Another settlement

Should people living within the boundaries of the Diocese of Orange County take this news into consideration when the next annual Bishop's appeal is made?

A former student at St. John the Baptist School who claimed that a priest there sexually abused him in the 1990s has settled his lawsuit against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Orange.

The terms of the diocese's settlement with plaintiff Jonathan Kirrer, now 24, were not disclosed. His attorneys objected to publicizing them, though the archdiocese didn't.

The Orange County District Attorney's Office is investigating Kirrer's claim that the Rev. Denis Lyons sexually abused him in 1994 and 1995.

Kirrer is pleased with the settlement and hopes to put the civil case behind him, said his attorney, V. James DeSimone.

*****

Archdiocese spokesman Ryan Lilyengren said the settlement money will come partly from insurance money and an administrative account. The agreement would not affect spending for the schools or the parishes, he added.

Unless the diocese has a magical printing press, the money had to be taken from something. Maybe people who were worthwhile of help from the diocese.

Church and diocese finances are rarely made known to the faithful. That's till a scandal breaks out. Like two Diocese of Palm Beach priests who embezzled perhaps over a million dollars from the Parrish they ran. There was also this bank scandal the Vatican got itself involved in. Laundering money for the mafia is God's work. As is cutting off the insurance to a mother on pregnancy bedrest.

Lyons has been excommunicated from the church, Lilyengren said, but it is unclear whether the Vatican will defrock him.

Lyons gets excommunicated for molesting boys. Then tell me why the stepfather in this story doesn't have the same done to him? Costing the Catholic Church money Embarrassing the Roman Catholic Church is probably a greater sin than getting a nine-year-old girl pregnant.

Consistency or logic thy name isn't the Roman Catholic church.

They need to get out more often

Don't have anything in your mouth when you read this.

The Vatican newspaper says that perhaps the washing machine did more to liberate women in the 20th century than the pill or the right to work.

The submission was made in a lengthy article titled "The Washing Machine and the Liberation of Women - Put in the Detergent, Close the Lid and Relax."

The article was printed at the weekend in l'Osservatore Romano, the semi-official Vatican newspaper, to mark international Women's Day on Sunday.

"What in the 20th century did more to liberate Western women?," asks the article, which was written by a woman.

"The debate is heated. Some say the pill, some say abortion rights and some the right to work outside the home. Some, however, dare to go further: the washing machine," it says.

Did the Onion suddenly start writing for the Vatican? Freedom to make their own choices liberated women, not one small bit of 20th century technology. Which I will also point out, much of the third world doesn't even enjoy. My Philippine in-laws when I first visited them had a two-legged washing machine. Her name was Lolita. I guess the Vatican isn't talking about the poorer parts of the world, but large numbers of Filipinas are liberated washing machine or no washing machine.

I've said this for years and much of this comes from having a wife who works for a Catholic diocese. The Roman Catholic leadership is totally out of touch with its flock. I'm inclined to give tomorrow's Knucklehead award to this.

Hat tip- Doug at Below the Beltway who writes "However, this is just so transparently dumb that it would have been better, for their sake, if they'd just stayed quiet."

Corrupting

A Vatican fears people will lose their soul their souls due to their use of cellphones and the internet.

'In the age of the mobile phone and the internet it is probably more difficult than before to protect silence and to nourish the interior dimension of life,' said Fr Lombardi. 'It is difficult but necessary.

'Today this is a very grave threat, and it is the most irreparable misfortune,' he said, adding that if the spiritual dimension of a person was not guarded and nourished or it could 'become barren to the point of drying up and, indeed, dying.

'Reflection, meditation, contemplation are as necessary as breathing,' he said.

'In the age of the mobile phone and the internet it is more difficult than before to protect silence and so nourish the interior dimension of life. It is difficult but necessary.'

By chance I wonder how many Cardinals have cell phones? Then where do they keep them? The last time I looked there were no pockets on the cassocks they wore.

How is the internet noisy? A distraction yes, one I can't avoid unless I'm in the hospital for a couple of weeks. Fr. Lombardi is probably referring to the time these activities consume in a person's every day life. Then on the other hand the access to communications and information they provide is essential if one doesn't want to be left behind. You could say cellphones and the internet are as essential as breathing in the developed world. I do however wish people would turn their contraptions off during Sunday mass.

A person can lose their soul, but I don't think its because we spend too much time on cellphones.

The Knucklehead of the Day award

Today's winner is Father Jay Scott Newman of St. Mary's Catholic Church in Greenville South Carolina. He gets the award for the following-

South Carolina's Charleston-based Roman Catholic Diocese said Friday that it doesn't believe parishioners who voted for Barack Obama should have to seek penance before partaking Holy Communion, a condition a Greenville priest suggested this week because of Obama's stance on abortion.

The priest, Father Jay Scott Newman of St. Mary's Catholic Church in Greenville, couldn't be reached for comment late Friday.

