Monday, June 30, 2008

Catholic New Media Conference: Communion of Saints

There’s hardly anything left for me to say about the Catholic New Media conference. Kate from Momopoly took NOTES for crying out loud. I didn’t even think to bring a notebook and was left scratching things on a 3 x 5 card. Then she went right home and started writing. (She wears matching clothes too.)

CNMC Part 1: Tips for Bloggers/Podcasters

CNMC: Part 2: Blogging Humility

Heidi who was travelling with children…well come to think of it, so was I…..got pictures up on her Mommy Monsters blog.

So since my internet was spotty and my computer absconded with (that’s my story and I’m sticking to it) whilst I was on vacation, I got scooped by pretty much everyone there. What on earth is left for me to say? I had a good time? I did. I enjoyed meeting everyone? Well I did. I have always thought in terms of a Catholic blogging community. I’ve enjoyed “meeting” people through what they share on their blogs and now I have an additional dimension to add to that picture. I found a community of truly fun and funny people. They laughed until they cried at the “Binary Song“….ok I laughed until I cried at the “Binary Song” and surely I couldn’t have been the only one. We joined together in faith, in worship and by Our Eucharistic Lord and by our fervent desire to see the Gospel proclaimed to everyone. And so we were exhorted in significant ways…in scripture, in the homily, in the main addresses…to join together as a community and to avoid falling into prideful behavior…but Kate got there first on the significant stuff so let me pick up the slack on the little things.

While we may be joined together by faith, and by worship, and by the Eucharist, we live in the world. We may need to spend time in pray and St. Padre Pio might have been able to communicate at times through supernatural menas without the use of a phone, or text message, or email, or letter, the rest of us need to rely on the latter. I’d like to encourage everyone to take a minute or several and join in some of the social networking tools that are available to us. I’d love to see deepen the sense of community in the Catholic New Media by utilizing these tools. At first we might be only talking to each other, and that will be fun, but perhaps we’ll draw the attention of some of those around us and bring them into the True Community….ONE, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic. 

4Marks is a Catholic Networking website similar to Face book. They were also a major sponsor of the Catholic New Media Conference. You can email me if you’d like to connect with me on there.

My Space….links to my page.

Twitter…you can find me via my email address sisterspitfire [at] gmail [dot] com.

I’d love to continue the conversation that started at the Catholic New Media Conference in these other venues.

Posted by Red Neck Woman at 13:12:28 | Permalink | No Comments »

Sunday, June 29, 2008

Feast of St Peter and St. Paul: Kepha bar Jonah (repost)

(Internet search brought you here? This post can be read on my new blog which conveniently does not randomly cut off the right hand side of the text.)

Today’s gospel reading for the Feast of St. Peter and St. Paul reminded me of this entry and I thought I would re-post it. I just love it when suddenly a scripture passage comes alive for me and this is one that really has since I became Catholic.
Quote:

Originally Posted by someone on that Protestant homeschooling forum

I don’t really understand where you are going with this.

“Simon son of Jonah”…… “Barjonah” or “son of Jonah”…..it’s just telling you Peter’s surname. I looked at several Catholic Bible Commentaries online looking for the link, but this is all they came up with as well.

I’ve always understood the issue with this passage to be with what Jesus meant by “this rock”.

I asked because it’s one of the MANY things going on in that passage that we tend to blip right over. This passage of scripture has a lot going on in it that we tend to trip right over because we just don’t have the cultural glasses to read it with. And when I look at ALL of the details, the idea that Jesus is building anything on Peter’s statement of faith and not Peter himself, makes no sense to me whatsoever. It’s a dense DENSE passage and it calls on the symbolism of the place in which it was delivered, the culture in which Jesus was speaking, the symbolism of the Old Testament, as well as other things that Jesus said and did right after this happened to grasp just how firmly and thoroughly Jesus was making His point here.

