PARIS: Attack on a procession honoring Catholics martyred by the Commune

In Paris a couple of days ago there was a procession to honor the Catholic martyrs of the Commune, who were slain 150 years ago on 26 May 1871. Among those killed was the Archbishop of Paris Georges Darboy.

The procession was to go to the Church of Notre-Dame-des-Otages (“hostages”), built in honor of the martyrs. It was not to be.

The procession was attacked by left-wingers who threw things and assaulted people.

The story is at CNA:

[…]

The May 29 procession started from the square de la Roquette, where Darboy was killed on May 24, 1871, and made its way toward Notre-Dame-des-Otages.

As soon as the group left the square, those in the procession were subjected to jeers and whistles, reported the French weekly Famille Chrétienne.

A few minutes later, a group of around 10 men physically attacked the procession, tearing down flags and throwing projectiles.

A video posted on social media showed black-clad, far-left demonstrators punching and kicking participants in the procession.

Two elderly people were reportedly knocked to the ground, with one later requiring stitches for a head injury.

Around 50 demonstrators then blocked the procession near the Church of Notre-Dame de la Croix de Ménilmontant. Organizers asked those taking part in the procession to take refuge in the church, where Paris auxiliary Bishop Denis Jachiet decided that the procession should not proceed to Notre-Dame-des-Otages.

“We waited and prayed until the police extracted us,” the event’s organizer told Le Figaro newspaper, adding that mothers and children were “in shock.”

[…]

How many attacks on churches have there been in France in the last couple of years?

If you don’t think that this sort of thing could happen where you are, guess again.

BTW… on the sidebar of the blog, I have an image of Paris burning while Archbp. Darboy is being shot by the Commune as Our Lord’s Sacred Heart and His Mother are pained over the outrages being carried out.

It's hard to accept that dear old Detters has gone...

I have been sad this bank holiday weekend. It's hard to accept that dear old Detters has gone.

We had such a lively correspondence over the past sixteen years. Rip-roaring, rollicking good fun I always called it. To the outsider it looked like there was animosity. Not so. Deep down we had the ultimate respect for each other. I think Detters saw me as a loveable rogue. There was throughout a sub-text to our banter that the outsider would miss. Take this exchange from last Christmas Eve:

MIDNIGHT MASS

Inbox

Bobby Slingshot <bobbyslingshot8@gmail.com>	Thu, Dec 24, 2020, 5:28 PM
to James

Detters I know that this is very last minute but I do hope you won't attempt to attend Midnight Mass tonight. It's much too dangerous with this new strain of the virus going through Tyneside like wildfire. 

You are a vulnerable person - with your cardiac and renal problems adding further vulnerability.

Detters we don't want to lose you. We need you around for years to come.

By the way I hope you approve of my new Wanda username on the TES. Myself, I think it adds a certain androgynous  insouciance to my posting.

The most hearty Yuletide felicitations to you and yours,

GENE

 

James Woodforde <kochel525@gmail.com>	Thu, Dec 24, 2020, 11:07 PM
to me

FUCK OFF., YOU SLIMY, HYPOCRITICAL BASTARD.

What Detters is really saying is:

"Thanks Gene. I will take care. I will not go to Midnight Mass."

 

 

DETTERLING  ...   1944 - 2021

REST IN PEACE

 

AND WHO IS TO BLAME FOR THIS DELIA? ONLY YOURSELF.

"I wish you could have seen my son’s reaction to reading some of the things you said about his father, and as for the things you wrote about us two in bed, and the messages from the “Good Yarn Gang” about you shagging me [“does shagging mean what I think it means, Mum?”] and the like – his distress was pitiable to see."

I am now very worried about you having custody of Sebastian.

Kind regards,

GENE

PS

And Delia if you are going to impersonate posters don't impersonate the one poster who would never show up on this blog  -  Anonymous of Northwood.

AND FURTHERMORE DELIA...

' Your remarks about my son and me are rude and ignorant.'

