Roman Catholic Blog

"Catholic" surgeon general nominee supports Obama abortion stance, White House says

Washington D.C., Jul 15, 2009 / 07:09 pm (CNA).

"Speculation about whether President Barack Obama’s new nominee for surgeon general is a pro-life Catholic has been circulating in the press and on the internet. On Wednesday, a White House spokesman touched on the matter but only said Dr. Regina Benjamin supports the president on “reproductive health issues.”

 

Dr. Benjamin, a rural Catholic doctor from Alabama, has served on the board of the Catholic Health Association. She  has also received the Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice award from the Pope because of her example in her Catholic faith and in her medical profession, Monsignor Michael L. Farmer told CNA on Monday.

 

Msgr. Farmer, rector at the cathedral in Mobile, Alabama. Benjamin had served as a lector there. Acknowledging that he did not “explicitly” know the nominee’s position on abortion and other life issues, he said that to his knowledge she has been “in conformity with the Catholic Church.”

 

The monsignor also expressed hope she would adhere to Catholic moral teaching in a position with the Obama administration.

 

However, White House spokesman Reid Cherlin told McClatchy Newspapers on Wednesday that Dr. Benjamin “supports the president’s position on reproductive health issues.”

President Obama supports legalized abortion, public funding of contraception and “comprehensive” sex education.

 

“Like him she believes that this is an issue where it is important to try and seek common ground and come together to try and reduce the number of unintended pregnancies,” Cherlin continued, according to McClatchy. “As a physician, she is deeply committed to the philosophy of putting her patients' needs first when it comes to providing care.”

 

Dr. Benjamin founded and operated the Bayou La Batre Rural Health Clinic, which does not perform abortions. An unidentified clinic employee told McClatchy that patients seeking information about abortions would be referred to providers in the state.

The surgeon general nominee was also a board member between 1996 and 2000 of Physicians for Human Rights (PHR), an international group that has advocated access to “safe” abortions in its investigations of conditions in some countries.

 

A PHR associate of Benjamin's said that during her time on the board abortion “was never a focus of her advocacy work.”

 

Dr. Benjamin is President Obama’s second proposed candidate for surgeon general. He had previously considered CNN’s Dr. Sanjay Gupta, who withdrew himself from consideration in March."

 

see: http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/new.php?n=16572

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Let's see if I have read this article correctly? The Diocese of Mobile nominates Dr. Benjamin for the Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice Award. She is granted the award by the Holy Father. Nonetheless the Rector of the Cathedral in Mobile can state:

"he did not “explicitly” know the nominee’s position on abortion and other life issues..."

Wilbur, Wilbur, Wilbur!

The Diocese of Orange just can't stay out of the news.

Over at Patrick Madrid's Blog (http://patrickmadrid.blogspot.com/) old Monsignor Wilbur Davis (pic above) has made it into the news again.

"You Call This "Maturity"? - May 26, 2009

I respond here to a letter-to-the-editor from a Catholic priest which appeared in the Daily Pilot. The letter's headline is: "Mature Catholics Welcome Obama," referring to the recent controversy over the University of Notre Dame's decision to confer an honorary doctorate on the President of the United States, who just  happens to be an implacable foe of the Catholic Church's teaching that abortion is a grave moral evil.

The obvious implication of the headline [most likely chosen by the Pilot editors] is that Catholics who did not approve of this stunt are "immature." That would include, of course, the 70+ U.S. Bishops and 350,000+ other Catholics who publicly denounced the Notre Dame debacle. According to the Pilot and, presumably, the priest who wrote the following letter, they are the immature ones, and those who laud Notre Dame's actions are the ones exhibiting "maturity."

The author of the letter to the editor is a Monsignor Wilbur Davis, a priest in Southern California. "

 ________________

A few years ago old Wilbur was in the news when some of his e-mails were leaked.

