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Month: June 2008

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Perspective, Political

Perpetuating lies

From Time Magazine: Perpetuating the al-Qaeda-Iraq Myth

In an interview with the Washington Post last week, CIA Director Michael Hayden claimed we’re beating al-Qaeda. As Hayden put it: “Near strategic defeat of al-Qaeda in Iraq. Near strategic defeat of al-Qaeda in Saudi Arabia.”

I’ll defer to Hayden on Saudi Arabia, but when it comes to Iraq, Hayden betrayed his belief in the neo-con lie that Iraq was one of al-Qaeda’s bases before the 2003 invasion and still is today. Can no one drive a stake into a lie that suckered us into a war we didn’t need? Probably not.

A friend of mine at the White House complained to me the other day that the Bush administration and the Pentagon until this day believe we are fighting al-Qaeda in Iraq. They “stand up” al-Qaeda as the enemy in Iraq, he said, even behind closed doors. In the teeth of the facts, they ignore that the enemy we’re fighting in Iraq is a half a dozen homegrown insurgencies, an incipient civil war, and criminal gangs. They ignore the fact that although a handful of Osama bin Laden’s followers showed up in Iraq after the invasion, in a futile attempt to hijack the Sunni resistance, al-Qaeda is not the main enemy in that country.

It should be clear by now, but apparently it isn’t: al-Qaeda is an idea, a way of thinking. Al-Qaeda thinks the world is divided between believers and nonbelievers, and the believers are divinely obliged to destroy the nonbelievers. It is a simple idea that has attracted tens of thousands of Muslims, but it is neither a political prescription nor the makings of an army. The Sunni Arabs who drifted into Iraq after the invasion and the Iraqis who embraced al-Qaeda were never an organization. They were never an army. They were never the main enemy. They numbered, what, a couple of thousand? They nearly triggered a civil war, but even that they failed to accomplish.

The success we’re seeing today in Iraq has nothing to do with rooting out terrorist cells. What we’re seeing instead is a shriveling of grassroots support, Sunni Muslims turning against al-Qaeda and its messianic, dualistic way of looking at the world. It hasn’t gone unnoticed in the Middle East that al-Qaeda has killed more Muslims than nonbelievers. Or that al-Qaeda has failed to take an inch of ground in the name of Islam. With this kind of record how could the Iraqis not turn against al-Qaeda?

…So why should we now mischaracterize the enemy?

The tendency will be to leave it at the lie: We fought and beat al-Qaeda in Iraq. But it’s a lie we’ll pay for later. By mischaracterizing the enemy in Iraq, we mischaracterize the enemy in Pakistan. Whether the car bomb that destroyed the Danish embassy in Pakistan on Monday was the work of an actual member of al-Qaeda or not does not matter —” what does is that al-Qaeda’s way of thinking is not defeated.

A good testament against the lies we have been told and those who are perjuring themselves in perpetuating those lies. The fact that so many have suffered and died, that so much has been destroyed, including our economy, for no real purpose, is the lasting price of the lie. I personally hope that our country’s leadership finds a moment of clarity and leaves the lie behind, that they hold the liars accountable, and that they promote healing for the people of this country and of Iraq.

PNCC, Political

Barak Obama & family – welcome to the PNCC?

In the spirit of this post at Shuck and Jive: Why the Obamas Should Become Presbyterian, and a dose of good natured humor, I offer the following as reasons the Obama Family should become members of the PNCC:

  • The PNCC was founded by immigrants, right here in the U. S. of A. We are 100% American, pluralistic, and respect and honor our immigrant ancestors.
  • We were founded by hard working Americans who were Labor organizers and members. Labor will love that.
  • We began in Scranton, PA (Hillary’s hometown 🙂 ), Buffalo, and Chicago. We are 100% in touch with our blue collar roots. These are the folks you need.
  • We are One, Holy, Catholic, Apostolic, and democratic in our governance. You can say that both you and your Church honor and protect the democratic process. A Democratic President from a democratic Church? Sounds good – right?
  • We are Catholic, but no, not that kind. We’ve already had a Roman Catholic President so that’s less of an obstacle, and what are people going to say? They can’t say that Rome is ordering you around.
  • Roman Catholics will recognize the fact that you believe what they believe (even though their Church might not).
  • You get to attend very cool High Church liturgies. It’s really visual and looks great on TV – especially for your kids first communions and confirmations.
  • Our Confession of Faith includes the following: I BELIEVE in immortality and everlasting happiness in eternity, in the union with God of all people, races and ages, because I believe in the Divine power of love, mercy and justice and for nothing else do I yearn, but that it may be to me according to my faith. People identify with that.
  • We are constitutional.
  • We don’t compromise on core beliefs. In essentials, unity; in non-essentials, liberty; in all things, charity. or words to that effect.
  • We have the world’s greatest church cooks. All those fundraisers and long campaign nights will be more than bearable with a load of pierogi and golambki on the stove.

