Van harte welkom, Leah!

Hieronder het laatste bericht van blogster Leah Libresco (senior politieke wetenschappen aan Yale University, journalist bij The Huffington Post en columniste van The Yale Daily News) voor het Atheist Portal van website Patheos.com (het laatste - want haar blogs staan voortaan op het Catholic Channel van dezelfde website):

For several years, a lot of my friends have been telling me I had an inconsistent and unsustainable philosophy. ”A virtue ethicist atheist whose transhumanism seems to be rooted in dualism? Who won’t shut up about moral lapses as wounds to the soul and keeps trying to convince us it’s better to be sinned against than sinning? Who has started talking about mortifying her pride and keeps pulling out Lewis and Chesterton quotes? C’mon, convert already.”
I could see where they were coming from, but I stayed put. I was ready to admit that there were parts of Christianity and Catholicism that seemed like a pretty good match for the bits of my moral system that I was most sure of, while meanwhile my own philosophy was pretty kludged together and not particularly satisfactory. But I couldn’t pick consistency over my construction project as long as I didn’t believe it was true.
While I kept working, I tried to kee my eyes open for ways I could test which world I was in, but a lot of the evidence for Christianity was only compelling to me if I at least presupposed Deism. Meanwhile, on the other side, I kept running into moral philosophers who seemed really helpful, until I discovered that their study of virtue ethics has led them to take a tumble into the Tiber. (I’m looking at you, MacIntyre!).
Then, the night before Palm Sunday (I have excellent liturgical timing), I was up at my alma mater for an alumni debate. I had another round of translating a lot of principles out of Catholic in order to use them in my speech, which prompted the now traditional heckling from my friends. After the debate, I buttonholed a Christian friend for another argument. During the discussion, he prodded me on where I thought moral law came from in my metaphysics. I talked about morality as though it were some kind of Platonic form, remote from the plane that humans existed on. He wanted to know where the connection was.
I could hypothesize how a Forms-material world link would work in the case of mathematics (a little long and off topic for this post, but pretty much the canonical idea of recognizing Two-ness as the quality that’s shared by two chairs and two houses, etc. Once you get the natural numbers, the rest of mathematics is in your grasp). But I didn’t have an analogue for how humans got bootstrap up to get even a partial understanding of objective moral law.
I’ve heard some explanations that try to bake morality into the natural world by reaching for evolutionary psychology. They argue that moral dispositions are evolutionarily triumphant over selfishness, or they talk about group selection, or something else. Usually, these proposed solutions radically misunderstand a) evolution b) moral philosophy or c) both. I didn’t think the answer was there. My friend pressed me to stop beating up on other people’s explanations and offer one of my own.
“I don’t know,” I said. ”I’ve got bupkis.”
“Your best guess.”
“I haven’t got one.”
“You must have some idea.”
“I don’t know. I’ve got nothing. I guess Morality just loves me or something.”
“…”
“Ok, ok, yes, I heard what I just said. Give me a second and let me decide if I believe it.”
It turns out I did.
I believed that the Moral Law wasn’t just a Platonic truth, abstract and distant. It turns out I actually believed it was some kind of Person, as well as Truth. And there was one religion that seemed like the most promising way to reach back to that living Truth. I asked my friend what he suggest we do now, and we prayed the night office of the Liturgy of the Hours together (I’ve kept up with that since). Then I suggested hugs and playing Mumford and Sons really, really loudly.
After I changed my mind, I decided to take a little time to make sure I really believed what I thought I believed, before telling my friends, family, and, now, all of you. That left me with the question of what to do about my atheism blog. My solution was to just not write anything I disagreed with. Enough of my friends had accused me of writing in a crypto-Catholic style that I figured no one would notice if I were actually crypto-Catholic for a month and a half (i.e. everything from “Upon this ROC…” on) . That means you already have a bit of a preview of what has and hasn’t changed. I’m still confused about the Church’s teachings on homosexuality, I still need to do a lot of work to accept gifts graciously, and I still love steam engines.
Starting tomorrow, this blog is moving to the the Patheos Catholic channel (the url and RSS will remain unchanged). Meanwhile, I’m in RCIA classes at a DC parish, so you can look forward to more Parsing Catholicism tags (and after the discussion of universalism we had last week, I think it will be prudent to add a “Possibly Heretical” category).
This post isn’t the final word on my conversion. I’m sure there’s a lot more explaining and arguing to do, so be a little charitable in your read of this post and try to give me a little time to expand my ideas over the next few weeks. (Based on my in-person arguments to date, it seems like most of my atheist friends disagree two or three steps back from my deciding Morality is actually God. They usually diverge back around the bit where I assert morality, like math, is objective and independent of humans. As one of my friends said, “Well, I guess if I were a weird quasi-Platonist virtue ethicist, this would probably convince me”).
And how am I doing? Well, I’m baking now (cracking eggs is pretty much the least gnostic thing I can do, since it’s so, so disgusting to touch, and putting effort into food as more than the ransom my body demands for continued function is the second least gnostic). I’ve been using the Liturgy of the Hours and St. Patrick’s Breastplate for most of my prayer attempts. and, over all, I feel a bit like Valentine in this speech from Arcadia:
It makes me so happy… A door like this has cracked open five or six times since we got up on our hind legs. It’s the best possible time to be alive, when almost everything you thought you knew is wrong.

