CMTV News Roundup 05-21

Pope praying for children, others struck by Oklahoma tornado

Pope Francis sent special condolences to those parents who lost their children in a tornado that killed around 100 people in Oklahoma.

“I am close to the families of all who died in the Oklahoma tornado, especially those who lost young children,” the Pope said on his Twitter account on May 21.

“Join me in praying for them,” he added. Pope Francis also tweeted the same message in Spanish.

Earlier in the day during his morning Mass in the Vatican, the Pope personally added a prayer intention for the tornado victims and those who are missing, especially the children.

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St. Christopher Magallanes and Companions

The Saints of the Day for May 21 are St. Christopher Magallanes and Companions.

Like Blessed Miguel Agustin Pro, S.J. (November 23), Cristobal and his twenty-four companion martyrs lived under a very anti-Catholic government in Mexico, one determined to weaken the Catholic faith of its people. Churches, schools and seminaries were closed; foreign clergy were expelled. Cristobal established a clandestine seminary at Totatiche, Jalisco. Magallanes and the other priests were forced to minister secretly to Catholics during the presidency of Plutarco Calles (1924-1928).

All of these martyrs except three were diocesan priests. David, Manuel and Salvador were laymen who died with their parish priest, Luis Batis. All of these martyrs belonged to the Cristero movement, pledging their allegiance to Christ and to the church that he established to spread the Good News in society—even if Mexico's leaders had made it a crime to receive baptism or celebrate the Mass.

These martyrs did not die as a single group but in eight Mexican states, with Jalisco and Zacatecas having the largest number. They were beatified in 1992 and canonized eight years later.

— Excerpted from Saint of the Day, Leonard Foley, O.F.M.

CMTV News Roundup 05-20

Rome university launches course on liturgical music

This is really good news for the liturgy.  Just as the Church is still in the process of correcting liturgical abuses that have occurred  in recent years, I hope this program will help us reclaim the beautiful music that was once part of the Liturgy.

A pontifical university in Rome has launched a master's program in Gregorian chant and the use of the organ at Mass so as to build unity among Catholics world-wide.

“The most important thing is that music, when it is truly liturgical, creates community,” Father Jordi Piqué, dean of the Pontifical University of Saint Anselmo's liturgical institute, said May 20.

“When one hears a Mass that is sung or the organ interpreting a beautiful melody, it’s never individualistic, it’s always as a group,” he added at the Benedictine Abbey where the university is located.

Fr. Piqué, who plays the organ, is from the Benedictine Abbey of Montserrat, Spain, and was named dean of the program six months ago.

“The Pontifical Liturgical Institute has always had liturgical sources as its base and since the Second Vatican Council studies have been adapted to spread and make liturgy be valued by the faithful,” he explained.

“A very important part of liturgy is the music and chants, and now we’ve been able to unite with the Pontifical University of Sacred Music and offer this Master's.”

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Man Takes 12-Year-Old to Planned Parenthood for Abortion to Hide Rape

 Here's how much Planned Parenthood cares about women...

A man in Washington state took a 12-year-old girl to a Planned Parenthood clinic for an abortion to cover up his sexual assault on the teenage girl. The abortion business apparently did the abortion without hesitation. 12 years old?  really?  Did Planned Parenthood even ask her age? or care if she was a minor?

According to the Bellingham Herald:

A Washington State man who impregnated a preteen girl and forced her to have an abortion must serve a six-year prison sentence, then leave the country

Luis Gonzalez-Jose, 31, raped the girl at a home in rural Whatcom County while her mother was in the shower, according to charging documents filed in Whatcom County Superior Court.

He brought the girl to a Planned Parenthood clinic in August 2012. She told staff members that her 14-year-old boyfriend impregnated her, but she couldn’t give the boy’s name or address.

Six weeks after the abortion, the girl told a detective how she had really become pregnant. Gonzalez-Jose had insisted “it would be best for her” to not have the baby, according to the documents.

Gonzalez-Jose pleaded guilty to second-degree rape of a child in April.

Mark Crutcher, the head of the pro-life group Life Dynamics, told LifeNews that Planned Parenthood and abortion clinics have become a place where predators can go to hide evidence of their crimes when sexual assaults on minors lead to pregnancy.

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St. Bernardine of Siena

The Saint of the Day for May 20 is St. Bernardine of Siena.

Bernardine was born in Carrara, Italy, in 1380. Even as a boy he nursed the sick during a time of pestilence in Siena. During a severe illness he decided upon entering a monastery and becoming a Franciscan. His superiors assigned him the task of preaching, and he submitted humbly despite a throat affliction. God heard his petition, and the ailment was miraculously cured.

