Original post by spirituality - Google News and software by Elliott Back

Original post by spirituality - Google News and software by Elliott Back

We are new creatures in Christ Jesus. There has been a re-creation in which God has given us a new set of senses, values, and spiritual principles.

Before we were spiritually blind, now we see with spiritual eyes, and we see all things new.

Before we were spiritually deaf and we could not hear God’s Word, and now we have a new set of spiritual eyes and we hear and respond to the Holy Spirit.

Before our minds were in spiritual darkness, and we called bad, good and good, bad. Now we have the mind of Christ and we see the difference between that which is good and that, which is evil…

Original post by mattpruett@faith-net.net (Faith Community Church of Canton NC) and software by Elliott Back

wa american casinoobjects for games 3d casinoabs casinosinternet casino offshore account merchant3 1n casino 1a prayer gamblingcasino internet provider merchant accountonline all jackpots casino Map

Sat Mar 31, 2007 7:41 pm (GMT -5)
news-press.com

By JENNIFER BOOTH REED

jreed@news-press.com

Originally posted on March 31, 2007

Link to original

Sylvia DiLorenzo thought she was doing a good thing.

In January, the certified yoga instructor began offering classes to fellow parishioners at Blessed Pope John XXIII Church in south Fort Myers.

She charged no money — participants could give a donation if they wanted — and dedicated two hours a week to teaching 65 parishioners how to stretch and strengthen their muscles, control stress and find peace.

Her good intentions have erupted into controversy.

In the past few weeks, a couple of people have accosted the yoga practitioners, accusing them of evil-doing, and the leader of the Catholic church in Southwest Florida has banned the classes.

His spokeswoman said it’s for reasons other than moral objections to yoga.

The events have left DiLorenzo, her students and other Catholic observers shaking their heads over the authoritarian leadership of their new bishop, who has been in office since July.

It started like this:

An unidentified woman stumbled upon a Friday morning class and was incensed to see yoga in a church, DiLorenzo said.

The woman returned the next Monday, armed with holy water that she sprinkled on the participants as they started their class.

"This is sinful. This is evil," DiLorenzo recalled her saying.

DiLorenzo and her students had never seen the woman or her companion who handed out leaflets in the parking lot condemning yoga as anti-Christian.

Some fundamentalist Christians object to yoga because of its Eastern spiritual roots and its philosophy of reflecting on the self rather than God.

DiLorenzo said the woman also condemned it as being "sexual."

"My theme for the month of March is ‘non-harming’ — the principle of unconditional love and compassion," DiLorenzo said. "How non-Christian is that?"

The Rev. Marc Lussier, parish administrator, assured them that they had done nothing wrong.

The classes kept meeting.

Then, two weeks ago, the area’s highest-ranking Catholic leader, Bishop Frank Dewane of the Diocese of Venice, ordered the classes disbanded. He has not explained his decision.

Diocese spokeswoman Adela Gonzales White said in a phone interview Friday that the problem was the location and timing of the class.

It had been scheduled — inadvertently, according to DiLorenzo — at the same time as a Friday morning spiritual service.

The class was meeting in the chapel, which Lussier had planned to convert into a multipurpose room so he could eliminate the costly lease on the parish hall. Worshippers in the sanctuary could see the class taking place in the chapel.

Some, including the woman with the holy water, found that offensive.

Lussier had blinds installed to make sure that didn’t happen again.

Later, when Dewane overruled his decision on the parish hall, Lussier had planned to move the class back into the hall, which has been leased for another year.

Lussier did not return phone calls to The News-Press. The only indication of his feelings comes from his March 25 message in the church bulletin: "Unfortunately, many people who benefited from this health service will be deprived because of the few who objected! The squeakiest wheel gets the oil!"

White didn’t know about the blinds or the parish hall. She said the bishop simply felt yoga — or any other activity — shouldn’t run concurrent with a spiritual service.

"He just decided let’s just not do it, and they have to respect that," White said.

His decision doesn’t mean he has a problem with yoga, she said but doesn’t think he’ll reconsider.

And that’s the problem Blessed Pope John members have with the decision. They say it’s just one more example of the church’s authoritarian rule.

"Unless the bishop personally comes to see Sylvia’s classes or sends a representative, he doesn’t have any right to condemn it," said Judy Cook, 65, of south Fort Myers. "I don’t see anything in the Bible that says we can’t do yoga, and I don’t know what commandment we’re breaking."

The controversy has caught the attention of the Boston-based Voice of the Faithful, the group founded after the priest sexual abuse scandal and dedicated to giving lay Catholics a greater say in the church.

