Category Archives: Catholicism

Sodomizing Jesus

3/25/2010 – 10:55 am

For any parent, one of the scariest stories in the New Testament has to be in the second chapter of the Book of Luke. Twelve-year-old Jesus is separated from his parents on a trip to Jerusalem. They’re halfway back to Nazareth before they realize he’s missing and they rush back in a panic [...]

By floegel | Also posted in Commentary | Tagged , , , , , | Comments (0)

Two Priests Walk Into….

12/24/2009 – 10:59 am

A chain store? A casino?
Two stories in Wednesday’s Washington Post: The first was about Father Tim Jones, an Anglican priest at the parish of St. Lawrence in York, England. From the pulpit last Sunday, Fr. Tim said shoplifting is not a sin, if the act was caused by need instead of greed. [...]

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The Price of a Life

8/6/2009 – 9:56 am

Today is the 64th anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima. Sunday is the 64th anniversary of the bomb dropped on Nagasaki. These detonations are the entire history of nuclear war, so far.
Sunday is also the 66th anniversary of the execution of Franz Jaegerstaetter. Mr. Jaegerstaetter was an Austrian [...]

By floegel | Also posted in Commentary, Economy | Tagged , , , | Comments (0)

The Nun’s Priest’s Tale

12/4/2007 – 1:34 pm

The Catholic diocese of Burlington is litigating a long series of sex abuse cases, in which it is accused of covering up pedophilia by its clergy. I think it’s lost or settled every case so far, but that hasn’t stopped diocesan attorneys from doing all they can to humiliate the victims of abuse on [...]

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The Big Schlep (Glossary Included)

10/5/2006 – 10:19 am

Monday was Yom Kippur, the annual Jewish day of repentance. A Jewish friend once told me, “Catholics are lucky. You can go to confession and get absolved of your sins any time you want. Jews only get the chance once a year. It’s a big schlep.” (Schlep: verb, to carry, lug [...]

By floegel | Also posted in Commentary | Comments (0)

Abolitionists

4/7/2005 – 3:02 pm

Around the time the pope died Saturday, I was sorting through various letters of charitable solicitation. A word in the epistle from Citizens United Against the Death Penalty stopped my eye: abolition.
Anti-death penalty advocates are, by definition, abolitionists – they’re trying to abolish the death penalty. The word “abolitionist” in America, however, connotes [...]

By floegel | Also posted in Civil Liberty, Commentary | Comments (0)

Vatican Roulette

5/1/2003 – 2:52 pm

Now that hostilities have subsided in the Iraq war, we’re all hoping for an outpouring of democratic spirit. At the same time, we fear the nation may be falling into the hands of fundamentalist demagogues. I’m not talking about Iraq; I mean the United States of America.
Three weeks ago, Rick Santorum, the Republican [...]

By floegel | Also posted in Civil Liberty, Commentary | Comments (0)