A powerful and eloquent preacher (Pius II called him "a second Paul") and a zealous apostle, Bernardine traveled the length and breadth of Italy, inculcating love and reverence toward the holy Name of Jesus. He exerted a powerful influence upon his contemporaries, inaugurating a genuine reformation within the Church. Seldom has a saint had so many and so distinguished followers (including St. John Capistran). Upon entering a city, Bernardine had a standard carried before him upon which was the holy Name of Jesus (IHS) encircled with twelve golden rays and surmounted by a cross.

When he preached, this symbol was placed alongside the pulpit; or he would hold in his hand a tablet bearing the divine monogram in letters large enough to be visible to the entire audience. It was also his zealous appeals that induced many priests to put the Name of Jesus on the altars and walls of their churches, or to have little cards with the inscription distributed among the people. At his instigation the public buildings in many cities of Italy were adorned with the monogram suitably enlarged, as can still be seen in Siena. At the Council of Florence St. Bernardine labored strenuously to end the schism (1439).

— Excerpted from The Church's Year of Grace, Pius Parsch.

Movie Review: Iron Man 3 - PG13

Tony Stark faces his latest nemesis, The Mandarin, and finds his whole world ruined, and those he cares about in danger.   But the plot is bigger than that, and Tony must stop a conspiracy that is more extensive and involved than first thought.

There is tons of action, and the special effects are spectacular, and one of the coolest features is how fast Tony can now suit up as Ironman.
The plot is somewhat more involved than you'd expect in a super-hero movie, and both Pepper Potts Colonel Rhodes are more involved in the action than before.

There is also a good plot twist regarding the Mandarin.

The ending was especially good, as it wrapped up the story lines very nicely.

Excellent!  Don't miss it!

http://marvel.com/ironman3

CMTV News Roundup 05-17

Documents Prove IRS Harassment of Pro-Life Groups Dates to 2009

Today, the Thomas More Society offered over 150 pages of analysis and evidence to the House Ways and Means Committee about repeated IRS harassment of pro-life organizations.

At the request of Congressman Aaron Schock (R-IL), Thomas More Society President Thomas Brejcha, Executive Director Peter Breen, and Special Counsel Sally Wagenmaker, prepared the legal memorandum with solid evidence of IRS harassment of pro-life organizations dating back to 2009.

Shock asked the IRS commissioner today if this discrimination is appropriate and he was unable to say yes or no.

The memo details the history of IRS misconduct in the cases of three organizations represented by the Thomas More Society. The abuse dates back further than the now publicized 2010 complaints and extends beyond the IRS’s recently exposed Cincinnati office to also include the tax agency’s California operations in the charges of blatant bias.

The IRS office in El Monte, California, began harassing Christian Voices for Life of Fort Bend County, Texas in 2011. In a series of questions penned by Exempt Organization Specialist Tyrone Thomas from the California office, the IRS asked a series of unwarranted questions ordering Christian Voices for Life without any foundation, to explain its content, message, and prayers as if they were engaging in highly offensive or criminal behavior.

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Card. Dolan ‘would not suggest’ pro-abort Gov. Cuomo not a Catholic ‘in good standing’: archdiocese

Since the Cardinal is unwilling to address the issue, allow me to clarify CINO Cuomo's standing as a Catholic:

From the catechism:
2272 Formal cooperation in an abortion constitutes a grave offense. The Church attaches the canonical penalty of excommunication to this crime against human life. "A person who procures a completed abortion incurs excommunication latae sententiae," "by the very commission of the offense," and subject to the conditions provided by Canon Law. The Church does not thereby intend to restrict the scope of mercy. Rather, she makes clear the gravity of the crime committed, the irreparable harm done to the innocent who is put to death, as well as to the parents and the whole of society.

After New York Cardinal Timothy Dolan appeared to suggest during a radio interview this week that he may not view pro-abortion Governor Andrew Cuomo as a Catholic “in good standing,” the archdiocese has issued a statement saying that this is not the case, and that Dolan's remark was misunderstood.

“Cardinal Dolan would not, and did not, suggest the governor might not be a Catholic in good standing going forward,” archdiocesan spokesman Joseph Zwilling said in a statement originally sent to the New York Times, and forwarded to LifeSiteNews.

Dolan made the remark during a discussion about Gov. Cuomo’s intention to propose a law to make abortion less regulated and more accessible. Cuomo announced the initiative during his State of the State address in January, in which he pledged to “protect a woman’s freedom of choice” by enacting a “Reproductive Health Act."

The governor added, repeating three times, “Because it is her body, it is her choice. Because it's her body, it's her choice. Because it's her body, it's her choice.”

During this week’s radio interview, the host of the show, Fred Dicker, asked Cardinal Dolan how Cuomo “could be a leader on an issue that the Church fundamentally feels so strongly about," namely abortion, and “still be considered a Catholic in good standing?”