Members from Southwest Florida contacted the Boston office to complain.

"To me, it’s just indicative of the misuse of power by a bishop," spokesman John Moynihan said. "That he should declare war on yoga is outrageous."

Gateway Trinity Lutheran Church invited DiLorenzo to expand the yoga program she was teaching there by bringing her Blessed Pope John classes.

"She was giving her gift to the parish. That’s what is so upsetting, said Jan Castiglione, 57, who splits her time between south Fort Myers and Boston.

Original post by mattpruett@faith-net.net (Faith Community Church of Canton NC) and software by Elliott Back

Sat Mar 31, 2007 5:12 pm (GMT -5)
Pope’s aide blasts church media coverage

Reuters

April 1, 2007

http://www.theage.com.au/news/World/Popes-aide-blasts-church-media-coverage/2007/04/01/1175366053431.html

A top aide to Pope Benedict has blasted the media for highlighting the Vatican’s views on sex while maintaining a "deafening silence" about charity work done by thousands of Catholic organisations around the world.

Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, who as secretary of state is effectively the Vatican’s prime minister, also accused the media of deliberately misinterpreting the Pope’s speeches, especially his Regensburg address last September which angered Muslims.

"We face an extremely grave problem. The church’s messages are subject to a type of manipulation and falsification by some western media," Bertone said in an interview with Le Figaro Magazine published in Paris on Saturday.

"I see a fixation by some journalists on moral topics, such as abortion and homosexual unions, which are certainly important issues but absolutely do not constitute the thinking and work of the church," he said.

"Why this deafening silence?" he asked. "We have to say the press does not write much about the social and charity work of thousands of Catholic organisations around the world."

Bertone said journalists had twisted the Pope’s Regensburg address - in which he quoted a Byzantine emperor linking Muslims and violence - into a speech on Islam rather than the discussion on the role God played in society.

"Pope Benedict’s thoughts were neatly blacked out," he said.

"Commentators who take phrases out of context in a misleading extrapolation are exercising their trade dishonestly."

He said the German-born Pontiff had made clear in Regensburg that he wanted "a healthy confrontation" with Islam and that several Muslim thinkers had welcomed his invitation to dialogue.

Bertone has been one of the church’s harshest critics of Dan Brown’s popular novel The Da Vinci Code.

In the interview he also took aim at The Lost Tomb of Jesus, a new film claiming that archaeologists have found the tomb of Jesus and his family and indications that Mary Magdelene, one of his followers in the gospels, was his wife.

According to the Bible, Jesus never married and rose bodily from the dead after his crucifixion.

"This is a strategy against the church and the divine figure of Christ," he said. "These campaigns try to sap the faith of Christian people and the trust the faithful have in the church."

The apocryphal gospels used as sources for popular books and films were not new discoveries but well-known books written a century or two after the original gospels, he said.

"Authors who try to sow confusion between these two different sources profit from religious ignorance," he said.

Original post by mattpruett@faith-net.net (Faith Community Church of Canton NC) and software by Elliott Back

Sat Mar 31, 2007 5:23 pm (GMT -5)
"Ecumenical" Holy Week breakfasts for men and a luncheon for the ladies

By Teresa Atkerson

March 31, 2007

http://www.mcalesternews.com/local/local_story_090171037.html

Holy Week will start Monday in McAlester with the first men’s breakfast at First Christian Church, 300 E. Carl Albert Pkwy.

The speaker is Richard Askew, All Saints Episcopal Church.

Tuesday’s breakfast will be held at Grand Avenue United Methodist Church, 225 E. Carl Albert Pkwy., with Dwayne Witt, First Baptist, as the speaker. Wednesday’s speaker will be Philip Stizza from St. John the Evangelist Catholic Church. The breakfast will be at All Saints Episcopal Church, 325 E. Washington Ave.

Thursday’s breakfast will be at St. John the Evangelist Catholic Church, 300 E. Washington Ave., with Eric Janzen, First Presbyterian, as the speaker.

Friday’s speaker will be Evans McBride, Grand Avenue United Methodist. The breakfast is at First Presbyterian Church, Third Street and Washington Avenue.

Saturday’s breakfast is set at First Baptist Church, 100 E. Washington Ave., with Rudia Halliburton, First Christian, as the speaker.

The breakfasts are at 7 a.m. Monday through Friday and at 8 a.m. Saturday.