 

In his brilliant article, The roots of the Catholics' scandal, Orange County Register commentator, Steven Greenhut wrote:

"A 1998 letter from the diocese's current vocations director, Fr. Wilbur Davis, to Director of Communications Msgr. Lawrence Baird, also deals with topics in the Bulletin. Fr. Davis depicted Catholic Family Radio as extremist. He called Mother Angelica, the TV nun who offers kind-hearted but traditional Catholic opinions, an apostle of 'religious intolerance and arrogance.' He criticized one of the nation's well-respected traditional Catholic colleges [Franciscan University of Steubenville] as 'the home of Catholics United for the Faith, a pathetic organization of bitter people.' (The roots of the Catholics' scandal, by Steven Greenhut, Orange County Register, June 9, 2002)"

 _____________________

Back in 1988, Davis locked horns with then Orange Bishop Norman McFarland.

 

"MAY ALL BISHOPS BE SO BOLD: In late March, Bishop Norman McFarland of the diocese of Orange sent a letter to Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez (D-46th District), who is running for re-election, telling her she could not continue to address Catholics from the pulpit. The bishop's letter warned Sanchez, a staunch pro-abortionist, that it is "incumbent upon you to give witness to the consistent ethic of life that should animate all conduct, but most especially political conduct." The bishop said he was "becoming increasingly alarmed by your visits, I want to share with you my inquietudes in this matter before more public gestures on my part become necessary."

"Beginning in early March, Sanchez made the rounds of parishes, including at least four in the Orange Diocese. According to parishioners at St. Boniface in Anaheim, Sanchez was introduced from the pulpit by the pastor, Monsignor Wilbur Davis. He introduced her as a fellow Catholic but made no reference to her pro-abortion stance or her support of President Clinton's veto of the partial-birth abortion ban. Sanchez appeared at St. Callistus church in Garden Grove on Respect Life Sunday. According to one parishioner, when she confronted the pastor, Father Rudolph Preciado, with Sanchez' pro-abortion stance the next day, he told her that most priests are too busy to keep up with current events."

(See: http://www.sdnewsnotes.com/ed/notes/0698note.htm)

 

___________________________

 

And this guy was the vocations director in

Orange for eight (-8-) years?!

Pope Basher Gets Obama Nod...

Obama Faith Adviser opines - "Pope Benedict" is a "discredited" leader.

Prior to his appointment to the President's Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships Harry Knox told a gay newspaper that the Knights of Columbus do "a great deal of good" but they are following "discredited leaders" such as Pope Benedict.

On Wednesday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said she was not aware of the negative comments, CNS News reports.

However, Pelosi praised the Catholic Church for what it has done about poverty, disease and climate change when asked about the Obama adviser's comments.

In April, Obama named Harry Knox to the President's Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. Knox, a Christian, is the director of the faith and religion program at the Human Rights Campaign, a homosexual rights organization.

"The Knights of Columbus do a great deal of good in the name of Jesus Christ, but in this particular case, they were foot soldiers of a discredited army of oppression," Knox told the Bay Area Reporter, a San Francisco-based gay newspaper, in March.

He was referring to the Knights' support for Proposition 8, a California state constitutional amendment approved by voters in November 2008 that defined marriage as being between one man and one woman.

The newspaper further reported: "Knox noted that the Knights of Columbus 'followed discredited leaders,' including bishops and Pope Benedict XVI. 'A pope who literally today said condoms don't help in control of AIDS.'"

See: http://clericalwhispers.blogspot.com/2009/05/benedict-discredited-obama-faith.html

Catholic Identity Crisis

Great article at National Review on-line by Fr. Robert A Sirico at the Acton Institute.

April 17, 2009, 3:30 p.m.

The Catholic Identity Crisis
What the Georgetown and Notre Dame controversies reveal.

By Rev. Robert A. Sirico

Here are the money quotes:

"If this thesis is correct, then it is not far-fetched to assert that nominal Catholics are in the midst of an identity crisis. They are embarrassed by the distinctiveness of their more faithful brethren who observe fast days, don’t approve of abortion, think marriage is what their grandparents thought it was, and hold conservative views on the other hot-button issues that Catholics in public life frequently get asked about by reporters."

"Of course, nominal Catholics would deny such an identity crisis. We simply believe in a pluralistic and tolerant society, they would insist. But if the Georgetown episode doesn’t reflect an identity crisis — the religious family that was once the Church’s leading defender blots out their name (Jesuit) and their historic inspiration (Jesus) — then what does?"

