Catholic Answers, a California-based nonprofit, is gearing up for its next national conference, which will be held September 4-6 in San Diego. The conference is designed to help the faithful defend the Catholic Faith against the challenges it faces in today’s culture.
Conference speaker Christopher Check explained: “Our doctrines and practices are ridiculed in the media. We are called bigots for speaking the truth about marriage. We are labeled intolerant for defending innocent life. And now the government wants to force us to pay for abortions and contraception. The Church has entered a new age of persecution.
“Following Pope Francis’s call for a new evangelization, Catholic Answers is calling on the faithful to learn how to evangelize with charity and to live their Faith more publicly,” Check said.
Other speakers include Karl Keating, Jimmy Akin, Tim Staples, Trent Horn, and Hector Molina.
The keynote address will be delivered by Archbishop Alexander Sample of Portland, Oregon. The archbishop will also take part in a special radio broadcast of Catholic Answers Live, hosted at the conference by Patrick Coffin. Archbishop Sample will field questions directly from conference attendees.
The conference will take place at the San Diego Sheraton Hotel and Marina.
Registration and more information are available at CatholicAnswersConference.com.
At this juncture, rather than “persecution” I would refer to our situation as “recusancy”. There is little risk of jail or bloodshed, but plenty of threats of fines, practical loss of civil rights and officially-abetted opprobrium. Think Great Britain prior to the Act of Toleration (1829).
Tom Byrne, how can you suggest that what happened in Great Britain was not persecution?
Here was the fate of a recusant in Great Britain prior to 1829: The most common type of punishment on those who did not participate in Anglican religious activity, were fines, property confiscation, and/or imprisonment.
Persecute – To oppress or harass with ill-treatment. To annoy persistently.
Tracy:
When older Catholics like myself hear the word “persecution” in the history of our faith we think either Roman or Communist: official violence and degradation actively led from some central point. That kind of horror was not going on the century prior to 1829 in Great Britain (Ireland was a separate case, for political reasons). Bloody persecutions and confiscations (very scattered after the death of Elizabeth I) basically stopped with the ascension of Queen Anne, and any such laws on the books (offensive enough) were let lie. It wasn’t just or pleasant, but it wasn’t the Warsaw Ghetto either. My use of the term “recusancy” was meant to suggest what we endure now and may in the immediate future in “liberal” America: jeers but not jackboots, so to speak: the sort of thing we went through before in many of America’s eastern cities in the early 19th century.
Tom Byrne, even if some older Catholics like yourself only equate the word “persecution” with “Roman or Communism”, this does not negate the fact that what happened to the “recusant” in Great Britain was persecution.
Tracy, how about the Church’s persecution and torture of innocent children. you can’t be a woman and a priest, I’ll buy that for the moment. And you can’t be a married man and priest, I’ll buy that for the moment. But why can you be a child sex offender or a child molester and a priest?’ It’s the only occupation that I know in civil society in which you can sexually assault and abuse children and (be allowed to remain) employed and working with children and families in that occupation around the world. That is what has got to change.
Anonymous, explain to us your reasoning for now injecting into the dialogue, (Tom Byrne and myself were having), the straw-man scenario of “the Church’s persecution and torture of innocent children”? Is this perchance an attempted effort on your part to neutralize and divert attention away from the reality, exposed in the above article, that “we ARE called bigots for speaking the truth”? :(
Anonymous, would you advocate the abolition of all parenthood because parents have been known to kill/molest/abuse/torture their own offspring? How about just extinguish the human race all together, because, well, something needs to be done because human beings are crass, senseless killers prone to all manner of filth and degeneracy.
You seem to think that pedophilia is part of a priest’s job description. It isn’t, you know. And I think you do know.
Tracy,
Why did you leave out “hung, drawn, and quartered” or “Pressed on London Bridge”?
God have mercy May on an amoral Amerika!
Viva Cristo Rey!
Yours in Their Hearts,
Kenneth M. Fisher, Founding Director
Concerned Roman Catholics of America, Inc.
Kenneth, I figured I would leave those facts for you to mention! Thank you!
Tracy, what you define as persecution is what CCD does to gay people nearly every day. If annoying persistently is a definition of persecution, then CCD takes the prize.