"As administrator of the Diocese of Charleston, let me state with clarity that Father Newman's statements do not adequately reflect the Catholic Church's teachings," Monsignor Martin T. Laughlin said Friday in a posting on the diocese's Web site. "Any comments or statements to the contrary are repudiated."

On Friday, Newman said in a message posted on St. Mary's church Web site that his original statement had been misunderstood. Newman said that he didn't intend for his comments to be seen beyond his parish and that he has received more than 3,500 emails from across the globe both in support of and condemning his comments.

In Friday's posting, Newman said that voting for Obama isn't "in itself or by itself a mortal sin" but that "a vote for a pro-abortion candidate can be a mortal sin if the intent is to support abortion, that abortion is not merely one issue among other important issues, and that no Catholic should endorse a pro-abortion politician if a plausible pro-life alternative is available."

I'm Catholic, my wife works for the local diocese, and I have problems with what Father Newman said. Mostly because the Roman Catholic church is hypocritical when it comes to life. Take for instance a mother 6 years ago who was on hospital pregnancy bedrest. She was a diocese employee, the church she worked at paid her health insurance premiums. The Diocese of Palm Beach sent a HR employee to tell the mother in the hospital that her health insurance was being stopped unless she paid for them. She can't work because of being in the hospital, so where the #%^%! is the money supposed to come from? The skin flint diocese and church pastor thought it more important to save the $80 a week in premiums than the two human lives were at stake. If life was so sacred, you know what the choice would have come down to between the money and the mother and child. Sick, sick, sick and BTW the mother lost the d but then Bishop Sean O'Malley got a consolation prize. He's a cardinal.

Memo to the catholic church- Stop the human life hypocrisy. I know what matters to you the most- the almighty dollar. In the meantime I name Father Jay Scott Newman of St. Mary's Catholic Church in Greenville South Carolina today's Knucklehead of the Day.

Missing Eucharist

We're not talking about Sunday mass but this news from the Orlando Sentinel.

ORLANDO - -Holy bread -- considered the body of Christ -- was stolen last week from Good Shepherd Catholic Church, according to the Orlando Police Department.

Entering through an unlocked door late Thursday or early Friday, the burglar broke the Oleander Way church's sacristy, a room holding sacred vessels used to celebrate Mass.

Using a key hanging on the wall, the burglar unlocked the tabernacle, a cabinet containing the wafers of holy bread.

A small, circular glass case of wafers known as the luna was stolen, but not a covered bowl containing consecrated leftovers from the previous communion, according to the police report.

At some point, the burglar pried open the collection box and removed whatever cash it held, the report said.

The church estimated damage at $100 and the value of the missing holy bread and luna at $120.

The thief certainly wasn't there to steal the Body of Christ but the donation money. Whoever he or she was, they'll have to explain their theft to God one day. They better hope he is in a good mood.

Mark Schlueb, Henry Pierson Curtis, Bianca Prieto, Christopher Sherman, April Hunt, Sarah Lundy, Kristen Reed and Rachael Jackson of the Sentinel staff contributed to this report.

Nine employees of the Sentinel staff contributing to a 140 word article. That has to set a record for journalistic overkill.

Linked to- Adam, Bright & Early, Right Wing Nation, Rosemary, The World According to Carl,

The Knucklehead of the Day award

Today's winner is Father Henry Romero. An Associated Press article came out yesterday, talking about Nicaragua's total ban on abortions, including when a mother has an ectopic pregnancy. Why did Romero win the Knucklehead?

"A child is not a sickness," said Henry Romero, a priest who helped lead the campaign. "When two lives are in danger, you must try to save both the woman and the child. It's difficult to say now that it isn't possible to save both."

The baby in an ectopic pregnancy can't be saved. If you don't believe me, ask the Mayo Clinic.

Pregnancy begins with a fertilized egg. This egg is called a zygote. Normally, the zygote attaches itself to the lining of the uterus. With an ectopic pregnancy, the zygote implants somewhere else.

More than 95 percent of ectopic pregnancies occur in a fallopian tube — the tubes that carry the egg from the ovaries to the uterus. These are known as tubal pregnancies. Ectopic pregnancies are possible in the abdomen, ovary or neck of the uterus (cervix) as well.

An ectopic pregnancy can't proceed normally. The developing embryo can't survive, and the growing placental tissue may destroy important maternal structures. Without treatment, life-threatening blood loss is possible.

About one in every 40 to 100 pregnancies is ectopic. Thanks to earlier diagnosis and treatment, the chance for future healthy pregnancies is better than ever before.

Romero is through his complete ignorance is condemning women to death, for that, I make Father Henry Romero today's Knucklehead of the Day.

Linked to- Big Dog, Blue Star, Bright & Early, Conservative Thoughts, DragonLady, High Desert Wanderer, Leaning Straight Up, Outside the Beltway, Perri Nelson, Pirate's Cove, Populist, Pursuing Holiness, Right Voices, Right Wing Nation, Rosemary, Samantha Burns, Third World County, The World According to Carl,

Church Bandit

How does one stead nearly 1 million dollars from a church? Supposedly Karen Raborn did just that at St. Mary Magdalen Catholic Church in Altamonte Springs. Was there any kind of supervision going on? If Raborn stole money through her, whoever the church pastors were at the time were grossly negligent in their duties. It wouldn't be the first such instance here in Florida. The diocese of Palm Beach County had its own scandal last year.