Quote:
Matthew 16: 13-21 When Jesus went into the region of Caesarea Philippi he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” They replied, “Some say John the Baptist, others Elijah, still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” Simon Peter said in reply, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”Jesus said to him in reply, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah. For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father. And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” Then he strictly ordered his disciples to tell no one that he was the Messiah. From that time on, Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer greatly from the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed and on the third day be raised.

When Jesus went into the region of Caesarea Philippi

You don’t just go to Caesarea Philippi from Galilee. It is a two-day journey deep in to Gentile territory. Jesus and his disciples would be considered ritually unclean because of their journey there and thus, it was not a journey to be taken lightly. In chapter 16 we see Jesus talking to the Pharisees and Saducees so He was obviously not in gentile territory right before this took place and nothing but this encounter with Peter is recorded as having taken place in Caesarea Philippi; therefore, Sacred Scripture seems to imply that Jesus went to this place expressly for the purpose of having this talk with his disciples at the foot of a huge rock.

Here is a picture of Caesarea Philippi:

At the top of this rock was a temple built by Herod in honor of Caesar. The rock itself was the site of the pagan worship of Pan who was the pagan god of sheep and shepherds. At the base of the rock is a huge cavern that at the time was considered bottomless. Human sacrifices were thrown into the cavern and the pagans called this place the “gates of death.” The rock is also the headwaters of the Jordan River.

He asked his disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” They replied, “Some say John the Baptist, others Elijah, still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” Simon Peter said in reply, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”Jesus said to him in reply, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah.

Ok here we see the reference to Peter being the son of Jonah. In the culture of the time, names and relationships are very important and always in scripture if God is changing a name it is a signal of something extremely important.

John 1:42 Then he brought him to Jesus. Jesus looked at him and said, “You are Simon the son of John; you will be called Cephas” (which is translated Peter).

So if Peter is the biological son of John, why is Jesus calling him the “son of Jonah”?

The key to this is in Matthew 12

Matthew 12: 39-40 He said to them in reply, “An evil and unfaithful generation seeks a sign, but no sign will be given it except the sign of Jonah the prophet. Just as Jonah was in the belly of the whale three days and three nights, so will the Son of Man be in the heart of the earth three days and three nights.

Jesus is the sign of Jonah the prophet. And Peter is the “son of Jonah.” This is a statement of inheritance. Jesus is designating Peter as his heir. All by itself this might not mean anything, but it is one more intensifier to a passage that is deeply layered.

Jesus goes on…

For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father.

Peter has received a revelation from God!

Joseph became the steward of the Kingdom and the head of his 11 other brothers because he also received a revelation from God and nothing was withheld from him except the throne itself. One Protestant commentator (The Pentateuch vol. 1 Commentary on the Old Testament; Kyle and Delitzsch; page 352 as cited in Upon This Rock has even described Joseph as receiving the “gift of infallible interpretation from God” (Which is a pretty good understanding of what Catholics believe Papal infallibility to be.)

And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it.

In English we totally lose the wordplay here, so it’s important to consider how this passage would have sounded as Jesus said it in Aramaic.

And so I say to you, you are Kepha and on this Kepha I will build my church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it.

The Aramaic, unlike the English, does not leave any room for wiggle room on the antecedants. Jesus is talking about Peter and not Peter’s statement of faith.

Jesus not only continues changing Peter’s name from Simon barJohn to Kepha barJonah; He is setting up an immense visual parallel here. Jesus the True Shepherd is standing at the base of this huge rock with a false church and the center of worship to the false god of sheep and shepherds with a pitiful mockery of the actual gates of death at the base and saying in effect to Kepha barJonah, “You are going to be bigger than this that you see right here. I, the True Shepherd, will build the True Church on you where there will be True Worship not like this false temple where they worship the false god with false worship. Through you will come the source of the True Living Water (remember that this was the headwaters of the Jordan) and the actual gates of hell and not this pathetic mockery of them….will not prevail!!”

But He’s not done yet…there is more…

I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven.

