Notes: Thursday-Monday, January 13-17, 2011

1. Some figures on attitudes of mothers towards paid work

From the on-line version of an article which expands on a shorter article which I read in the Sydney Daily Telegraph last week:

... a British survey has found nearly two-thirds of women would love to find a husband with a bigger pay packet than theirs to allow them to care for their kids full time.

The YouGov survey of 922 women found 55 per cent of respondents would like to be home with their children full time if money were not an issue.

And 60 per cent said they felt pressured by society to go out and work.

[...] "Research evidence consistently shows most mothers would prefer not to have competing demands of family work and paid jobs," Dr [Catherine] Hakim said.

Her report arrives as the biggest Australian survey of parents in decades has found a third of women would like to work less, and two-thirds thought working made them less effective as a parent.

But only about 15 per cent of women could afford to be at home full time because their partner earned enough money to support them.

The Australian Institute of Family Studies' Growing Up in Australia study of 10,000 children and their parents shows two-thirds of mothers with four to eight-year-olds worked 20 to 30 hours a week.

Two thirds of these women enjoyed work and thought it made them a good role model for their kids, but they didn't always find it compatible with family life, and would prefer to work less.

[...] Jenny Baxter, Australian Institute of Family Studies senior research fellow, said women might like the idea of being at home full-time, especially if they had young children.

"But many women are highly educated and like working, and would worry about financial dependency given thehigh rate of relationship breakdown," Ms Baxter said.
[http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/mothers-hanker-for-husbands-of-wealth/story-fn6bmg6l-1225985375979]

Labels: families, parenthood, social trends, work

2. Some observations about Mme. Le Pen

If I'm not mistaken, Msgr. Lefebvre regarded M. Jean-Marie Le Pen as the 'least-worst' altervative among French politicians with realistic chances of electoral success. I'm not sure that he would have the same regard for M. Le Pen's daughter and likely successor as leader of the National Front:

She has campaigned against immigration and Brussels but favours a woman's right to have an abortion. She also advocates the return of the death penalty. In a more sober style than her father she has denounced “fundamentalist Catholics” and “those obsessed by the Holocaust”.

“Marine Le Pen portrays herself as a lawyer, a mother, twice-divorced, very liberal on issues like abortion or homosexuality,” said Sylvain Crepon, a sociologist at West-Nanterre University.

“She can woo the working and middle classes, who are worried about crime and immigration and who used to see the National Front as too conservative.”
[http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/daughter-to-succeed-french-far-right-leader-jean-marie-le-pen/story-e6frg6so-1225988872315]

Labels: Marine Le Pen

3. An interesting discussion at Fr. Zuhlsdorf's blog

With some suprising contributions, such as the first red-coloured interpolation in this comment, by Fr. Zuhlsdorf:

http://wdtprs.com/blog/2011/01/sspx-bp-fellay-criticizes-benedict-xvi-about-assisi-meeting/#comments

Labels: John Zuhlsdorf, Papacy, theology

4. Dr. Sudlow is blogging again

http://thesensiblebond.blogspot.com/2010/08/sensible-bond-returns.html

Labels: blogs, Brian Sudlow

5. "Ha'aretz says U.S. officials face 'pro-Israel' background check"

http://walt.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2009/12/04/haaretz_says_us_officials_face_pro_israel_background_check

(brought to my attention by this AQ comment)

Labels: State of Israel

6. Cardinal Pell and the so-called Catholic Charismatic Renewal (C.C.R.)

I was interested to read the following in Msgr. Coleridge's eulogy for the late Lord Bishop of Sandhurst (may he rest in peace):

A sign that things were changing in the Church came when Archbishop Pell chose Joe to be spiritual director of the seminary, an appointment which surprised some who either didn’t know Joe or who underestimated him.
[http://www.dow.org.au/news/death-of-bishop-joe-grech]

I did not know that Cardinal Pell endorsed the C.C.R. so strongly as to appoint one of its major local figures to such a position.

Labels: C.C.R., George Pell

7. Ms Legge on so-called gay marriage

Excerpts (I don't have time to comment on them, unfortunately, so I'm just saving here for future reference the excerpts of most interest to me):

... But when a son or a daughter or a brother or a sister or a niece or a nephew turns out to be gay there’s an inevitable mellowing of suspicion and prejudice. Is there a grandparent on the planet who would spurn a soft, warm bundle of kinship, however tangled the threads?

