Archbishop Cordileone on the Canonization of Fr. Junipero Serra

Would They Read the Manosphere?

Catholic San Francisco: Bishops asked to assess marriage, family life by Cindy Wooden

More on Christians in the Near and Middle East

The Precarious Position of Christians in the Holy Land
Middle Eastern Christians struggle due to American foreign policy, Jewish nationalism, and Muslim jihad

Oakland Has a New Bishop

A Jesuit! A resurgence in the order or a last gasp? Fr. Michael Barber, SJ named new bishop of Oakland - Diocese of Oakland - press conference.

Cal Catholic Daily

Pope Francis

Unfortunately, Daylife is no longer available.



Rome Reports:
'Habemus Papam': Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio is the new Pope of the Catholic Church


New Pope greets the World Francis I


Francis I to faithful: pray for me, trust in me


Pope Francis: His First Words

Chiesa: The First Pope Named Francis
From 2002: Jorge Mario Bergoglio, Profession: Servant of the Servants of God

Vatican Insider:
Jorge Mario Bergoglio is the new Pope of the Catholic Church: Francis I
Photo Gallery

First Things
Ethika Politika

Zenit:
Cardinal Bergoglio Is the 267th Successor of St. Peter
A Profile
1st Words

Francis Has Spoken With Pope Emeritus
And Journalists to Be Among First to Have Papal Audience

Patriarch Sviatoslav: Newly elected Pope knows Ukrainian Catholic Church, its Liturgy and Spirituality

Pope Francis, Not Francis I

Habebimus Papam Novum.

The big news of the day, for Catholics. The Sarge called me at 3 in the morning to inform me what was going on, so I already knew about it when I was awoken 2 hours later by someone else regarding the same piece of news.





Pope announces he will be stepping down citing lack of strength
Vatican Radio
Sandro Magister
Catholic World Report
Catholic News Agency
CNN
NYT
Pope's Resignation Stuns Native Germany

Statement of the U.S. Anglican Ordinariate
UK Ordinariate
Metropolitan Hilarion
TAC
CUA
What was the cardinals' reaction to the Pope's announcement?
What will the Pope do when he is no longer Pope?

Zenit:
Pope Benedict XVI Announces Resignation
US Bishops Respond
UK Bishops Respond
Cardinal Angelo Sodano's Statement After Pope Announces Resignation
Cardinal Sodano: "We Are Closer to You Than Ever"
Pope's Announcement Seen as Sign of Freedom, Wisdom
Who Will Vote for the Next Pope
Vatican spokesman: Pope Benedict will not participate in the conclave to elect his successor
About.com

Some Commentary and Blog Posts:



Scott Richert
Tom Piatak
Stephen Herreid
Patrick Buchanan, Benedict's Farewell, and Christianity's?
William Fahey
Michael Brendan Dougherty
Vox
Fr. Z (more)
Pope Benedict’s Resignation in Historical Context by Donald S. Prudlo (interview with Vatican Radio)
Daniel McCarthy
Rorate Caeli
Fr. Dwight Longenecker

From 2010: Pope Benedict XVI's new devotion to Pope St Celestine V

The Pope Tweets

Rome Reports:


English translation of the Italian: “Dear friends, I am pleased to get in touch with you through Twitter. Thank you for your generous response. I bless all of you from my heart.”

Is there a way to write a monumental first message without making it sound like one is being too "nice" (or craving attention)? Will he continue to use Twitter a year from now? (Or will he have someone else do it for him?)

Bishops, refocus on the personal and forget electronic gadgets. Be a good example to the laity of how one should cultivate friendships through real, personal interaction. While one cannot reduce grace to nature, one should note that many successful groups have used this strategy to convert and make new members, and continue to do so.