What about the keys? Well remember that the apostles were steeped in the Old Testament. What do the keys represent in the Old Testament? That’s in Isaiah 22

Isaiah 22:20-25 On that day I will summon my servant Eliakim, son of Hilkiah; I will clothe him with your robe, and gird him with your sash, and give over to him your authority. He shall be a father to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and to the house of Judah. I will place the key of the House of David on his shoulder; when he opens, no one shall shut, when he shuts, no one shall open. I will fix him like a peg in a sure spot, to be a place of honor for his family; On him shall hang all the glory of his family: descendants and offspring, all the little dishes, from bowls to jugs. On that day, says the LORD of hosts, the peg fixed in a sure spot shall give way, break off and fall, and the weight that hung on it shall be done away with; for the LORD has spoken.

The King at the time of this passage is Hezekiah and his house steward/palace administrator is Eliakim. The office of palace administrator was one of great prestige and extreme power. It is similar to the kind of authority exercised by Joseph in Egypt (Genesis 41:39-40) AND the office of palace administrator passed in a parallel line to that of the King. In other words, the authority was passed down from generation to generation. I believe that Jesus is clearly referencing this passage in Isaiah with himself and the King and Peter is the palace administrator. The keys show up again in Revelation 3:7 when Jesus returns and the office of stewardship of Christ’s church on earth ends.

But Jesus is STILL not done. Just like in John 6, when He repeats and confirms the literal meaning of his words regarding the Eucharist to make sure that nobody misunderstands, He is doing the same thing here. And really given the significance of what He is saying, that is to be expected.

Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven

Additionally it is important to understand Jesus’ words in context of rabbinical terms because that is how the Apostles were most likely to understand the meaning of what Jesus had told them.

Jesus Peter and the Keys: A Scriptural Handbook on the Papacy pg 54
“The terms [binding and loosing] thus refer to the teaching function, and more specifically one of making halachic pronouncements [i.e., relative to laws not written down in Jewish scriptures but based on an oral interpretation of them] which are to be ‘binding’ on the people of God. In that case Peter’s ‘power of the keys’ declared in [Matthew] 16:19 is not so much that of the doorkeeper, who decides who may be admitted to the kingdom of heaven, but that of steward (as in Is. 22:22, generally regarded as the Old Testament background to the metaphor of the keys here), whose keys of office enable him to regulate the affairs of the household.” R.T. France, Matthew: Evangelist and Teacher (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1989), 247. as found in Jesus Peter and the Keys: A Scriptural Handbook on the Papacy page 54

I can’t say for sure, but I suspect Zondervan does not publish any Catholic books so the above comes from a Protestant commentary. In any case I think the meaning of this passage goes far beyond antecedents of ‘this rock.’ I think it is as important to look for OT context as well as the Jewish cultural context to a more complete understanding of the symbol of the keys that Jesus used. I highly recommend the book Jesus, Peter and the Keys: A Scriptural Handbook on the Papacy for an exhaustive study of the topic from the Catholic perspective as well as Upon This Rock. (And lest you think that Catholic perspective means an intellectually incestuous-type work by referencing only Catholic scholars and works, it is significantly referenced to Protestant primary sources and reference materials!)

Finally, this passage is wrapped up with this statement.

Then he strictly ordered his disciples to tell no one that he was the Messiah. From that time on, Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer greatly from the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed and on the third day be raised.

This marks the beginning of Jesus’ active preparation for death which further reinforces the idea that Jesus is bequeathing something here to Peter that is reflected in calling him Kepha barJonah.

That’s my Catholic understanding of the passage and why I believe that calling Peter the “son of Jonah” is significant.

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INTJ Here…..

(Internet search brought you here? This post can be read on my new blog which conveniently does not randomly cut off the right hand side of the text.)

Thanks to Kate at Momopoly, these are hysterical and painfully true I am afraid….

ISTJ: Lord, help me to relax about insignificant details beginning tomorrow at 11:41:23 a.m. E.S.T.

ISTP: God, help me to consider people’s feelings, even if most of them ARE hypersensitive.