We herinneren aan de zin van J.H. Newman: "Conversions are nothing more than a deeper discovery of what we already truly desire".

(Via het Katholiek Nieuwsblad. Lees Leahs eigen bericht voor de links naar haar eerdere artikelen die (achteraf) de passen van haar bekering illustreren)

FAQs over het katholieke geloof, met de antwoorden

Afgelopen week is Aleteia.org on-line gegaan, een nieuw internetinitiatief van katholieke leken in samenwerking met de Pauselijke raad voor sociale communicatie en de onlangs opgerichte Pauselijke raad voor de bevordering van de nieuwe evangelisatie.
De site - in het Engels, met vertalingen in Italiaans, Spaans en Frans -

offers Questions and Answers about the Catholic faith, life and society. Here you can find answers to the most pressing questions on current events, the Pope, prayer, science, history, etc...
Aleteia [= Grieks voor 'waarheid'] is run by a team of journalists, experts, media managers and bloggers, who are eager to find answers to your questions about the Catholic faith, life and society. They are continually producing Q&As, interviews and videos to help you learn more about what most interests you.
We often think that there are no precise, simple and well-documented answers to all the questions we ask about the Catholic faith, life and society.
Aleteia is dedicated to integrating the best available resources into our answers so we can all benefit from having information at our fingertips that none of us would be able to find on our own.

Lijkt een boeiende site. Have a look by yourself.

Hitler is uit, Taliban is in

In de landelijke media wordt de (plotseling politiek relevante) orthodox-calvinistische SGP (die de gemiddelde opinieleider niet kan luchten of zien) op grote schaal weggezet als 'poldertaliban'.
Op micro-niveau etiketteren internetondernemer Eric van den Berg en FKT-medewerker Frank Bosman al langer andere zich in de media profilerende katholieken (wier optreden hun blijkbaar een doorn in het oog is), zoals KN-hoofdredacteur Mariska Orbán-de Haas, als 'talibankatholieken'.
In de Volkskrant legt Nausicaa Marbe uit waarom 'mediadeskundigen' graag dit soort absurde etiketten plakken:

De vraag is niet of [deze mensen] op de Taliban lijk[en], maar waarom die vergelijking zo gretig gemaakt wordt. De Taliban zijn, als bekend, godsdienstwaanzinnige moordenaars. De rapporten van de Verenigde Naties spreken boekdelen: over de terreuraanvallen op dorpen, lynchpartijen, groepsmoorden, martelingen en openbare executies. Daarnaast plegen ze terroristische aanslagen in een (voor ons) uitzichtloze oorlog. Misdadigers dus, met wie [brave orthodoxe christenen] gelijkgesteld worden. Waarom die doelbewuste provocatie? Simpel: omdat opvattingen over de SGP de barometerstand aangeven van alle religieuze gevoeligheden in het koortsige multiculturele debat. Ook zijn die meningen een lakmoesproef voor hypocrisie als het om vrijheid van meningsuiting en discriminatie gaat.
De loze vergelijking van de SGP met moordende moslimfundamentalisten is bedoeld om een ontkenning uit te lokken. Waarna de ontkenner ontmaskerd kan worden als moslimbasher.
Volg de simpele logica: als je de SGP [of Mariska Orbán -vh] niet even erg vindt als de Taliban, dan vind je vrouwen- en homodiscriminatie door christenen minder erg dan soortgelijke discriminatie door moslims. Wie dat doet is een hypocriet die niks geeft om discriminatie, maar zélf moslims discrimineert.
Nu u het mij toch vraagt: het is de zoveelste, geperverteerde verschijningsvorm van het virus dat politieke correctheid heet.

