computer models programmed to produce no more than convenient fictions.

Thirdly, as banks collapsed and the global economy plunged into its worst recession for decades, harsh reality at last began to break in on those self-deluding dreams which have for so long possessed almost every politician in the western world. As we saw in this month's Poznan conference, when 10,000 politicians, officials and "environmentalists" gathered to plan next year's "son of Kyoto" treaty in Copenhagen, panicking politicians are waking up to the fact that the world can no longer afford all those quixotic schemes for "combating climate change" with which they were so happy to indulge themselves in more comfortable times.

Suddenly it has become rather less appealing that we should divert trillions of dollars, pounds and euros into the fantasy that we could reduce emissions of carbon dioxide by 80 per cent. All those grandiose projects for "emissions trading", "carbon capture", building tens of thousands more useless wind turbines, switching vast areas of farmland from producing food to "biofuels", are being exposed as no more than enormously damaging and futile gestures, costing astronomic sums we no longer possess.

As 2009 dawns, it is time we in Britain faced up to the genuine crisis now fast approaching from the fact that – unless we get on very soon with building enough proper power stations to fill our looming "energy gap" - within a few years our lights will go out and what remains of our economy will judder to a halt. After years of infantile displacement activity, it is high time our politicians – along with those of the EU and President Obama's US – were brought back with a mighty jolt into contact with the real world.

I must end this year by again paying tribute to my readers for the wonderful generosity with which they came to the aid of two causes. First their donations made it possible for the latest "metric martyr", the east London market trader Janet Devers, to fight Hackney council's vindictive decision to prosecute her on 13 criminal charges, ranging from selling in pounds and ounces to selling produce "by the bowl" (to avoid using weights her customers dislike and don't understand). The embarrassment caused by this historic battle has thrown the forced metrication policy of both our governments, in London and Brussels, into total disarray.

Since Hackney backed out of allowing four criminal charges against Janet to go before a jury next month, all that remains is for her to win her appeal in February against eight convictions which now look quite absurd (including those for selling veg by the bowl, as thousands of other London market traders do every day). The final goal, as Neil Herron of the Metric Martyrs Defence Fund insists, must then be a pardon for the late Steve Thoburn and the four other original "martyrs" who were found guilty in 2002 – after a legal battle also made possible by this column's readers – of breaking laws so ridiculous that the EU Commission has even denied they existed (but which are still on the statute book).

Readers were equally generous this year in rushing to the aid of Sue Smith, whose son was killed in a Snatch Land Rover in Iraq in 2005. Their contributions made it possible for her to carry on with the High Court action she has brought against the Ministry of Defence, with the sole aim of calling it to account for needlessly risking soldiers' lives by sending them into battle in hopelessly inappropriate vehicles. Thanks not least to Mrs Smith's determined fight, the Snatch Land Rover scandal, first reported here in 2006, has at last become a national cause celebre.

May I finally thank all those readers who have written to me in 2008 – so many that, as usual, it has not been possible to answer all their messages. But their support and information has been hugely appreciated. May I wish them and all of you a happy (if globally not too warm) New Year.

Cardinal Dulles - Requiescat in Pace

Cardinal Dulles Dead at 90
Scholar Suffered From Post-Polio Syndrome

NEW YORK, DEC. 12, 2008 (Zenit.org).- The New York Province of the Society of Jesus reported that renowned theologian and prolific author Cardinal Avery Dulles died this morning at 90.

Avery Dulles was born Aug. 24, 1918, in Auburn, New York. He was the son of John Foster Dulles, who later served as U.S. Secretary of State under President Dwight Eisenhower.

Dulles converted to Catholicism in 1940 while studying at Harvard University. After graduation he continued at Harvard studying law, but after a year and a half he left the university to join the Navy during World War II, where he rose to the rank of lieutenant.

He entered the Jesuits in 1946 and was ordained 10 years later. He earned a doctorate from the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome in 1960.

Father Dulles taught theology at Woodstock College from 1960 to 1974 and at the Catholic University of America from 1974 to 1988.

He served as the Laurence J. McGinley Professor of Religion and Society at Fordham University from 1988 until April of this year.

