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Year: 2006

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Christian Witness, Current Events,

The blood of martyrs

From various news sources: Priest and three children burnt alive

A RUSSIAN Orthodox priest and his three children were burnt alive in their home in what could be a case of arson to stop his efforts to combat alcohol abuse.

Police have opened an investigation into the death of Andrei Nikolayev and his children at his home on Saturday in a village outside Moscow.

“At the time of the fire, presumably, Andrei Nikolayev himself, his wife Oksana and three young children were in the house,” prosecutors were quoted as saying.

Police found the remains of the priest and his children but the fate of his wife remained unknown.

Village residents and church representatives were quoted as saying Mr Nikolayev may have been killed for trying to stop alcohol abuse in the village.

Some said alcoholics have stolen icons and other religious objects from Mr Nikolayev’s church and then sold them to buy drink.

Eternal rest grant onto them O Lord, and may the perpetual light shine upon them.

May the blood of martyrs be the seed of the Church. May the Lord have mercy on us.

Current Events, Political

—¦and on historical revisionism

From the BBC: Row erupts over Israeli textbooks

Israel’s education minister has said school textbooks should show Israel’s pre-1967 borders, prompting a storm of criticism from right-wingers.

Yuli Tamir said changes were needed to give Israeli children a proper understanding of their history.

Currently, schoolbooks show Israel’s territorial conquests in the 1967 war – the West Bank, Gaza, East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights – as part of Israel.

International law deems them occupied land that Israel has illegally settled.

The dovish minister is reported to have ordered the books to be changed. There has been no immediate comment from the prime minister’s office.

…

Ms Tamir’s position is seen as a direct challenge to the Jewish settlement movement, which is a powerful interest group in Israel.

Settlers and their supporters have fought hard against any attempt by governments to withdraw from occupied land, either to foster peace with the Palestinians or enhance Israeli security…

Of course historical revisionism works for the settlers. Actually, if they want to be historically and biblically accurate they should claim all the land from the sea to the two great rivers.

Am I correct in assuming that the use of historical revisionism is a sin only when it is done by ones’ enemies?

Media, Poland - Polish - Polonia

Correcting inaccuracies in the media

To which the refrain is heard: good luck.

The Detroit Free Press ran an article by David Ashenfelter, Holocaust Justice Hits A Wall: Exile or mercy for old Nazi guards?

The well written article discusses the government’s case against three persons believed to have been Nazi guards at concentration camps and the question of whether or not they should be deported.

The single sticking point was a photo by Eric Seals, of the Detroit Free Press, which was included with the article.

The CTV, NY Times, and others have recently set an editorial policy regarding references to Poland and the Holocaust. Writers may not refer to Nazi German Concentration Camps in occupied Poland as —Polish Concentration Camps.— Such references were quite common and improperly portrayed Poland as either supportive of, or complicit in, Nazi German atrocities.

Mr. Seals’ photo, a cropped picture taken at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, indicates Poland Murdered: 3,001,000. The area in which the picture was taken indicates the Nazi death toll by country.

The photo, as presented, falls within the same editorial policy. Photos, or at least their captions, should accurately portray the facts of the situation being portrayed.

Several people have written to the articles’ author, Mr. Ashenfelter, requesting a correction to the photo’s caption clarifying the fact that Poland did not murder 3 million plus people.

LZ, a member of the Polish American Forum group wrote to Mr. Ashenfelter as follows:

The article was very good, it is the picture that is disturbing. Poland did not murder 3,001,000 Jews. The German Third Reich murdered over six million Jews, Slavs and Gypsies. I relize [sic] that the photo can be taken out of context. I know that it tells that 3,001,000 Jews were murdered in Poland. Your average reader will not realize this.

Is it possible to correct this?

Mr. Ashenfelter’s reply follows:

The photo was taken in front of a wall at the Holocaust Memorial.

Are you suggesting that the Holocaust Memorial folks got their numbers wrong about the people who died in Poland?

