Saint Pio (d. 1968)

Less than a fortnight before his death, Padre Pio wrote to Pope Paul VI:

“I know that Your heart suffers much these days on account of the happenings in the Church: for peace in the world, for the great needs of its peoples; but above all, for the lack of obedience of some, even Catholics, to the lofty teachings which You, assisted by the Holy Spirit and in the name of God, have given us. I offer Your Holiness my daily prayers and sufferings…

“I thank Your Holiness for the clear and decisive words You have spoken in the recent encyclical, Humanae Vitae, and I reaffirm my own faith and my unconditional obedience…”

The reaction of James Patrick Shannon, auxiliary bishop for the Archdiocese of Saint Paul, to the encyclical on contraception was very different.

(After receiving his doctorate from Yale, he became one of the bright lights of Catholic higher education -- being named, at age 34, the president of the College of St. Thomas).

Two months after Padre Pio died, James Shannon resigned his bishop's seat in protest on November 22, 1968.

Progressives who pride themselves as allies of Islam

Why do the president and Secretary of State Clinton think that the rest of the world will be any more open to being hectored about the nobility of homosexuality, than were the more than 30 American states which amended their constitutions to ban same-sex marriage?

Leftists should stop trampling on the dignity of Muslims by trying to flood the Third World with contraceptive pills and abortion clinics.  This is the new benighted colonialism!

An excerpt from‘FrontPage’magazine:

In the early stages of the Iraq War, George Galloway -- a British Member of Parliament and an inveterate America-hater -- gave voice to the mindset underlying the socialist left's alliance with radical Islam. Galloway was asked: "You often call for uniting Muslim and progressive forces globally. How far is it possible under current situation?" He replied:

"Not only do I think it's possible but I think it is vitally necessary and I think it is happening already. It is possible because the progressive movement around the world and the Muslims have the same enemies. Their enemies are the Zionist occupation, American occupation, British occupation of poor countries mainly Muslim countries. They have the same interest in opposing savage capitalist globalization which is intent upon homogenizing the entire world turning us basically into factory chickens which can be forced fed the American diet of everything from food to Coca-Cola to movies and TV culture. And whose only role in life is to consume the things produced endlessly by the multinational corporations. And the progressive organizations & movements agree on that with the Muslims... So on the very grave big issues of the day - issues of war, occupation, justice, opposition to globalization - the Muslims and the progressives are on the same side."

UPDATE:   Corporations are bad, apparently, unless they make things that forward-looking people need.  Here is the tale of the first commercial oral contraceptive ("The prevailing wisdom was that no healthy woman would ever willingly take a drug that neither treated nor prevented disease.")

The Pill was manufactured by Searle – the company headed from 1977-85 by one Donald Rumsfeld.

Caryll Houselander (d. 1954)

Miss Houselander on modern man:

“He thinks that his bewilderment is caused by lack of knowledge about himself, but here man is wrong; the real source of his bewilderment is lack of knowledge about God…

“Man is constantly haunted by the fear that if he is not loved, he will cease to be; this is not a delusion, it is the truth.  If he were not loved, he would cease to be; he exists only because God wills him to be, and keeps him in being, that he may be the object of his own creative love.”

"Nothing in his [decade in Congress] / Became him like the leaving it"

The late Jesuit priest, Robert Drinan, was elected to the U.S. House two years before the Roe v. Wade decision.  During his tenure, Father Drinan (though claiming to be personally aghast at the practice) often spoke up in support of a mother’s freedom to abort.  An evangelical leader such as Jerry Falwell seemed more scandalized at the priest’s stance than Jesuit leaders or Cardinal Medeiros of Boston. 

Eventually, though, the Vatican forbade him from running for re-election.  Urged by many of his supporters to disregard the edict, Father Drinan showed no hesitation in displaying his nobler side:  "That would be unthinkable."

The tragedy of the nuns – such as this angry and confused sister in Saint Paul – who are currently facing off against Pope Benedict and the American bishops is that they are breaking faith with Drinan and Dorothy Day and earlier radicals.  They seem determined to send themselves to Coventry.

Maybe not the best guide to recovering masculine solidarity

The videos and talks of Father Robert Barron are often very impressive – such as this commentary on gender, and how best to steer a boy toward manhood.

Sometimes, though, Barron concedes way too much to trendy progressivism.  Why would he laud Father Richard Rohr as some kind of model of masculinity?

Rohr and his meditation center in New Mexico are hip-deep in a witch’s brew of enneagrams and strident disdain for the teachings of the Catholic Church.  If Rome did a bit more in reining in priests like him, the number of nuns turning feminist somersaults would be fewer.

One further aspect of the kookiness of Father Rohr: he has sung the praises of Eckhart Tolle, a spooky German mystic who is guru to Oprah and other Hollywood folks.