Folks from other Christian Churches – what would attract the Obama family to your Church? Any predictions?

Fathers, PNCC

June 3 – St. Gregory Nazianzus from an Exposition of the Character of the Priestly Office

This is why the heathen rage and the peoples imagine vain things; why tree is set over against tree, hands against hand, the one stretched out in self indulgence, the others in generosity; the one unrestrained, the others fixed by nails, the one expelling Adam, the other reconciling the ends of the earth. This is the reason of the lifting up to atone for the fall, and of the gall for the tasting, and of the thorny crown for the dominion of evil, and of death for death, and of darkness for the sake of light, and of burial for the return to the ground, and of resurrection for the sake of resurrection. All these are a training from God for us, and a healing for our weakness, restoring the old Adam to the place whence he fell, and conducting us to the tree of life, from which the tree of knowledge estranged us, when partaken of unseasonably, and improperly.

Of this healing we, who are set over others, are the ministers and fellow-labourers; for whom it is a great thing to recognise and heal their own passions and sicknesses: or rather, not really a great thing, only the viciousness of most of those who belong to this order has made me say so: but a much greater thing is the power to heal and skilfully cleanse those of others, to the advantage both of those who are in want of healing and of those whose charge it is to heal. — Paragraph 25 and 26.

PNCC

The PNCC in the Press

Two recent articles on Polish National Catholic parishes and PNCC distinctives. Please note, as with any Press article, not every item mentioned in the articles is accurate. For more info on problems with the Press’ understanding of religion see Get Religion.

From the Toledo Blade: Polish National Catholic Church has found a home

Nearly 2 1/2 years after holding its first Mass, and after meeting in members’ homes and several different rented spaces since then, Resurrection Polish National Catholic Church has found a home.

The parish was founded by about a dozen people whose parishes were closed by the Toledo Catholic Diocese in 2005 as part of the diocese’s major realignment of parish boundaries.

On May 31, a Dedication Mass will be held at 11 a.m. at Resurrection PNCC in its new location, 1835 Temperance Rd., Temperance.

The Rev. Jaroslaw Nowak, Resurrection’s administrator, will preside at the Mass with two PNCC hierarchs, the Rev. Robert Nemkovich, prime bishop of the Polish National Catholic Church, and the Rev. Jan Dawidziuk, bishop of the western diocese.

The brick building, which has about 5,400 square feet of space, can seat approximately 80 people in the sanctuary and also features a community room where it will hold church gatherings, Polish dinners for the community, and other events.

“There were two things we were looking for in starting up a parish: that it is traditionally Catholic, and that it belonged to us,” said Chris Cremean, a founding member of Resurrection whose previous parish, Toledo’s St. Jude, was closed by Bishop Leonard Blair…

From the Standard-Times via South Coast Today: A different kind of Catholic Church in Fall River

FALL RIVER —” The parishioners own the church building, manage the finances and decide whether to sell or hold parish property.

Blessed Trinity Church in Fall River is not your typical Catholic parish.

The church was formed in 2000 after parishioners of two Polish National Catholic Church parishes in Fall River voted to merge. The parishioners sold property and built a new church that was dedicated in 2005. Three years later, the laity continues to run the parish, which is debt-free.

“It wasn’t the bishop that imposed this on us, it was the will of the people,” said the Rev. Robert M. Nemkovich, 38, Blessed Trinity’s pastor. “We have a church that, when it comes to making decisions on material things and administration, the people have a voice and a vote.”

Joanne Oliveira, who serves on Blessed Trinity’s parish committee, described her church as being a sort of “Ellis Island for Catholicism.”

“I just feel that way because of the acceptance and welcoming of the parish in not denying people the sacraments. It’s just such a free experience,” Ms. Oliveira said.

However, although its administration is democratic, its priests can marry, and divorced parishioners can receive the Eucharist, Blessed Trinity should not be confused with a liberal, mainline Protestant denomination.

The teachings of the Polish National Catholic Church —” the communion to which Blessed Trinity belongs —” are similar to those of the Roman Catholic Church, which the PNCC split from in the late 19th century.