Items of Interest, 24 October 2011

Full Text: Note on financial reform from the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace
Vatican Radio
Peter Daniel Haworth, Prudential Questions About the Vatican’s Call for New International Authority Over Financial Institutions and Policy
Fr. Z, The new “white paper” from the Pont. Council Justice and Peace. Fr. Z rants like loon.
Richard Spencer, The Vatican Calls for Global Usury
Marc DeGirolami
Rod Dreher
CHT

Relocalization:
Distributist Review: Mondragon Revisited
Local residents galvanize around agricultural issue
By Matthew Renda
Kitchen Table Talks: A Food Activist’s Guide to Growing the Movement
Economic Solutions Worth Spreading
Slow Money: Sign the Principles

Farming:

Rodale Institute: The Farming Systems Trial
Eric Herm:


The Shocking, Graphic Data That Shows Exactly What Motivates the Occupy Movement
Robbing Us Blind by David S. D'Amato
The Occupation Movement Reader by Brad Spangler


Peak Oil:
Commentary: Oil and the economy by Chris Martenson (EB)
Special call with Chris Martenson, Tues. 10/25
Richard Heinberg on "The End of Growth: Adapting to our New Economic Reality (mp3)
A Peak Oil Primer AKA Why Daniel Yergin is a Dumbass Corporate Whore for Big Oil (EB)
Daniel Yergin massively reduced his energy estimates by Jeffrey J. Brown
The Olduvai Theory
Paul Ehrlich Global Collapse Warning

Water:
California: So cities can have water, farmers are paid if they don’t plant

Counterpunch:
PATRICK COCKBURN, Fury Mounts Among Greek People
MARSHALL AUERBACK, The Myth of Greek Profligacy
PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS, Totally Corrupt America
DEEPAK TRIPATHI, Killing Gaddafi
ANTHONY DIMAGGIO, What the Establishment Isn’t Telling You About Libya


NPR: Deadly Monopolies; Patenting the Human Body

The Gaddafi I Knew
Daniel Larison, Follies of Self-Determination

The Decline of American Intellectual Conservatism by Claes G. Ryn
Pat Buchanan, What is it We Wish to Conserve
Yet another “progressive” argument for an unlimited Commerce Power doesn’t add up

Catholic:
Rome Reports:


Zenit: Pope Explains Basis for Vatican Dialogue
ZENIT Leaders Look to Future
Q-and-A With Faces From Behind the Scenes
And Notes the Choices That Should Be Discouraged

Order of Malta: Grand Prior of England Installed

What is the Holy Rosary?


FBI Says Gangs Infiltrating the US Military
A post by John Robb.

US Army: Uniform Traditions

Why be so unoriginal?

It is a rip-off of Christ the Redeemer in Rio de Janeiro. With all the money that was spent, couldn't they have hired an artist to create something new (and perhaps smaller). Better yet, how about funding the construction of a church with traditional architecture?



Telegraph: Giant statue of Jesus Christ unveiled in Peru (alt)
Giant Jesus Graces Hilltop in Peru, Sparks debate
Cristo del Pacifico draws criticism from several fronts
slideshow

Denver Post: Photos: Final Mass for Archbishop Charles Chaput in Denver

A lot of "conservative" Catholics are fans of the former archbishop of Denver. He may be among the better American bishops, but has he done enough with respect to liturgical orthopraxis? And then there is his seeming embrace of the proposition nation and "nationalist" conservatism. It would not be surprising if Yankee culture dominated late 20th century American Catholicism. How about in the early 20th and late 19th century?

ABC Final Mass from OneBillionStories.com on Vimeo.

His installation Mass in Philadelphia will be September 8, 2011.

Sandro Magister, Vatican Diary / A new doctor of the Church. And seventeen more on hold (via Insight Scoop)

The Jesuit priest at the seminary, Fr. PB, questioned why St. Therese of Lisieux was made a doctor -- if she qualified, then St. Ignatius of Loyola should surely be named a Doctor of the Church as well.

WYD 2011

Benedict XVI to seminarians
St. John of Avila (John of the Cross) to be proclaimed Doctor of the Church

What were the historical circumstances that lead to St. Teresa of Avila being declared a Doctor of the Church before him? That is, why weren't they both declared Doctors of the Church at the same time?