David Ashenfelter
Federal Court Reporter
Detroit Free Press
600 W. Fort St.
Detroit, MI 48226
Office: 313-223-4490
Fax: 313-222-5981

Mr. Ashenfelter missed the point completely. As Bozena Urbanowicz-Gilbride, a Polish Catholic Holocaust survivor recently stated in a speech at St. Frances de Chantal R.C. Church in Wantagh, New York:

—Every Jew a victim but not every victim a Jew—

Ms. Urbanowicz-Gilbride presents an accurate description of the Holcaust. Every Jew was a victim because every Jew was marked for death, based solely on their ethnicity and/or religion. Every person killed was a victim as well, and often times they were marked for death based solely on their ethnicity (Roma) or based on who they were (homosexual, mentally retarded).

…and yes Mr. Ashenfelter, the numbers as portrayed on the wall are inaccurate in that they only reflect half the deaths in Nazi occupied Poland. The total number of Poles (Christians, Jews, Roma, etc.) killed exceeded 6 million, which the Holocaust Museum fully recognizes (it places the Holocaust death toll at 11 million).

But that’s not the point. People were politely requesting that the photo’s caption be clarified so that no one is misled into believing the people of or government of Poland killed 3+ million people. Not all too difficult, unless of course you don’t care.

Mr. Ashenfelter, if you are at a loss for words try this:

…stands before a representation of the number of Polish Jews murdered in Nazi German concentration camps and elsewhere in occupied Poland.

I’ll even let you use it without attribution.

Saints and Martyrs

December 4 – St. Barbara (Św. Barbara)

St. Barbara

Boże, któryś okazał cudowna łaskę Twoją wzbogacając słabą płeć zwycięzką siłą w męczeństwie, dozwól łaskawie, abyśmy, którzy błogosławionej Barbary Panny i Męczenniczki Twojej narodzenie do życia wiecznego czcimy, naśladując jej przykłady do Ciebie się zbliżali. Przez Chrystusa Pana naszego. Amen.

Current Events, Media, Political

Some people don’t get it

The NY Times is carrying an article about a man who has erected a protest site, filled with crosses, which doubles as a memorial to those killed in Iraq. The following excerpt from Homemade Memorial Is Stirring Passions on Iraq sums up the situation:

LAFAYETTE, Calif., Nov. 30 —” The tranquil suburb of Lafayette hardly seems the most likely place in the Bay Area for a battle over the First Amendment and the war in Iraq. Liberal Berkeley is just over the hill, after all, and nearby San Francisco is always spoiling for a fight.

But over the last few weeks, it is Lafayette —” an affluent bedroom community 20 miles east of downtown San Francisco —” that has become the scene of a passionate debate over the place of political speech in suburbia.

At issue is a hillside memorial, made up of some 450 small white crosses and a 5-by-16-foot sign that reads: —In Memory of 2,867 U.S. Troops Killed in Iraq.— The memorial was created by Jeff Heaton, a building contractor and antiwar activist, who said it was meant —to get people involved on a local level— and talking about Iraq.

Sure enough, people here have become involved, including more than 200 people and a half-dozen television news crews and reporters who crammed into the usually sparsely attended City Council meeting last week to voice their opinions about the memorial. And while many there said they found the crosses deeply moving, others called the memorial unpatriotic, disrespectful or just plain ugly.

That camp included Jean Bonadio, a former Marine sergeant who said she was so offended that she stopped her car and climbed the hill to dismantle the sign, which sits with the crosses on private property of a fellow advocate just north of Highway 24, a major Bay Area thoroughfare, and the Lafayette light-rail station.

—My first reaction was, ‘What a disgrace to those who have sacrificed,’ — said Ms. Bonadio, 53, a dog trainer. —I had no tools with me, so I removed it with my bare hands and feet.—

So, free speech, and protecting the rights of all United States citizens (the alleged motivation of every soldier, and the alleged justification for every foreign venture) becomes exhibit A in the land of irony. Former Marine sergeant Jean Bonadio invades private property, destroys private property, and denies a fellow citizen his free speech rights, because he has no right to say it. Semper Fi Sgt. Bonadio, Semper Fi.

The retired sergeant qualified for the ‘Some people just don’t get it award.’

Homilies,

The First Sunday of Advent

—Beware that your hearts do not become drowsy
from carousing and drunkenness
and the anxieties of daily life,
and that day catch you by surprise like a trap.”

Did you ever get the idea that Jesus is trying to bring us back to reality. In listening to these words, we hear Him telling us to avoid, to shun the things that are inconsequential to our salvation.

The salient point is that Jesus’ caution is accompanied by His promise and commitment to us.