What CCD does to gay people nearly every day? Please, YFC. Stop equating the embracing of homosexuality as wholesome and good (especially in a Catholic setting) and Catholics will not be (not feel) duty bound to correct you.
Or at the very least take some accountability for poking the bear. It’s not like you don’t know it’s a bear…or that bears are especially protective when there are cubs involved. Or are you purporting that hapless gay folks are being drug in off the street and forced to push their agenda on Catholics just for a photo op to castigate gays? Really? Is that what’s happening?
Or do we have a growing number of bear pokers that love it when the bear growls so they can claim to be a victim?
AM I am not the editor of CCD who puts up anti-gay posts nearly every day, nor am I one of the comentators that makes nearly every OTHER post into an anti-gay tirade. I’m not the one poking the bear. It is CCD who torments gay people every day.
YFC, no, you are not the editor of CCD. And you are not one of those featured in CCD articles – although you may well belong to one of those groups who mask their appearance. So saying, those with same sex attraction or those advocating for same sex attraction in Catholic settings and especially in those areas that involve Catholic children (against the laws of the Church and nature) are the ones, in fact, poking the bear – that’s why it’s reported as news. CCD doesn’t have to make this up. They just report it…. thank goodness.
Your defense of such seeming oblivious bear-poking is nothing but poking those who are Catholic here on CCD which you do exhaustively and always under the guise of supposed ignorance. And, YFC, you are not ignorant. So perhaps you should show mercy to your fellow Catholics and pull whatever strings you can to call a halt to the homosexual persecution/torment against Catholics.
No doubt CCD would laud your efforts!
Tolerance goes both ways, my friend, and so does having a penchant for gay tirades. Pro as well as con.
YFC, can I conclude from your April 13, 2014, 6:38 pm comments that you are open to equating persistent annoyance with persecution? If this be so then for the past year I too have been a “victim of persecution” by my neighbors barking dogs! At any rate. Let it be known that YOU have a habit of persistently annoying me as well!
All joking aside, we should never ever diminish the reality of the horrible persecution our Catholic ancestors in England suffered under the “recusancy” nor the ones that faithful Catholics in our own day and age are currently suffering and/or one day soon may suffer.
US pro-family activist detained by Canadian customs for alleged violation of ‘hate’ law
A prominent U.S. pro-family activist was detained by the Canadian Border Services Agency Thursday for alleged violations of Canada’s “hate propaganda” law.
Peter LaBarbera, president of Americans for Truth about Homosexuality, had flown into Regina International Airport to speak at the Saskatchewan Pro-Life Association provincial conference this weekend.
LaBarbera had been targeted by a makeshift group known as “Intolerance Free Weyburn,” which pressured the government to deny him access to the country. LaBarbera believes he was flagged by customs as a result.
Marci Millette, president of Saskatchewan Pro-Life Association, was flabbergasted at LaBarbera’s detainment. “Are these tyrants going to detain Christian priests and pastors next? They preach the same Gospel messages,” she said.
https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/breaking-us-pro-family-activist-detained-by-canadian-customs-for-alleged-vi?
“The persecution of Sister Jane Dominic Laurel
Teaching the truths about homosexuality, chastity, adultery, and how God wants us to live our lives is not always an easy thing to do.
Nor is living that life. But God asks that we do our best nevertheless, for our ultimate goal is eternity with Him.
We cannot plead ignorance.
We cannot justify that we chose otherwise.
God’s word is the truth, and though some may try to silence those who tell the truth, it doesn’t change the facts.
https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/the-persecution-of-sister-jane-dominic-laurel?
The past thirty years have revealed much about the institutional Church. Perhaps the most far-reaching conclusion one can draw is that there is a sharp division between the institutional Church and the Body of Christ and that the institutional Church is essentially atheist, judging by its choice to protect its worldly image, prosperity and power rather than respond to the priest abuse victims with immediate care and concern.
It’s too bad that Catholic Answers can not use their own Diocese Archbishop Gomez.
But the Abp allows Roger Mahony to have a place of honor on his Diocese web site, and to have a very public ministry within the Diocese.