[...] Days after Liberal frontbencher Malcolm Turnbull spoke against gay marriage, he began to equivocate. He now acknowledges he’s “open” to persuasion. ...

[...] That’s how Tasmanian gay activist Rodney Croome explains the desire for marriage amongst a younger cohort he calls “the Family Law Act generation”. ... The institution of marriage has evolved through no-fault divorce and the rise of de facto relationships. ...

[...] Marriage matters to ["Alex Grimshaw, 30, spokesman for Australian Marriage Equality"]: “It’s important for equality, the symbolism, because it allows us to be more comfortable with who we are.”

[...] Frank Bates, emeritus Professor of Law at Newcastle University, can’t see what’s wrong with another shift to account for the rise of same-sex relationships. Originally seen as a means of securing property rights, marriage became invested with romantic and emotional baggage in the 19th century. “There’s nothing magical about the Marriage Act – it’s just another piece of legislation,” says Bates. ...

[...] Concerns at how these offspring will fare may not be resolved until a generation are well into adulthood. A US study that followed 78 children raised by lesbian mothers for 17 years reported last June that these adolescents demonstrated healthy psychological adjustment. But critics have challenged the veracity of these results. The academic arena is so heavily politicised that one Australian academic who has reviewed the scientific literature for state parliamentary reviews examining same-sex couple adoption now begs anonymity because of the abuse he’s copped for pointing out methodological flaws in the research. He believes work on the children raised in these families is embryonic and suffers from bad science and bias.

Little is known about the impact of donor anonymity on children’s welfare. Much depends on the individual personality of the child and the stability of their adult relationships. There is no rulebook; each couple devises strategies to suit their needs. Australian researcher Dr Ruth McNair shares a three-year-old son, Sam, with her lesbian partner. Sam knows the identity of the man who helped his mothers conceive. The man visits from time to time. Sam calls him by his first name. Eilis Hughes of the Melbourne based Rainbow Families Council says her daughter Drew enjoys frequent contact with the biological father she calls “Dad”. The Mok children can access the identity of their donor father when they turn 17. The Luiciani-Crouts say they have chosen anonymity to limit problems and confusion for their daughter. The Fergusons were concerned to avoid donor intervention down the track.

[...] The couples I interviewed try very hard to bring a mix of genders into their family circle so that male or female family and friends counter the imbalance in their household. Megan and Leanne Ferguson held a “naming ceremony” for baby James where guests were invited to contribute to his lifelong education. ...
[http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/features/we-are-family/story-e6frg8h6-1225986408817]

Labels: families, G.L.B.T., marriage, morality, parenthood, social trends

Feast of St. Anthony, Abbot, A.D. 2011

Notes: Friday, October 8, 2010

Interesting Herald article on marriage annulment law in Australia (and, historically, in Britain)

http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/till-debt-us-do-part-case-dismissed-20101007-169px.html?skin=text-only

Mr. Macintosh on voting

A letter in today's Herald:

Arguments aplenty to feed intellectually hungry

Date: October 08 2010

[...] In her excellent article Elizabeth Farrelly suggests that voting should be not just a duty but ''a privilege, earnable by demonstrating some semblance of knowledge''.

This reminded me of Neville Shute's novel In The Wet, in which he imagined that Australia at some time in the future had adopted a multiple voting system, with everyone able to have up to seven votes, based on educational attainment and achievement.

This led to a flowering of achievement here, whereas Britain had stagnated under the single-vote-for-all system.

It would offend against our so-called egalitarianism, but perhaps it is an idea whose time has come.

Andrew Macintosh Queenscliff
[http://www.smh.com.au/national/letters/arguments-aplenty-to-feed-intellectually-hungry-20101007-169oy.html?skin=text-only]

I seem to recall that John Stuart Mill (a Liberal, of course) suggested giving university graduates an additional vote.

