Burial of the dead is still the preferred way of interment
In the new edition of the Funeral Rite, cremation is not disallowed but is discouraged by demotion to treatment in an index of the book rather than along with the prayers in the Rite. This for the reason that "the burial of the dead is more appropriate, that it expresses faith in the resurrection of the flesh, nourishes the piety of the faithful and favours the recollection and prayer of relatives and friends".
Vatican Information service news release follows:
NEW FUNERAL RITES: NO TO THE SCATTERING OF THE ASHES OF THE DECEASED
Vatican City, 30 March 2012 (VIS) - The second Italian-language edition of the "Funeral Rites", produced by the Vatican Publishing House, was presented recently at the headquarters of Vatican Radio. Among other things, the new edition contains fully revised biblical texts and prayers.
The first novelty refers to the visit to the family, which was not part of the earlier edition. Msgr. Angelo Lameri of the National Liturgical Office of the Italian Episcopal Conference, explained how "for a priest this a moment to share in the suffering, to listen to the mourning relatives, to learn about certain aspects of the deceased's life with a view to a correct and personalised presentation during the funeral".
Another change involves the revised and enriched ritual for the closing of the coffin; with a number of different texts for various situations: an elderly person, a young person, or someone who has died unexpectedly. Other changes involve the pronouncement of words recalling of the deceased at the moment of the committal, and the introduction of a broad range of possibilities for the prayer of the faithful.
However the most significant new departure, contained in the appendix of the book, concerns cremation. Msgr. Lameri explained that the issue of cremation had been placed in an appendix to highlight the fact that the Church, "although she does not oppose the cremation of bodies, when not done 'in odium fidei', continues to maintain that the burial of the dead is more appropriate, that it expresses faith in the resurrection of the flesh, nourishes the piety of the faithful and favours the recollection and prayer of relatives and friends".
In exceptional cases the rites normally celebrated at the cemetery chapel or the tomb may be celebrated at the cremation site, and it is recommended that the coffin be accompanied to that site. One particularity important aspect is that "cremation is considered as concluded when the urn is deposited in the cemetery". This is because, although the law does allow ashes to be scattered in the open or conserved in places other than a cemetery, "such practices ... raise considerable doubts as to their coherence to Christian faith, especially when they conceal pantheist or naturalistic beliefs".
The new "Funeral Rites" also focuses on the search for the meaning of death. Concluding the presentation, Bishop Alceste Catella, president of the Episcopal Commission for Liturgy, explained that "the book is testament to the faith of believers and to the importance of respect and 'pietas' towards the deceased, respect for the human body even when dead. It is testament to the pressing need to cultivate memory and to have a specific place in which to place the body or the ashes, in the profound certainty that this is authentic faith and authentic humanism".
On Wednesday’s “The O’Reilly Factor” on the Fox News Channel, Cardinal Timothy Dolan, the Archbishop of New York and a man considered the post powerful cleric of the Roman Catholic Church in the United States, leveled the charge that the Obama administration and its supporters are attempting to divide the Catholic Church.
Dolan said that the issue of contraception is being used as a political tool, and that its use is infringing on religious freedom.
“You are right on target,” Dolan said, addressing that the church’s position on banning contraception is unpopular with large sections of the American public. “It’s a tough battle because of that, and our opponents are very shrewd because they have chosen an issue that they know we are not very popular on and that is why, Bill, we have to be vigorous in insisting that this is not about contraception — it’s about religion freedom. And I don’t want to judge people, but I think there would be a drift in the administration that this is a good issue and if we can divide the Catholic community (because it’s already divided) and if one can caricature the bishops as being hopelessly out of touch — these bullies who are trying to achieve judicially and legislatively what they’ve been unable to achieve because their moral integrity was compromised recently. There is the force out there trying to caricature us, alright? But we can’t back down from this fight because it’s about religion freedom — it’s close to the heart of the democratic enterprise what we know and love and the United States of America is all about.”
Dolan dismissed the notion that there is a wall between church and state, saying that it isn’t the church itself that wants to be a force in American politics, but its members.
“The Catholic Church wants its people to be a player in the American politics. Twenty-eight percent of the population of the United States are Catholics, OK? And the Catholic Church, through them, you bet, wants to have a say in the direction of our beloved country,” he said. “To think that there is a Berlin Wall between one’s religious convictions and one’s political activity is crazy. It’s ludicrous. It’s not only non-Catholic, non-Christian, non-biblical, it’s also un-American.”
Dolan added that these efforts to undermine the church are “un-American” because there has been a traditional role for religion in matters of politics.
“You know that every great movement in American history has been driven by people of religious conviction, and if we duct tape the churches — I’m just not talking about the Catholic Church — if we duct tape the role of religion and churches, and morally convince people in the marketplace, that is going to lead to a huge deficit, a huge void, and there are many people who want to fill it up, namely a new religion called secularism, OK, which would be as doctrinaire and would consider itself as infallible as they caricature the other religions doing. So, to see that morally-driven, religiously-convinced people want to exercise their political responsibility, I think that is not only the heart of biblical religion — it is at the heart of the American enterprise.”
GLORIA, LAUS ET HONOR
In celebration of the 201st anniversary of the birth of John Neumann, the first male American saint, and the 160th anniversary of his ordination as a bishop, the relics of Saint John Neumann will make their own pilgrimage to “Mary’s Shrine” on March 28.
