Thoughts and opinions from a Priest in the PNCC
Deacon Raphael, who is also a Police Officer in Buffalo, NY requests our prayers for two of his comrades who were shot in the line of duty last night.
Please pray for Officers Carl Andolina and Patricia “Patty” Parete. Officer Parete is in very serious condition.
Renee from the Polish American Forum notes that her parents received two replies to letters they sent as follows:
“Thanks for your comments. Anyone who knows anything about World War II knows that Poland didn’t kill $3 million people. The Nazis did. But we should have done a better job in the caption to make clear that Mr. Weiss was standing beside a wall at the Holocaust Center containing the Poland inscription and that the inscription about Poland referred to everyone killed by the Nazis. Thanks again for the feedback. David Ashenfelter”
and
“Hello again. We’re planning to write a clarification for tomorrow’s paper about the photo, where it was taken and what the inscription meant. Thanks again for taking the time to respond to the story. We appreciate and value your comments… Best wishes. David Ashenfelter”
Boże, któryś błogosławionego biskupa Mikołaja niezliczonemi cudami wsławić raczył, spraw, abyśmy przez modlitwy i zasługi jego od ognia piekielnego wybawieni byli. Przez Chrystusa Pana naszego. Amen.
O Oriens,
splendor lucis aeternae,
et sol justitiae:
veni, et illumina
sedentes in tenebris,
et umbra mortis.O Dawn,
splendor of eternal light,
and sun of justice,
come, and shine
on those seated in darkness,
and in the shadow of death.O Wschodzie,
Blasku światłości wieczystej
i Słońce sprawiedliwości,
przyjdź i oświeć
żyjących w mroku
i cieniu śmierci.
So we sit in darkness waiting for something to happen to us, for the light to break through. We wallow in our self imposed agony, O God, when will you set us free?
We forget that He set us free already. We are free to choose Him, an easy choice if you consider the alternatives. We are free to enter into union with Him, every day at the altar; a great gift and blessing.
But still we sit and cry out, expecting the quick fix and the black and white answer. It won’t come, because our questions are not worthy of consideration. Rather what we need to do is allow the light of the new Dawn to shine in us, to set ourselves aside, and to work in truth, to struggle —“ fighting the good fight, and by doing so we will succeed —“ eternal life, eternal light.
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.
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?
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.
Błagamy Cię Panie niech łaska niebieska rozmnarza Twój Kościół, który zasługą i nauką błogosławionego Sawy opata uświęcić raczyłeś. Przez Chrystusa Pana naszego. Amen.
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.
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.’