"Moscow [Russian Orthodox] patriarchate criticizes Nobel Prize award for in-vitro pioneer"

http://angelqueen.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=34066

Fr. Zuhlsdorf on the origin of the Novus Ordo Missæ's 'Preparation of the Gifts' formula

Frankly, this sort of thing [celebrants changing the 'Preparation of the Gifts' formula] comes from the – in my opinion – ill-considered change to the offertory prayers for the Novus Ordo. This would be impossible to do in the older, traditional form of Mass, since the two offertory prayers are quite different and actually Catholic in their origin. The two new offertory prayers – which are Jewish berakha in origin – are so similar as to nearly invite this sort of editing when the less than careful priest has one of these flashes of brilliant insight as to how he can make improvements.
[My interpolation, italics in the original,
http://wdtprs.com/blog/2010/10/quaeritur-priest-changes-the-words-of-the-offertory/]

Now a true ritual sacrifice has three 'stages' (I'm not sure that that's the best word but it'll do): Oblation, consecration, and consummation. So Father is acknowledging in his post that the New Mass basically 1. gets rid of one of the parts of a true ritual sacrifice and 2. replaces it with Jewish (i.e. Talmudic, i.e. not just non-Catholic, but anti-Catholic) table blessings, and yet he continues not just to approve of, but even celebrate, this evil (since evil is a deprivation of the due good, and 1. and 2. clearly involve such a lack) rite? Incredible.

Mr. Christopherson on marriage

A commenter at Mr. Muehlenberg's blog wrote the following:

... The holy scriptures give three valid reasons for the end of a marriage. Death of one of the partners, adultery which was punishable by death under the Old Covenant effectively declaring the erring partner dead to the marriage, and permanent abandonment. ...
[http://www.billmuehlenberg.com/2010/10/07/christians-living-like-pagans/]

Where does it say that in Scripture? If he's referring to the provisions of the Old Law, then clearly that is not a valid basis for his argument, since the Old Law has been abolished. And under the New Law, only the Pope can dissolve the natural contract of marriage (and no-one can dissolve the Sacrament of Marriage).

H.H. The Pope on Church-State relations and public morality

An item in today's Vatican Information Service daily e-mail bulletin:

REAPPRAISING THE SPIRITUAL AND HUMAN HERITAGE OF CHILE

VATICAN CITY, 7 OCT 2010 (VIS) - Benedict XVI today received the Letters of Credence of Fernando Zegers Santa Cruz, the new ambassador of Chile to the Holy See. He began his address to the diplomat by expressing his closeness to the Chilean people following February's earthquake, and he recalled "the immense efforts being made by the Chilean Catholic Church, many of whose communities were also badly affected by the quake, to help people most in need. ... Nor can I forget", he continued, "the miners of the Atacama region and their loved ones, for whom I continue to pray fervently".

Going on then to observe that the new ambassador is beginning his mission in the year in which Chile celebrates the bicentenary of its independence, the Pope said: "Many are the fruits the Gospel has produced in that blessed land: abundant fruits of sanctity, charity, human promotion, and of constant striving for peace and coexistence". In this context he also recalled last year's celebration of the twenty-fifth anniversary of the signing of the Treaty of Peace and Friendship with Argentina which, "with pontifical mediation, put an end to that dispute in the southern hemisphere", he said.

"That historical agreement", the Holy Father proceeded, "will remain for future generations as a shining example of the immense benefits that peace brings, and of the importance of preserving and encouraging the moral and religious values that constitute the most intimate fabric of a people's soul. We cannot hope to explain the triumph of this longing for peace, harmony and understanding without bearing in mind how deep the seed of the Gospel has taken root in the hearts of Chileans".

"It is very important, and even more so in present circumstances in which so many challenges threaten cultural identity, to encourage, especially among the young, a healthy pride and a renewed appreciation and reappraisal for their faith, history, culture, traditions and artistic heritage, and for everything that constitutes the best and richest spiritual and human patrimony of Chile".

At this point Benedict XVI also noted how, "although Church and State are independent and autonomous, each in its own field, they are both called to loyal and respectful collaboration in order to serve the personal and social vocation of the same people. In carrying out her specific mission to announce the good news of Jesus Christ, the Church seeks to respond to man's expectations and doubts, while at the same time drawing on those ethical and anthropological values and principles which are inscribed in the nature of human beings".