Blessed Trinity celebrates the same seven sacraments Roman Catholics do. Mass is celebrated every Sunday. Scripture is interpreted through the church’s canonical authority, not the personal judgments of the faithful. There are no female priests. Same-sex unions are not recognized.

The major difference between the two churches lies in authority. The Polish National Catholic Church recognizes the pope as the bishop of Rome, the successor to St. Peter, but does not believe he has authority over the universal church.

“We don’t see authority being in one person,” Rev. Nemkovich said. “We see it as being shared, going back to the early church model we read about in the Scriptures where decisions were made in councils whenever there was a challenge.”

In addition to scripture and tradition, PNCC teachings are founded on the first seven church ecumenical councils; the gatherings of bishops that defined doctrine until 1054, the year the Christian church split into the Roman Catholic West and the Orthodox East…

Perspective, Political

Advice from the Rabbi?

From Christian Newswire: I Stand with Pastor John Hagee

Pastor John Hagee is a towering leader in the Evangelical Church who has dedicated a great part of his enormously successful ministry to reaching out in love and loving-kindness to the Jewish people and the State of Israel. He has admirably defended our right to our historic homeland even when our enemies have attempted to disgorge us from our homes and drive us into the sea; he has praised the Lord for having imbued us, the “post- Holocaust dry bones of Ezekiel,” with renewed life and vigor… He has organized Christian lobby groups for the only true democracy in the Middle East across the length and breadth of the United States even when a former American President and professors from Harvard and Chicago Universities have denounced our own lobbying efforts as un-American and anti-Democratic.

Pastor Hagee has expressed his profound affection for us even when it has been most unpopular to do so. Can we, the recipients of his heart and goodwill, dare be silent now, when the political frenzy of primary elections hysterically seeks to defame and discredit one of the greatest voices on behalf of Christian-Jewish healing and cooperation? No, for the sake of Jerusalem and for the sake of the God of love and peace we must raise our voices in support of and friendship for the very individual who has never faltered in his support and friendship for us!

Does this mean that I must necessarily agree with all of the theological positions taken by Pastor Hagee? Not at all! True friendship means that I continue to love and even partner with my friend, despite disagreeing with him on even fundamental positions of theology and ideology – as long as his views do not threaten the life or limb of innocent human beings…

We are living in a world divided between those who believe in a God of love and peace, and those who believe in a Satan of Jihad and suicide bombers. Any attempt to marginalize and slander leaders of the camp of the former will only serve to strengthen the camp of the latter, with the future existence of the free world perilously hanging in the balance. And so I continue to proudly shout from the rooftops that this rabbi in Israel stands firmly alongside -his beloved friend, a true friend of Israel and the free world, Pastor John Hagee.

Shlomo Riskin
Chief Rabbi of Efrat, Israel
Founder: Ohr Torah Stone Center for Jewish-Christian Understanding & Cooperation.

Three things:

First, I guess it is that easy – all us good, all them Muslim and assorted other folk bad.

Second, who are the innocent human beings the Rabbi wishes to protect? Only those he deems innocent or worthy? That does not count all them there bad people (who are just all bad) I guess.

Third, check out the YouTube video below, especially from time mark 2:13 forward. I’ll take advice from the one Rabbi that matters and not from Rabbi Riskin. See the Ohr Torah Stone Center’s About Us page where he says:

Over two decades ago, Rabbi Shlomo Riskin dreamt of inspiring a new movement of Jewish leadership which would successfully synthesize Halachic commitment with the needs of contemporary Western life, and work toward the unification of the Jewish world by promoting a Judaism based on tolerance, openness and inclusion. In 1983, Rabbi Riskin embarked upon the process of realizing his vision with the founding of Ohr Torah Stone Colleges and Graduate Programs.

The words —Ohr Torah— literally mean —the Torah is light,— and refer to the enlightening beacon which radiates from a true combination of Torah values, Zionist ideals, and a dedication to tikkun olam…

So the Rabbi seeks to tell us that the Torah will enlighten us? I prefer having Christ Who is our light. Faith tells me I am enlightened far beyond anything any man can provide.

“Everyone needs a Rabbi? We have one. His name is… Jesus. I don’t need this guy.” 😉

Fathers, PNCC

June 2 – St. Gregory Nazianzus from an Exposition of the Character of the Priestly Office

Of external warfare I am not afraid, nor of that wild beast, and fulness of evil, who has now arisen against the churches, though he may threaten fire, sword, wild beasts, precipices, chasms; though he may show himself more inhuman than all previous madmen, and discover fresh tortures of greater severity. I have one remedy for them all, one road to victory; I will glory in Christ namely, death for Christ’s sake. — Paragraph 87.