Disclosure- My wife works for the Diocese of Palm Beach

Linked to- High Desert Wanderer, Populist, Pursuing Holiness, Right Wing Nation,

Longtime church employee Karen Raborn was charged Wednesday with stealing more than $320,000 in recent years from her Catholic parish, St. Mary Magdalen in Altamonte Springs.

But investigators suspect that's only one-third the amount she stole, part of it from the weekly collection plate.

In paperwork forwarded to the Seminole County State Attorney's Office, Altamonte Springs police alleged that "approximately $929,000" had disappeared from the church on Maitland Avenue.

Assistant State Attorney Beth Rutberg said the state had stopped counting at $320,000 because of the expense of obtaining old bank records.

Raborn, 50, who lives about a mile from the church, was charged with one count of organized fraud and one count of grand theft involving more than $100,000. If convicted, she faces up to 60 years in prison.

She was booked into the Seminole County Jail on Wednesday and was being held on $9,800 bail.

Police records indicate she grew desperate in July about being accused of theft.

She sought out a longtime friend and neighbor, an Altamonte Springs police officer, on July 15 and told him she had stolen $18,000 from the church's 2006 fall community festival.

She felt awful, she told the officer. Raborn also confessed to a priest at another church, according to a police report.

By then, the church had hired an outside expert and tried to total up its losses.

At Sunday services on July 22, the Rev. Charlie Mitchell read to the congregation a letter from Bishop Thomas Wenski of the Catholic Diocese of Orlando. It said the church had lost an estimated $675,000 to an embezzler.

The next day, Raborn tried to kill herself at a Winter Park cemetery, according to a police report. She was found unconscious, slumped over the wheel of her car, a beige Lincoln Town Car, and was taken to a hospital.

For weeks, church and diocese officials have declined to answer questions about Raborn and the missing money. The St. Mary Magdalen Sunday bulletin indicates that large sums of money are collected in its weekly offerings -- most recently, $43,194 on Oct. 13-14 and $35,867.91 on Oct. 20-21.

On Wednesday, diocese spokeswoman Carol Brinati would only say, via e-mail, that Raborn had worked at the church from 1995 to 2006.

Lights, Camera, Cardinal?

Some news from Poland-

WARSAW (AFP) - Poland's Cardinal Jozef Glemp is playing himself in a film dedicated to Father Jerzy Popieluszko, the Solidarity chaplain killed by the communist secret police in 1984, producers said Tuesday.

Glemp, who is the primate, or head, of the church in deeply Catholic Poland, reenacts real conversations he had with Popieluszko, Julita Swiercz-Wieczynska, the boss of the Focus Producers company, told AFP.

"We have already filmed the scenes with the primate. Cardinal Glemp is a natural when he's in front of the camera," said Swiercz-Wieczynska.

"He's also been a consultant, sharing his memories with us. We're making a historical film and we want to get as close as possible to reality," she said.

Make-up artists helped to take two decades off Glemp, who is now 87, so he looked more like his younger self.

The film, entitled simply "Popieluszko", is due for release late in 2008.

It stars 33-year-old Adam Woronowicz, who is mostly known for his television work, and who bears an uncanny resemblance to the eponymous priest.

The death of 37-year-old Popieluszko turned him into an enduring symbol of opposition to Poland's communist regime.

It also highlighted the crucial role played by the church, which was one of the few bulwarks against the communist authorities in this country of 38 million, where more than 90 percent of the population is Roman Catholic.

Popieluszko stood shoulder to shoulder with Solidarity, the communist bloc's first free trade union, which was founded in 1980.

After the regime's martial law crackdown on December 13, 1981, Popieluszko won renown for his sermons, which drew thousands of people to his parish chruch in Warsaw.

Popieluszko was kidnapped and tortured to death on October 19, 1984 by a three-man commando from the communist SB security police, who dumped his body in the River Vistula.

Sounds like an interesting subject for a movie. I wasn't aware of Popieluszko's story before today.

As for Actor Cardinal Jozef Glemp, any good reviews for his acting are unlikely to go to his head. After all, eighty-seven is a late age for a career change.

Linked to- Leaning Straight Up, Perri Nelson, Pursuing Holiness, Right Wing Nation,

The Knucklehead of the Day award

Today's winner is Roman Catholic Cardinal Norberto Rivera. He gets the award for the following.

LOS ANGELES - A judge dismissed a lawsuit Tuesday against Mexico City Cardinal Norberto Rivera, who had been accused of conspiring with Roman Catholic officials in the U.S. to transfer a priest accused of sexual abuse.

Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Elihu M. Berle found Rivera could not be held accountable in a U.S. court because the plaintiff didn't have enough evidence against him, said Mike Finnegan, the plaintiff's attorney.

"It was a legal technicality," he said. "It didn't reach any of the merits of the case, and it didn't get to the key issues in the case, which is Cardinal Rivera's complicity in sending (the priest) to the United States as a child molester."

The judge's ruling also dismissed claims against the Mexican Diocese of Tehuacan, where the cardinal was bishop at the time he transferred the priest.

Steve Selsberg, an attorney representing the Mexican cardinal in Los Angeles, said the judge found no evidence of conspiracy after reviewing a year's worth of evidence collected by attorneys from both sides.

Plaintiff Joaquin Aguilar Mendez, 26, filed the lawsuit in Los Angeles Superior Court, alleging that Rivera, who was then a bishop in Puebla state, knew that the priest had molested children when he sent him to the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. The priest, Nicolas Aguilar Rivera, is no relation to the cardinal or the plaintiff.

The cardinal's spokesman, Hugo Valdemar, told The Associated Press in Mexico City that the cardinal was pleased with the judge's decision.

To this non-legally trained mind, it appears Judge Berle is correct. US courts don't have jurisdiction.

As to Cardinal Rivera, who I've blogged about before, he is far from an innocent in this matter.

In a declaration filed in February, the cardinal said he sent a letter to Los Angeles Cardinal Roger Mahony in 1987 warning him that the priest had "homosexual problems." A spokesman for the Los Angeles archdiocese has said the U.S. cardinal never received it.

The priest fled to Mexico after he was accused of sexual abuse in Los Angeles and before police could begin an investigation. He has since been charged in California with 19 felony counts of committing lewd acts on a child.

The priest lied to the Archdiocese of Mexico City and was able to get temporary permission to serve as priest there, Selsberg said. He fled Mexico City in 1995 when Norberto Rivera was promoted to cardinal and has been a fugitive since, Selsberg said.

The priest's whereabouts are currently unknown, Finnegan said.

Rivera got rid of his problem by hoisting off Nicolas Aguilar Rivera on unsuspecting people. Now this Cardinal uses the law to allude justice. And this man gets up in front of thousands and preaches about sin. What a sicko, Cardinal Norberto will get his just reward in heaven one day but first, I make him today's Knucklehead of the Day.

Linked to- Bright & Early, High Desert Wanderer, Leaning Straight Up, Outside the Beltway, Perri Nelson, Pirate's Cove, Populist, Right Voices, Right Wing Nation, Rosemary, Third World County, Woman Honor Thyself,

Expanding the College

Texas will get its very first Roman Catholic Cardinal.

VATICAN CITY - Pope Benedict XVI named 23 new cardinals Wednesday, giving Texas its first "prince" of the Roman Catholic Church in a clear recognition of the growing Latino presence in the U.S. church.

The appointment of Archbishop Daniel N. DiNardo of Galveston-Houston brings the number of American cardinals to 17 — second only to Italy — and increases the American contingent's clout in any conclave to elect a future pontiff.

I didn't know that there were more American Cardinals than anywhere but Rome. I'll bet $50 none ever gets elected Pope between now and doomsday. The only problem is if I'm wrong and dead, you could have trouble collecting.

Benedict tapped Vatican officials, academics, diplomats and archbishops from five continents. Eighteen of the new cardinals are under age 80 and eligible to vote in a conclave; five others, including the patriarch of Baghdad, were named in recognition of their service to the church.

Now the Patriarch of Baghdad must be a very brave man. His counterpart in Mexico City should take a lesson from him.

Benedict said he would give them all their red hats at a Vatican ceremony Nov. 24.

The naming of DiNardo, 58, of Galveston-Houston was something of a surprise since there are several other U.S. archdioceses which usually have cardinals leading them, including Washington and Baltimore, but the pope did not elevate their archbishops.

The Cardinal of Boston should be removed just on the basis of what employees of the Palm Beach Diocese did in regards to a pregnant mother on hospital bedrest when the Cardinal was Bishop of the Diocese. $100 a week to for 2-3 months to pay the mother's insurance(She was and is a diocesan employee) to ensure the safe delivery of a baby was apparently too big of an expenditure for Cardinal Sean or he simply didn't care. Either way it points out the hypocrisy of the Church today. Give them the chance to protect their money or two human lives, a Roman Catholic Bishop will choose the money.

This is all true, I got the letters to the father from the diocese. They make interesting reading.

Linked to- High Desert Wanderer, Pirate's Cove, Right Wing Nation, Webloggin, The World According to Carl,

Just say no to martyrdom

I found this news out of Mexico interesting.

Mexico's top Roman Catholic cardinal, who is accused in a U.S. lawsuit of protecting an alleged pedophile priest, said he has received threats and will ask the government additional security.

Norberto Rivera said he feels "always at risk" in an interview broadcast by the Televisa network, after several protesters kicked, pounded and reportedly spat at his car outside Mexico City's cathedral after his weekly Mass.

