School named after Our Lady presents vulgar play

The University of Notre Dame in Southbend, IND, has apparently presented the play entitled the "Vagina Monologues" for the past 2 years as a student production and is planning to present it again this year.

Fr John Jenkins, president of Notre Dame University, who approves of the presentation of this play, states he has allowed it, in order to present all viewpoints to the student body. My open question to him is whether Catholics who attend the university WANT all viewpoints (especially those considered sinful by the Catholic church) when they pay the high tuition for Notre Dame and if they did want "all" viewpoints, why wouldn't they save thousands of bucks per year and attend the public universities?

The V-monologues, apparently presents several sub-plays, some of which include chanting, singing and repeating vulgar terms for the female part, much resembling, said one article, "a Billy Graham crusade". Others have described the play as thinly veiled male bashing or reducing a woman to being a sexual object and in the CNS article, it was mentioned that alternate expressions of intimacy like lesbianism are included in the play. According to Bishop D'arcy of the diocese of South Bend Indiana, who opposes Notre Dame's decision and who has apparently studied the text of the V-monologues, one of the subplays portrays a sexual relationship between a woman and a young girl. I suspect that this play will likely be openly or covertly anti Catholic as most of this type of stuff is.

I think that it's a student production, is even worse than were it a professional production because in learning the lines and practicing for the play, won't the students LEARN what the play wants to teach which seems diametrically opposed to Catholic teachings?

Fr Jenkins' feels the student production of the monologues is appropriate because it is presented in a classroom setting, no admission is charged and because "people MAY debate the pro's and con's of Catholic teachings" after the play. I asked the president's office whether one could assume that the students putting ON the play AGREED with what the play preached and she said "yes, we can assume that." I also asked her what would be the reason parents would SEND their kids to a school like Notre Dame if they wanted "all viewpoints" because they can get THAT in a public university at state tuition fees. There was no official answer to that question.

I also informed them that Patrick Reilly of the Cardinal Newman Society has published a book of Catholic Colleges which still DO uphold traditional Catholic teachings and that though the bottom line on allowing this "Play" may be to not annoy the students advocating it, (so they do not choose another school) that the decision might hurt them in the long run where Catholic parents WILL choose other schools, such as those listed in Patrick Reilly's book of colleges.

I asked for Fr Jenkins' email address and she gave it to me...

president@nd.edu

(this is not listed on the website by the way).

You can express your concern to Bishop D'Arcy of SouthBend Diocese, using the following email address of his secy asking her to forward the letter to him.

mschott@fw.diocesefwsb.org

Bishop D'Arcy is very much against the presentation of this play at Notre Dame and wrote for a recent editorial in "Today's Catholic" their diocesan newspaper:

"The Vagina Monologues is offensive to women; it is antithetical to Catholic teaching on the beautiful gift of human sexuality and also to the teachings of the church on the human body relative to its purpose and to its status as a temple of the Holy Spirit. The human body and the human person, in the tradition of the church, must never be seen as an object. "

Bishop D'arcy also wrote:

"The theme, however, finds no place in the text in question. In that text, the physical is separated from the spiritual. The body is separated from love. The woman is separated from the man and is even placed in opposition to him. There is nothing of beauty here, nothing of love. There is much here which Notre Dame has stood against and has opposed in recent times, both in administrative decisions and in pastoral work. It is especially painful that this play is being performed at Notre Dame, the school of Our Lady, as many of her graduates call her. She, who is both virgin and mother, has always drawn people in this place to the highest ideals in their respect for one another and for women. Her watchful presence over the campus and her prayerful intercession for Notre Dame over the years cannot be tarnished; but her presence, so often invoked in this place, gives special responsibilities on the rest of us who love her and who love her university."

I do think that Catholics should make their feelings known about this type of deviation from Catholic teachings on a Catholic campus which can mislead many students attending the school. How sad that a university named after the Blessed Mother, the exemplification of purity and virginity and authentic femininity, is presenting such a play.