ESTP: God, help me to take responsibility for my own actions, even though they’re usually NOT my fault.

ESTJ: God, help me to not try to RUN everything. But, if You need some help, just ask.

ISFJ: Lord, help me to be more laid back and help me to do it EXACTLY right.

ISFP: Lord, help me to stand up for my rights (if you don’t mind my asking).

ESFP: God, help me to take things more seriously, especially parties and dancing.

ESFJ: God, give me patience, and I mean right NOW.

INFJ: Lord, help me not to be a perfectionist. (Did I spell that correctly?)

INFP: God, help me to finish everything I sta

ENFP: God, help me to keep my mind on one th - Look a bird! - at a time.

ENFJ: God, help me to do only what I can and trust you for the rest. Do you mind putting that in writing?

INTJ: Lord, keep me open to other’s ideas, *wrong* though they may be.

INTP: Lord, help me to be less independent, but let me do it my way.

ENTP: Lord, help me follow established procedures today. On second thought, I’ll settle for a few minutes.

ENTJ: Lord, help me slow downandnotrushthroughwhatIdo.

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I’m Home…Here Are My Excuses….

(Internet search brought you here? This post can be read at my new blog here and the good news is that my new blog does not randomly cut off the right side of the text.)

I didn’t mention not blogging for a week or so while I was out of town because…well….I expected to not only have the internet access to blog while I was travelling, I expected to have the time to blog. I was, as with most things in my life, utterly and completely wrong.

The rooms we stayed in were supposed to have wireless internet access. They did not. There were hotspots in the resort where we vacationed with my husband’s family instead. Not all of those hotspots would actually connect to the internet without knowing the secret handshake. Turns out….nobody knew the secret handshake but at random times you could connect and thus encourage others around you to waste hours on end trying to discover the secret handshake for themselves. When I was in psych 101 in college I learned that there was some kind of name for this sort of reinforcement technique…..random vs predictable reinforcement but I don’t remember the name….and how random reinforcement tended to increase persistence in test subjects. It works. I spent a good three hours one afternoon before I noticed that I was starting to grow whiskers that looked remarkably like a laboratory rat’s.

Once I got the internet access difficulty ironed out, by walking a very long way to a hotspot that actually allowed internet access, I discovered that more often than not I did not have my computer. Why is that you ask? Well my husband, on the flimsy excuse that he needed to submit some invoices and reports so that we could get paid next month, hijacked my computer. Not only did my husband do that, but it clearly runs in the family because my computer was also hijacked by my brother-in-law and I even saw it in use by my mother-in-law and father-in-law and they don’t even use their OWN computers.

So while I intended to spend some time while I was away reflecting on the Catholic New Media Conference, and reading, and blogging, I did not. I did reflect and read and jet ski with some dolphins but I did not blog. I also did not kill my daughter when she threw up in the car not five minutes after being told, “If you have to throw up, tell us so we can stop the car…..” but that’s a story for another day and one you may not want to hear. It’s good to be home. 

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Saturday, June 21, 2008

A Brief Thought From the Road….

(Internet search brought you here? This post can be read at my new blog here and the good news is that my new blog does not randomly cut off the right side of the text.)

I am travelling to the Catholic New Media Celebration, and since my husband is driving I have had time to text a friend or two. The lovely thing about having serious conversations via text message is that sometimes the desire for brevity (even with a full keyboard on the phone, it’s still a big pain to type long sentences.) you can hit on a gem or two. From today:

Friend 1: It’s going to take all of my will power to do this [very hard thing].

Friend 2: Well just remember that you don’t get any of God’s will power until you run out of your own without giving in first.

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Thursday, June 19, 2008

Leave it to Et-Tu Jen To Challenge My Christian Virtue….

(Internet search brought you here? This post can be read at my new blog here and the good news is that my new blog does not randomly cut off the right side of the text.)

I really should be working up some Chrisitan compassion for a sister in Christ who has been invaded by scorpions but, I’ve long known that I don’t have much Christian virtue so I can say “They’re baaaaaccckkkk! And they couldn’t be funnier.”

