HEDGE OF REASON (Letter to Dom Post, January 30)

Next time I’m driving through Waiks, I’ll divert down Te Moana Road just so I can gaze upon that magnificent “Hedge of Reason” (January 30) - and maybe go on down to the beach for coffee.

 

For heaven’s sake, this is a tourist attraction. Waikanae should be advertising it. In France and Italy trees encroach on roadways everywhere and drivers slow down to enjoy them.

 

“A thing of beauty is a joy for ever” – but not it seems, if the worthies of Waikanae have their wicked way.

 

AIDEMORT PSEUDO-FRENCH FOR LETHAL INJECTION (letter to Sunday-Star Times, January 30)

The whole tenor of the push for euthanasia (Letters, January 29) is for people like Lecretia Seales whose illness is incurable. That’s hardly unforeseeable circumstances excusing the attending physician from maintaining the patient’s life, which is the meaning of Dr Tony Atkinson’s obscure expression, “force majeure”.

 

As for the “huge toll” taken by euthanasia on the attending physician, Atkinson could read Josie Crawley’s story in the same issue. It’s family who take the major toll, can take it bravely and turn it to good account.

 

“Aidemort” is Atkinson’s own pseudo-French euphemism for a lethal injection or its equivalent. David Seymour’s End of Life Choice Bill is certainly irredeemably flawed, but for doctors who live by the Hippocratic oath there’s no moral and ethical hazard. They know a physician is there to sustain life, not to end it. 

MELANIA TRUMP = COLUMN INCHES (Letter to Dom Post, January 26)

Oh, cheer up Rosemary (Pity Melania, trapped in centre of Trump's dismal fairytale, January 26). Think of the column inches you’ll get out of Melania and her frocks and hairdos.

A whole lot more than you’ll ever get out of Mary English.

AUTHENTIC PRAYER AND CONTEMPLATION

From Fr Gabriel of St Mary Magdalen OCD's  classic, 'Divine Intimacy':

While we are on earth, prayer, even contemplation itself, cannot consist solely in the enjoyment of God; it must always be united with sacrifice – only thus is it true.

Authentic prayer and contemplation incite the soul to generosity, disposing it to accept for God any labour or toil, and to give itself entirely to him.

A CONVERSATION AT ADORATION, WITH A SMALL BOY

Today, about five minutes after I'd set up for Adoration, I heard someone else come in. Most unusual. Gabriel arrives at 4.30, Randell at 4.50, Peter at 4.55 and Linda occasionally at either 4 p m on the knocker when Adoration begins, or at 5 p m for Mass. I thought I heard jandals so I thought, Linda, a bit late. For some reason though, after a few minutes I opened my eyes and saw a small boy. Filippino. In crocs.

I went over to sit beside him and said, “Are you looking for Father?” No, he’d just seen the door open and a car outside and thought he’d come in. On his way home from a swim. He had his togs and towel in a supermarket bag which he kept twirling between his knees. He was about seven. He reminded me of both the little boys I’ve just seen in Lion and Moonlight. A beautiful kid. We had a conversation, starting with an explanation of Jesus in the monstrance, and moved on to the Stations of the Cross. Why did Jesus die? Why didn’t God save Him? Then Adam and Eve – why was it wrong to eat the apple? Why didn’t God kill the devil?

His name was Caleb. “It’s in the Bible. Do you know about Caleb?” No, I didn’t. We sort of ended with hell. He didn’t want to go to hell, because it’s like boiling lava and you never get out. Yes, I said, and aren’t we so blessed that we know there is a hell and how to keep out of it? Yes, he said. 

That’s so good I said, because the devil is the father of lies and his biggest lie is that there’s no such thing as hell and all we have to do to keep out of it is get closer and closer to God and doing what He wants, and further and further from the devil and what he wants.

And God might be wanting Caleb to go home to Dad before he started worrying. Yes, he said, and got up to go. I said I might see him at Mass on Sunday. No, he wouldn’t be there. But he’d be going to Mass. At Havelock North. At Our Lady of Lourdes? I asked. Yes. Maybe my grandson Theo knows him.

I hope so.