Something from MoJ by Robert Araujo, S.J.: Advice to Catholic University Educators

Zenit:
Papal Homily at Mass With Seminarians
"We Have to Be Saints"

Benedict XVI's Reflection on Way of the Cross
"The Cross Was Not a Sign of Failure, but an Expression of Self-Giving in Love"

Holy Father's Words to University Professors
"You Provide a Splendid Service in the Spread of Truth"

Sandro Magister on the new cardinals

Twenty-four New Cardinals, Tailor Made for the Pope
Koch, Ravasi, Burke, Amato, Ranjith... all very much in line with Benedict XVI. Who, for the honor of great sacred music, is also giving the purple to maestro Bartolucci. With a secret thought, perhaps, for his brother Georg

(Purple appears in the article instead of red?)

See also:
Ratzinger's Best Pupils Are in Sri Lanka and Kazakhstan
They are the bishops Ranjith and Schneider. They follow the pope's example in the liturgical camp more and better than many of their colleagues in Italy and Europe. One revealing test is the manner of giving communion at Mass

Interview with Jesuit Father Samir Khalil

Zenit: The Civic State and Middle East Christianity (Part 1)

And: Benedict XVI Names 24 New Cardinals

Prayer Vigil/Pope Benedict XVI in Hyde Park,London


Pope/Ecumenical Celebration at Westminster Abbey.


Gloria TV News on the Feast of Andrew Kim Taegon, Paul Chong Hasang and Companions

Items of Interest, 15 July 2010

CHT: On the Anti-Occidental Edmund Burke Institute for American Renewal

Field Report: A Michigan Teen Farms Her Backyard (via Rod Dreher)

Zenit:
History of Norms Addressing Gravest Crimes

Father Lombardi on Significance of New Norms
"A Great Contribution to the Clarity and Certainty of Law in This Field"

Norms Addressing "Gravioribus Delictis"

Changes Made to "Sacramentorum Sanctitatis Tutela"
Made to "Render the Text More Useful"

Asia News:
Fr. Samir: French ban on burqa a welcome law!
by Samir Khalil Samir
For the expert on Islam, the law is an invitation for European Muslims to strive for integration and marginalize Salafi trends of opposition and conflict. Moreover, the burqa has no justification in the Koran or Islamic tradition, it is merely a custom of Saudi Arabia (and some other countries) which confirms chauvinism and the "the woman’s grave".

New bishop of Yulin (Yan’an), a PhD graduate from Rome
by Zhen Yuan

Church tightens, clarifies rules on sex abuses by priests
Changes on ‘Rules on the Most Serious Crimes’ are made public today. They include faster procedures, a longer statute of limitations (20 years), treating as a crime the acquisition, possession or disclosure “in any way and by any means” of pornographic images of minors by priests. Changes are also made to the rules that govern crimes against the faith and the sacraments.

Religious freedom, the path to peace: a Carmelite convert from Hinduism comments
by Nirmala Carvalho
Sister Mary Joseph, a former Brahmin Hindu, since 1977 has lived in the cloistered Carmelite Convent in Mumbai. Here she comments to AsiaNews the theme "Religious freedom, the path to peace", chosen by Pope Benedict XVI for World Day for Peace 2011.

Ethnic unrest in Guangxi over water pollution by industrial plant
Thousands of villagers come out to protest against polluting aluminium plant, but are beaten by company security guards. Police face sit-ins and demonstrators, who belong to the Zhuang ethnic minority.

Asia Times:
Death on your doorstep
Restrepo directed by Tim Hetherington and Sebastian Junger

Repeated tight shots of earnest US soldiers are the perfect metaphor for what makes an otherwise cinematically-pleasing film almost useless for telling us anything about the real war. The lack of critical local knowledge of what it's like to live through decades of conflict leaves a gaping hole in this Sundance prize-winner. - Nick Turse

A year after Xinjiang riots, tensions simmer
On the surface, Urumqi, scene of last year's deadly riots in China's western Xinjiang autonomous region, seems calm. But as Beijing moves to develop the country's west, there are underlying ethnic tensions it will need to address to avoid future flare-ups. - Gordon Ross

Counterpunch:
Frida Berrigan, Trillion Dollar Babies: Re-examining the Pentagon's Spending Habits
Dave Lindorff, How Bank of America Got Away With a Huge Swindle
Paul Craig Roberts, Economics in Freefall

Another of Stiglitz’s shortcomings, one that he shares with most economists, is his habit of reifying the market economy. The market is a social organization. The results of market activity reflect the behavior of the human participants in the market. When economists reify the market, they attribute the behavior, ethics, and morality--or lack thereof--of humans to the market itself. Thus, Stiglitz describes human failures as “market failures,” and he asks in his new book, Freefall, “why didn’t the market exercise discipline on bad corporate governance and bad incentive structures?”