"Think of it: A Catholic university was willing to cover up the name of Jesus, hide it from the cameras, because the president of the United States was coming and asked them to do so. The fact alone gives me chills."

"At the root of tolerance is the notion that one is permissive, not about one’s own beliefs, but about the beliefs of those with whom one disagrees. If you do not know who you are and what you hold to be true, you cannot be tolerant."

For the full article see:

http://article.nationalreview.com/print/?q=ZDAyYTdiMjU5N2RmOGI4NjdkY2VjYWViN2ZmNDE4ZDE=

Obama DID ask that Jesus' Name be covered...

Georgetown Says It Covered Over Name of Jesus

to Comply With White House Request

Wednesday, April 15, 2009
By Edwin Mora

(CNSNews.com) - Georgetown University says it covered over the monogram "IHS"--symbolizing the name of Jesus Christ—because it was inscribed on a pediment on the stage where President Obama spoke at the university on Tuesday and the White House had asked Georgetown to cover up all signs and symbols there.

As of Wednesday afternoon, the "IHS" monogram that had previously adorned the stage at Georgetown’s Gaston Hall was still covered up--when the pediment where it had appeared was photographed by CNSNews.com.

"In coordinating the logistical arrangements for yesterday’s event, Georgetown honored the White House staff’s request to cover all of the Georgetown University signage and symbols behind Gaston Hall stage," Julie Green Bataille, associate vice president for communications at Georgetown, told CNSNews.com.

"The White House wanted a simple backdrop of flags and pipe and drape for the speech, consistent with what they’ve done for other policy speeches," she added. "Frankly, the pipe and drape wasn’t high enough by itself to fully cover the IHS and cross above the GU seal and it seemed most respectful to have them covered so as not to be seen out of context."

On Wednesday, CNSNews.com inspected the pediment embedded in the wall at the back of the stage in Gaston Hall, where Obama delivered his speech. The letters "IHS" were not to be found. They appeared to be shrouded with a triangle of black-painted plywood.

Pictures of the wooden pediment prior to Obama’s speech show the letters "IHS" in gold. Many photos posted on the Internet of other events at Gaston Hall show the letters clearly.

The White House did not respond to a request from CNSNews.com to comment on the covering up of Jesus’ name at Gaston Hall.

Georgetown, which is run by the Jesuit order, is one of the most prestigious Catholic institutions of higher education in the United States.

Roman Catholics traditionally use "IHS" as an abbreviation for Jesus’ name. According to the Catholic Encyclopedia, "St. Ignatius of Loyola adopted the monogram in his seal as general of the Society of Jesus (1541) and thus became the emblem of his institute." The Society of Jesus is the formal name for the Jesuits.

Although the monogram was covered over on the wooden pediment at the back of the Gaston Hall stage where it would have been directly above and behind President Obama as he spoke, the letters "IHS" are posted elsewhere around the hall approximately 26 times on shields representing different parts of the United States and the world.

Obama did not mention the name of Jesus during his address. However, he did mention Christ’s Sermon on the Mount.

"There is a parable at the end of the Sermon on the Mount that tells a story of two men…‘the rain descended and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house…it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock,’" Obama said.

"We cannot rebuild this economy on the same pile of sand," he added. "We must build our house upon a rock."

 

SEE: http://www.cnsnews.com/public/content/article.aspx?RsrcID=46667

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The primary opprobrium for this should be directed not at our secular humanist President, but at the "Roman Catholic" religious order - the so named "Society of Jesus," for taking part in this affrontery.

An "Extreme Embarrassment."

 

President of US Bishops' Conference:

Notre Dame Obama Invite an "Extreme Embarrassment"

By Kathleen Gilbert

From: http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2009/mar/09033106.html

NOTRE DAME, Indiana, March 31, 2009

Cardinal Francis George, Archbishop of Chicago, has said that the University of Notre Dame's decision to host and honor President Obama at their commencement ceremony this year was an "extreme embarrassment" to Catholics.