BREAST CANCER AND ABORTION: IT'S NOT ROCKET SCIENCE (Letter to Dom Post, Jan 19)

No, we certainly “shouldn’t be overselling how well we understand (breast cancer)” (Mammograms need more scepticism, January 19). Not when the mainstream media seem unable to understand or publicise the proven correlation between this disease and abortion.

Abortion's effect of interrupting the female body’s preparation for pregnancy results in unstable breast tissue which is very vulnerable to the female hormone estrogen, a known carcinogen. It’s not rocket science.

So it’s less a question of misunderstanding than of refusing to face facts.

MAN'S INCLINATION TO INJUSTICE (letter published in Dom Post, Jan 23)

Dr Miles Williams FRACP (January 19), who says “the strength of a democratic society is the freedom it gives its members”, sounds like a just man, although probably one who has never felt threatened.

As Reinhold Niebuhr has observed, it’s man’s capacity for justice that makes democracy possible.

However, the strength of a democratic society is in fact the protection it gives its members, especially the most vulnerable. And Niebuhr reminds us that it’s man’s inclination to injustice which makes democracy necessary.

It’s exactly that inclination which means our democracy must maintain its prohibition on euthanasia.

NO TO TV3 SCREENING 'FIFTY SHADES OF GREY' WHEN KIDS ARE WATCHING

Bob McCoskrie of Family First is on to it. He warns that Tv3 is screening Fifty Shades of Grey with its sexual violence content, on Sunday night at 8.30 pm. I've written to Tv 3 to protest as follows:

In scheduling rubbish such as Fifty Shades of Grey at 8.30 p m – in the school holidays so lots of kids will be glued to the screen - Tv3 are making a very bad call.

 

I’m appalled already at some of the stuff that screens before children’s bedtime. I'm glad to have had a heads-up on this, so I can demonstrate my abhorrence of the mindless and conscienceless way the telly barons are destroying our children’s right to childhood.

 

I'll be taking note of the advertisers who are willing to be associated with a production that has no merit for adults, let alone the children for whom we adults are supposed to have care and responsibility.

I will boycott those advertisers and use social media to encourage others to boycott them also.

ONE REAL PRESENCE, OR THREE? (Letter to NZ Catholic, Jan 18)

Preaching the Eucharist, Fr Rolheiser (N Z Catholic, November 27) says what’s missing in our understanding of the presence of Christ is "the fact that there are three real presences: the Word, the consecrated bread and wine and a saving event’, and "Christ is really present in the Word ... the preaching and the music." (!)

These ‘facts’ are likewise missing from the Catechism of the Catholic Church which states, "Christ’s presence under the Eucharistic species is unique.” (Emphasis added.) The Council of Trent calls the consecrated bread and wine "Christ himself, living and glorious, present in a true, real, and substantial manner; his Body and his Blood, with his soul and his divinity".

Our understanding of the presence of Christ has been dulled by preaching like Rolheiser’s which has led to abuses such as non-Catholics routinely receiving Communion, and ignorance of the grave dangers of this practice (1 Cor 11, 27-29).

 

The Protestant Churches celebrate the word of God as Christ being present. If there’s no difference between Word and Eucharist, why don't we just toddle along to their services? To gloss over the difference between Christ in Word and in Sacrament (signficantly, Rolheiser never uses the word ‘Sacrament’) is to miss the crucial difference between Catholic and Protestant, a difference which will not and cannot go away.

DAVE ARMSTRONG WOULD ROB CHILDREN OF CHILDHOOD (Letter to Dom Post, Jan 17)

Since sex ‘education’ (Don't leave sex education just to parents, January 16) was introduced there has been a huge rise in sexually transmitted infections, pregnancy and abortion among teenagers.

I'd rather have ‘some Bob McCoskrie-type character’ who's capable of grasping that fact teaching our children than someone who can't, someone who can't see its implications and who would rob them of their childhood, like Dave Armstrong.

A POLITICALLY INCORRECT SCRIPTURE VERSE

Here, from Fr Gabriel of St Mary Magdalen, is a thought based on one of those politically incorrect Scripture verses which are no longer in mainstream circulation in the Church in NZ (the Catholic Church, that is, and maybe the Anglican likewise but my other Protestant friends don't have a quarrel with them).