En waar dient politieke correctheid toe?
De sovjet-mediakenners leerden: als je zelf niet over een positief (aantrekkelijk) aanbod beschikt, maar toch macht (invloed) wilt houden, moet je een onbetwistbare, gemeenschappelijke vijand crëeren. Bij voorkeur een ongevaarlijke, aan wie je zonder zelf risico te lopen alle kwaad kunt toedichten en ten opzichte van wie je jezelf als vèr weg, 'Goed' en dus verplicht-aantrekkelijk kunt afficheren. De eenvoudigste en minst kostbare manier is het plakken van een afschrikwekkend etiket.

"Francis Bacon ontwierp de leer over de idolen. Hij zei dat de mensen niet geneigd zijn vanuit de zuivere ervaring te leven en haar liever met vooroordelen besmetten. Die vooroordelen zijn de idolen. 'Idolen van de soort', zoals Bacon ze noemde. (...)
De 'idolen van het theater' zijn de gezaghebbende meningen van anderen waardoor de mens zich laat leiden als hij datgene interpreteert wat hij niet zelf heeft ervaren. (...) Er zijn nog andere 'idolen van het theater': de kritiekloze instemming met de resultaten van de wetenschap. Kortom, het gaat om de vrijwillig overgenomen dwalingen van anderen. (...)
De 'idolen van de markt' zijn de dwalingen die voortkomen uit de wederzijdse band en de relaties tussen mensen. Ze bedriegen de mens omdat het de gewoonte is geworden formules te gebruiken die de rede geweld aandoen. Bijvoorbeeld: vijand van het volk! vreemd element! verrader! iedereen laat je in de steek!" (Aleksandr Solzjenitsyn, Kankerpaviljoen)

Heeft een zekere Godwin de afgelopen jaren 'Hitler' en 'extreem-rechts' vrijwel onbruikbaar gemaakt (een sneue poging, in de NL RK microwereld, om op deze manier één van de weinige bestaande basis-initiatieven de nek om te draaien, is mislukt), nu is er 'gelukkig' een nieuw etiket dat je - met een minimum aan denkwerk en een maximum aan effect - op gewenste vijanden kunt plakken. Waardoor je, zonder je te hoeven bezighouden met argumenten en redenen, jezelf toch als weldenkend kunt blijven profileren.

Zolang als het duurt. Want: al is de leugen nog zo snel, de waarheid achterhaalt haar wel.

Romeinse verslaggeving over Nederlandse kerkmensen (en hun beweegredenen)

De bekende Italiaanse vaticanist Paolo Rodari schrijft op zijn weblog, onder de kop 'De pro-pedofilie-salesiaan en de laatste salvo's van de Hollandse revolutie':