"Whatever else is clear, it is clear that Notre Dame didn't understand what it means to be Catholic when they issued this invitation," George told the crowd at a conference Saturday on the Vatican document Dignitatis Personae. The conference was hosted by the Chicago archdiocese's Respect Life office and Office for Evangelization at the Marriott O'Hare hotel.

In a video obtained by LifeSiteNews.com (LSN) today, Cardinal George prefaced his remarks by noting that although he is the president of the USCCB, he does not have jurisdiction or authority over other bishops. His role, he indicated, nonetheless has "some moral authority, without any kind of jurisdiction or any sort of real authority."

"As president of the U.S. bishops' conference I have to precisely speak for the bishops and not in my own name, as I could as Archbishop of Chicago," he added.

George said he had spoken with the administrative committee of the bishops' conference and corresponded with University president Fr. John Jenkins several times on the issue.

"That conversation will continue .... whether or not it will have some kind of consequence that will bring, I think, the University of Notre Dame to its [the USCCB's] understanding of what it means to be Catholic," said the Cardinal. "That is, when you're Catholic, everything you do changes the life of everybody else who calls himself a personal Catholic - it's a network of relationships.

"So quite apart from the president's own positions, which are well known, the problem is in that you have a Catholic university - the flagship Catholic university - do something that brought extreme embarrassment to many, many people who are Catholic," said the cardinal.

"So whatever else is clear, it is clear that Notre Dame didn't understand what it means to be Catholic when they issued this invitation, and didn't anticipate the kind of uproar that would be consequent to the decision, at least not to the extent that it has happened," said George.

The Cardinal urged concerned Catholics "to do what you are supposed to be doing: to call, to email, to write letters, to express what's in your heart about this: the embarrassment, the difficulties."

Our Lady's University?

NOTRE DAME, Indiana, March 20, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) - White House Secretary Robert Gibbs stated today that Obama will give the commencement address at Notre Dame University this year. The school confirmed the announcement, stating on its website that Obama will also receive an honorary doctor of laws degree at the University's 164th University Commencement Ceremony at 2 p.m. May 17 in the Joyce Center on campus. In 2004, the United States of Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) approved a policy statement called "Catholics in Political Life," which says, with reference to pro-abortion politicians, "They should not be given awards, honors or platforms which would suggest support for their actions."

President Obama has been called the "abortion president" by pro-life activists, and his appearance at the university would appear to violate the USCCB's policy against honoring pro-abortion politicians.

The "unseen" villian in all this is Rev. John I. Jenkins, C.S.C., President of Notre Dame. (pic below)

 

His ND bio reads:

Rev. John Jenkins, C.S.C., professor of philosophy, presently serves as President of the University of Notre Dame. Areas of scholarly interest include medieval philosophy, particularly Aquinas and Augustine, philosophy of religion and epistemology. He received a B.A. and M.A. in philosophy from the University of Notre Dame (1976, 1978), a Licentiate in Sacred Theology from the Jesuit School of Theology at Berkeley (1984) and a D.Phil. in philosophy from Oxford University (1989). He is th author of Knowledge and Faith in Thomas Aquinas (Cambridge University Press, 1997) and of articles which have appeared in The Journal of Philosophy, Medieval Philosophy and Theology, and Journal of Religious Ethics.

"Father" Jenkins can add inviting Obama to speak (and receive an honorary doctorate) to his list of infamy which includes his allowing the Notre Dame Queer Film Festival and the Vagina Monologues to be hosted on a campus supposedly dedicated to Our Lady!

Miracle on the Potomac.

I just returned from a conference in Washington DC. I've attended this conference for almost each of the last ten years. This trip was unique in two ways:

1.) The "cult" of President Obama is alive and well in our nation's capital. I have NEVER, and I mean NEVER seen so overt a "cult of personality" as pertains to an elected official. Even in the museums; e.g., the Smithsonian, the National Portrait Gallery, he is omnipresent.

I don't mean the blasphemous Obama votive candles like those above. I actually didn't see any of these. Poor St. Martin de Porres, one wonders whether he's laughing or crying in heaven?

 

No, I mean these omnipresent Obama "hope" images liker this one below.