Salvation is a gift, and whoever does not accept it excludes himself from it by his own act; this is the meaning of eternal damnation, foreshadowed in the punishment inflicted on those who have disdained the wedding invitation (in the parable).

... The Church welcomes anyone who wishes to enter ... but at the end of time God himself will make the choice, and those who are taken by surprise ‘without a wedding garment’ will be cast ‘into the outer darkness; these men will weep and gnash their teeth.'

 

MURRAY MCCULLY AS A BRAVE LITTLE DAVID (Letter to Dom Post, Jan10)

Christians who saw your cartoon (Jan 9) depicting Murray McCully as a brave little David and Israel as a horrible, hulking Goliath will be dismayed. I imagine nascent anti-Semitism in Nazi Germany was accompanied by similar manifestations of ill-will.

Would you publish a cartoon with such a Goliath displaying not the star of David but the koru? Hardly.

 

If Israel is Goliath it’s not because of size, but because of the belief in God and his commandments which historically have driven its success as a nation, a belief and success New Zealand would do well to emulate.

WHEN CAN NON-CATHOLICS RECEIVE COMMUNION?

WHEN CAN NON-CATHOLICS RECEIVE HOLY COMMUNION?

Why does the Catholic Church in New Zealand largely ignore the requirements in Scripture and Canon Law for the reception of Holy Communion by non-Catholics?

I attend Mass regularly at a retirement home where Communion is offered to everyone in the room, Catholics and non-Catholics alike. “Would you like to receive Communion today?” asks Father, as the intended recipient lolls in their chair, sometimes fast asleep. It’s as if a plate of mallowpuffs were on offer.

And at the abbey where I’m often privileged to attend Mass it’s ‘come one, come all’. It seems like everyone - including people who obviously don’t know the responses to the parts of the Mass - goes up to receive Communion.

Lest you are about to quote Pope Francis’ statement in November, to the effect that the question of whether or not a non-Catholic can receive Communion in the Catholic Church is one that “must be responded to on one’s own”, we should remember that the Pope wasn’t speaking ‘ex cathedra’. His statement doesn’t come with a guarantee of infallibility. And his prefect of the Congregation of Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, Cardinal Robert Sarah, reminds us that not even the pope can change divine law on Communion:

“The entire Church has always firmly held that one may not receive communion with the knowledge of being in a state of mortal sin, a principle recalled as definitive by (St) Pope John Paul II in his 2003 encyclical ‘Ecclesia de Eucharistia”.

So the question arises, how can a priest know that non-Catholics presenting for Communion even know of this divine law? Let alone be in a state of grace? Cardinal Sarah says of interfaith communion that “it would promote profanation. … My conscience must be enlightened by the rule of the Church, which says that in order to communicate, I need to be in the state of grace, without sin, if married be properly married, and have the faith of the Catholic Church.”

“Rare and exceptional” is the case presented by an Anglican who believes in the Real Presence, but that “is something extraordinary and not ordinary”.

Well, if you’re an Anglican who believes in the Real Presence, wouldn’t you want to be received into the Catholic Church and so be entitled to receive the sacrament, and its inestimable graces, every day? And are such people asked by the priest giving the Sacrament if they wish to be received into the Church?

27 Therefore anyone who eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord unworthily is answerable for the body and blood of the Lord.
28 Everyone is to examine himself and only then eat of the bread or drink from the cup;
29 because a person who eats and drinks without recognising the body is eating and drinking his own condemnation.
30 That is why many of you are weak and ill and a good number have died (1 Corinthians).

And Canon Law is very clear. Canon 874 states that ‘Catholic ministers may lawfully administer the Sacrament only to Catholic members of Christ’s faithful’. Exceptions are allowed if there is danger of death, or ‘when other Christians not having full communion with the Catholic church … cannot approach a minister of their own community and who seek such on their own accord, provided that they manifest Catholic faith in respect to these sacraments and who are properly disposed’.

So there are two conditions for non-Catholic reception of Holy Communion: grave necessity and manifestation of Catholic faith in the Sacrament.