Bill Clinton's deception about pro lifers

While campaigning for his wife’s Democratic nomination, Bill Clinton, was confronted by pro-Life demonstrators. One protester held up a sign that said "Abortion is murder." Bill Clinton lost his cool: "I gave you the answer. We disagree with you." He continued,

"You wanna criminalize women and their doctors and we disagree. I reduced abortion. Tell the truth, tell the truth, if you were really pro-life, if you were really pro-life, you would want to put every doctor and every mother as an accessory to murder in prison. And you won't say you wanna do that because you know, that you wouldn't have a lick of political support. Now, the issue is who, the issue is, you can't name me anybody presently in politics that did more to introduce policies that reduce the number of real abortions instead of the hot air putting out to tear people up and make votes by dividing America. This is not your rally. I heard you. That's another thing you need is a president, somebody who will stick up for individual rights and not be pushed around, and she won't."

This is a clever ruse on the part of Mr Clinton, a view probably shared by his wife, Hillary and an easy excuse for condemning both pro lifers and the pro life movement but of course, it is a totally warped view of reality.

First of all, it's a lie that Clinton did a lot to reduce abortions. He wouldn't DO that since he was heavily FINANCED by the abortion industry!

Secondly, Pro life folks are NOT targeting ANY humans either providing abortions or having abortions. What they are targeting is the idea that the termination of a human being can be a "choice" in a country which has a document offering ALL Americans the right to "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of happiness", these things which are NOT offered to those unlucky infants in utero whose mothers decide that they should not live.

There is a lot of misunderstanding about the whys and wherefores of Roe V Wade (and its companion decision, Doe V Bolton) which allows this "choice" for any reason up to the moment of birth.

The Supreme Court does not work with the scientific reality that an unborn child IS a full fledged human being. Their decision, a very close one, by the way - vote was like 5 in favor, 4 against - was based on their decision that the writers of the Constitution did not mean to include unborn children among those having the right to "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" and so in a strict interpretation of the Constitution, the protection of unborn children would come under question (according to the decision).

While it is true that when the Constitution was written, there WERE several groups of people not considered to be included in the declaration of these "inalienable rights" (among which were indentured servants, slaves, and women), since abortion was considered, for centuries, a horrendous insult to mother and baby, it is likely that the only reason unborn babies were NOT specified in the Constitution as protected, was because it was likely, off the radar screen of those who drafted it, that anyone would NOT advocate the protection of unborn children.

A Guttmacher institute survey several years ago (in the 1980's, I think) found that if abortion were not legal, 75 percent of women would not have abortions. Many of the aborted women I've met, are now sorry that this "choice" was available - they had chosen this route out of desperation and because of pressure from society, family and friends but as the years pass, find that they never get over those children who were never born because of their decisions.

One of the strongest pro life groups around and one of the fastest GROWING groups in the USA is "Silent No More", a group composed OF aborted women who feel they were cheated out of a part of their lives by that decision and want to warn other women BEFORE they make that choice.

Finally, another Guttmacher survey found that "the more women know about abortion, the more they are against it".

So Mr and Mrs Clinton, nice try but no dice. Pro life means PRO LIFE and the protection and acknowledgement of the sanctity of human life in all ages and all habitats, including women, babies AND those doctors providing abortion.

The John and Sally Cojanis mission

We've all been to missions at church. Mostly it's a priest who is a good speaker and we sit and listen and that's good, we learn a lot. But somehow I have not been too inspired to go to this type of mission.

At our church just before Lent, we had a different type of mission given by John and Sally Cojanis. I guess the fact that they ARE lay people and that people who have attended their missions say there are some miraculous physical healings taking place, intrigued me enough to attend.

This couple, obviously in a long term marriage, are just ordinary folks like us, living on a major shoestring (they are some of the few in the fulltime ministry who really ARE living hand to mouth - although God's Hand to their mouth!).

Cojanis' are real. They don't pretend to be something they aren't. John does prayers of healing (and attendees of his mission participate in praying for others, a very healing practice in itself) but he says up front that sometimes it happens and sometimes it doesn't (the physical healings). I think the spiritual healings DO happen to all who attend! And those are the most important healings.

You cannot really put them in a category or box. They are NOT "faith healers". But miracles happen at their missions. They are charismatic but probably not in the charismatic movement.

They DO give talks containing homespun wisdom which all can relate to. For example we were told to go to confession. John asked us "what if you were in this very fancy restaurant, you know the type where the waiter comes and asks (in a British accent) 'can I grind some pepper for your dinner?'. And then the waiter goes into the kitchen, kicking open the door and you see all sorts of cockroaches - on the counters, on the floors?" He then pointed out that if we don't go to confession, our souls could look like that restaurant kitchen! It was memorable!