Maar weinigen in de Nederlandse Kerk vinden de opvattingen van de twee salesianen acceptabel. Het debat gaat vooral - en hier en daar nogal heftig - over de theologische oorzaken van de opvattingen van de twee. De grote vraag is: wat brengt kerkmensen ertoe te verdedigen dat pedofilie iets toelaatbaars is?
Sommigen stellen dat alles begonnen is na het Tweede Vaticaans Concilie, toen de Nederlandse Kerk, veel meer dan andere Kerken, in 'open' en 'liberal' stijl drastische hervormingen doorvoerde in zijn eigen DNA. Bernard Jan kardinaal Alfrink, aartsbisschop van Utrecht, publiceerde met steun van verschillende theologen (onder wie de domenicaan Edward Schillebeeckx) een Nieuwe Katechismus vol grote openingen op het punt van homosexualiteit, abortus, anticonceptie, vrouwelijk priesterschap, priestercelibaat.
Anderen daarentegen menen, ofschoon ze de opvattingen van de twee salesianen geenszins delen, dat die toch teken zijn van een Kerk die bepaalde problemen niet uit de weg gaat en over deze problemen wil praten. Tot voor enkele maanden was de belangrijkste voorstander van deze Kerk die openstaat voor de wereld en haar geest, Adrianus Herman van Luyn, bisschop van Rotterdam - ook hij salesiaan. Op 18 januari heeft de paus zijn ontslag aanvaard wegens het bereiken van de pensioengerechtigde leeftijd.

Over hoe de affaire-Spronck Rome bereikt heeft, weet Kath.net te melden:

Es ist das Verdienst von Bloggern, die den „Fall Spronck“ ans Tageslicht gebracht haben. Es war der italienische Blog Gli estremi confini, der sich mit der Kirche in Holland und Flandern beschäftigt und das Interview mit Spronck vom Holländischen ins Italienische übersetzte. Der Blog messainlatino.it griff die Sache auf, so dass er schließlich aus der Blogosphere in die Welt der traditionellen Medien drang und dann auch zur Reaktion der Leitung der Salesianerkongregation in Rom führte.

De zegeningen van internet voor de eenvoudige gelovige

Van het pittige Ierse blog Splintered Sunrise:

The internet – and how Catholics are using it to communicate with each other – [is playing] a huge part [...] Ten years ago, you would not often have a US archbishop criticising a wayward editorial in a British Catholic magazine. Nor would the laity have access to Vatican documents which they can print out to show to their local parish priest. The internet has changed all of this. Sure, the Catholic Church has always been about universals. But now Catholics have formed an online community they’re becoming a more coherent force, and they won’t be sidelined or misrepresented.
Leaving aside relations with the outside world, there’s an obviously revolutionary internal element to this. Modern communications tools make it much easier for stroppy laity or indeed stroppy priests to hold bishops to account, which is very much a good thing. Those further down the food chain have better access to information than ever before. [...] This is most advanced in America, with an extremely pugnacious Catholic blogosphere, which has forced the Catholic press to up its game, which in turn has an effect on the hierarchy.

www.thepapalvisit.org.uk

Van donderdag 16 tot zondag 19 september bezoekt paus Benedictus XVI Engeland en Schotland. Het is het eerste staatsbezoek van een paus aan Engeland. De eerste paus die Engeland bezocht was Johannes Paulus II, in 1982, met een pastoraal bezoek.

Het pausbezoek heeft als motto Cor ad cor loquitur - heart speaks unto heart, het kardinaalsmotto van de grote Engelse denker en theoloog, de "gids in het post-seculiere labyrint" John Henry Newman.

The Holy Father will fly to Scotland where he will be received at the Palace of Holyroodhouse by Her Majesty The Queen. He will also celebrate a public Mass in Glasgow [17.9]. In England, amongst other things, His Holiness will make a speech to British civil society at Westminster Hall, meet with the leaders of other Christian traditions, take part in a service of Evening Prayer with the Archbishop of Canterbury, lead a prayer vigil [18.9] and beatify the nineteenth century theologian and educationalist Cardinal John Henry Newman [19.9].

Hier de officiële website van het pausbezoek.

Goedkope tickets vanuit Eindhoven naar Londen en vanuit Weeze (bij Goch in Duitsland) naar Engeland en Schotland zijn hier te vinden :)

Vijf jaar Benedictus XVI - voor ons blog een nieuwe naam

Vandaag is het vijf jaar geleden dat Joseph Ratzinger door de kardinalen gekozen werd tot paus Benedictus XVI, 266e opvolger van de apostel Petrus.
In stilte voert hij grote hervormingen door in de Kerk; en hij moedigt alle christenen aan ook zelf in het klein hun verantwoordelijkheid te nemen.
Zo heeft hij op 24 januari van dit jaar de priesters opgeroepen actief aanwezig te zijn op het internet, er ruimten te scheppen die kunnen dienen als een soort "Voorhof van de heidenen", zoals de Tempel van Jeruzalem die kende.
Vandaag wil ik, door mijn weblog een nieuwe naam te geven (www.voorhof.net), het expliciet verbinden met deze oproep van de paus. 'Voorhof': een programma, een voornemen, niet per se een beschrijving van de werkelijkheid. Maar ik hoop dat ik op zeker moment de woorden van kardinaal Newman zal kunnen nazeggen:

In a long course of years I have made many mistakes. I have nothing of that high perfection which belongs to the writings of Saints, viz., that error cannot be found in them; but what I trust that I may claim all through what I have written, is this,—an honest intention, an absence of private ends, a temper of obedience, a willingness to be corrected, a dread of error, a desire to serve Holy Church, and, through Divine mercy, a fair measure of success.

Niet iedereen kent Russisch, niet iedereen Italiaans!

Het Russische persbureau Interfax meldt dat

Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia believes the Church’s basic documents should be easy to understand to believers of the countries included in the Moscow Patriarchate.
“I believe it extremely useful for strengthening church unity to spread liturgical, catechetic texts and the most important documents of the Russian Orthodox Church, including patriarchal messages, in basic languages of peoples in its jurisdiction,” Patriarch Kirill said on Tuesday at a Bishops’ meeting in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior.
He reminds that today the Russian Church takes care of “her faithful children in many countries,” including Ukraine, Byelorussia and Moldavia, which constitute “a core of vast area of our shared civilization originated from the Dnepr font of the Holy Equal to the Apostles Prince Vladimir.”
“We bear a duty of pastoral care for our believers and witness to spiritual values of Orthodox tradition, to historical and cultural unity originated from it in the contemporary world,” Patriarch Kirill believes.

A fortiori zouden alle persberichten van het Vaticaan, centrum van de Wereldkerk, en met name de toespraken die de paus (wiens "September 2006 Regensburg address established him as the only leader of the West able to defend the spiritual foundations that distinguish the West", aldus David Goldman) bijna iedere dag houdt, veel eerder niet alleen in het Italiaans, maar ook in de belangrijkste wereldtalen (Engels, Frans, Duits, Spaans, Portugees, Russisch, Arabisch en Chinees - Nederlands mag ook) in officiële vertaling beschikbaar gesteld moeten worden op de officiële website van het Vaticaan!
De waarheid hoeft niet verdedigd te worden, alleen maar uitgedragen. Maar dat moet wel gebeuren in begrijpelijke taal (niet de hele wereld kent Italiaans!).

Van priesters mag verwacht worden dat ze aanwezig zijn op het web

Boodschap van paus Benedictus op de gedachtenis van St. Franciscus van Sales, patroon van de journalisten:

Church communities have always used the modern media for fostering communication, engagement with society, and, increasingly, for encouraging dialogue at a wider level. Yet the recent, explosive growth and greater social impact of these media make them all the more important for a fruitful priestly ministry.
All priests have as their primary duty the proclamation of Jesus Christ, the incarnate Word of God, and the communication of his saving grace in the sacraments. Gathered and called by the Word, the Church is the sign and instrument of the communion that God creates with all people, and every priest is called to build up this communion, in Christ and with Christ. Such is the lofty dignity and beauty of the mission of the priest, which responds in a special way to the challenge raised by the Apostle Paul: "The Scripture says, 'No one who believes in him will be put to shame ... everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.' But how can they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how can they believe in him of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone to preach? And how can people preach unless they are sent? (Rom 10:11, 13-15).
Responding adequately to this challenge amid today's cultural shifts, to which young people are especially sensitive, necessarily involves using new communications technologies. The world of digital communication, with its almost limitless expressive capacity, makes us appreciate all the more Saint Paul's exclamation: "Woe to me if I do not preach the Gospel" (1 Cor 9:16) The increased availability of the new technologies demands greater responsibility on the part of those called to proclaim the Word, but it also requires them to become more focused, efficient and compelling in their efforts. Priests stand at the threshold of a new era: as new technologies create deeper forms of relationship across greater distances, they are called to respond pastorally by putting the media ever more effectively at the service of the Word.
The spread of multimedia communications and its rich "menu of options" might make us think it sufficient simply to be present on the Web, or to see it only as a space to be filled. Yet priests can rightly be expected to be present in the world of digital communications as faithful witnesses to the Gospel, exercising their proper role as leaders of communities which increasingly express themselves with the different "voices" provided by the digital marketplace. Priests are thus challenged to proclaim the Gospel by employing the latest generation of audiovisual resources (images, videos, animated features, blogs, websites) which, alongside traditional means, can open up broad new vistas for dialogue, evangelization and catechesis.
Using new communication technologies, priests can introduce people to the life of the Church and help our contemporaries to discover the face of Christ. They will best achieve this aim if they learn, from the time of their formation, how to use these technologies in a competent and appropriate way, shaped by sound theological insights and reflecting a strong priestly spirituality grounded in constant dialogue with the Lord. Yet priests present in the world of digital communications should be less notable for their media savvy than for their priestly heart, their closeness to Christ. This will not only enliven their pastoral outreach, but also will give a "soul" to the fabric of communications that makes up the "Web".
God's loving care for all people in Christ must be expressed in the digital world not simply as an artifact from the past, or a learned theory, but as something concrete, present and engaging. Our pastoral presence in that world must thus serve to show our contemporaries, especially the many people in our day who experience uncertainty and confusion, "that God is near; that in Christ we all belong to one another" (Benedict XVI, Address to the Roman Curia, 21 December 2009).
Who better than a priest, as a man of God, can develop and put into practice, by his competence in current digital technology, a pastoral outreach capable of making God concretely present in today's world and presenting the religious wisdom of the past as a treasure which can inspire our efforts to live in the present with dignity while building a better future? Consecrated men and women working in the media have a special responsibility for opening the door to new forms of encounter, maintaining the quality of human interaction, and showing concern for individuals and their genuine spiritual needs. They can thus help the men and women of our digital age to sense the Lord's presence, to grow in expectation and hope, and to draw near to the Word of God which offers salvation and fosters an integral human development. In this way the Word can traverse the many crossroads created by the intersection of all the different "highways" that form "cyberspace", and show that God has his rightful place in every age, including our own. Thanks to the new communications media, the Lord can walk the streets of our cities and, stopping before the threshold of our homes and our hearts, say once more: "Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will enter his house and dine with him, and he with me" (Rev 3:20).
(...) With the Gospels in our hands and in our hearts, we must reaffirm the need to continue preparing ways that lead to the Word of God, while being at the same time constantly attentive to those who continue to seek; indeed, we should encourage their seeking as a first step of evangelization. A pastoral presence in the world of digital communications, precisely because it brings us into contact with the followers of other religions, non-believers and people of every culture, requires sensitivity to those who do not believe, the disheartened and those who have a deep, unarticulated desire for enduring truth and the absolute. Just as the prophet Isaiah envisioned a house of prayer for all peoples (cf. Is 56:7), can we not see the web as also offering a space - like the "Court of the Gentiles" of the Temple of Jerusalem - for those who have not yet come to know God?
The development of the new technologies and the larger digital world represents a great resource for humanity as a whole and for every individual, and it can act as a stimulus to encounter and dialogue. But this development likewise represents a great opportunity for believers. No door can or should be closed to those who, in the name of the risen Christ, are committed to drawing near to others. To priests in particular the new media offer ever new and far-reaching pastoral possibilities, encouraging them to embody the universality of the Church's mission, to build a vast and real fellowship, and to testify in today's world to the new life which comes from hearing the Gospel of Jesus, the eternal Son who came among us for our salvation. At the same time, priests must always bear in mind that the ultimate fruitfulness of their ministry comes from Christ himself, encountered and listened to in prayer; proclaimed in preaching and lived witness; and known, loved and celebrated in the sacraments, especially the Holy Eucharist and Reconciliation.

To my dear brother priests, then, I renew the invitation to make astute use of the unique possibilities offered by modern communications. May the Lord make all of you enthusiastic heralds of the Gospel in the new "agorà" which the current media are opening up.