Social institutions are inanimate. They do not possess life and cannot impose good outcomes on human action.

Libertarians also reify markets, but instead of blaming markets for human failures, they imbue the market with human virtues and even with the super-human virtue of producing results that human intelligence cannot improve upon. Economists’ “risk models” for which Nobel Prizes have been awarded and Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan attributed the social institution with economic wisdom beyond man’s.

It is likely that the practice of reifying the market economy developed as a form of shorthand. It was convenient to say that the market did this and that rather than to have to describe the human interactions that produced the results. The market was transformed from an abstraction into a life form and became the actor instead of the humans operating within the institution.

If the outcomes are good, libertarians attribute the good results to the market’s virtues; if bad, libertarians blame human interference--government regulation. Economists of Stiglitz’s persuasion see it in the opposite way. Good results are produced by regulation; bad results are the result of allowing the market to make decisions on its own.

This way of thinking, which reifies a social institution, is ingrained in economics. It is the source of enormous confusion and has resulted in a pointless long-running ideological battle that Stiglitz calls “a battle of ideas.”

It is possible to clear away the confusion. First, understand that a free market is one in which prices are free to respond to supply and demand. Economists of all persuasions understand that to fix a price below the price at which supply and demand equate results in shortages. Economists have learned this from rent control. Fixing a price above the price at which supply and demand equate results in surpluses. Economists have learned this from agricultural subsidies. A free market does not mean a market in which human behavior is not regulated. A free market is one in which supply and demand are permitted to equate.

Second, understand that regulation regulates human behavior, not the market. It is the actors in the market who are charged with regulatory infractions, not the institution itself. Regulation is necessary because of human faults, such as greed, fraud, carelessness, not because of market faults. Regulation is necessary because of human failure, not because of market failure.

Third, understand that the problem of regulation is that it is done by flawed humans. Human flaws do not disappear by moving human action from the economy to government. Most likely the flaws worsen as government decisions are often unaccountable. Many economists assume that regulators act in the public interest. However, as George Stigler, another Nobel Prizewinner, pointed out several decades ago, regulators are invariably captured by the industries that they regulate.

Zenit: Pope Accepts Resignation of Irish Bishop

Must the Church in Ireland die in order to be reborn? Given the enormity of sex scandal there, has the reconversion of Ireland been put to a halt and reversed because the witness of the Church is suspect? (Does the scandal have any links to Irish Jansenism?)

NCR: Priest-founder of Life Teen youth ministry laicized (via NLM)

Perhaps the association of Mr. Dale Fushek with Life Teen was not as great as that of Fr. Maciel with the LCs, but can the Life Teen avoid being stigmatized because of him? And how much of its program did Mr. Fushek create or inspire? (I don't think he is mentioned on the website.)

Zenit: Benedict XVI's Condemnation of Sexual Abuse Crisis

Zenit: Decrees of Vatican's Saint Congregation
Testify to 10 Miracles; 10 Cases of Heroic Virtue; 1 Martyrdom

Anglicanorum Coetibus

Zenit: Apostolic Constitution "Anglicanorum Coetibus""Jesus Prayed to the Father for the Unity of His Disciples" [2009-11-09]
Complementary Norms for Anglican Constitution [2009-11-09]
Vatican Commentary on New Norms for AnglicansFather Gianfranco Ghirlanda Explains Significance [2009-11-09]

[2009-11-09] 1st British Anglicans Headed to Rome
[2009-11-09] Celibacy as a Rule Still in Force for Anglicans
[2009-11-09] New Avenue Leads to Communion

Some posts at other blogs:
Fr. Finigan
Damian Thompson: Apostolic Constitution: Vatican publishes the details, Apostolic Constitution: the full text, Apostolic Constitution: married ex-Anglican bishops may keep insignia of episcopal office, Pope's historic offer creates an Anglican tradition within the Catholic Church
American Papist
Fr. Z