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CERC BI-WEEKLY UPDATE - April 17, 2008 NEW RESOURCES EDITORIALS OF INTEREST EDUCATION MATTERS Note from the Managing Editor:
Media coverage of the Pope's visit to America (April 15-20) is turning out to be overwhelmingly positive, with better informed and more thoughtful commentary than anything we've ever seen during a Papal visit. It would surely be hard for anyone looking at all this to muster a defense for the position that the media is reflexively or conspiratorially hostile to the Catholic Church. Rocco Palmo, in his Whispers in the Loggia blog, relates how one Midwestern cleric wrote in to say that, impressive though it is, the PopeTrip 'isn't the Second Coming' and that everyone should 'get a grip.' Meanwhile, the rest of us are basking in the fact that something as important as the Vicar of Christ on earth coming to America has quite properly captured the spiritual and intellectual attention of the American people and their media. As is pointed out below and elsewhere, Pope Benedict is a master teacher. And while people came from all corners of the world to "see" Pope John Paul II they are now coming, in even larger numbers, to "hear" what Pope Benedict has to say. The two addresses he gave today are reproduced below. Read them carefully. To watch live online video coverage of the Pope’s "Christ Our Hope" visit to America, and to stay up on all aspects of the visit, go here. - J. Fraser Field This CERC Bi-Weekly Update is also available on our web site here.
Television Coverage of the DC Leg - Pope2008.com Catholic school enrollment dwindling - USA Today Goodbye to the Catholic school skirt - Today Benedict and the Universities - National Review Teenage Brains Really Are Different From Child Or Adult Brains - Science Daily Rap music increasingly glamourises drug use - Newswise Homosexual Propaganda Removed From UK Schools, But Only After Muslim Complaint - LifeSiteNews School Choice Now More Than Ever - Wall Street Journal School's cross-dressing day angers Christian network - USA Today In a New Generation of College Students, Many Opt for the Life Examined - New York Times Blockbuster speech on The Gay Gene Hoax silences pro-gay crowd - Mass Resistance Genocide Awareness Project Displays Aborted Baby Pictures at University of Toronto - LifeSiteNews.com Teen Pregnancies, Abortions Drop From 1990 to 2004: CDC - Health Central 'We Live It Every Day' - Washington Post Address to the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops - Pope Benedict XVI Dear Brother Bishops: It gives me great joy to greet you today, at the start of my visit to this country, and I thank Cardinal George for the gracious words he has addressed to me on your behalf.
White House Welcome Ceremony Address - Pope Benedict XVI Mr. President: Thank you for your gracious words of welcome on behalf of the people of the United States of America.
Pope Benedict XVI makes his first visit to the U.S. as pontiff from April 15-April 20, 2008. The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life invited John Allen and George Weigel to discuss the issues.
John Paul made you burst into tears. Benedict makes you think. It is more pleasurable to weep, but at the moment, perhaps it is more important to think.
It has been said in Rome that the crowds came to see Pope John Paul, but they come to hear Pope Benedict XVI.
You grew up in the country as the youngest of three children. Your father was a constable, the family poor rather than well-off. Your mother, you once recounted, even made her own soap.
The key to all that William was and did is that wherever he was and whatever he did, reading a book or writing one, opening a bottle of wine or sailing some sea, he was near Jerusalem.
William F. Buckley Jr. - Father Raymond J. de Souza - National Post We came first to pray for William F. Buckley, Jr., and then to praise him.
"Miracle" stories can double as cautionary tales - Colleen Carroll Campbell - St. Louis Post-Dispatch Zach Dunlap doesn't remember the four-wheeler crash that landed him on life support in a Texas hospital last fall. But he does remember hearing a doctor pronounce him dead.
The Real Problem With Darwinism - Dinesh D'Souza - Dinesh D’Souza blog The real problem with Darwinism in the public school classroom is that it is often taught in an atheist way.
The Non-Factsheet - Dale O’Leary, Dean Byrd, Richard P. Fitzgibbons, & James E. Phelan - CERC The APA and the other 12 organizations that comprise the Just the Facts Coalition have just published a new edition of Just the Facts about Sexual Orientation and Youth: A Primer for Principals, Educators, and School Personnel.
Sex Education - Donna Freitas - Wall Street Journal In the next three weeks or so, most college-bound high-school seniors and their families will be deciding which institution of higher education should receive their tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of dollars.
Totaled Utopia - Thomas C. Reeves - Touchstone For the utopian, heaven on earth seems only a leader or an idea away, but, alas, there is always some sort of religious or reactionary obstacle to overcome.