We were also asked to forgive someone we know. I, at first, thought, "well I've forgiven everyone" but John told us "think of someone you need to forgive, someone who did not treat you very well!" And a friend who had dropped me without any explanation came to mind. John led us through a prayer of forgiveness for that person. He said the words and we repeated after him. And that was a healing feeling to do that. More importantly we learned HOW to pray like that! "You know, the bridge to Heaven is made of YOUR forgivenness!" John reminded us. What a picture and how true seeing as how we pray in the Lord's Prayer "Forgive us our sins AS we forgive those who sin against us!"

What I loved about this mission was I could relate to everything they said in their talks (Sally read a poem about if Jesus came to stay with us, would we have to change the way we lived? Would we feel comfortable or wait for Him to leave?). And then, after the talks, we prayed together and John taught us HOW to pray for each other. It was a spiritually intense experience and very healing whether the physical healing came or not.

John and Sally are very much in demand (I can imagine - most who attend this mission love it) and they travel a lot, living most of the time in a motorhome and following a rather backbreaking schedule.

John has had two unsuccessful heart bypass surgeries and lives with the cloud over his head of wondering how much longer the Lord will allow him to minister. The mission was not easy for him to give. The second day, he sat down for part of the prayer service and looked very tired and pale after the first session was done.

There are many around who claim to be annointed and I find most of them not what they claim but, and I don't say this lightly, this couple SEEMED really annointed to me, very up front and just darned good people.

There were no spectacular healings at our session although I heard that at the night session, there were more healings. I felt the pain in my arthritic thumb go away and also the crunching in my neck (from arthritis). The crunching in my neck is still gone but the pain in my thumb has returned with a vengeance. Relief from it for a couple of days was nice though.

John said to continue our healings we needed prayer AND fasting. And that fasting combined with prayer was powerful. "But don't fast to lose weight," he told us. And this Ash Wednesday, I fasted for the first time in my life. And it was hard for me but a good feeling.

If John and Sally Cojanis visit your parish, go to their mission - go both days because I believe it is an honor to have attended and you will certainly, walk away with a whole lot of spiritual healing, increased skills in praying, serenity and peace and some good tools for practicing Christianity. You might even witness a miracle of physical healing or two or three.

Death

Sooner or later in a blog like this, I've got to write about death. Because it's something we all, will have to face.

However, I find I wrote about death last week so this will be my second post about it. Oh well.

I will never forget an email I got early in my web net era. The writer, a young woman, wrote:

"You are correct about starvation killing us. What I want to know is, how long does it take to die of starvation? You see I stopped eating a week ago."

In my usual manner, I was reading email in the early hours of the morning and I stared at that one for several minutes, a feeling of horror creeping over me. Something about it led me to believe she was serious and really wanted to end her own life. I wrote back what might be called a collection of "bromides" (what DO you say to someone who is intent on ending her life?). Like "you have your whole life ahead of you" and "can anything be so bad that death is preferable to living?" and so forth. I never heard back from the woman so don't know if she was reaching out in her final hour or if she aborted the plan. I hope, of course, the latter.

We all have seen death in the movies and TV many times. I'm sure you are familiar with the scene.

Bad guys (and women) die quickly, usually by accident or gunshot but since they have no personality, we don't worry about them.

And good people die lying there, either in their beds or on the street. They have a serene look on their faces - some even seem look wide eyed at the other side of the room suggesting they have seen an angel coming to get them (and in many movies, people are SHOWN on the other side, walking in a beautiful field of flowers toward a golden horizon).

Church tells us we should work and pray for a Holy Death. Which is basically what the movies are showing us. A beautiful death where we smoothly transition from life to eternity. In the "Hail Mary" we ask Jesus' mother to pray for us during the two most important times in our lives.... NOW at the moment -and- at the hour of our death.

Trouble is, being 63 years old, I'm beginning to see some folks around me die and their deaths are anything but the movie variety. They are angry, they often fight with their families and a greater number than we would like to think, commit suicide by stopping consuming liquids and food.

A relative in our family who was dying of cancer, told his wife "Come on let's get on with this" and he stopped drinking fluids. He rallied for a day when some of his siblings came to visit him and he ate some popsicles but then the day after they left, no fluids again.