It was unclear why the protesters attacked the car, and Rivera has not said who is behind death threats against him.

Mexico City Mayor Marcelo Ebrard said Tuesday he had instructed his security secretary, Joel Ortega, to help. But Church officials have suggested that Sunday's confrontation may have involved supporters of Ebrard's Democratic Revolution Party, which party officials deny.

"We can't tolerate this kind of chaos at the cathedral," Rivera said, "where today they hit me and tomorrow they shoot at me."

If the Cardinal is protecting or hiding a pedophile priest from law enforcement authorities, he is guilty of a crime(Obstruction of Justice) himself. Who appointed Rivera arbiter or judge?

As to those angry at the Cardinal, they have a right to protest but non-violently. Violence and death threats are inexcusable.

I do find Cardinal Rivera asking for additional security interesting. He is doing God's work, why should he fear violence being committed against him? I mean if he died doing his Priestly duties, Rivera would become a saint in heaven. Did Pope John Paul back down from his stance against communism and for human rights after being nearly assassinated? Somehow it looks to me(and feel free to disagree) that Cardinal Rivera is forgetting some basic teachings of Roman Catholicism.

So stand up and be brave Cardinal Rivera. Unless you've committed some mortal sins you have nothing to fear, right?

Linked to- High Desert Wanderer, Perri Nelson, Pirate's Cove, Right Wing Nation,

Thou shalt not steal

Some news from Singapore. You could say the judge threw the book at him.

Linked to- Blue Star, Bullwinkle, Stuck on Stupid, Third World County,

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - A Singaporean judge sentenced a man to four months in jail for stealing a Bible, admonishing him with Scripture before hauling him off to prison, The Straits Times newspaper reported on Wednesday.

District judge Bala Reddy also gave a new Bible to the 26-year-old thief, who said he had tried to steal the book from a bookshop last month because he wanted to replace his old, tattered copy.

At the Tuesday sentencing, the judge told the defendant -- who has previous convictions for theft -- to open his gift.

"You will see at page 65 that it says "Thou shalt not steal. While you are in prison, sit in prison and read the Bible, and ensure that you don't come before the courts again," Reddy said.

Disobeying orders

From AP-

KAZIMIERZ DOLNY, Poland - Police pushed their way into a Polish convent Wednesday and began evicting about 65 rebellious ex-nuns — arresting the mother superior and a monk who had occupied the complex with them illegally for two years.

The women had taken over the building in a rebellion against the Vatican, which had ordered the replacement of their mother superior, Jadwiga Ligocka.

"They were disobedient," said Mieczyslaw Puzewicz, a spokesman for the Lublin diocese of the Roman Catholic Church. The Vatican formally expelled the women from their Sisters of Bethany order last year.

Police arrested Mother Jadwiga and a former Franciscan friar, Roman Komaryczko, who had been living with the nuns, police spokesman Mariusz Sokolowski said. He would not say what the specific charges were.

Are these women really ex-nuns or are they just being displaced or moved? Disobeying the local Bishop or Vatican is serious business. Ask the father whose wife was on pregnancy bedrest and faced the loss of their health insurance. The mother was an almost ten-year employee of the diocese. The Bishop of Palm Beach through the actions of his employees clearly showing what he values most. The dollar or a human life? I think my readers can infer the correct answer from what I wrote above.

Note- Nuns are female monasitics or the equivalent of a monk.

Several hours into the operation, the women, in black habits and each escorted by two policewomen, began filing out of the building. Some carried musical instruments — guitars, a tambourine, a drum — while others bore simple backpacks or carried large blue garbage bags apparently packed their with belongings.

Almost sounds like a traveling band to me. If these women are really ex-nuns now, maybe they have a career in music ahead of them. As you can imagine, TFM has a name for their groups.

Nuns and Rosaries.

Linked to- Cao, Leaning Straight Up, Pirate's Cove, Right Wing Nation,

Archbishop Christodoulos

The leader of Greece's Orthodox Church was having transplant surgery in South Florida.

ATHENS, Greece - Doctors in Miami halted liver transplant surgery for the head of Greece's Orthodox Church, Archbishop Christodoulos, on Monday after his cancer was found to have spread, church officials in Athens said.

The 68-year-old archbishop was diagnosed with cancer in June after intestinal surgery. He was having surgery at Miami's Jackson Memorial Hospital Monday after waiting for 50 days for a compatible liver to become available.

The operation was overseen by renowned Greek transplant specialist Andreas Tzakis, director of the University of Miami's organ transplant institute.

But during the operation, Tzakis discovered the cancer had spread, said Harris Konidaris, the archbishop's spokesman.

Due to this, "the transplant was not possible," Konidaris said, adding that the archbishop would remain in the hospital in Miami for several days and possibly weeks so doctors could determine a possible new method of treatment.

Please say a prayer for the archbishop's full recovery.