He was created a cardinal by Pope John Paul II in 2001, making him the first American-born theologian not a bishop to receive this honor.

A respected theologian, he served as president of both the Catholic Theological Society of America and the American Theological Society. He authored over 750 articles on theological topics, and dozens of books, the latest including "The History of Apologetics," (revised edition, 2005), and "Magisterium: Teacher and Guardian of the Faith" (2007).

The cardinal had been suffering of complications of post-polio syndrome, which he contracted as a Naval officer. Confined to a wheelchair and unable to speak, the cardinal continued to read and communicated by slowing typing on a computer keyboard or writing on a pad of paper.

Upon stepping down as the Laurence J. McGinley Professor of Religion and Society at Fordham University in April, he wrote: "Well into my 90th year I have been able to work productively. As I become increasingly paralyzed and unable to speak, I can identify with the many paralytics and mute persons in the Gospels, grateful for the loving and skillful care I receive and for the hope of everlasting life in Christ. If the Lord now calls me to a period of weakness, I know well that his power can be made perfect in infirmity. 'Blessed be the name of the Lord!'"

During Benedict XVI's visit to the United States last April, the Pontiff and Cardinal Dulles met for a private meeting.

Great theologian

Cardinal Francis George, the archbishop of Chicago and president of the U.S. episcopal conference, said the death of Cardinal Dulles "brings home to God a great theologian and a totally dedicated servant of the Church."

"His wise counsel will be missed; his personal witness to the pursuit of holiness of life as a priest, a Jesuit and a cardinal of the Church will be remembered and will encourage the Church to remain ever faithful to her Lord and his mission," he added.

Cardinal Edward Egan, the archbishop of New York, said in a statement this afternoon that he learned of the death of Cardinal Dulles with "deep sadness."

"Cardinal Dulles was an eminent theologian and professor of theology in seminaries and universities throughout the nation," said Cardinal Egan. "All of us here in the archdiocese are very much indebted to him for his wisdom and priestly example."

Father James Massa, executive director of the Secretariat of Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs at the episcopal conference and a student of Cardinal Dulles, said the cardinal was "for a generation of priests, scholars and faithful [...], a reliable and faithful interpreter of the Second Vatican Council. A number of his books have become classics in theological education."

"In some ways," the priest added, "his life bears comparison with another great cardinal-theologian, John Henry Newman, on whose birthday, 200 years later, Avery Dulles was created a cardinal of the Catholic Church."

"Oh Bama..." [sigh]

This was emailed to me about Obama's school choice policy...

Barack Obama has made few policy pronouncements since his November election. But he and his wife have made a personal decision that is rich with policy ramifications: the choice of a school for their daughters. During the campaign, Obama said he supports charter schools, which are public schools that are free of some bureaucratic constraints, but that he opposes private school choice, because it doesn't work. Turns out it does work for the Obamas, who determined that no public or charter school in the nation's capital would be the 'best fit' for their daughters. Instead they chose Sidwell Friends, an exclusive private school that counts Chelsea Clinton among its alumni. No one should begrudge the Obamas for choosing the best possible school for their children. But we should begrudge Barack Obama for vowing to deny such choices to low-income parents. As Polly Williams, the state representative who gave birth to Milwaukee's school choice program put it, 'The president shouldn't be the only person who lives in public housing who gets to send his kids to private schools.'

The Immaculate Conception - Eastern Fathers speak

Some Eastern Father's on the Immaculate Conception...

Monday, 08 December 2008
The Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary - Solemnity

Saint Ephrem : «You allowed no stain of Adam's sin to touch the Virgin Mary. Full of grace, she was to be a worthy mother of your Son» (Proper preface of the Mass)


Book of Genesis 3,9-15.20.