In addition, the Abp’s main thrust seems to be ILLEGAL aliens, rather than the Saving of all Souls.
https://www.la-archdiocese.org/cardinal/Pages/default.aspx
Public records In the aiding and abetting of crime by Mahony.
https://documents.latimes.com/los-angeles-archdiocese-priest-abuse-files/
Dave,
While almost all of what you write it true. Catholic Answers operates out of the Diocese of San Diego (Sad Diego)!
God have mercy May on an amoral Amerika!
Viva Cristo Rey!
Yours in Their Hearts,
Kenneth M. Fisher, Founding Director
Concerned Roman Catholics of America, Inc.
Our Blessed Lord said that if the world hates you, know that it has hated me first. To be a faithful Catholic means to deny ourselves, pick up our crosses, and follow Christ. The enemies of Our Lord called Him names, and accused Him of crimes He never committed. The world and the devil is doing the same things to us, so why should we be surprised?
I agree Father. Coming from them, its a compliment, it means we are doing the right thing. We are to please God, not the secular. They label people bigots but still they call themselves Christians. How crooked and twisted is that. They are prideful people because they walk around flaunting that they are Catholic Christians and speaking with authority while they dissent from God and His natural law. You know them by their immodesty and unchaste ways. They try to confuse truths to suit their fleshly desires. They change the meaning of words to insult and tackle at God’s people by making those words seem good! They are unholy full of pride, lacking so much true charity! Its all there for all to see, those who want to seek the truth always, will discover their tricks and deceptive ways!
In spite of the insistence of Pius’ successors that this is the only authentic understanding of the socio-political structuring of the people of God, the realities of life in the Catholic Church over the past fifty years have shown that rather than comply in lock-step to such stratification, the voices and actions of a significant number of lay persons, religious and clerics have shown that “agere sequitur esse”, “action follows being,” is not so much changing the meaning of the Church, but revealing what it really is.
The revelation, Jim, is no revelation at all as human nature has always been inclined to indulge itself. So while we ruminate over the supposed sin of being in lock-step, oh the anathema of clarity, we basically go right back to what we really are. Sinners in need of grace. A society turned toward self-indulgence. Nothing new there at all. Much like the rebellion of the significant numbers of lay persons, religious, and clerics.
It’s called serve thyself, forget God.
So saying we are a people that still sin and sin regularly and have need to recognize as much, repent, and seek God’s forgiveness. Not foolishly absolve ourselves of wrongdoing just because these are new and different times. The issues of abortion and gay marriage are not fasting regulations.
“Fr. Karl” is correct. Put another way, either Christ was a first-class charlatan, or He was right in what He said, and who He was. Unfortunately, many of the enemies of learning about and living a true Catholic life are in the Church. All that the Faithful can do to (1) highlight Church abuses, (2) re-focus Catholics on the key elements of their Faith, and (3) otherwise assist all to achieve salvation, is a very good thing. Happy to have the calumny of the world thrown in, as well. It shows that those in the vanguard of the Catholic restoration are doing their job.
What you believe is the truth!
Please explain.
Interesting? Yes please explain.
There is a real difference between honestly held belief about the sinfulness of homosexual acts or the wrongness of gay marriage and bigotry and hate. In every statement by a bishop about the marriage issue, and there sure have been a lot of them, they point out in one way or another that gay people should be loved and respected like all the other children of God.
The problem is that they have become so focused on the issue that they allowed themselves, and us, to be identified with Protestant fundamentalist extremists and others who do preach hate. Over time there developed an atmosphere of fear and hysteria led to people being fired and even baptized children being denied their right to a Catholic education
The gay marriage fight is all over except for the shouting. I pray our bishops will not throw good resources after bad and follow the culture warriors in their hopeless crusade to amend the U.S. Constitution, but rather move on to the Holy Father’s call for the new evangelization and to work for social justice with renewed vigor.
C&H,
Once again written like a true modernist!
God have mercy May on an amoral Amerika!
Viva Cristo Rey!
Yours in Their Hearts,
Kenneth M. Fisher, Founding Director
Concerned Roman Catholics of America, Inc.