I believe(and anyone feel free to correct) if a person due for an organ transplant, is discovered to metastasized cancer, they are no longer a candidate for surgery. As a cancer survivor myself, I know the uncertainty people with this disease live with. Cancer is very unpredictable, there was a malignant melanoma survivor named Kim Wheeler. She lived over 25 years after being diagnosed with Stage IV disease. Melanoma Stage IV has a median survival rate of less than a year. Kim's story was amazing, God rest her soul. I hope Archbishop Christodoulos has a similar miracle.

Disclosure- My sister-in-law Leonette is employed by Jackson Memorial Hospital.

Linked to- Right Wing Nation, Rosemary, Third World County, The World According to Carl,

Forgiving

From the Tallahassee Democrat-

The woman who was brutally attacked in a Tallahassee church is recovering and telling loved ones that she's ready to forgive her assailant.

"I hope the man repents and is born again," the woman's husband, Donsoo Jeon, said of the man who attacked her. "My wife said she is ready to forgive him."

Jeon's wife, who is four months pregnant, was kneeling in the front of the church sanctuary just before the attack. She was beaten and stabbed multiple times in the face, neck and hands. She's been released from the hospital and is recovering, and her unborn child is expected to be OK.

Johnny James Byrd Jr., 25, was arrested shortly after the attack on charges of attempted first-degree murder, armed burglary, attempted sexual battery, grand-theft auto and armed robbery. He's being held without bail in the Leon County Jail.

The woman, a devout Christian, prayed at Tallahassee Korean Baptist Church every day, her husband said. He worried about her going to the church alone early in the morning.

"I warned her, 'It's dangerous. It's not a very good neighborhood,' " he said. "But she is based on faith. She said God protects her."

I found it curious that the story never names the person that was attacked. That prompted me to write article's author, Nic Corbett, who kindly replied back to me.

I didn't name the wife because generally our newspaper doesn't print the names of victims. Also, if you didn't know the family, you wouldn't be able to figure out who she is very quickly because her husband's last name is different from her last name.

The Democrat doesn't print the name of victims? Did they do that in the case of the Virginia Tech massacre? How about the story of a Northern Florida Sheriff whose wife was murdered? I'm not criticizing Corbett, but the newspaper's policy. To me it seems inconsistent. Also I think the story would be more powerful, if the victim was known. Like in the case of Peter and Cathy Read after their daughter Mary Karen was murdered at VT. Of course if the victim doesn't want their name published, it is a whole different matter.

One last note- Korean women traditionally keep their family name after marriage. Though I have a friend who didn't

More of the article is below.

A member of the church, B.J. Oh, said Jeon's wife was praying when she heard noises. She didn't open her eyes at first because she thought it was just the pastor arriving. Then she heard a knock, opened her eyes and saw a man behind her.

She ran to a side room to escape, but the man caught up with her. He beat her and stabbed her. She tried to fend him off with her hands, hoping to keep the knife from hurting her baby. Investigators say Byrd was going to sexually assault her, but she convinced him to leave because other church members would be arriving.

He threw blankets on top of her so she wouldn't be able to move, Oh said. But she managed to crawl 270 feet from the sanctuary to a kitchen, which had a phone that she used to call 911.

Meanwhile, her attacker took her purse and drove away in her car. Byrd was arrested after a deputy spotted the car nearby. Investigators say he was burglarizing the church when the woman came in to pray.

When the pastor arrived, he saw the deputies' cars and an ambulance. He couldn't recognize the woman's face because it was badly swollen from the attack.

"He nearly beat her to death," Oh said.

Oh said the woman thanked God that she was attacked rather than one of her fellow church-goers.

"Our question was, 'Why God? Why was it her?'" Oh said. "But we all know it could have been one of us."

Jeon and his wife have attended the church for more than a decade. She first joined when she was a foreign-exchange student at Florida State University. She was a Sunday school teacher for many years. She went on two missionary trips to Birmingham, Ala., and a Navajo reservation in New Mexico.

She also led the church's rescue mission, providing meals to homeless people at The Shelter once a month.

"She's been an example to all of us," Oh said.

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Reverend James Kennedy dead at 76

While I've known his name and face for years, I only caught brief glimpses of Rev. Kennedy on television. He always appeared to be an honorable man to me who preached the word of God. The Pastor died this morning after retiring just last month. RIP.

Linked to- Adam, Big Dog, Bright & Early, Cao, Perri Nelson,

FORT LAUDERDALE -- - Conservative leader the Rev. D. James Kennedy died Wednesday morning, sources at his Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church reported today.

The pastor died "peacefully, in his sleep, at home" around 3 a.m., according to the Rev. Ronald Siegenthaler, executive minister at the 10,000-member church. By his side was Anne, his wife of five decades.

Kennedy, who also founded a broadcast ministry, a seminary and an annual series of conservative conferences, suffered multiple complications ever since Dec. 28, when he suffered arrhythmia and cardiac arrest. He never fully recovered, despite a rigorous regimen of physical therapy in Florida and Michigan.

