Video Meliora, proboque; Deteriora sequor

[This] indicates that we must make a real distinction between charismatics and liberals. Although both may enjoy informal types of worship, they are not both liberal in their theology. Charismatic Catholics are usually theologically and morally conservative. They are usually very loyal to the pope and to church teaching...One conclusion (which must make the more stuffy traditionalist think twice) is that Charismatics are clearly more open to 'the other side' than the traditionalists are. In other words, (if the report is true) Charismatics seem not only tolerant of the Tridentine Rite, but are happy for it to be more widespread...The Charismatics therefore seem to score the most points on being tolerant, open minded and encouraging towards the Tridentine Rite folks, while most of the afficionados of the Tridentine Rite still throw up their hands in horror at the idea of charismatic styles of worship. Who's more likely to be right? - Fr. Longenecker on news that charismatics cheered the news of the forthcoming widening of the Tridentine mass (tip Darwin Catholic)

It makes me realize how wise the Church is to make Sundays days of obligation for her children. I have proved to myself, well and truly, that if it weren't for external obligation I would be the laziest, slobbiest Catholic on the planet. Obligation alone made me show up every evening to receive the graces that I received. I think that says something about me--maybe about all of us, but I'm not generalizing here. Even in the face of graces received, I'd still stay at home and watch Wheel of Fortune instead. Maybe one day that won't be true. Maybe one day I can do it because it is pleasing to God. How lucky are we? We get graces even when we perform only grudgingly. Now that's a deal! - MamaT of "Summa Mamas"

Something struck me in listening to news coverage of the Virginia Tech shootings. It was a commentator on National Public Radio [who] said something about how these 'children' don't seem to have the respect for human life. I think that the commentator was talking about violent video games especially the 'first-person shooter' games. But it really struck me that this is the generation that grew up with around 1/4 of its members missing due to abortion. And this is also a generation where many have a belief system that justifies abortion due to the belief that the baby's soul is just recycled, that killing the baby now will give it a chance for a 'better life' somewhere else where it is wanted. - Alicia of "Fructus Ventris"

With a recent study showing that today's college students are the most narcissistic and self-centered in decades, a small chorus of professionals is offering a bold response: We have no one to blame but ourselves. "Things went too far," says psychologist Jean Twenge, lead author of the study and a professor at San Diego State University. What she means is that parents overcorrected for the harshness of a previous generation that preferred children to be "seen and not heard." - clip from the "Boston Globe" via Henry Dieterich

I see a lot of strong people trampling on weak people. Bruised reeds are there for the breaking, it seems, particularly among those who view tensions within the Church in militaristic terms. If you're fighting a war -- of culture, of liturgy, of ideas -- then it only makes sense to strike where the enemy is weak. But what if the enemy isn't the ones with a particular weakness? What if the enemy is the weakness itself? Then, I'd say, two things follow. First, people who are weak should not be treated as enemies. Second, we'd better make sure the people we do treat as enemies aren't people who are weak. My impulse is to assume that anyone I perceive as trampling on a weak person is himself strong, and so I may treat him as a strong person. To a strong person, I can say, "Hey, you! Stop trampling on that weak person!" But my impulsive assumption is, in general, false. Someone trampling on someone else may well be weak -- his very habit of trampling may be his weakness. In that case, for me to treat him as a strong person could be for me to trample on his weakness, to treat this bruised reed as though he were an oak tree. So I'm in a bit of a fix. On the one hand, I firmly support a "No Bellyaching" rule; I think there are too many complainers who can, and therefore ought to, shut their pie hole and suck it up. On the other hand, I have no way of knowing who, in particular, is breaking that rule. - Tom of Disputations

Many of us in the trenches have suffered the arrogant criticism of "principle" pro-lifers who dismiss our legislative efforts because "they don't outlaw abortion." -Wanda Franz, president of National Right to Life

As some of you know, I have a mentally ill son, now age 25. He is living in the streets. There are two kinds of social workers, I have found. The first kind tries to force "solutions" on the perceived problems of someone like my son. This does not work. He will do his best to sabotage any efforts made in this direction. The second, and wiser, social worker, lets the client take the lead. If a homeless person shows a persistent interest in living indoors, such a social worker will facilitate that, but only on the condition of the client's continuing initiative. (Not cooperation. Initiative.) Experience has shown that only the latter approach works. So also God. He has gone the extra mile in reaching out to us, but under the rules He Himself has imposed (love must be freely given, not coerced) there is only so far He can go. At some point we must take the initiative if this is to be truly what He desires, that is, love. So to receive, we must truly ask. - commenter Susan on "Ten Reasons"

I am not really surprised to find that Kathy Shaidle and Our Sunday Visitor were not quite a match, but the benefit for us is that we get to now read the column she wrote for OSV that they wouldn't print on the non-coincidence of Lenin's Birthday and Earth Day an how environmentalism has become a substitute religion. I remember as a young atheist the first Earth Day and see now how ecology was my religion and recycling a major sacrament. I remember watching PBS on that first high holy day for environmentalists and dutifully watching a program that contained a cartoon of the whole earth being covered with cement. - Jeff of "Curt Jester"

Cho? I know what we need to know: "gun control" means "free citizens need to learn to use guns and keep them handy." - Bill of "Summa Minutiae"

There is a difference between the Christian concept of loving your enemies and the secular concept of appeasing them. The former says "I believe you to be wrong and I do not trust you in the slightest, but I will seek your good even to the risk of my own hurt"; the latter says, "We're both basically right, you just need to let us know what we can do or how we can change so that we can all get along." Human nature has always seemed to ensure the appeaser's outcome: stone dead or supplicating upon deaf and heartless ears. - Ham of "Social Engineer"

During my second year at McGill, I plunged into the deepest depression I’ve ever known. I wrestled in prayer, searched the scriptures, examined my conscience, and fell apart. I told my wife about it one night; the next morning, a letter arrived from a Christian psychotherapist who had felt an inexplicable but irresistible urge to write. I still have that letter. Over the next year I learned more about myself and my emotions than I had thought possible. If today I manage to function as a pastor, it is not least because I know something about pain. I know, too, that healing of memory and imagination is not just wishful thinking. Six years later, as I prepared to teach a course on Jesus in his historical context, I realized what else had been happening. I combed through my notebooks for all my old jottings. All the most significant insights about Jesus I had ever had, particularly my deepest reflections on the crucifixion, were dated in that period of depression. - Anglican bishop N.T. Wright

Let’s get something straight: Lust means desire, not good observational skills. Some women are sexy. To deny it is to lie and look like a fool. There is, however, a great deal of difference between seeing what is plain to everyone and desiring that person. - blogger at "Eating Words"

I went to a distinguished Evangelical university for a couple of years. In the dorm rooms masturbation by and large wasn’t taken seriously; it was joked about, taken as a given and unavoidable. I only knew a handful of guys that seriously engaged it as sin, that rigorously fought against the temptation. My own (Lutheran) pastor told me not to take it too seriously during a conversation in private confession — an admonition that at the time I loved and was thankful for (for obvious reasons), but in retrospect I see it as a grievous error.) Fight fire with fire, I say. Uphold chastity at all costs, even magnify and extol those who ‘are made eunuchs for the Kingdom’, instead of looking at them as abnormal or somehow deficient. - commenter on "Eating Words"

Perhaps that it isn't appreciated as it should be is indicative of our need for such mercy, as well as God's willingness to dispense it.- Rick Lugari concerning Divine Mercy Sunday