Not so Delia. You were extremely in the wrong to allow Sebastian to read the exchanges between myself and Detters. How could you have done this? What were you thinking of? Detters would be turning in his grave if he knew that this had happened.

I maintain you ought to be reported to social services for this lapse in parental care.

Kind regards,

GENE

DELIA I HAVE READ YOUR LATEST COMMENT. OKAY, I WILL NOT ASK YOU TO FURNISH ME ANY DETAILS YOU CONSIDER PRIVATE.

However Delia, I will offer you some advice gratis: please don't attempt to go down the legal route. That will bring nothing but hurt, pain and frustration.

Detterling used to huff and puff and threaten various people with all sorts of legal action but at the end of the day he was astute enough not to go through with this.

Let me tell you a little story to illustrate this:

Some years ago Detterling posted - I think it was on his now-defunct blog -  that Oxford University had awarded me a bogus degree. I fooled him into thinking that I had contacted the University and that they were coming after him with legal action. My word! Did that put the frighteners on him! He withdrew his allegation mucho  pronto and headed into hiding. I let him stew for a while and then wrote to him that I was only kidding, and that I had not contacted the University. He returned a chastened man.

So please Delia, no lawyers.

Kind  regards.

GENE

DELIA COULD YOU PLEASE SEND ME THE FOLLOWING:

An account of Detterling's last days. His final words if this is possible. Any mention that he may have made of me in those last days. Details of his final day.

Also I would be very grateful if you could send me a PDF file of the liturgy of his funeral service. I know this might be difficult as it would be breaching the anonymity he enjoyed in his correspondence with me. However, you could redact any names or place names.

I would also be very grateful if you would let me know if his gay nephew attended the funeral.

Now Delia I hesitate to bring this up but you were very amiss to allow Sebastian to read that X rated banter and badinage between myself and Detters. What were you thinking of? To be frank Delia, you ought to be reported to social services for this lapse in parental care.

Best wishes,

Gene

 

DETTERLING    1944  -  2021

 

DELIA I THOUGHT YOU WOULD LIKE TO SEE THE FINAL CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN MYSELF AND DETTERS

James Woodforde <kochel525@gmail.com>

Fri, Jan 29, 10:25 AM

Setting aside your usual bluster, wind and piss, be assured that I shall check for your blog every day.

The moment it appears, your humiliation will be set in train.

Once started, this process cannot be stopped.

See you in the headlines, Robert.

D

Bobby Slingshot

Mon, Feb 1, 9:20 PM

'Setting aside your usual bluster, wind and piss,' Set aside whatever you wish, but don't forget what happened to Anon of Northwood: "Mr Craddock will speak to you now Sir."

James Woodforde <kochel525@gmail.com>

Mon, Feb 1, 10:32 PM

your usual bluster, wind and piss.......

I will write to you again tomorrow Delia. I am a little tired tonight. I am now a full time writer and have had an exhausting day today.

Best wishes,

GENE

I see Delia. You are not prepared to come down to Uxbridge and meet up with me. Pity...

I see Delia. You are not prepared to come down to Uxbridge and meet up with me. Pity, as there is so much I wish to hear from you and so much I wish to say that  would be better said face to face.

Nevertheless thank you for confirming that dear old Detters has passed away. Please accept my heartfelt condolences. 

I am very sad. I had known your husband for over sixteen years. We had some great times ... laughs and rollicking good fun. Detters was a legend on the Times Educational Supplement website. So many Tessers like myself will be greatly saddened.

I am so pleased that he received a Church of England funeral. He was a staunch supporter of the C of E.

I will write to you again tomorrow. There is so much to find out. Was Detters' passing sudden? Did he mention me in his final days? What were his last words? Was he buried or cremated? And much more.

Delia would you be prepared to come down to Uxbridge and meet up with me?

Delia would you be prepared to come down to Uxbridge and meet up with me? You could stay at the Travelodge next to Uxbridge Station.