PNCC

Polish National, Roman Catholic Churches Address Doctrinal Issues At Spring Meeting

Posted at the USCCB:

Doctrinal issues led agenda items at the spring session of the Polish National Catholic (PNCC) —“ Roman Catholic Dialogue, May 19 and 20, in Scranton, Pennsylvania. The meeting was held at the PNCC’s National Church Center and hosted by Bishop Robert Nemkovich, the PNCC Prime Bishop. Bishop Edward U. Kmiec of Buffalo and Bishop Anthony Mikovsky of the PNCC Central Diocese co-chaired the meeting.

Two new Roman Catholic members joined the group: Bishop Mitchell Rozanski, Auxiliary Bishop of Baltimore, and Bishop Matthew Ustrzycki, Auxiliary Bishop Emeritus of Hamilton, Ontario. The Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops became an official participant in the dialogue at the meeting.

Dialogue members considered the situation of PNCC military chaplains and the options for sacramental sharing in combat zones. Members also heard an update on a proposal to permit PNCC faithful to act as sponsors at Roman Catholic baptisms, and to require the dispensation of form for liceity only in the case of mixed marriages in the PNCCFrom the March 2008 BCEIA and SEIA Report:

Our dialogue with the PNCC has not met since the last meeting of the Administrative Committee; the next session is scheduled to take place in Scranton, Pennsylvania, May 19 and 20. I mentioned in my last report that Bishop Skylstad had written to Cardinal Kasper regarding two incremental steps forward (allowing PNCC faithful to serve as godparents at Catholic baptisms in addition to a Catholic godparent, and requiring the dispensation from canonical form for liceity only when a mixed marriage takes place in a PNCC ceremony). We later learned that these matters should be raised directly with Cardinal William Levada, Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. We are now consulting with the Committees on Doctrine and Canonical Affairs regarding these steps.

.

Msgr. Thomas Green of The Catholic University of America School of Canon Law reviewed presentations from the 1996 dialogue regarding the canonical status of former Roman Catholic clergy and faithful who have joined the PNCC and the 2006 statement by the Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts regarding the formal act of leaving the [Roman] Catholic Church.

Members also re-examined two previous agreements between Roman Catholics and Old Catholics of the Union of Utrecht regarding the transfer of clergy from one church to the other: the agreement signed in 1996 between Cardinal Edward Cassidy, then President of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity and Archbishop Antonius Jan Glazemaker of Utrecht (later withdrawn) and the 1999 agreement between the German Bishops’ Conference and the Old Catholic Diocese in Germany. The PNCC members also shared the text of the Declaration of Scranton, a document intended to clarify the doctrinal position of the PNCC on several issues.

Members also considered the April visit of Pope Benedict XVI to the United States and local examples of misunderstandings between members of the two churches. The next meeting is slated for November 6-7, in Baltimore.

The Polish National Catholic Church and the Roman Catholic Church have been meeting for a semiannual dialogue since 1984. Current PNCC members include Bishop Anthony Mikovsky (Co-Chairman), Bishop John E. Mack, Very Rev. Marcell W. Pytlarz, Very Rev. John Z. Kraus, Very Rev. Paul Sobiechowski, and Father Robert M. Nemkovich Jr. Roman Catholic members include Bishop Edward U. Kmiec (Co-Chairman), Bishop Thomas G. Wenski of Orlando, Florida, Auxiliary Bishop Mitchell T. Rozanski of Baltimore, Auxiliary Bishop Emeritus Matthew Ustrzycki of Hamilton, Ontaro, Msgr. John Strynkowski, Msgr. Thomas J. Green, Father Phillip Altavilla, and Paulist Father Ronald G. Roberson (staff).

Fathers, PNCC

June 1 – St. Ignatius from The Epistle to Polycarp

Give heed to the bishop, that God also may give heed to you. My soul be for theirs that are submissive to the bishop, to the presbyters, and to the deacons, and may my portion be along with them in God! Labour together with one another; strive in company together; run together; suffer together; sleep together; and awake together, as the stewards, and associates, and servants of God. Please Him under whom you fight, and from whom you receive your wages. Let none of you be found a deserter. Let your baptism endure as your arms; your faith as your helmet; your love as your spear; your patience as a complete panoply. Let your works be the charge assigned to you, that you may receive a worthy recompense. Be long-suffering, therefore, with one another, in meekness, as God is towards you. May I have joy of you for ever! — Chapter 6. The duties of the Christian flock.

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