What are we to evangelize, C&H, if there is talk of mercy but no talk of that which is sinful – that which calls for mercy. As for the Bishops making statements with regard to the marriage issue, there should be a lot of them. There should have been far more of them. Not to single any group out, but rather to address one of the hottest moral issues of our time.
The fact that American culture has seemingly shifted to embrace that which is intrinsically disordered, under the auspices of justice, is a direct sign of a poorly catechized ‘Catholic’ faithful. An unfaithful faithful, C&H, because they have been taught to value American values over those of God.
So ‘social justice’ means what exactly? Abortion? Unrestrained sexual license. The ‘freedom’ to define marriage as being whatever anybody chooses dependent upon where society ‘norms’ move? The false notion that everyone has a ‘right’ to have the same things that everyone else has? (sounds like a hard-line fix for coveting)
But that’s not evangelizing. That’s following in society’s wake. Even so, if money and time were the issue, one could argue that it would be a waste of time and money to pursue truth instead of remaining ‘pertinent’. But what of the souls wasted and led astray? The Church’s mission is to save souls, not appease souls despite where the tide of society might lead.
Physicists said in the 19th century that physics was a closed subject…that all that could be known had been discovered. S&H (always reminds me of greenstamps, but I doubt she recognizes the allusion) feels the marriage fight is over. Too amusing! A little issue of over a billion irate muslims comes to mind. I’d be most curious to see how the homosexualists are going to win that battle. ha Also, there’s always, always, always been a backlash to any movement unpopular with the majority being coerced by a militant minority throughout history and, getting back to physics, for every action there’s a reaction. Eventually, even the most weak kneed liberal is going to reach a point of saturation where he or she has had enough…in the 1980’s it was “Whaddaya call a conservative?” ans. “Someone who was mugged last night”! In this case, the big ‘counter-revolution’ is already fomenting. When enough people are negatively affected by gov’t intrusion into their private lives with all these fascist, anti-family laws being enacted through liberal monkey courts, there are going to be some very surprised s&h’s of this world. God will not be mocked. Pray for God-fearing leaders and faithful believers to save this country from self-immolation.
C & H was right in that the Church got sucked into supporting bigotry.
In the past, the Catholic Church has written amicus briefs to:
1) support the legality of firing homosexuals from their jobs, for their sexuality
2) supported the right of the boy scouts to exclude people not for homosexual acts, but for possessing a homosexual orientation
3) supported putting homosexuals in prison for gay sex
The fact is #1 is immoral under catholic theology. Homosexuals need to be allowed to make a living, and if so called “moral” employers wish to make them starve on the street, they are not anything resembling a true Christian. Those who want to make sure homosexuals are only allowed to hold jobs which are ridiculed or stigmatized in society are simply an order of magnitude less bigoted.
If it is right and moral to exclude homosexuals from social groups for sin, what about masturbators? Should we fire everyone from their job who has ever masturbated in their life? If we only socialize with sinless people, well….no social group could ever exist, including everyone on this board.
When the Church supported these positions they participated in a pattern of ridicule and humiliation heaped upon homosexuals in the recent past. This treatment has led to the backlash we see today.
Now, are homosexuals behaving improperly? Are they going too far now that the social weather vane has now blown in their direction? Yeah. They’re stomping on freedom of religion in many ways and pointing the finger of ridicule an ostracism at those who once spoke out against them.
cont.—
Yet, the homosexuals do forget that the Church, and Catholic Hospitals took the lead in treated AIDs patients even when little was known about the risks of transmission to caregivers. This was the Church acting in line with its greatest traditions—such as how the Church responded to the plague. Sometimes, I wish the homosexuals would remember that now that society favors them.
I’m with you JonJ up until your last paragraph. Absolutely not. It is a good and proper thing that the shame game once directed at homosexuals has now naturally shifted to those who are anti-gay. There is no injustice here. Is it an injustice that one can’t believe that gay people are lesser without some uppity homosexual objecting? “Behaving improperly” is just another way of saying those “uppity blacks”. When the traditional “anti”-arguments begin to fail, this is the old standby and it is a sure sign that SOCIETY is well on its way to accepting the practice of equality; and yes, SOCIETY will shame those individuals who disagree, as would be expected.
The truth regarding Faith and Morals for ALL Catholics is contained in the Doctrine of the Faith – a “Catholic Bible and the Catechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition”.