Countercultural Icon: A tribute to Charlton Heston - Charles Colson - Breakpoint What made him such a great and rare figure was that he was not content to be celebrated as a cultural icon for playing roles like Moses, Ben-Hur, Michelangelo, and others. He was willing to risk scorn and ridicule to be a countercultural icon as well.
Hug the Earth, kill the humans - Barbara Kay - National Post In reaction to the March 29 maritime deaths of four seal hunters, Paul Watson, Sea Shepherd Conservation Society chief, declared the deaths of seals a “greater tragedy.”
Television Coverage of the DC Leg - Pope2008.com There are an abundance of options for folks wanting to catch part of the Pope's DC leg of his journey. Of course, streaming video is available right here at Pope2008.com and at EWTN.com.
Wednesday on the PopeTrail - Whispers in the Loggia This first full day of the trip is, of course, Joseph Ratzinger's 81st birthday. 
From the Plane - Whispers in the Loggia After the plane-party made their way to the hotel, it didn't take long for word to start circulating about the backstory behind The Statement.
The Holy She Sees - National Review An interview with the U.S. ambassador to the Vatican.
Sainthood’s next stop: New Haven? - Yale News At 8:15 on Tuesday morning, three parishioners sat after mass in the pews at Saint Mary’s Church on Hillhouse Ave.
Va. judge sides with breakaway Episcopal parishes - Washington Times A Virginia circuit-court decision today has recognized the right of eleven Episcopal parishes to retain their church properties even though they have left the Episcopal Church.
Remembering, and Misremembering, Martin Luther King Jr. - First Things blog This is a week of remembering.
Radio Silence - Wall Street Journal Usually radio hosts have to offend sacred moral sensibilities to be thrown off the air.
Coincidentally: Unserious Reflections on Trivial Connections - Father George Rutler - ISI lecture Father Rutler in a wide ranging and entertaining romp about important matters in human affairs. (video)
Blair urges bigger role for faith - BBC Former prime minister Tony Blair has called for faith to be given a central role in tackling the world's problems.
The Archbishop of Sydney on why Cardinal Newman is relevant today - Times on line "Cardinal Newman is a most important figure today," the Archbishop of Sydney, Cardinal George Pell, told me during a private visit to quiet Quarr Abbey, the Benedictine monastery, near Ryde on the Isle of Wight.
Pope Benedict praises 'supernatural' John Paul II - Times on Line Pope Benedict XVI today said that his predecessor, John Paul II, had "supernatural qualities".
The film called 'Fitna' creates scandal among Muslims - Catholic Online The Dutch Film alleges there is a connection between violence, terrorism, and the Qur'an.
McCain shies away from religion talk - Politico Traversing the country this week on a tour of places that have shaped his life and informed his values, John McCain spoke in strikingly personal language to introduce himself to the American public.
Pitching With Purpose - David Brooks - New York Times A few years ago, a former professional baseball player mentioned a book that had made a great impression on him.
Thousands wowed by Co-Cathedral - khou.com Pomp, circumstance and celebration was surely the order of the day downtown.
The Evolution of Religious Bigotry - National Review It’s not that secular progressives support Muslim religious fanatics, it’s that they reserve their scorn for religious Christians who are neither fanatical nor violent.
Muslim reformer's 'heresy': The Islamic state is a dead end - Christian Science Monitor From Nigeria to Indonesia, Sudanese law professor spreads ideas of a secular state and human rights.
Wright stuff: T.D. Jakes has a blog - Get Religion What do you know. I was wrong.
Being American — and Muslim - Time It was evening rush hour in New York City. 42nd St. was packed, and I was hoping I would make the bus. His voice came out of the crowd.
Darwin 's Kool-Aid - LifeSiteNews A review of "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed" (opening in theaters April 18).
Vatican fence-mending campaign with Jews draws mixed reviews - John Allen Jr. Efforts to mute criticism of a Good Friday prayer for the conversion of the Jews in the old Latin liturgy of the Catholic Church, which have escalated ever since Pope Benedict XVI announced the revival of the Latin Mass last July, intensified this week.
Choosing to eliminate unwanted daughters - Boston Globe The unfettered "right to choose" is a progressive value, we are instructed by the abortion lobby. But a new study prompts an awkward question: How exactly are American women empowered when abortion is deployed to prevent the existence of American girls?
Pope Calls for End to "Conspiracy of Silence" - LifeSiteNews This past Saturday Pope Benedict XVI outlined appropriate pastoral responses to what he called the "wounds of abortion and divorce," which he said "involve so much suffering in the lives of individuals, families and society."
Religious Freedom Panel Urges Bush to Boycott Beijing Games - Pew Forum A federal religious freedom watchdog panel has urged President Bush to boycott the opening ceremonies of the Beijing Olympics unless "there is substantial improvement" in China's treatment of Tibet.