The LORD God then called to the man and asked him, "Where are you?" He answered, "I heard you in the garden; but I was afraid, because I was naked, so I hid myself." Then he asked, "Who told you that you were naked? You have eaten, then, from the tree of which I had forbidden you to eat!" The man replied, "The woman whom you put here with me--she gave me fruit from the tree, so I ate it." The LORD God then asked the woman, "Why did you do such a thing?" The woman answered, "The serpent tricked me into it, so I ate it." Then the LORD God said to the serpent: "Because you have done this, you shall be banned from all the animals and from all the wild creatures; On your belly shall you crawl, and dirt shall you eat all the days of your life. I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; He will strike at your head, while you strike at his heel." The man called his wife Eve, because she became the mother of all the living.

Psalms 98,1.2-3.3-4.

Sing a new song to the LORD, who has done marvelous deeds, Whose right hand and holy arm have won the victory.
The LORD has made his victory known; has revealed his triumph for the nations to see,
Has remembered faithful love toward the house of Israel. All the ends of the earth have seen the victory of our God.
Has remembered faithful love toward the house of Israel. All the ends of the earth have seen the victory of our God.
Shout with joy to the LORD, all the earth; break into song; sing praise.


Letter to the Ephesians 1,3-6.11-12.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavens, as he chose us in him, before the foundation of the world, to be holy and without blemish before him. In love he destined us for adoption to himself through Jesus Christ, in accord with the favor of his will, for the praise of the glory of his grace that he granted us in the beloved. In him we were also chosen, destined in accord with the purpose of the one who accomplishes all things according to the intention of his will, so that we might exist for the praise of his glory, we who first hoped in Christ.

Holy Gospel according to Saint Luke 1,26-38.

In the sixth month, the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a town of Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man named Joseph, of the house of David, and the virgin's name was Mary. And coming to her, he said, "Hail, favored one! The Lord is with you." But she was greatly troubled at what was said and pondered what sort of greeting this might be. Then the angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. Behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall name him Jesus. He will be great and will be called Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give him the throne of David his father, and he will rule over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end." But Mary said to the angel, "How can this be, since I have no relations with a man?" And the angel said to her in reply, "The holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God. And behold, Elizabeth, your relative, has also conceived a son in her old age, and this is the sixth month for her who was called barren; for nothing will be impossible for God." Mary said, "Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord. May it be done to me according to your word." Then the angel departed from her.

Commentary of the day :

Saint Ephrem (c.306-373), deacon in Syria, Doctor of the Church
Marian hymn

«You allowed no stain of Adam's sin to touch the Virgin Mary. Full of grace, she was to be a worthy mother of your Son» (Proper preface of the Mass)


St. Ephrem the Syrian
Son of God, grant me your own admirable Gift that I may celebrate the wondrous beauty of your beloved Mother! The Virgin gave birth to a son while preserving her virginity; she suckled him who gives nourishment to the peoples; in her immaculate breast she bore him who carries the whole world in his hands. She is Virgin and Mother, what will she not be hereafter? Holy in body, all beautiful in soul, pure of mind, upright in intelligence, perfect in feeling, chaste and faithful, pure of heart and filled with virtue.

May the hearts of virgins rejoice in Mary since of her was born the one who set humankind free from dreadful slavery. May the old Adam, wounded by the serpent, rejoice in Mary; it is Mary who gives Adam a posterity that allows him to crush the accursed serpent and who cures him of his mortal wound (Gen 3,15). Let priests rejoice in the blessed Virgin; she has brought the High Priest into the world who gave himself as a victim, putting an end to the sacrifices of the Old Covenant... Let the prophets rejoice in Mary, since in her were fulfilled their visions, in her were realized their prophecies, in her were confirmed their oracles. Let all the patriarchs rejoice in Mary since she received the blessing promised to them, she who, in her son, has brought them to completion...

Mary is the new tree of life who, instead of the bitter fruit picked by Eve, gives to mankind that sweet fruit on which the whole world is fed. [Sounds like St. Ephrem's 'intermediate' state language at work here; definitely coincides with the Immaculate Conception dogma of the west.]

-------------------------------------------------------------

On the Immaculate Conception
"The Reflection of the Beauty That Saves the World"

ROME, DEC. 9, 2008 (Zenit.org).- Here is a translation of the address Benedict XVI gave Monday, the solemnity of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary, before praying the Angelus with those gathered in St. Peter's Square.