A priest friend of mine had two personas. One was the kindly elderly priest - what most people who knew him saw. The other was the one I knew, an angry disappointed man who wondered every day whether he had made the wrong life decision. A man who was so angry, he felt he couldn't face his anger and told me he distracted himself when he started thinking about it. "Has that diminished your anger?" I once asked him. "No" he admitted.

I felt it's always better to face one's fears and anger because that's the only way to get rid of it. One of my favorite poems is "the litany of fear" from Herbert's Sci Fi book, DUNE:

"Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it is gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing.
Only I will remain."

Of course, men tend to suppress their emotions and he was no exception. On the contrary. He did not take my advice about this, and so, instead of facing his fears, he got increasingly angry and afraid inside. And it began to, I believe, take its toll on him physically.

I guess I hoped he would come to grips with his life situations which really were not bad - he had lived a long full life and I thought a nice retirement and resting for his last years when he really could pray and spend time with God getting ready for the big passage (and interceding for the many people in the world who are needy), would be the ticket.

But that was not to be. Instead he starved himself more and worked feverishly to avoid thinking about how angry and afraid he was inside.

"My greatest fear", he once told me, "is that when I face God in death, I will reject Him!" I thought that was ridiculous - who would say "no" to God. He looked sad and said I didn't understand. And I guess I didn't.

But God in His Mercy, must have thought that a real possibility because as it turned out, he had some kind of stroke and was so confused before he lost consciousness forever, that he undoubtedly didn't even THINK about refusing God's mercy.

And I suppose in a way that tells us just how merciful God IS but geesh, this is NOT how you want to see a priest die!

I am remembering a saying I once heard "most men live a life of quiet desperation!"

I have seen one lady die a Holy Death - she was a patient named Anna whom I visited a few times to give her Communion. And I was not with her when she died but I saw in her face, when I visited her the last couple of times, real beauty, breathtaking beauty. Almost like a luminescence shining out from her face. I bring those I go to visit, treats like candy or small gifts (magazines etc) but to this lady, the greatest gift I could give her was praying the Rosary with her. One time she made it through (and this was difficult because she was very ill). "We made it through," she said, triumphantly in her weakened voice and touched my arm with her frail hand. "yes, true" I said, smiling at her beautiful face.

The last time I visited her, three days before her death, she was too weak to say a Rosary so we said a couple of "Hail Mary's". I gently took her arm and said "Anna, you know I love you!" and she said "Yes I do and I love you too".

A couple of days later, her daughter called to tell me that she had died. I felt great serenity about her death because when I saw her, she was on the threshold of Heaven.

But most I have seen die, do not die Holy Deaths and some die definitely unholy deaths but God in His Mercy will reach out to us all and I guess that's as inspirational as seeing someone die a Holy Death.

Living forever on earth - a heaven or the other place

Living forever on earth is something which has occurred to each of us, I'm sure, especially as we grow older. And death not being particularly appealing, the idea of not having to face it, seems at first, a rather pleasant one.

It has been the subject of several movies, one of which is called "Tuck Everlasting". I don't remember much about this movie except that a girl whom our hero (who is living forever on earth after drinking from a spring) has fallen in love with , chooses to _not_ drink from the Spring because she decides she doesn't want to live forever. At least not on earth. I believe Tuck moves on... he's seen many live and die - no big deal.

In searching the web, the subject is discussed a lot but no one reaches any conclusion about whether this would be a good idea or not.

Perhaps one of the most memorable treatments of the subject was a TV show wherein a magic man gives the elderly in a nursing home (none of whom are suffering from the usual maladies like osteoporosis, alzheimers, or blindness) the chance to be kids again. All of them jump, at first, at the idea of moving without pain and having their whole lives ahead of them. But one by one, as they think about it and even experience being young, they decide against it. One lady says that she does not want to be young again without the love of her life at her side. Another person says he would not want to live through his life again. In the end, all the elderly go back to being elderly and only one individual remains a youth - he joyfully bid his littermates farewell and goes bounding through an open window into the night, headed for a lifetime of new adventures. I (probably like many other viewers) reached no conclusion about whether I would like to be the one who remains a youth or whether I would go back to being old and arthritic. Perhaps that was because I was reasonably young when I first watched this show.