The breakfasts began 54 years ago as a way for the men of the community to observe Holy Week in a non-denominational way. Representatives from each of the six churches in the downtown McAlester area form a committee each year to plan the breakfasts. This year’s committee includes Bill McMahan, First Christian; Wade Oss, Grand Avenue United Methodist; John Goodyear, All Saints Episcopal; Al Ross, St. John the Evangelist Catholic; Pete Mills, First Presbyterian; and Ted Kennedy, First Baptist.

McMahan said the breakfasts are open to any and all men in the community no matter where they attend church.

The Ladies’ Holy Week Salad Luncheon will be April 5 starting at 11:30 a.m. at the Scottish Rite Masonic Center, Second Street and Adams Avenue. Ladies not working outside the home are asked to bring a large salad at 11:30 with ladies working outside the home to arrive by noon. Those bringing salads should not bring serving utensils and are asked to put some type of identification on their dishes so they can be returned.

This year’s speaker is Jeanie Lee Dancer, a McAlester native now living in Tulsa. Music will be provided by Kristen Warren-Caroll, soloist; and Sally Hanway, pianist, from All Saints’ Episcopal Church.

The opening and closing prayers will be given by Peggy Grippando, St. John the Evangelist Catholic Church. Mistress of ceremonies is Carol Durant, First Baptist.

The table decorations will be provided by Grand Avenue United Methodist Church. The ladies of First Baptist are hostesses. Publicity is under the direction of members of First Christian Church.

Original post by mattpruett@faith-net.net (Faith Community Church of Canton NC) and software by Elliott Back

Sat Mar 31, 2007 5:43 pm (GMT -5)

Jewish ritual tied to Passover, Easter

By Christopher Hall

Special to The Courier-Journal

March 31, 2007

Link to original

As both Easter and Passover near, the Sacred Heart Model School played host to an event closely tied to both.

The traditional Jewish Passover meal and ritual — called a Seder — celebrates the Jews’ freedom from captivity and is tied directly to Easter and the death and rebirth of Jesus Christ in the Christian tradition.

About 80 children from the Catholic school’s fourth- and fifth-grade religion classes took part in a model Seder at the school to better understand the roots of their own Catholic traditions.

The Seder on Wednesday was led by Peter Anik, community relations director of the Jewish Community Federation of Louisville.

Passover — and the Seder — celebrate the freedom of the Jews from Egypt. The word "Passover" refers to the Angel of Death sparing the first-borns of the Jews as it passed over while they were in Egyptian captivity.

It was at a Passover Seder just before his crucifixion that Jesus is said to have told his followers to take bread and wine and eat of his body and drink of his blood.

Sally Rothenburger, one of the religion teachers who organized the event, said she and fellow teacher Maggie Osborne decided to put on the model Seder to help their students understand from where their own religion originated.

"This is where our roots came from, the Jewish heritage. Jesus was a Jew, and Jesus was celebrating Passover on what we call Holy Thursday," Rothenburger said.

"(We want) the children to understand from the Bible where the Passover originated and why Jesus was celebrating it and why we continue to celebrate, because the Catholic Eucharist was initiated that night."

As they sat and prepared for the ritual, fourth-graders Charlotte Cheek and Thomas Hall and their classmates glanced through the Hagaddah, the Seder prayer book from which they later would read. The children seemed eager for the experience.

"It’s a very important Jewish celebration," Charlotte said.

"I think it is a great opportunity to learn a little bit more about the Jewish faith," Thomas said.

Fifth-grader Joshua FaKunle, had more youthful expectations.

"I think it’s going to be really fun," he said.

Which would please Anik, who later said the Passover Seder should be a family- and child-centered event that, while it deals with a serious subject, should be a fun and joyful experience.

"You’re celebrating freedom," he said.

The Jewish Community Federation leads model Seders for schools and churches of any denomination, Anik said.

"Passover celebrates the themes of freedom, and that works for anyone. Not just Jews and Christians, anyone," Anik said.

Rothenburger said she hopes her young charges took away another lesson from Wednesday’s event: "I hope that they’ll understand that there’s a oneness under God, that we all believe in God."

"We’re all His children."

Passover begins at sundown Monday and lasts for eight days. Easter is April 8.

Original post by mattpruett@faith-net.net (Faith Community Church of Canton NC) and software by Elliott Back

Sat Mar 31, 2007 4:10 pm (GMT -5)


Demographic Winter - demographic crisis - in Europe

As Homosexual ‘Marriage’ Sweeps the West, 3,500 Pro-Family Int’l Leaders to Meet in Warsaw

4th World Congress of Families May 11-13 to form united front against liberalism and secularism

WARSAW, Poland, March 28, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The fourth World Congress of Families will meet in Warsaw this year, May 11-13, drawing together pro-life and pro-family leaders from around the world to form a united front against the forces of liberalism and secularism.