Some have said that God doesn’t dabble in small matters, that falling off a curb or tripping over an obstacle is no concern of His. Yet Jesus told us the Father, who is Father of all, cares for us even in small matters. In Matthew 16 Jesus tells us:

Look at the birds in the sky; they do not sow or reap, they gather nothing into barns, yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are not you more important than they? … Learn from the way the wild flowers grow. They do not work or spin. … If God so clothes the grass of the field, which grows today and is thrown into the oven tomorrow, will he not much more provide for you

Latter, in Matthew 10 Jesus tells us that

Are not two sparrows sold for a small coin? Yet not one of them falls to the ground without your Father’s knowledge.

Yes, God does watch over us, in each step we take, in each thing we do. Our brother Jesus is ever at our side, ready to give us a little jolt, a nudge to reawaken us from our drowsiness. He is there to guide us back to the things that are really important.

Jesus speaks of end things today, things so awesome and fearful that He said, —People will die of fright.— He knows what awaits us, and He tells us that the best way to get to Him is to be awake and alert, to be active participants in His plan of salvation.

Jesus works at us consistently and constantly, stay awake, be ready, I will not let you sleep. You need to change, to grow, to mature in faith and in the life you are called to —“ not just life on earth, but eternal life.

Jesus tells us that the Father has the spectrum covered. From the smallest things in life to the greatest, He is there. In the end, He is there to let us know that regardless of the negatives we may encounter, the bad that may happen as a result of sin, He holds us in the palm of His hand.

The promise is great, yet we fall short in sin, in laziness, drowsiness, monotony, dissatisfaction with our family, our state in life, our Church. Therefore, we need a time, a time to re-commit to working out our salvation, as it is said, in fear and trembling.

That time is now. That time is Advent. Advent is about our answer to God’s care for us. It is about our preparation, a time of fasting, prayer, and re-commitment.

It’s funny, because the world has turned Advent upside-down. It has filled Advent with an intensified dose of the anxieties of daily life —“ the very thing our Lord warns us to avoid. The things that pull us away from our focus on God.

So place the world in perspective this Advent. Let us recommit, taking an inventory and putting the tools Jesus gave us to work in reforming, amending, and preparing our lives for Him.

Paul prays:

May the Lord make you increase and abound in love
for one another and for all,
just as we have for you,
so as to strengthen your hearts,
to be blameless in holiness before our God and Father
at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his holy ones. Amen.

Paul’s prayer asks the Lord to grant us an abundance of love and a strengthening of our hearts. These gifts, along with the tools we have before us, the bulwark of the Holy Church, the sacraments, and prayer arm us for action. We have been armed for the day of Christ’s coming.

Isaiah prophesied about it:

The days are coming, says the LORD,
when I will fulfill the promise.

The days are indeed coming. Use this Advent to prepare yourselves, to strengthen yourselves, to re-arm yourselves so that Jesus’ words to us will come to fruition in our lives, so that we are prepared to:

stand erect and raise your heads
because your redemption is at hand.

Everything Else

You open, and no one shuts

O Clavis David,
et sceptrum domus Israí«l,
qui aperis, et nemo claudit,
claudis, et nemo aperuit:
veni, et educ vinctum
de domo carceris,
sedentem in tenebris,
et umbra mortis.

O Key of David,
and scepter of the house of Israel,
you open, and no one shuts,
you shut, and no one opens:
come, and lead the prisoner
from jail,
seated in darkness
and in the shadow of death.

O Kluczu Dawida
i Berło domu Izraela,
Ty który otwierasz a nikt zamknąć nie zdoła,
zamykasz a nikt nie otworzy,
przyjdź i wyprowadź
z więzienia
człowieka pogrążonego
w cieniu śmierci.

Definitely not literal! How many times do we seek the easy answer, the black and white definition; the answer to our longing, but on our terms?

The Lord asks us to come and follow Him. He opens the narrow path for us, and He can even allow the rich man to pass through the eye of the needle.

But, we see no easy answer because we cannot let go of our complexity.

Come follow me is quite easy, but it means leaving ourselves behind. He opens the way —“ for He is the way. He will, by His grace, close the door to our self-centered desires, our prison, because as we fall into His arms, arms of love, we will never desire anything other.

He is the key, the gate, and the door.

Lord, help us enter into the sheepfold through You. Lord, be our shepherd.

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