We have Bill Donohue coming to speak at Faith on Tap!

Papal Election Brings End to Worldwide Unsupervised-Catholic Sin Binge

Funny stuff from The Onion again.

I should have mentioned earlier that the Therese movie is now showing in Babylon and Franklin Square.

In German town, Benedict XVI known for love of cats, conversation

"It was full of cats, and when he went out, they all ran to him. They knew him and loved him. He stood there, petting some and talking to them, for quite a long time. He visited the cats whenever he visited the church. His love for cats is quite famous."

Reaction to the election of Pope Benedict XVI -

"what I and many other liberal Catholics are smelling with this election are the rotting corpses of Africa's children who have been given a fresh death sentence with this conservative stitch-up."

This was in the comments of a post on Dr. Blosser's blog . I would suggest the commentator switch to decaf.

Someone came here searching for "hans kung fan club"???? You'd better watch yourself, haven't you been reading all the news about our new Pope? Between the Grand Inquisitor Pope and Opus Dei you might want to hide out where they can't find you.

PS - I don't think there is a Hans Kung Fan Club, sorry.

I am certainly getting a lot of hits here for "laying the smackdown on heresy since 1981". That of course is the slogan of the Cardinal Ratzinger Fan Club.

Long Island Media cover Ratzinger, I mean, Pope Benedict XVI

"If there was shock on some people's faces, even as most rejoiced, that's because Ratzinger's conservatism has alienated some Catholics."

Can you guess which Long Island newspaper had a news story that included that line? Feel free to take 2 guesses and I will give a hint - it wasn't The Long Island Press.

Ignatius Press has a problem! How to handle the crush of orders they are receiving since they are the primary publisher of Cardinal Ratzinger's (now Pope Benedict XVI) books in English. This is wonderful to see - for those who are not familiar with this incredible publishing company - check it out. It was founded by Fr. Fessio, a Jesuit priest who studied under Ratzinger. He is an orthodox Jesuit and has not been treated very well by the order. He is currently working on creating Ave Maria University in Naples, Florida.

Habemus Papam

For most people of my age or younger we have known no other Pope. And the Pope we knew was one of the few to be known as "the Great". The past two weeks have been simply amazing to witness in the Church. The sickness, the vigil, the death, and funeral of Pope John Paul the Great are a blur of incredible and beautiful images one after the other. For me, the election of Cardinal Ratzinger does not yet seem real - it is hard to digest. I was 8 when Pope John Paul II was elected. I know Cardinal Ratzinger as Ratzinger, not as Pope Benedict XVI, so this will take some getting used to. (I even have a beer stein with his picture on it)

I was just able to catch a few minutes of television this evening and saw Mark Shea and Kathy Shaidle on MSNBC. They were great - Kathy was asked about ordination of women and said she "wished those who discussed this would stop fighting the battles of the 70's and 80's and do what they always want the Church to do - move into the 21st Century!" . Just a few minutes ago I was able to watch the replay of the events on EWTN starting with the white smoke and now the first blessing of the new Pope. The drama was great. When Ratzinger's name was said, Fr. Neuhaus and Raymond Arroyo were obviously delighted -I heard Neuhaus exclaim "Oh my God" kind of in the background... and sounding like he broke up -he was not heard from for a few minutes. Two more images -

This is what I imagine some Catholics felt when seeing Ratzinger elected -

But as someone mentioned on another blog, it is not time to gloat, it is time to pray - for any Catholics dismayed at Pope Benedict's election, and for the Pope himself.

And -

Thanks to Christopher Blosser for all the work he has done over the past few years with The Cardinal Ratzinger Fan Club. His intelligence, humor, and insight have introduced many of us Catholics to this great Churchman. His site is currently a living testimony to Yogi Berra's saying -"Nobody goes there anymore, it's too crowded".

( I was just able to get on the site now after a few tries)

Guess which Catholic figure this is about:

"In 1993 he won the feature of the year award from the Black Journalist Association for a series he wrote and produced on Malcolm X"


4/18/05 -- The answer was given by John M in comments -

Raymond Arroyo!

The only place I found this was here. I tried to verify it but couldn't find any other mention of it. It was surprising to me because I didn't know he was a reporter before EWTN and I associate him with that network so much I find it hard to picture him doing general news. I was also surprised to see he was a graduate of NYU.

The Amityville Horror

There is a new movie out that will once again exploit this real life tragedy. The actual story of what happened when Ronald DeFeo murdered his entire family can be found at The Amityville Murders website, done by an author of a book about the Amityville thing. Since this is a Catholic blog I will point out the Catholic Church and The Hoax section. The priest involved in this story "dropped out of sight" according to my diocese in a 2002 letter to the author. That doesn't exactly fill me with confidence in the way the Diocese tracked priests in the 1970's and 1980's but there it is. One thing about this story - please don't come to Amityville to gawk at the house as people have done in the past. The house doesn't have those weird windows anymore, the address was changed, and no one has ever reported any weird things going on since the book and movie came out the first time. Amityville is a nice little town and doesn't need more traffic. Thanks.