UXBRIDGE TRAVELODGE

GENE'S BLOG CLOSING DOWN FOR THE NEXT 24 HOURS

Although I don't have any confirmation of this, it does appear that Detterling has passed away.  As a mark of respect this blog will close down for the next 24 hours.

GENE

 Delia why won't you respond to me?

My question is simple. Has dear old Detterling died? Yes or no.

 GENE

 Delia, I am in the state of shock...

I have read your comments again and again. Are you telling me that Detterling has died? Why would you be closing his computer and talking about a difficult time if he has not gone to his eternal reward? I pray to God that my friend Detters has not passed away. If he has God rest his soul.

Please respond to me immediately. If he has died the first thing I will do is to have a Mass offered for the repose of his soul. I will have this offered in our local parish church in Uxbridge.

Last week I sent him an email and it came back rejected. I thought that he had simply blocked me - but now in the light of your comments this takes on a more ominous meaning.

Please Delia respond to me as soon as possible.

GENE

PS

And Delia please bear in mind that my responding to you does not constitute an admission that my name is Robert Kennedy.

 

1. LEAVENING LIBERALISM

   by R. R. Reno5 . 13 . 21
   

Peter Leithart’s recent contribution to the failure-of-liberalism genre opens with an arresting claim: “Liberalism is centrally an alternate, anti-catholic ecclesiology.” This assertion strikes me as correct, although too cryptic. We need to be more precise: Liberalism functions as an “ism” insofar as its proponents insist upon its magisterial authority, asserting that liberal principles—and only liberal principles—offer a full, perfect, and sufficient basis for the ordering of common life.

Leithart directs us to “A Letter Concerning Toleration,” where we find John Locke at his most extreme. The key conceptual move comes in his definition of our “civic interests.” They concern “life, liberty, health, and indolency of body; and the possession of outward things, such as money, lands, houses, furniture, and the like.” 

The only spiritual value on Locke’s list is liberty. The others bear upon bodily life and are matters of utility. Winnowing down the higher goods we seek to share with others (the “anti-catholic ecclesiology,” as Leithart puts it) to ever-greater liberty—and only ever-greater liberty—makes consent supreme. The reason is evident. If we deem liberty the only matter of spiritual concern in public affairs, then we will demand that every man be free to consent or not consent to any authority invested with society’s power of coercion, limited only by the principle that his consent (or lack of consent) does not impede anyone else’s liberty or compromise his utility.

Over time, this demand for free consent erodes political respect for natural authority. In our time, feminism, gay rights, and transgenderism insist that the male-female difference deserves no authority over our laws and social mores. 

The same demand erodes the authority of history. Norms of citizenship and duties of communal membership flow from our recognition of the authority of particularity. We are children of our time and place, and in an analogous sense we owe filial duties to our cultural and historical inheritance, duties our consent ennobles but does not create. 

And, as Leithart notes, the requirement of consent is antithetical to a Christian understanding of life under the lordship of Christ. Yes, we can only participate in his kingdom as his disciples insofar as we freely affirm him as our lord and savior. But the legitimacy of Christ’s authority flows from his divinity. It in no way rests on our consent.

Leithart says that Patrick Deneen and I are satisfied to blunt the revolutionary character of liberalism. In the tradition of Burke, Tocqueville, and others, we call for a renewed respect for non-liberal modes of life—family, community, nation, and church. I cannot speak for Deneen. But as far as my own efforts are concerned, Leithart is correct. 

It requires only modest awareness of the human condition to see that we share powerful “civic interests”: the integrity of marriage, family patrimony, historical memory, and communal pride, to say nothing of truth and justice. I call these commitments “strong gods,” because they rouse men to sacrifice health, wealth, and even life. And I urge us to minister to their return that they might pinion liberalism’s imperial ambitions and leaven our liberal age with loves and loyalties that give direction and purpose to our freedom.