It triggered a memory in me of twenty five years ago, when still an undergraduate I had to switch trains in Berlin's Alexanderplatz station. At that time the leader of communist East Germany was Erich Hoenecker. His picture was everywhere in the DDR (East Germany).

 

In the midst of all this adulation, in Washington DC a morally "suspect" city irregardless of who is President, there exists an unbelievably vibrant liturgical life.

2.) If you want good liturgy go to DC. I had been familiar from past trips with the Basilica of the Immaculate Conception, the largest Church in North America. (Pic below)

All day, every day, at multiple hours there are masses, confessions, adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, etc...  I got off a plane at 4:00pm, checked into my hotel, drove up to Catholic University (on whose grounds the Basilica is found) and voila - there was some form of devotion on-going. I needed to go to confession, and is normally the case found an incredibly erudite confessor (probably an academic at CUA).

The next day, which was Sunday, I decided to go to mass at the Cathedral of St. Matthew.(pic below) They offer a Novus Ordo Latin Mass at 10:00 am on Sundays. It was sublime. It was the best done mass I have attended outside of St. Michael's Abbey in Orange County.

 

My point is this, even in the midst of the ascension to power in the government of the United States of a President like Barak Obama, with the tide of secular humanism rising higher and higher, there exist pockets of grace - at places like The Basilica of the Shrine of the Immaculate Conception and at the Cathedral of St. Matthew.

If G*d initially spared Sodom because of a handful of righteous men, who knows the beneficial impact of good churches in staying G*d's hand from punishing our Republic?

Niederauer's Communicant

 

Apparently, those "private conversations" Archbishop Milktoast

(er Nierderauer) has had with Speaker Pelosi have had an effect.

GADS!

 

PELOSI SAYS BIRTH CONTROL WILL HELP ECONOMY
The Drudge Report

Sun Jan 25 2009 22:13:43 ET

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi boldly defended a move to add birth control funding to the new economic "stimulus" package, claiming "contraception will reduce costs to the states and to the federal government."

Pelosi, the mother of 5 children and 6 grandchildren, who once said, "Nothing in my life will ever, ever compare to being a mom," seemed to imply babies are somehow a burden on the treasury.

The revelation came during an exchange Sunday morning on ABC's THIS WEEK.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Hundreds of millions of dollars to expand family planning services. How is that stimulus?

PELOSI: Well, the family planning services reduce cost. They reduce cost. The states are in terrible fiscal budget crises now and part of what we do for children's health, education and some of those elements are to help the states meet their financial needs. One of those - one of the initiatives you mentioned, the contraception, will reduce costs to the states and to the federal government.

STEPHANOPOULOS: So no apologies for that?

PELOSI: No apologies. No. we have to deal with the consequences of the downturn in our economy.

The Dance Macabre Begins

While the media wants us to focus on images like the one found below.... 

A very different type of dance has started......

 

From President Obama's official website:

• Supporting Stem Cell Research: President Obama and Vice President Biden believe that we owe it to the American public to explore the potential of stem cells to treat the millions of people suffering from debilitating and life-threatening diseases. Obama is a co-sponsor of the Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act of 2007, which will allow research of human embryonic stem cells derived from embryos donated (with consent) from in vitro fertilization clinics. These embryos must be deemed in excess and created based solely for the purpose of fertility treatment.
• Supports a Woman's Right to Choose: President Obama understands that abortion is a divisive issue, and respects those who disagree with him. However, he has been a consistent champion of reproductive choice and will make preserving women's rights under Roe v. Wade a priority in his Adminstration. He opposes any constitutional amendment to overturn the Supreme Court's decision in that case.
• Preventing Unintended Pregnancy: President Obama was an original co-sponsor of legislation to expand access to contraception, health information, and preventive services to help reduce unintended pregnancies. Introduced in January 2007, the Prevention First Act will increase funding for family planning and comprehensive sex education that teaches both abstinence and safe sex methods. The Act will also end insurance discrimination against contraception, improve awareness about emergency contraception, and provide compassionate assistance to rape victims.

See: http://www.whitehouse.gov/agenda/women/