"When the Church raises her voice on the great challenges and problems of the present time - such as wars, hunger, widespread extreme poverty, the defence of human life from conception until natural end, or the promotion of the family founded on marriage between a man and woman, primary educator of children - she is not acting out of special interest or of principles perceptible only to people who profess a particular religious faith. Respecting the rules of democratic coexistence, the Church does this for the good of all society, and in the name of values that everyone can share", the Holy Father concluded.
CD/ VIS 20101007 (540)

Reginaldvs Cantvar
Feast of St. Bridget of Sweden, Widow, A.D. 2010

Fr. Zuhlsdorf on the prospects for H.H. The Pope celebrating the Traditional Latin Mass

http://wdtprs.com/blog/2010/01/fr-zs-predictions-for-2010/

The Rev. Fr. John T. Zuhlsdorf has posted a list of his predictions for 2010. One of them is that

The three-year post Summorum Pontificum report will cause liberal enemies of the Pope to engage in a vicious campaign of disinformation.

I had completely forgotten about Summorum Pontificum’s accompanying explanatory letter’s invitation for feedback from the Hierarchy on the experience of the subsequent three years. Here is the relevant portion of that letter (addressed by His Holiness to “[His] dear Brother Bishops)”:

Furthermore, I invite you, dear Brothers, to send to the Holy See an account of your experiences, three years after this Motu Proprio has taken effect. If truly serious difficulties come to light, ways to remedy them can be sought.
[http://www.oriensjournal.com/Summorum%20Pontificum%20plus%20explanatory%20letter.html]

On the one hand, that last sentence and its talk of “ways to remedy” potential difficulties could be taken as having an ominous ring to it. On the other hand, it does speak of “truly serious difficulties”, as though to rule out frivolous complaints by obstructionist Modernist ordinaries.

But what I found really interesting was what this implies for the prospects for the Holy Father celebrating a public Papal T.L.M. The first commenter in the combox at Fr. Zuhlsdorf’s post noted that

“Pope Benedict will publicly celebrate the EF ad orientem.” is not on the list…

Comment by Geremia — 5 January 2010 @ 4:51 pm

To which Fr. Zuhlsdorf replied:

Geremia: That is because that won’t happen until after the three-year review of SP takes place.

Comment by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf — 5 January 2010 @ 4:54 pm

And in response to the following follow-up comment:

… Fr Z.: Yeah, but that will be in July, right? He could still celebrate it after July.

Comment by Geremia — 5 January 2010 @ 5:31 pm

Fr. Zuhlsdorf elaborated:

Geremia: You think this will be done quickly? ROFL!

Think about it. Bishops will start sending reports after the three year mark of implementation… SEPTEMBER 2010. The reports will trickle in.

The Holy See will have to wait for the reports until “enough” have arrived.

Then everything will have to be studied and debated.

The results will eventually be presented to the Holy Father, at that time at least a year older.

Comment by Fr. John Zuhlsdorf — 5 January 2010 @ 5:45 pm

Nevertheless, even if His Holiness does eventually celebrate a public Papal T.L.M. (a prospect which now seems a lot less remote to me than it did before I was reminded of the invitation for Episcopal feedback after three years) we must be careful not to be overly optimistic about what it implies; the Latin Church desperately needs the T.L.M. to be restored as her normative, indeed her only, rite, but I get the impression that the Holy Father sees the T.L.M. more as a means to improving the style with which the Novus Ordo Missæ is celebrated—Fr. Zuhlsdorf’s notion of a ‘gravitational pull’—in the vain hope of pulling the N.O.M. out of its anarchic death-spiral.

Reginaldvs Cantvar
7.I.2010

On Summorum Pontificum

http://wdtprs.com/blog/2008/09/musing-on-the-long-desired-document/

Rev. Fr. John T. Zuhlsdorf has posted a brief piece on the upcoming clarification of the Motu Proprio Summorum Pontificum. But I’m not sure what needs to be clarified; the Old Mass was never abrogated, so what more is there to say on it? What we really need is a pointing out of in which documents Paul VI made the New Mass obligatory. Its botched promulgation in the Apostolic Constitution Missale Romanum has been noted not only by the S.S.P.X. but also by non-partisan observers like Prof. Romano Amerio.