Leithart regards my political theology as too accommodating to liberalism. By his reckoning, my approach fails to challenge the liberal ecclesiology and its claim to magisterial authority. He suggests that I instrumentalize the church, turning her into yet another mediating institution. But it is perfectly possible to both honor marriage vows as sacred and point out that staying married leads to better health and material happiness. Just so, affirming the civic benefits of the church does not undermine affirmations of her supernatural foundation.

In his First Apology, Justin Martyr addresses the pagan charge of atheism, which in the ancient context amounted to the claim that Christians did not respect the gods of the city, and were therefore disloyal and treasonous. He notes that Christian teaching inclines men to virtue, not quarrelsomeness. Christians are ready to sacrifice their material goods rather than fling themselves into greedy and grasping endeavors. They are prompt in the payment of taxes and respect the law. “We are in fact of all men your best helpers and allies in securing good order.”

Because Leithart and many others share with me a staunch opposition to liberalism’s arrogance, I want to end with a warning: Let us not be so foolish as to become Locke’s negative. Liberty will (and should) remain an enduring “civic interest.” We need a society that is at least liberal, but not merely liberal.

Most of my critics press in directions opposite to Leithart’s charge that I do not challenge liberalism head-on. They imply (or say outright) that my call for “strong gods” leads to “illiberalism.” To answer this charge, I draw upon Tocqueville. He recognized that our liberal age tends toward dissolution, which paradoxically breeds conditions of modern tyranny, not plenary freedom. We need the ballast of non-liberal loyalties—“strong gods.” And if I may rephrase Justin Martyr, those who minister to their return are in fact of all men the best helpers and allies of those who seek to preserve the modern culture of freedom.

R. R. Reno is editor of First Things.

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President Biden and Public Scandal

Fr. Gerald E. Murray

MONDAY, MAY 17, 2021

Dear Friends: Today we have a hard-hitting column by our TCT colleague and my Papal Posse co-conspirator Fr. Gerald Murray on something that’s going to occupy all of us for at least the next four years: the scandal of an ardent pro-abortion and pro-LGBT president – nominally a Catholic – who seems hell-bent (I used the term advisedly) on using the power of the federal government not only to advance that radical social agenda but to force institutions like Catholic hospitals, schools, universities, adoption agencies, and many more to accept it. We also bring you a new podcast (click under TCT video) in which I discuss with Brad Miner the new edition of his book “The Compleat Gentleman.”  I’ve known Brad many years but reading those pages gave me even greater appreciation for his wisdom, wit, and good sense. Do yourself a favor: buy it and read it for pleasure but also inspiration. Many of you are also enrolled in our current online course on Dante’s Purgatorio. We’ve got other course offerings like that one lined up for later in this year – the sheer size of the response to the first offerings told us that many of our readers are eager to connect more deeply with our Catholic tradition. We’re determined to help with that. But this brings me to my reason for writing: we cannot do any of these things without you. In a few weeks, we’ll celebrate thirteen years of publishing The Catholic Thing. That means we’ve survived the housing bubble bursting, various other ups and downs, COVID and the lockdowns, and much more. And the reason for our longevity is that we have such loyal and generous readers – such as yourself. We only come to you twice a year, once around now and then again towards the end of the year. We can do that because my confidence in our readership has never proved false in all that time. So let me just say simply: you know why you come here every day, and you know the many battles in which we are engaged. My sense is we’ll have to be able to do even more for the rest of 2021 – and that includes returning to our analysis of things going on in Rome as those start up again. No one in the usual institutions is going to carry out his work; that puts the responsibility directly on all of us. So please – just click the Donate button below. Follow the simple steps. Do your part in keeping this Catholic Thing of ours alive and kicking in 2021 and for many years to come. – Robert Royal

 

Should President Joseph Biden be admitted to Holy Communion when he attends Mass? The simple answer is, “No,” owing to his public and unwavering support for legalized abortion. Canon 915 of the Code of Canon Law states: “Those. . .obstinately persevering in manifest grave sin are not to be admitted to holy communion.” Abortion, the killing of innocent unborn children, is a grave sin, as is the legalization and promotion of this heinous practice. It’s a criminal violation of an unborn person’s right to life.