If you’ve been waiting for scorpion season just so you can hear the stories from Et-Tu Jen’s house, wait no longer. Be warned however, do not read her scorpion stories with liquids in your mouth or a full bladder.

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Romanian Orthodox Prelate Threatened With Excommunication

(Internet search brought you here? This post can be read at my new blog here and the good news is that my new blog does not randomly cut off the right side of the text.)

This story makes me very sad. How it must grieve our Lord to see these divisions persist. I don’t know who is right, and who is wrong, or who should or should not be disciplined. I am only certain that these divisions added to the suffering Our Lord endured in the Passion.

Join me in praying the Chaplet of Unity for healing in Our Lord’s Church?


Using the Rosary, Recite on the large bead before each of the five decades:

L: God our Heavenly Father, through Your Son Jesus, our Victim-High Priest, True Prophet, and Sovereign King,

R: Pour forth the power of Your Holy Spirit upon us and open our hearts. In your Great Mercy, through the Motherly Mediation of the Blessed Virgin Mary, our Queen, forgive our sinfulness, heal our brokenness, and renew our hearts in the faith, and peace, and love, and joy of Your Kingdom, that we may be one in You.

Recite on the ten small beads of each of the five decades:

L: In Your Great Mercy,

R: Forgive our sinfulness, heal our brokenness, and renew our hearts that we may be one in You.

Conclude in unison:

Hear, O Israel! The Lord Our God is One God!

Oh Jesus, King of All Nations, may Your reign be recognized on Earth!

Mary, Our Mother and Mediatrix of All Grace, pray and intercede for us your children!

Saint Micheal, great prince and guardian of your people, come with the holy angels and saints and protect us!

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Wednesday, June 18, 2008

Christian Virtue Is Not For Sissies

(Internet search brought you here? This post can be read at my new blog here and the good news is that my new blog does not randomly cut off the right side of the text.)

Our Lord answers prayer. So much so that as an evangelical Christian “we” all knew to never pray for patience. After all, one does not gain the virtue of patience when things are going swimmingly. On the contrary, patience is cultivated only  in trying circumstances. So what do you think would happen if someone were to pray the following prayer regularly?

Litany of Humility

O Jesus meek and humble of heart, hear me.

From the desire of being esteemed, deliver me, Jesus.

From the desire of being being extolled, deliver me, Jesus.

From the desire of being honored, deliver me, Jesus.

From the desire of being praised, deliver me, Jesus.

From the desire of being preferred to others, deliver me, Jesus.

From the desire of being consulted, deliver me, Jesus.

From the desire of being approved, deliver me, Jesus.

From the fear of being humiliated, deliver me, Jesus.

From the fear of being despised, deliver me, Jesus.

From the fear of suffering rebukes, deliver me, Jesus.

From the fear of being calumniated, deliver me, Jesus.

From the fear of being forgotten, deliver me, Jesus.

From the fear of being wronged, deliver me, Jesus.

From the fear of being suspected, deliver me, Jesus.

That others may be loved more than I, Jesus grant me the grace to desire it.

That others may be more esteemed than I, Jesus grant me the grace to desire it.

That in the opinion of the world, others may increase and I may decrease, Jesus grant me the grace to desire it.

That others may be chosen and I set aside, Jesus grant me the grace to desire it.

That others may be praised and I unnoticed, Jesus grant me the grace to desire it.

That others may be preferred to me in everything, Jesus grant me the grace to desire it.

That others may become holier than I, provided that I become as holy as I should, Jesus grant me the grace to desire it. Amen.


by Rafael Cardinal Merry de Val


And just in case I was thick-headed and not getting it…..I was thick-headed and not getting it by the way…..I read this in the Diary of Saint Maria Faustina Kowalska.