Any Catholic who does not adhere is a heretic and/or schismatic.
Personal opinions do not matter. Personal opinions are merely personal opinions.
Well said Joan!
“C&H”: Your comments are nothing more than more pixie dust thrown up to avoid Truth. Your call for “Social Justice” can not and will not change anything about the gross immorality of homosexual sex and the illicitness of homosexual relationships. Certainly, civil laws may recognize homosexual sexual unions (and child adoption and other perversions) but Nazis and Communists had laws galore, but all to put snow on manure, as the cleaned up version goes. The clergy of the Catholic Church can rant all they want about “pastoral” this and that, but nothing changes, nothing can change. Ever. Your words carry a heart-felt desire to gain credibility for your sodomy, but such actions are always mortal sins. What foolishness to think that by doing a good thing or two something that is anathema to the Faith will than become acceptable. There are other homes for homosexual sexualists and those so inclined should go and find them, returning when, as the Prodigal Son showed, there is repentance. Don’t take too much comfort in the words of many clergy, who are themselves largely homosexual, or very inclined to condone and enable such behavior.
Holy Week is here!…Hope everyone has an opportunity to meditate and reflect on the this most special time of the liturgical year. God bless everyone, hold fast to your faith, pray to the Blessed Mother and go to confession this week. One good sacramental confession is far more powerful than even an “exorcism”…the Mass…the most hallowed, potent and edifying event that transpires on our planet…Praise be Jesus Christ…
The “homosexual”, who indulges in the reprehensible act of sodomy is on a sleigh ride to Hades!…pure and simple…the evildoers who indulge in this perversion will answer for this abomination!…as the sun rises in the east and sets in the west…this is a certainty, without equivocation
Well, according to Governor Mike Hucklebee on his show last night, Chick Fil A has caved to the homosexual agenda and will no longer be giving to traditional marriage., so truly faithful Catholics Christians and others out there you need no longer go out of your way to buy their chicken as I did. I do not really like chicken anyway, but their chicken salad sandwiches and salads were good, but I will not be eating them any more. Instead I will put my money into other good moral causes.
I wouldn’t worry too much about that. It really means nothing.
It makes no sense in the first place for a corporation, even a privately held one, to take positions on social issues that have no advantage to its business operations, and can alienate as much as half is its customer base. Corporations are amoral entities beholden to a bottom line, and the founding family’s personal beliefs are a tangible liability.
Luckily for the Cathy family, there are lots of options to donate virtually unlimited amounts of their own money to anti-gay causes, anonymously, with scant accountability or impact on brand value. It’s safe to assume they’re still giving money to similar causes, just more opaquely.
A correction: that is Governor Huckabee. I would buy Chick Fil A over some of the other fast food places, though, who actually give money to decadent causes such as the LGBT parades and abortions. So far, as far as I know, Chick Fil A is not giving to that.
I love a pithy turn of phrase, particularly if it rings so true. Like the man says, we don’t need a bigger tent, just a bigger bus to throw the Un-Good Under…
” the Magisterium of Sophomores,”
Another Catholic school embroiled in battle over Church teaching on sexuality
Another controversy has erupted at a Roman Catholic school after students and parents reacted with outrage to Church teaching on sexuality as presented at a school assembly.
…Catholic observers suggest the controversy is part of a growing tendency to uproar against Catholics for simply professing Church teaching on marriage and homosexuality.
“Once again we have an example of the Magisterium of Sophomores,” wrote Fr. John Zuhlsdorf of the What Does the Prayer Really Say? blog. “Is this it now? Is this how it is to be? Do we now have an inquisition made up of High School students and soccer moms?” Zuhlsdorf called the situation at Prout a “train wreck.”..
“The response to angry mobs demanding that Catholic schools not teach Catholic teaching has been to wave the white flag and toss the hapless offender who committed the crime of doing what the Church says we should all do under the bus,” Hamilton wrote. “If every Catholic who believes what the Church teaches gets thrown under the bus for being politically incorrect enough to say so in public, we’re going to need a lot bigger bus.”
https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/another-catholic-school-embroiled-in-battle-over-church-teaching-on-sexuali?