A Week is Packed with Pacwa

First, after blogging twice about the debate between Dr. James White and Fr. Pacwa, I completely forgot about it on Thursday. I was sitting at home at 6:30 pm reading the Long Island Catholic newspaper and I saw a little notice about Fr. Pacwa and slowly the brain cells kicked in and I ran to change my clothes and go to the event. The Huntington Townhouse really is huge, and I was glad to see a big turnout for the event. The first speaker who introduced Dr. White said he shared a Polish heritage with Fr. Pacwa, although his heritage was Polish and Norwegian: “My ancestors pillaged their own villages”. I too have Polish heritage so I always enjoy a good Polish joke. I soon realized that most of the people there were on Dr. White’s side. I have never gone to a debate like this before and overall, it was interesting and well done. It did go on for awhile though and I left at 11 pm because I live about 30 minutes away and I had to get up for work the next day. Fr. Pacwa certainly is a good speaker, he comes across much better in person than on EWTN. The debate was on whether or not the priesthood was biblical and historical. To be honest, I was a bit lost when Fr. Pacwa spoke about the words used in the Bible indicating various ministries. The debate centered around the disagreement on the words used and whether they indicated priesthood. Dr. White found the idea of the priest being “alter Christus” offensive and his overall point in the debate was that we offer our lives as sacrifice in thanksgiving to God, rather than a sacrifice offered by a priest. The debate at least made me want to learn more about the whole subject so I think it was a good experience. The overall impression I went away with, was that the crowd was respectful and serious about their Christian faith, and this was good to see. I also went home thinking that the Church lost my generation through lack of good education, especially in apologetics. I noticed during the break, people discussing areas of disagreement, especially with a couple of priests who attended. I wish I could have joined in the discussion but would have nothing to contribute except questions. This is after 16 years of Catholic school. We need to get serious about apologetics and the turmoil and divisions in the Church will not help this.

Friday evening I went to the Holy Hour at Our Lady of Lourdes which was led by Fr. Pacwa. The Holy Hours are good although they are not an hour but several hours. Fr. Pacwa gave a talk which included a call to evangelize Muslims! He believes the opportunity is available that has not been available in 1400 years. The talk was very bold and interesting. He mentioned some large numbers of Muslim conversions and I don’t know if this was wishful thinking or if he is onto something. (Interestingly, Mark Shea just posted something about the evangelization of Muslims and wonders whether Muslim devotion to Mary will make a difference). Afterwards Fr. Pacwa signed my copy of Father, Forgive Me, for I am Frustrated. He is going to speak tonight at the same Church and I will attend since he will talk about the Church since Vatican II and what needs to be done to renew the sense of the sacred, a topic of interest to me.