Charlton Heston: Manly, Commanding and Irony-Free - Wall Street Journal If you call up the specifics of Charlton Heston's career on the Internet Movie Database, you'll find 126 entries under the category of "Actor."
Discernment For Medjugorje Apparitions Now in Direct Hands of Vatican - Pew In Europe, the press has recently reported that the matter of Medjugorje — the famed apparition site in Bosnia-Hercegovina — has shifted directly into the hands of the Vatican.
A Cairo conversion - Prospect Magazine I moved to Cairo and fell in love with a beautiful Egyptian doctor. We decided to marry, but first I had to convert to Islam. It didn’t take long.
Catholic leader takes embryo fight to YouTube - Telegraph The leader of the Catholic Church in Scotland has turned to internet site YouTube in the latest step of his battle against "Frankenstein" embryo research.
Interview with the President of the U.S. - EWTN Just days before the historic visit of Pope Benedict XVI to the U.S., President Bush sat down with EWTN Anchor Raymond Arroyo for a candid interview about his faith, Iraq, freedom of religion, and why he’s still planning to attend the opening of the Olympic games.
'Now we have the technology that can make a cloned child' - The Independent A new form of cloning has been developed that is easier to carry out than the technique used to create Dolly the sheep, raising fears that it may one day be used on human embryos to produce "designer" babies.
How Pope Benedict will define 'success' on his American swing - John Allen Jr. When a high-profile public figure comes to town, Americans typically use a predictable set of measures to evaluate the success of the trip.
Backstories - Whispers in the Loggia Over the weekend, a Midwestern cleric wrote in to say that, impressive though it is, the PopeTrip "isn't the Second Coming" and that we should all "get a grip." True enough... but given all the hubbub, the two could be easily confused.
Olympic Flame Out - Slate China learns the price of a few weeks of global attention.
From Horses to Horsepower - Newsweek It's not your father's Mercedes. A peek inside the pope's American ride.
Who Will Save America's Urban Catholic Schools? - Thomas B. Fordham Institute America 's urban Catholic schools are in crisis. Over 1,300 of them have shut down since 1990, mostly in our cities. Fordham's latest report examines this crisis and offers several suggestions for arresting and perhaps reversing this trend in the interests of better education.
Catholic school enrollment dwindling - USA Today For years, parents at St. Joseph School, a tiny Catholic school in Petersburg, Va., have fretted over just about everything.
Goodbye to the Catholic school skirt - Today Students are more likely to be wearing jumpers and pants these days.
Benedict and the Universities - National Review Can we recapture the essence of Catholic higher education?
Teenage Brains Really Are Different From Child Or Adult Brains - Science Daily The hunt for a biological explanation of adolescent behaviour has turned up new evidence that the "teenage brain" has special characteristics shaping the way teens learn, feel and behave.
Rap music increasingly glamourises drug use - Newswise Folks who just can't abide the sound of it have another excellent reason for banning rap music from their environment: new research shows that the genre has increasingly glamorized drug use.
Homosexual Propaganda Removed From UK Schools, But Only After Muslim Complaint - LifeSiteNews Gay group head says "fuss" from parents "will cause children to think there is something wrong".
School Choice – Now More Than Ever - Wall Street Journal This week's revelation that 17 of the nation's 50 largest cities have high school graduation rates below 50% surely saddened many.
School's cross-dressing day angers Christian network - USA Today An elementary-school event in which kids were encouraged to dress as members of the opposite gender drew the ire of a Christian radio group, whose angry broadcast prompted outraged calls to the district office.
In a New Generation of College Students, Many Opt for the Life Examined - New York Times When a fellow student at Rutgers University urged Didi Onejeme to try Philosophy 101 two years ago, Ms. Onejeme, who was a pre-med sophomore, dismissed it as “frou-frou.”
Blockbuster speech on “The Gay Gene Hoax” silences pro-gay crowd - Mass Resistance Very powerful and informative — it blew them away, said one observer.
Genocide Awareness Project Displays Aborted Baby Pictures at University of Toronto - LifeSiteNews.com On Thursday, April 3, a pedestrian passing the Robarts Library on the giant University of Toronto campus may have seen large pictures of aborted children.
Teen Pregnancies, Abortions Drop From 1990 to 2004: CDC - Health Central Teen pregnancy rates in the United States declined from 1990 to 2004, as did the number of abortions, while the number of pregnancies among unmarried women increased slightly during that period.
'We Live It Every Day' - Washington Post Pope's Visit Cheers Young Conservatives Who Reject 'Cafeteria Catholicism' in Favor of the Full Menu. Subscribe/Unsubscribe |
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