His retirement was announced Aug. 26 by his daughter, Jennifer, who spoke at a joint gathering of all three Sunday services. The church also announced plans for a tribute to Kennedy's life and career, set for 11 a.m. on Sept. 23.

No padre

Some news from Spain. If Spanish bishops are anything like those in the US, this protest will fall on deaf ears.

Linked to- High Desert Wanderer, Morewhat, Pursuing Holiness, Right Wing Nation,

MADRID (Reuters) - Members of a Spanish village parish have gone on hunger strike in protest at the transfer of their much-loved priest to another church, the newspaper El Pais reported on Monday.

Eighteen members of a parish in Albunol in the southern province of Granada have refused to eat in protest at the transfer of Gabriel Castillo, and 200 parishioners have locked themselves in the church in an attempt to keep him as their priest.

But Castillo's transfer has been brought forward, El Pais said on its Web site, as the protests continue.

The youthful Castillo is popular with parishioners because he has involved himself with local social issues such as immigration and poverty.

The protesters say Castillo is being transferred because his ideas clash with a group of local nuns, who since his arrival have been hearing mass in a nearby village.

Socially unjust

From the Times Online-

Pope Benedict XVI is working on a doctrinal pronouncement that will condemn tax evasion as “socially unjust”, according to Vatican sources.

In his second encyclical – the most authoritative statement a pope can issue – the pontiff will denounce the use of “tax havens” and offshore bank accounts by wealthy individuals, since this reduces tax revenues for the benefit of society as a whole.

It will focus on humanity’s social and economic problems in an era of globalisation. Pope Benedict intends to argue for a world trade and economic system “regulated in such a way as to avoid further injustice and discrimination”, Ignazio Ingrao, a Vatican watcher, said yesterday.

The encyclical, drafted during his recent holiday in the mountains of northern Italy, takes its cue from Pope Paul VI’s encyclical Populorum Progressio (On the Development of Peoples), issued 40 years ago. In it the pontiff focused on “those peoples who are striving to escape from hunger, misery, endemic diseases and ignorance and are looking for a wider share in the benefits of civilisation”. He called on the West to promote an equitable world economic system based on social justice rather than profit.

This week the Italian centre-left Government of Romano Prodi began a concerted crackdown on tax evaders, saying that it would target individuals with second homes and other signs of “conspicuous wealth”. If the black economy is included, unpaid taxes amount to 27 per cent of Italy’s gross domestic product.

I blogged a week ago about the Italian Prime Minister's request for the Catholic Church's help with those who evade taxes. Apparently Pope Benedict got the message.

Regretfully I have to say this. Pope Benedict has lost his marbles or gone senile. This is just the latest, and may I add sad, proof. First we'll address a world economic system based on social justice rather than profit.

It's already been tried. The name for it is communism. How free is a society and people that lives under the control of such a government. If he was still alive, Pope John Paul II could have given Benedict the answer.

Instead I call on Captain Ed to do it.

Benedict should take a lesson from his predecessor, who came from an economic system that theoretically based itself of "social justice". John Paul II understood what happens in systems where the state manages of economic systems for their idea of social justice -- and no other management can be possible without the profit motive. Once profit gets removed from economic systems as a regulator for investment and control -- i.e., the one who invests and profits makes the decisions controlling the investment and use of the profit -- it takes an autocracy to decide the goals of investment for the purposes of social justice.

It didn't work out well in Poland for John Paul, nor in Soviet Russia and China, where millions died in famines thanks to ridiculous central agricultural planning. State-run economies always claim to champion social justice and equitable distribution.

If anyone needs an example of how unjust a Communist regime can be today, all we need look at is the state of North Korea. The people of the Hermit Kingdom have no profits, they also have no food or freedom either.

Could I remind the Pope how just the country of East Germany was?

BERLIN - The agency that manages the records of former East Germany's dreaded secret police has uncovered an order for border guards to fire on escaping citizens that is far more explicit than others on record, an official said in remarks published Saturday.

Though the official East German border regulations said use of a firearm was to be considered an "extreme measure in the use of force," the Oct. 1, 1973 order to border guards from the Ministry for State Security, or Stasi, is much less reserved, Magdeburg's Volksstimme newspaper reported.

"Do not hesitate with the use of a firearm, including when the border breakouts involve women and children, which the traitors have already frequently taken advantage of," the order instructed.

Before the 1990 reunification of Germany, more than 1,000 people were killed on the eastern side of the highly fortified border as they tried to escape to the West, including more than 125 at the Berlin Wall, which was erected in 1961.

Over 1,000 people died seeking their freedom to profit in the West. How just was the East German government who murdered them. You'd think Pope Benedict would see that. He having grown up during the days of Nazi Germany.

Another recent example of how Pope Benedict is losing it, is this news.

ROME (AP) — Pope Benedict XVI met briefly this week with a Polish priest who has been accused of making anti-Jewish comments.

Photos showing the pope at his summer residence with the Rev. Tadeusz Rydzyk, along with two other Polish priests, were published in Polish newspapers Tuesday.