Surely the Catholic Church, in giving Communion to non-Catholics who are presumed to manifest Cathlic faith in the Sacrament, is missing out on a whole lot of putative converts, some of whom might eventually prove to have a vocation to the priesthood.

From Fr Gabriel of St Mary Magdalen OCD:


(The kingdom of God) is a spiritual kingdom, infinitely distant from everything of the senses, or of worldly success or political power; it encompasses the abiding values of the spirit, takes hold of a man from within, transforming him into a child of God and hence into a citizen of his kingdom.

And when through faith and obedience we decide to enter it , this kingdom begins to establish itself within us in a manner that is most intimate and secret, without causing any external change, yet changing everything within.

A BEE IN NZ'S BONNET RE ISRAEL (Letter to Dom Post, Jan 6)

Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (Invasion is laughable but cyber-warfare is not, Jan 5) would laugh even louder than Patrick Smellie at the ridiculous notion of invading New Zealand. Going by the actual report of unnamed ‘Western diplomats”, the “war talk” was threatened not by Israel but by New Zealand.

 

And the idea that Israel would bother with a cyber-attack on New Zealand is just as risible. Really. Yes, Netanyahu did speak of rupture and consequences, but he’s got his hands full as it is.

 

You have to wonder what bee has got into NZ’s bonnet re Israel, and why. It’s almost sounding like we signed up to the UN’s declaration that “Zionism is racism”and Barack Obama’s Organising for Action.

NZ STANDS UP WITH HAMAS AND JIHAD (Letter to Dom Post, Jan 4)

Gillian Feist (January 4) says the Palestinians are “dispossessed and occupied.” In case she’s wondering why America vetoed 40 previous resolutions supporting the Palestinians, she should recall that they are also terrorists. And that the “impoverished Gaza strip” has the money for rockets to fire at Israel. 

 

The UN requirement of Israel in 1967 was not to withdraw from all, but from unspecified “territories occupied”, leaving wriggle-room for the parties to peace settlements and a buffer state with which Israel could negotiate. But the Palestinians refuse to negotiate.

The UN itself should be discredited as dysfunctional for having given millions to UNRWA, an organisation which routinely incites Palestinian students to anti-semitism and terrorism. “Brave Murray McCully” (Dave Armstrong, Jan 2) and New Zealand have in fact stood up with the terrorists Hamas and Jihad, who promptly endorsed this damaging resolution. 

 

And how would Mary and Joseph have felt about going up to the Temple to present the Child Jesus, knowing that they were entering “occupied Palestinan territory”, and that as Jewish visitors to the Jewish Quarter they were now officially criminals?

NO OTHER MEANS

Once again, a quotation from the post-Vatican II edition of Divine Intimacy, which has a meditation for every day of the liturgical year - a wonderful exposition of Catholic doctrine effortlessly absorbed over fresh fruit and honey with home-made Greek yoghurt, and 'I'm indoors' granola, and coffee ... oh, and raw cream:

If we wish to be united to God, we have no other means than to attach ourselves to Jesus, to pass through him, our Mediator, our bridge, our way. Jesus said, “I am the door; if any one enters by me, he will be saved” (Jn 10,9). Here then, is the only condition, the only way of salvation, of holiness.

HONEY IN THE MOUTH

Once more, a thought from Fr Gabriel of St Mary Magdalen:

St Bernard never tires of singing the glories of the name of Jesus: “It is light when it is preached, it is food in meditation, it is balm and healing when it is invoked for aid. ... (It) is honey in the mouth, music in the ear, gladness in the heart. But it is also a remedy. Is any of you sad? Let Jesus come into the heart.

 

A HOLY THOUGHT

Every night I send my children, grown-up and scattered as they are, a collective email which invariably ends with what I call 'a holy thought', taken from whatever I happen to be reading. On the first day of 2017 it occurred to me that I should post that idea, that inspiration, on this blog daily.

So here's last night's offering, from the classic work Divine Intimacy by Fr Gabriel of S Mary Magdalen OCD (the post-Vatican II version):

There is no better way to begin the year than to call upon the name of God and receive from him the precious gift of peace.