In the 2002 Doctrinal Note on some questions regarding the Participation of Catholics in Political Life, Cardinal Ratzinger, then Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), stated: “John Paul II, continuing the constant teaching of the Church, has reiterated many times that those who are directly involved in lawmaking bodies have a ‘grave and clear obligation to oppose’ any law that attacks human life. For them, as for every Catholic, it is impossible to promote such laws or to vote for them.” (Emphasis added)

In the 2004 Worthiness to Receive Holy Communion: General Principles Ratzinger specifically instructed the U.S. bishops that a Catholic politician engages in formal cooperation with the sin of abortion when he consistently campaigns and votes for permissive abortion laws. President Biden obviously promotes the abortion license and has directed that taxpayers’ dollars pay for abortions. He’s an unapologetic and determined promoter of this immoral attack on human life. This is an indisputable fact. Just ask his supporters at Planned Parenthood and NARAL.

Ratzinger told the U.S. bishops that, dealing with such a politician, “his Pastor should meet with him, instructing him about the Church’s teaching, informing him that he is not to present himself for Holy Communion until he brings to an end the objective situation of sin, and warning him that he will otherwise be denied the Eucharist.” He also cited a 2002 Declaration from the Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts: “When ‘these precautionary measures have not had their effect or in which they were not possible,’ and the person in question, with obstinate persistence, still presents himself to receive the Holy Eucharist, ‘the minster of Holy Communion must refuse to distribute it.’” (Emphasis added)

The Declaration explains: “The decision, properly speaking, is not a sanction or a penalty. Nor is the minister of Holy Communion passing judgment on the person’s subjective guilt, but rather is reacting to the person’s public unworthiness to receive Holy Communion due to an objective situation of sin.”

*

An objective situation of sin is scandalous in this case because such a Catholic politician who consistently promotes abortion by that very conduct actively encourages others to fall into the same sin. In Biden’s case, his well-known campaign promises to keep abortion legal and federally funded is clear evidence of his rejection of Catholic moral teaching. He plainly intended to convince other Catholics to join him in gravely sinful behavior. Such conduct renders him publicly unworthy to receive Holy Communion.

The facts, and the applicability of canon 915 to those facts, are indisputable.

For this reason, the recent Letter of the CDF Prefect, Cardinal Ladaria, to the American bishops is disappointing, even confounding. Remarkably, he never mentions canon 915. He calls for dialogue among the bishops “so that they could agree as a Conference that support of pro-choice legislation is not compatible with Catholic teaching.” But the matter is already beyond question. Any bishop who does not agree “that support of pro-choice legislation is not compatible with Catholic teaching” should change his mind or his job.

Ladaria then calls for dialogue with Catholic politicians “who adopt a pro-choice position. . .as a means of understanding their positions and their comprehension of Catholic teaching.” Really? After almost 50 years of legalized abortion, the “pro-choice” position needs no further study. Let alone “dialogue.” It is hard to imagine that President Biden and other Catholic advocates of legalized abortion are unaware of what the Church teaches about the sanctity of human life. They just don’t follow it.

Ladaria calls for further dialogue among the bishops, with other episcopal conferences, and further consultation with his office. How long would this process take? It’s a needless delay in tackling a major scandal.

The Church has a duty to teach God’s law and to sanction members who egregiously and continuously exempt themselves from obedience to that law – and encourage others to do the same. Depriving them of Holy Communion, we may hope, will jar them into reforming their conduct and their opposition to God’s binding law for all mankind.

Public defiance of God’s prohibition of unjust killing is an attack upon the faith and unity of the Church. The Church has a responsibility before God to lead the flock away from diabolical disobedience and into grace-filled obedience.

A Catholic who falls into immoral behavior, knowing that the Church has condemned it, should be presumed by his pastor to be imperiling his soul and the souls of those he is influencing. He needs to be told that his objectively sinful behavior constitutes a culpable offense for which he needs to seek pardon after repenting.