“Well, I don’t mind telling you that’s one of the things the governor and I talk about,” Cardinal Dolan responded. “And look, he and I have very grave differences. And this is one of them.”

The cardinal added that while he doesn’t like to “blab on the radio” about private conversations about matters of conscience, “I don’t mind telling you…that’s something that I talk turkey with him about, and leave it at that.”

The remark was interpreted by the New York Times as suggesting that the cardinal has reservations about whether Gov. Cuomo, who was also the leading advocate of New York’s 2011 gay “marriage” law, is a Catholic in good standing.

The archdiocese moved quickly to quell this interpretation.

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Pope's mission app launch spreads Gospel

With the touch of an iPad, Pope Francis became the first pontiff to unlock a new smartphone application and expanded the Church’s footprint in the digital world.

“I was quite anxious that we were going to get the signal and it was all going to work. Because this isn’t made up, these folks are actually waiting for the Holy Father to hit this button before it works,” said Father Andrew Small in a May 17 CNA interview.

The launch of the MISSIO App took place May 17 in the Vatican’s Clementine Hall during a meeting of the Pope and the 120 national directors of the Pontifical Mission Societies.

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Pro-life congressmen introduce 'No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act'

Before I even read the rest of the article, I knew Chris Smith would be one of the sponsors... He's a true pro-life hero!  I especially like NOT using taxpayer money for abortion. 

On Wednesday U.S. Congressmen Chris Smith, R-NJ, and Dan Lipinski, D-IL - who are co-chairs of the Bipartisan Congressional Pro-Life Caucus - and U.S. Senator Roger Wicker, R-MS, announced the introduction of the "No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act."

The legislation, which has been introduced as H.R. 7 in the House and S. 946 in the Senate, has the support of 95 cosponsors in the House and 21 in the Senate. (The text of the bill can be read at here).


Congressman Smith said of the bills:

More than 100 members of Congress have joined us in introducing the No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act, a government-wide prohibition on taxpayer subsidization for abortion. With the recent murder convictions of Dr. Gosnell, we’ve got to encourage Americans to ask—how different really is Gosnell’s House of Horrors from abortions that occur in clinics throughout the country? Not much, not much at all,” said Smith. “There are Kermit Gosnells all over America. Some abortionists may have cleaner sheets than Gosnell, and better sterilized equipment and better trained accomplices, but what they do—what Gosnell did is the same—kill babies and hurt women. President Obama has said he wants abortion to be rare. To Mr. Obama I say, ‘here is a bill for you.’ Even the Guttmacher Institute, the former research arm of Planned Parenthood, confirms that taxpayer funding bans are a proven abortion reduction method. According to Guttmacher, studies show that when abortion is not publically funded, abortions in the covered population are reduced by roughly 25 percent.


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Pope: 'If we annoy people, blessed be the Lord'

I love how Pope Francis speaks so plainly and yet profoundly at the same time. In the video below, he also urges us not to be backseat Christians.

The Pope told Christians it is better to be “annoying” and “a nuisance” than lukewarm in proclaiming Jesus Christ.

“If we annoy people, blessed be the Lord,” said Pope Francis during his morning Mass at the Vatican on May 16.

“We can ask the Holy Spirit to give us all this apostolic fervor and to give us the grace to be annoying when things are too quiet in the Church,” he said at the chapel of the Saint Martha residence, where he lives.

He celebrated the Mass alongside Cardinal Peter Turkson and Bishop Mario Toso, the president and the secretary of the Vatican Council for Justice and Peace.

Council staff and employees from Vatican Radio were among those attending the Eucharistic celebration.

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St. Paschal Baylon

The Saint of the Day for May 17 is St. Paschal Baylon.

Paschal Baylon (named after the day of his birth and death: Pentecost Sunday—Pascha Pentekostes) was a simple, pious shepherd boy who later became an ardent spiritual son of St. Francis and the heavenly patron of adorers of the Most Blessed Sacrament. He belongs to that illustrious circle of saints who, by heroic holiness of life, refurbished the Church's crown that had been desecrated by the heretics of the sixteenth century. He hailed from the Spanish section of Valencia and died at the age of 52. As he lay dead upon the bier, he opened and closed his eyes twice when the sacred species were elevated at the consecration. Leo XIII declared him the heavenly patron of all Eucharistic leagues and societies.

One day Paschal heard the bells of a convent announce the approaching consecration at Mass. Such an ardent longing for God overcame him that, prompted by yearning and love, he involuntarily cried out: "O God, most worthy of all adoration, please let me see You!" Hardly had he uttered the prayer when a glowing star appeared in the sky. As he watched, the heavens opened; the star disappeared and was replaced by a chalice with the Host, flanked by two adoring angels. Christian art has selected this vision to show his chief virtue, viz., love for the most holy Eucharist.

Excerpted from The Church's Year of Grace, Pius Parsch