In order to purify a soul, Jesus uses whatever instruments He likes. My soul underwent a complete abandonment on the part of creatures; often my best intentions were misinterpreted by the sisters, a type of suffering which is most painful; but God allows it, and we must accept it because in this way we become more like Jesus. There was one thing which I could not understand for a long time: Jesus ordered me to tell everything to my Superiors, but my Superiors did not believe what I said and treated me with pity as though I were being deluded or were imagining things.

And just in case I wasn’t getting the message….and I wasn’t…as I was praying, it ”occurred” to me that the nitty gritty of humility really only starts if your best intentions are being misinterpreted. It’s one thing to accept one’s just punishment with quiet humilty, but if we want to be like Jesus that kind of humilty really only starts when we are UNjustly accused. So if we pray for humility, we can COUNT on being unjustly accused.

Doesn’t THAT just make you want to pray for more humility? Brace youselves. Christian virtue is NOT for sissies.

Posted by Red Neck Woman at 02:36:14 | Permalink | No Comments »

Catholic Carnival #177: Wheel of Time

(Internet search brought you here? This post can be read at my new blog here and the good news is that my new blog does not randomly cut off the right side of the text.)

Support Catholic bloggers and go enjoy, read, and comment on this week’s Catholic Carnival up at Just Another Day of Catholic Pondering.

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Sunday, June 15, 2008

Heroic Catholic Families

Here’s a little Father’s Day reading to go with your Father’s Day viewing. I have long been of the not-very-humble-opinion that until Catholic Families begin taking the vocation of marriage and family seriously, that the Catholic Church will continue to struggle with a shortage of those willing to accept the call to the vocation of vowed religious life. Until we have Heroic Catholic Families who selflessly embrace the calling to marriage and family, how can we hope to inspire our children to selflessly embrace the call to vowed religious life?

From the article The Blueprint for Heroic Catholic Families. Go read it all, then email copies to all of your friends.

In early third millennium America, heroic Catholic families generally don’t send their kids to public schools if they have any conceivable alternative. Nor do they take advantage of parochial or diocesan schools if their staffs are still riddled with cafeteria Catholics (or worse). If a sound Catholic school is not available, heroic Catholic families pull up roots and move, or they found independent schools, or they home school. Even if outstanding schools are available, they may still home school. I use the word “generally” in the first sentence, because there are exceptions to every parenting rule, and it isn’t anybody’s job but yours to make the best decision for your own children.

It is axiomatic that God will always supply the most when we can do the least, but we must also expect Him to supply less when we are simply unwilling to do more. And so heroic Catholic families must do their very best to keep tight control over their children’s educational environment at least through high school, and many will do so through college as well, depending on the child and the feasibility of using an outstanding Catholic college. Moreover, in heroic Catholic families, schools are never chosen because of their outstanding secular reputations, the material value of their credentials, or their brilliant extra-curricular possibilities. Heroic parents don’t sacrifice their children’s moral and intellectual formation so that they will have the opportunity to make more money or excel at sports, drama or music.

In heroic Catholic families, mothers work outside the home as little as possible, and fathers make themselves available to their children regardless of the pressures of work or their desire for rest and relaxation. Heroic fathers are very much involved in raising their children. Parental closeness to each child is maintained throughout the teen years; it is not abandoned during the difficulties of adolescence. In this context of ongoing involvement and availability, heroic Catholic families also pray together every day, forming a habit and expectation of family prayer from early childhood, preferably including the daily Rosary—which has a proven track record.

Heroic households not only bar the door to intruders but regulate the airwaves, as well as broadband and phone connections. They restrict their children’s computer time, cell phone features, television and movie watching, and (perhaps above all) Internet use. They educate themselves concerning the moral dangers of these media, and they make a point of not allowing into their homes media that represents people acting in ways that may lead their children into sin—ways in which they would never allow real guests to act. Heroic parents are constantly vigilant. If they are ignorant about certain technological issues, they get help from those who understand them.

Thank you kindly, Leticia at Causa Nostrae Laetitiae for pointing me to this article.

Posted by Red Neck Woman at 22:52:31 | Permalink | No Comments »