The American bishops should act as a group, and individually in their dioceses, to end the scandal of the continued administration of Our Lord’s Most Holy Body and Blood to the highest public official in our land. To fail to do so amounts to a refusal to uphold the Church’s canon law, to the grave harms of souls. It would be a negligent passivity, a failure to defend the sanctity of the Christ’s greatest gift to his Church.

And it would communicate to all the message that God may be mocked without consequence when an important Catholic public figure decides to support, not God’s law, but rather the gruesome linchpin of the sexual revolution, unfettered legal abortion.

 

*Image: During the 2020 presidential campaign, Joe Biden poses at the Bethel AME Church in Wilmington, Delaware [CNS photo/Jim Bourg, Reuters]

The Rev. Dr. Bernard Randall, a school chaplain vilified by his employer as a 'terrorist'

Detters I just have to write to about this dreadful business. 

 Detters I just have to write to about this dreadful business. As former teachers both of us no doubt are totally appalled that this could happen. I have always said that basically you are a decent man who cherishes justice.

Now I know that we don't sing from the same hymn sheet politically, but I trust that you will put aside your left wing and pinko liberal inclinations and protest about what has happened to Dr Bernard Randall.

It's outrageous! The Church of England must take action, I doubt if this could happen in the Catholic school. If anything like that was attempted all the Catholic bishops would be up in arms.

I hope you will protest. But I'm not overly confident you will. Your silence on the dreadful injustice suffered by Cardinal Pell was deafening.

GENE

Another open letter to Richard Dawkins

Dear Dickie,

I am disappointed that you have not yet replied to my open letter of a few months back. That's not like you Dickie. My guess is that you just don't want to deal with the flack that you received over your dismissal of the great miracle of the sun at Fatima in October 1917. 70,000 people can't be wrong. Believers and non-believers alike saw it. Below a newspaper cutting eyewitness account. This is from a virulently anti-Catholic newspaper.

All the best Dickie,

GENE

Eye witness account of the miracle of the sun

on 13^th October 1917

Before the astonished eyes of the crowd, whose aspect was biblical as they stood bareheaded, eagerly searching the sky, the sun trembled, made sudden incredible movements outside all cosmic laws---the sun "danced" according to the typical expression of the people. Standing at the step of an omnibus was an old man. With his face turned to the sun, he recited the Credo in a loud voice. I asked who he was and was told Senhor Joao da Cunha Vasconcelos. I saw him afterwards going up to those around him who still had their hats on, and vehemently imploring them to uncover before such an extraordinary demonstration of the existence of God.

 

Identical scenes were repeated elsewhere, and in one place a woman cried out: "How terrible! There are even men who do not uncover before such a stupendous miracle!"

 

People then began to ask each other what they had seen. The great majority admitted to having seen the trembling and the dancing of the sun; others affirmed that they saw the face of the Blessed Virgin; others, again, swore that the sun whirled on itself like a giant Catherine wheel and that it lowered itself to the earth as if to burn it in its rays. Some said they saw it change colours successively....

 

—  O Seculo (a pro-government, anti-clerical, Lisbon paper)

 

THIS IS OUTRAGEOUS!  Why is the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, not dealing with this? Oops! Sorry I forgot. He is on sabbatical!

The ‘Terrorist’ Chaplain

The Rev. Dr. Bernard Randall, a school chaplain vilified by his employer as a 'terrorist'

The Rev. Dr. Bernard Randall is a Church of England priest who worked as a chaplain at a private British school, one founded on the Evangelical tradition, where an LGBT activist gave a rousing talk on the importance of “smashing heteronormativity” and suchlike. In a subsequent sermon, he told students that there was nothing wrong with them if they disagree with LGBT ideology. The school reported him to the government’s anti-terrorism agency. The program to which he was reported is one in which people are encouraged to report those believed to be at risk of radicalism and terrorism. The agency ruled that the vicar was not a terrorism risk

Justin Welby ... on sabbatical