Truth is, we all have a desire to live forever but most of us, especially as we grow older, get to feeling that perhaps living forever would not be real fun, if we remained earthbound.

The movie "Cocoon" and its sequel attempts to solve the dilemma without annoying anyone by mentioning the unmentionable (God, Heaven). It pictures a group of elderly going to "another place" which is pictured like a PERFECT earth where there is no sickness and pain. Heaven as Christians think of it, is strongly hinted at. Especially poignant in "Cocoon: The Return" was the separation of one grandpa from his grandson. Grandson was temporarily happy when his Grandpa returned but very sad when Grandpa leaves the earth forever.

Being 63 years old and having lost, first my best friend, 5 years ago (whom I still miss - she died of cancer) and recently having lost my Spiritual Advisor, a Jesuit priest who just turned 80 last year, I am beginning to formulate MY answer to this dilemma. I feel it would only be fun living forever if one could be with those one loves. For it seems that Heaven begins with being with our loved ones and goes from there.

And perhaps this lonely feeling we get when friends start being called Home, is planned by God to help us get over the fear of the great unknown, the sheer terror of the crossing over from earth to beyond. As time moves on, we think more and more about that place or state of being about which the Bible tells us "earth has not seen nor man has not known of the glories God has planned for those who love Him".

Priest dismissed because of pro life homily?

Lifesite news recently reported that a priest in the diocese of Rockford, was dismissed because of daring to preach on Natural Family Planning (NFP). That does sound concerning so I researched it a bit.

I couldn't get hold of anyone at the parish but I did read the homily available on the Lifesite website. Even from reading the homily, I got a very different point of view of what happened than was reported by Lifesite news.

First of all, it wasn't a homily, but rather a sermon having little to do with the readings (the homily is supposed to be a clarification of or based on the readings of the day).

Second, it was rather long and he rambled on and on. In places, the sermon could have been called a rant.

Third, he was inflammatory toward doctors, categorizing all of them (he did not qualify his statements to say "some" or even "many") as money greedy and incompetent. I understand his ire toward the medical profession but spinning negative stereotypes during a sermon in church is very inappropriate.

Fourth, he recommended (for some reason) two secular books on NFP which he admitted DID advocate contraception which is against church law - there is a Billings website, there is couples-to-couples league, EWTN and one-small-life and lots of CATHOLIC groups putting out NFP information so why would he recommend two secular books which advocate contraception? Most concerning about that is that NFP is NOT "Catholic contraception" and should NOT be thought of as such. It is making conception a decision between two married people and then, leaving the door open for God to override in case He sees fit. VERY different idea from contraception and important for Catholics to understand the difference.

Fifth, although Fr Tom's sermon mentioned that NFP was God's Plan, the sermon had nothing whatsoever to DO with the season of Advent or getting ready for the coming of Jesus and God has little mention in the sermon or rant.

It is not surprising that several parishioners left the church in frustration especially as this may not have been the first time Fr Tom gave a similar talk.

Can't blame them. As pro life as I am, I think I would rather hear a HOMILY on the readings, during the holy season of Advent (and I heard some excellent ones which helped me get ready for Christmas). Mentioning pro life is very appropriate but doing a teaching on the mechanics of NFP (including how one does it) during Advent when one is supposed to be talking about the readings seems very inappropriate even to some of us who are pro life folks.

My bets are, his dismissal from the parish is NOT because he was talking about NFP from the pulpit but rather has to do with many factors, some of which may be:

• That there may have been several complaints about his long Off Topic rants
• The fact that he admitted he was hospitalized recently for an unnamed illness but in a 70 year old, every illness is serious - his health may just not be holding up well under the stress of parish work
• That he seems to have no qualms about putting inflamatory statements into his sermons - those really don't do any good and can end up turning people away from the church
  

So now the diocese is likely finding him a position which will be easier on him energy-wise as well as discerning a place for him which will make the best use of his ardent pro life feelings and ability to teach NFP (maybe at this moment they are making a blog for him to write in!). :)

There are unfortunately, several pro life sources which have high visiblity, which do not check their information well and often write with a heavy bias.

Bad information from Catholics and/or pro lifers is as annoying as bad information from the press. In these days of spin we must question --- EVERYTHING....