The Vatican has not commented on the meeting. But a Vatican official confirmed Tuesday that the three were brought to the pope, along with other pilgrims, after the pontiff's weekly public blessing Sunday in Castel Gandolfo, his summer home.

Rydzyk, who runs a conservative media empire that includes the Catholic station Radio Maryja, was allegedly caught on tape suggesting that Jews are greedy and Polish President Lech Kaczynski is subservient to Jewish lobbyists.

Rydzyk is a jerk. It isn't alleged what he said about Jews, but fact. As leader of the Catholic Church, Pope Benedict shouldn't have anything to do with this priest, instead the pontiff meets with Rydzyk. Do you think that conveys a message that Rydzyk's anti-semitism is acceptable.

Don't forget Pope Benedict's remarks on Muhammad from 2006.

Show me just what Muhammad brought that was new and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached.

I've blogged before about how remote the church leaders are from their flock, but the Pope I feel isn't just out of touch. If we were just talking one example of poor judgment, we could say Pope Benedict had made a mistake,(I don't believe in the infallibility of the Pope. There was just one perfect one, and look what happened to him) or maybe the reporting by the Times is off in some way. Sadly, we have three examples of how 'lost' Pope Benedict is. The day for a new man to rule the Catholic Church can't come too soon.

Linked to- Adam, Church and State, Blue Star, Is it Just me?, Jo, Right Wing Nation, Woman Honor Thyself,

Former French Cardinal Jean-Marie Lustiger dead at age 80

Cardinal Jean-Marie Lustiger's personal story was fascinating. He was a convert from Judaism, whose mother died in the German concentration camp Auschwitz. Having visited Auschwitz myself in 2000, I agree with the Cardinal's assessment of the place. Sixty years later death still hangs in the air at the concentration camp. The former Cardinal died of cancer on Sunday. RIP.

Linked to- Bullwinkle, High Desert Wanderer, Right Wing Nation, Third World County,

Cardinal Jean-Marie Lustiger, who was the son of a Holocaust victim and converted from Judaism to become France's most influential Catholic of recent decades, has died, church officials said today.

The 80-year-old bishop, whose Polish immigrant mother was killed at Auschwitz, died yesterday at a hospice in Paris, the archbishop of Paris's office said in a statement. He had been gravely ill for some months.

Born Aaron Lustiger in Paris in 1926, the cardinal converted to Catholicism at the age of 14 after being sent with his sister to the city of Orléans, south of Paris, to escape the occupying Nazis.

After ordination, in 1954, he rose to become archbishop of Paris, a post he held for 24 years before stepping down in 2005. In this role, he was the public face of the church in predominantly Catholic France, as well as a leading figure in interfaith relations.

A confidant of the late Pope John Paul II, whom he was at one point mooted to succeed, Cardinal Lustiger represented the pontiff at ceremonies in January 2005 marking the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.

His mother's death was a subject the cardinal preferred to avoid. "I don't want to return, because it is a place of death and destruction," he told reporters at Auschwitz. "If I am going, it is because the Pope asked me."

Another rare public acknowledgement of his family history came in 1989, on France's national day of remembrance, when the cardinal took part in a reading of the names of French Jews killed during the war. When he came to that of Gisele Lustiger, he said, "my mother", and continued with the list.

He was also private about his conversion to Catholicism, but he did say in one collection of writings that this was never a source of anguish to him.

"Christianity is the fruit of Judaism," he said in The Choice of God, a book of conversations published in 1987. "For me, it was never for an instant a question of denying my Jewish identity. On the contrary."

Cardinal Lustiger announced in April 2007 that he was being treated for a "grave illness" at a Paris hospice.

A funeral mass will be said for him this Friday at the city's Notre Dame cathedral.

Calling St. Matthew

Some news from Italy. I don't recall a commandment saying- Thou shalt pay taxes. Yes Jesus said, Give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar, and to God what belongs to God. Didn't Caesar die around 2,000 years ago?

ROME (Reuters) - Thou shalt not steal -- from the state.

That's the message Italy's prime minister wants Catholic priests to preach from their pulpits to help him stamp out rampant tax evasion robbing the state of sorely needed cash.

"A third of Italians heavily evade taxes," lamented in an interview with Italy's prominent Catholic magazine, Famiglia Cristiana, widely quoted in Wednesday's newspapers.

"Why, when I go to Mass, is this issue almost never touched on in the homilies?"

Italy is struggling under the weight of Europe's largest debt pile in absolute terms. The government estimates the cost of tax evasion at 7 percent of gross domestic product, or about 100 billion euros (67 billion pounds) a year.

It says this is nearly double the rate of evasion in France, Germany and Britain and nearly four times that of Austria, the Netherlands and Ireland.

One Catholic leader said that while the Church strongly encouraged citizens to pay taxes, Italy's government also needed to prove to taxpayers that their money was being well spent if it wanted more cooperation.

All sarcasm aside, its up to the government to collect taxes properly. It isn't the job of the church to preach the payment of them.