Reginaldvs Cantvar.

A bit of balance from CathNews

http://www.cathnews.com/article.aspx?aeid=8793

I note that Rev. Fr. John T. Zuhlsdorf's blog was the featured website in yesterday's CathNews. Though I am no 'Fr. Z' groupie, it was pleasing to see a link to a man of decidedly more refined liturgical sensibilities than those to whom CathNews usually links.

But I see in the comments section that this has not pleased one Gerard Moore. That wouldn't be the Gerard Moore, Rev. Fr. Gerard Moore S.M. would it?

Reginaldvs Cantvar

Fr. Zuhlsdorf, human rights and the State

Rev. Fr. John T. Zuhlsdorf has posted some interesting remarks regarding human rights and the State on his blog. I reproduce them here in full:

I am irritated by something I have heard over the last couple days.

The pols and newsies keep talking about the anniversary of "giving women the right to vote" in the USA.

No!

Women always had the right to vote.

Their right to vote was finally recognized.

We must avoid, in discussing human rights and government, falling into the trap of thinking that the state grants rights.

We have rights because our Creator made us in His image and likeness.

They are written into our being.

We grant the state its rights and obligations.
http://wdtprs.com/blog/2008/08/irritated-by-something-i-hear-repeated/#comment-82821

The subsequent discussion abounded with confusion; I even saw Fr. Maritain and the U.N. Declaration on Human Rights being cited. In any discussion on rights and the State we need to keep the following principles in mind:

1) All authority is from God (Romans 13:1, Douay-Rheims version: “Let every soul be subject to higher powers. For there is no power but from God: and those that are ordained of God.”)

2) The State is the juridical and moral person that exercises God-given civil authority over a given populace in a given territory.

3) The State’s proper end is the common good. (This end is indirectly subordinate to the Church’s end, the salvation of souls.)

4) The State’s laws shall conform to God’s Laws; when they contradict God’s Laws they are not binding on the citizen.

5) A natural right is the moral liberty justifiably to claim some entitlement. Therefore the object of a natural right can only ever be that which is true and good. And for every right there is a corresponding duty.

So with these principles in mind, it is clear that no-one has a natural right to vote, though it might be the case that, in certain historical circumstances, it might be conducive to the common good for the State to grant a civil right to its subjects to vote, i.e., to grant universal or partial suffrage. This will depend on things like the moral and intellectual development of the populace, the sophistication of the means of disseminating information, and so on. And man's ontological dignity (his orientation towards a higher end, namely God) is no basis for a supposed 'right to vote'; this is clear from the fact that the State can deprive convicts and the insane of their right to vote, while those same individuals can never be deprived of their ontological dignity by the State.

Note that I spoke of ‘universal suffrage’ rather than democracy. Universal suffrage is just a means for choosing a government, whereas democracy is a principle of government according to which authority is held to originate in the people (from the Greek demos, or ‘the people’, and kratia, or ‘power, rule’). According to this principle, as Leo XIII put it in Immortale Dei (though without naming it as democracy), the populace delegates to the government “not the right so much as the business of governing, to be exercised, however, in its name.” This is incompatible with a Catholic sensibility, since the State is, whether it likes it or not, a delegate of Christ the King, not a delegate of the populace.

A theme running through the discussion at Fr. Zuhlsdorf’s blog is the notion of some kind of requirement for popular consent, whether expressed through a vote or not. But it is not clear to me that the people’s consent really has any part to play in the matter. So long as the State acknowledges Christ as the source of its authority, so long as it upholds the common good, and so long as it translates God’s Laws into civil laws and never defies them, it rules justly.

As for the U.N. Declaration on Human Rights, when it states, as someone quoted it, that “[t]he will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government”, this is clearly un-Catholic when compared with Romans 13:1, and in fact it has much in common with the principles of the French Revolution. And as for Fr. Maritain, Mr. Michael Davies showed quite clearly in The Second Vatican Council and Religious Liberty that Fr. Maritain’s theory of the State as merely a specialised portion of society concerned with upholding public order (the theory underpinning his ‘Integral Humanism’) rather than as a juridical and moral person upholding the common good (a broader category than mere public order) is erroneous.

Reginaldvs Cantvar