* * *

Dear Brothers and Sisters:

The mystery of Mary's Immaculate Conception, which we celebrated solemnly today, reminds us of two fundamental truths of our faith: in the first place original sin, and then the victory of Christ's grace over it, a victory that shines sublimely in Mary Most Holy. The existence of what the Church calls "original sin" is, sadly, a crushing truth, suffice it to look around us and above all in our interior. The experience of evil is, in fact, so consistent, that it imposes itself and makes us ask the question: from whence does it come? For a believer especially, the question is even more profound: If God, who is absolute goodness, has created everything, where does evil come from?

The first pages of the Bible (Genesis 1-3) respond precisely to the fundamental question -- posed by every human generation -- with the account of creation and our parents' fall: God created everything so that it would exist, in particular he created man in his own image; he did not create death, rather, the latter entered the world because of the envy of the devil (cf. Wisdom 1:13-14; 2:23-24), who, rebelling against God, also attracted men with deceit, inducing them to rebellion. It is the drama of freedom, which God accepts totally out of love, but promising that there would be the son of a woman that would crush the head of the ancient serpent (Genesis 3:15).

Hence, from the beginning, the "eternal counsel" -- as Dante would say -- has a "fixed term" (Paradise, XXXIII, 3): The Woman predestined to be mother of the Redeemer, mother of him who humbled himself to the extreme to lead us back to our original dignity. In God's eyes, this Woman has always had a face and name: "full of grace" (Luke 1:28), as the Angel called her when visiting her in Nazareth. She is the new Eve, spouse of the new Adam, destined to be the mother of all the redeemed. Thus wrote St. Andrew of Crete: "The Theotokos Mary, the common refuge of all Christians, was the first to be delivered from the primitive fall of our parents" (Homily IV, on Christmas, PG 97, 880 A). And today's liturgy states that God has "prepared a worthy dwelling for his Son and, in anticipation of his death, preserved her from all stain of sin" (Collect Prayer).


St. Andrew of Crete
Beloved, in Mary Immaculate we contemplate the reflection of the Beauty that saves the world: the beauty of God that shines on the face of Christ. In Mary, this beauty is totally pure, humble, free of all pride and presumption. The Virgin showed herself in this way to St. Bernadette 150 years ago in Lourdes, and in this way she is venerated in so many shrines. This afternoon, in keeping with tradition, I will also render her homage before the monument dedicated to her in the Piazza di Spagna. Let us now invoke the Immaculate Virgin with confidence, recalling with the Angelus the words of the Gospel, which today's liturgy proposes for our meditation.

Catholic - Orthodox (the latest)

Apostles' Unity Seen as Link for 2 Churches
Patriarch Points to Brotherhood of Peter and Andrew

ISTANBUL, Turkey, DEC. 2, 2008 (Zenit.org).- The social, political and economic crisis has an answer, Christian leaders say: the common path toward full union between the Catholic and Orthodox Churches.

This was the main point of the homilies of Orthodox Patriarch Bartholomew I and Cardinal Walter Kasper, the president of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, during a joint celebration of the feast of St. Andrew on Sunday, L'Osservatore Romano reported today.

The patriarch of Constantinople recalled the meeting in Jerusalem between Pope Paul VI and then Patriarch Athenagoras I, which began the journey of dialogue between the two Churches.

He went on to refer to the brotherhood -- not only spiritual, but also physical, of the Apostles Peter and Andrew. This fact, he said, should be recalled by both Catholics and Orthodox so that both sides respect unity: "Because one cannot think of Peter and Andrew as separated."

"This bond between two apostles, which has a beginning of a biological nature, becomes also a spiritual legacy in the name of Our Lord and ends by constituting the link that unites the two Churches," the patriarch said.

He also affirmed: "It is necessary to cut the thorns that have wounded relations between the two Churches for a millennium, and take as a precious guide toward unity the spirit of the common tradition of the seven councils of the first millennium."

For his part, Cardinal Kasper declared that unity "is not an option, it is a duty to Our Lord."

The cardinal said after the visit that, though the path of dialogue between Orthodox and Catholics will not be short, it is coming along well, "because with the Orthodox, we have much in common."