Father Newman (see below) may have at least one big gun on his side, rhetorically if not canonically or theologically. According to the student newspaper of Catholic University of America, Cardinal Francis Stafford, a longtime American in the Roman Curia, on Thursday night painted an apocalytpic picture of the America he sees in the wake of Obama's victory:
His Eminence James Francis Cardinal Stafford criticized President-elect Barack Obama as "aggressive, disruptive and apocalyptic," and said he campaigned on an "extremist anti-life platform," Thursday night in Keane Auditorium during his lecture "Pope Paul VI and Pope John Paul II: Being True in Body and Soul."
"Because man is a sacred element of secular life," Stafford remarked, "man should not be held to a supreme power of state, and a person's life cannot ultimately be controlled by government.""For the next few years, Gethsemane will not be marginal. We will know that garden," Stafford said, comparing America's future with Obama as president to Jesus' agony in the garden. "On November 4, 2008, America suffered a cultural earthquake."
Cardinal Stafford said Catholics must deal with the "hot, angry tears of betrayal" by beginning a new sentiment where one is "with Jesus, sick because of love."
The lecture, hosted by the Pontifical John Paul II Institute for Studies on Marriage and Family, pertained to Humanae Vitae, a papal encyclical written by Pope Paul VI in 1968 and celebrating its 40 anniversary this year.
Stafford also spoke about the decline of a respect for human life and the need for Catholics to return to the original values of marriage and human dignity.
"If 1968 was the year of America's 'suicide attempt,' 2008 is the year of America's exhaustion," said Stafford, an American Cardinal and Major Penitentiary of the Apostolic Penitentiary for the Tribunal of the Holy See. "In the intervening 40 years since Humanae Vitae, the United States has been thrown upon ruins."
This destruction and America's decline is largely in part due to the Supreme Court's decisions in the life-issue cases of 1973, specifically Roe v. Wade. Stafford asserted these cases undermined respect for human life in the United States.
"Its scrupulous meanness has had catastrophic effects upon the unity and integrity of the American republic," said Stafford.
Wow. I bet that wasn't the tenor of Obama's chat with the Pope the other day. Then again, lieutenants are there to do the dirty work so the white cassock stays clean.
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Gee! If the above is true, DGF, it just proves that the lovely leaders of the "ONE TRUE CHURCH" have once again been proven to be just plain people, with the potential to be as corrupt as anyone else, and certainly not special. Climbing over bodies to get to the top is true in church as well as in secular business. However I find the idea that the church even thinks they are that special very arrogant! There is not just one church ....there are many and all are, to their followers, THE church. ____As to what JC would have created? Who knows?
Fr. John Dear is an unfortunately wrong and a political ideologue.
God is all about people having sex. Read Song of Solomon. He just sets guidelines, like saving sex for married couples. The rules are there so that people can enjoy sex in the way it was intended.
As to what kind of church Jesus created, well it was the one that believed that He is the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father but by Him. We can differ on a lot of the things as Christians, but that is a fundamental belief. I have to believe Christ died for my sins to be a Christian. I welcome all my brothers and sisters in other denominations.
And pagansister is right about our outlooks as Christians. We should have joy. We are all fallen people, redeemed by the grace of God. Christians are just beggars who have found bread. I am not saved by my works, but by grace alone.
____I would like to know if Stafford was as equally outraged and outspoken__about the vile behaviour of his fellow pedophiliac priest. Maybe he __should focus on seeking justice for children whose childhoods have been stolen and families destroyed because of their heinous crimes.
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= OBAMA - THE CHRISTIAN IMPOSTOR
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Considering how much Obama has strayed from the teaching in the Bible, he fits the description provided by the apostle Paul in his second letter to Timothy. Paul says "men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear." Obama's position on abortion, homosexuality and other issues (and his own mocking of the Bible), fits the description. And Pauls calls these people "evil men and impostors."
Spurgeon wrote "It were a sad dishonour to a child of God to be the world's favourite. It is a very ill omen to hear a wicked world clap its hands and shout 'Well done' to the Christian man."
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