The theme of the Congress is “Beyond Demographic Winter: The Natural Family as the Springtime of Nations.”

“As “demographic winter” descends over Europe, plunging birthrates coincide with heavy immigration, primarily from Muslim lands. Following the logic of Mark Steyn’s America Alone, many conservatives have largely written off “old Europe” as a lost cause,” Dr. Allan Carlson, founder and International Secretary of the World Congress of Families, wrote for Human Events on March 22, 2007.

“This is unfortunate, for two reasons. First, courageous pro-family champions and organizations exist in every European country, even in hotbeds of militant secularism such as France, Sweden, and Spain. Second, several recent members of the European Union have elected strong pro-family governments, notably Latvia, Slovakia, and Poland. Despite intense pressures from EU bureaucrats in Brussels, these countries have implemented innovative programs to support natural families, grounded in marriage and welcoming towards children.”

Dr. Carlson said the WCF IV planning committee, decided to hold the fourth Congress in Poland as an encouragement to such positive pro-family developments, since, “If Europe is lost to demographic winter and radical secularism, much of the world will go with it.”

The Congresses are the largest international gathering of pro-family advocates, academics and politicians.

“More than 3,500 delegates from over 70 countries are expected to attend WCF IV. We will work together to protect human life (from conception to natural death), preserve traditional marriage, strengthen the natural family and oppose threats thereto (including pornography, Hollywood and anti-family bureaucrats),” the WCF said in a press release March 27.

The Congress is watched with deep suspicion by feminist and homosexual activism groups, the WCF acknowledged in a press release March 27–the uniting of multiple religions and nations under a common goal of protecting family life, freedom of religion and the basic rights of children is cause for concern among organizations seeking to promote individualistic and secularist values.

Poland’s pro-family president, Lech Kaczynski, will act as honorary patron of the Congress and will deliver opening remarks.

“We are honored to have President Kaczynski as the keynote speaker and Patron of the Congress,” said Dr. Carlson. “His well-known commitment to the family is very much in keeping with the theme of [the Congress.]”

Archbishop-Emeritus Kazimierz Majdanski is another patron of the event and has given it his blessing–the Archbishop survived the Dachau concentration camp during World War II and founded the Polish Institute for the Study of the Family.

Three previous World Congresses of Families were held in Prague (1997), Geneva (1999) and Mexico City (2004).

See related LifeSiteNews coverage:

World Congress of Families President Condemns EU Ban on Home Schooling

http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2006/oct/06101303.html

See World Congress of Families website

http://www.worldcongress.org/

P.S. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Europe

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Russia

http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crash_d%C3%A9mographique

http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/idbpyr.html

http://angelqueen.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=11783

_________________
http://www.geocities.com/demographic_crash

Original post by mattpruett@faith-net.net (Faith Community Church of Canton NC) and software by Elliott Back

Sat Mar 31, 2007 8:05 am (GMT -5)


Bertone confirms motu proprio

In an interview for the cover story (pages 56-60) of Le Figaro Magazine (weekly magazine of the French national daily Le Figaro), published today (not yet available on the newspaper’s website); excerpt:

Is a Decree widening the possibility of celebrating the Latin Mass according to the rite from before Vatican II (the so-called Mass of Saint Pius V) still expected?

Cardinal Bertone: The merit of the conciliar liturgical reform is intact. But both [for reasons of] not losing the great liturgical heritage left by Saint Pius V and for granting the wish of those faithful who desire to attend Masses according to this rite, within the framework of the Missal published in 1962 by Pope John XXIII, with its own calendar, there is no valid reason not to grant to every priest in the world* the right to celebrate according to this form. The authorization of the Supreme Pontiff would evidently preserve the validity of the rite of Paul VI. The publication of the motu proprio which specifies this authorisation will take place, but it will be the pope himself who will explain his motivations and the framework of his decision. The Sovereign Pontiff will personally explain his vision for the use of the ancient Missal to the Christian people, and particularly to the Bishops.

*au prêtre du monde entier: literally, to the priest of the whole world

Source: Le Forum Catholique.

P.S. Also Le Vatican remet nos pendules à l’heure

_________________
http://www.geocities.com/demographic_crash

Original post by mattpruett@faith-net.net (Faith Community Church of Canton NC) and software by Elliott Back

Original post by spirituality - Google News and software by Elliott Back

online cash fax loan advancepayday advance cash from loan onlineloan cash md advancems cash advance loanloan payday cash payday online advanceloan direct advancepayday search advance loanhome a advantage equity of loan Map