His Excellency, the Most Reverend Alexander Sample, Bishop of the diocese of Marquette, Michigan, pictured above celebrating the holy Mass in the Extraordinary Form, has announced that he will now offer the Mass "approximately once a month on Sundays" in his cathedral church.
On March 17 Saint Francis de Sales Catholic Church held the second annual "Volunteer Thank-You Dinner" at the parish hall. Many of our volunteers were able to attend and celebrate their own share in the missionary spirit of Saint Patrick who spread the Faith by serving others.
The Nationwide Rally for Religious Freedom is set to take place on Friday, March 23, in more than 100 cities across the country. From Hawaii to Maine, citizens are preparing to let their voices be heard on the value of religious freedom. Meeting places include historic sites, congressional offices and federal buildings. The theme for the rally is “Stand Up for Religious Freedom — Stop the HHS Mandate!”
The rallies, which are scheduled to take place on the second anniversary of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (commonly called Obamacare), are being organized by the Pro-Life Action League and by Citizens for a Pro-Life Society in response to the recent Department of Health and Human Services mandate requiring most employers’ health-insurance plans to provide co-pay-free sterilization, contraception and abortion-causing drugs.
The mandate is unacceptable to Eric Scheidler of the Pro-Life Action League, who is spearheading the rallies. While he says there are numerous objections to the mandate, opposition to it can be broken down into two key points. The first, he says, is that “in principle, this mandate treats fertility, which can be seen as the very definition of health, as a disease. This is being talked about as ‘preventive care,’ as if motherhood, fatherhood and childhood are diseases to be avoided. This is extremely offensive.”
The second point, which Scheidler sees as even more important, is the violation of religious freedom. “This mandate would force employers to pay for sterilization, contraception and abortion-causing drugs, even in violation of their consciences. This is a direct attack on religious freedom itself, despite what many are being led to believe,” he said.
“Some think that because a so-called ‘accommodation’ was offered, everything is fine,” Scheidler said. “The Church, not the insurance companies, would still be forced to pay for things which violate Church teachings. The only way around it would be if a Catholic hospital, for example, would only hire Catholic employees and serve Catholic patients. This is ridiculous — the corporal works of mercy are not meant for Catholics alone. The HHS ’accommodation’ is so narrow that Jesus and his apostles would not qualify for it.”
He noted that even as Obama and HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius presented the accommodation Feb. 10, the administration was “submitting their original plan to be published in the Federal Register. They did not intend to give us any leeway.”
Scheidler hopes to make this clear to those who had been unaware of it. “We really want this to be both a grassroots effort across the nation and also a unified effort with a very clear message. And that message is to stand up for religious freedom and stop Obama’s HHS mandate.”
Among the groups supporting the effort are Concerned Women for America, the National Black Pro-Life Coalition and Students for Life of America.
While many of the rally supporters are Catholic, Scheidler said this “really isn’t just a Catholic issue. This is a direct attack on the constitutionally protected right of religious organizations to define their own mission and purpose, which has been attacked by the Obama administration.” Scheidler wants to see everyone who supports his efforts, whether Catholic or not, to come to their nearest location in support of the effort. “We’re really encouraging people to invite local religious leaders — not just Catholics, but Protestants, Jews and others — to participate as speakers at the rallies as well.”
Speakers at the Federal Plaza in Chicago will include Sheila Liaugminas of Relevant Radio and Chicago archdiocesan priest Father Richard Simon. Cardinal Francis George will provide a recorded message for participants to hear. The newly installed coadjutor bishop of San Diego, Bishop Cirilo Flores, is scheduled to speak at the San Diego County Administration Building. New York City’s speakers include Father Benedict Groeschel of the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal and Alveda King, the pro-life activist and niece of Martin Luther King Jr.
Solidarity among all believers is something that Catholic radio talk-show host Al Kresta is also hoping for. “We want to see all believers support and join us in our efforts. This affects not just Catholics, but everyone. We cannot allow the federal government to dictate to us what we are to believe in. If we as a nation allow this one step, there’s no telling what else will ensue. It’s a shift from liberty to tyranny.”
Kresta, who is also the national spokesman for StopHHS.com, will be speaking at the Patrick V. McNamara Federal Building in Detroit. He expects to see a large turnout. “We’ve got a great group of people in Detroit who are interested in this issue, and I really do look forward to seeing a large number of them participating in what I think is the most important issue of our time.”
Every notable person Kresta has spoken with about the issue is in agreement on its nature. “I’ve talked with many people — constitutional scholars, bishops, attorneys, historians — and they all agree, whether they’re liberal or conservative, that this is unprecedented. Never before has the United States government attempted to force religious institutions to violate their deeply held beliefs,” Kresta explained.
“When abortion was allowed by law in 1973, it was very regrettable; and it remains regrettable that people are able to end the lives of their unborn children,” Kresta stated. “However, no American citizen is being compelled to commit abortion. We are all free not to engage in that activity. With the HHS mandate, there’s a reversal. They are trying to proactively force us to act against our beliefs. It’s not a toleration of evil, but a heavy-handed promotion of it.”
However, Kresta thinks that because of slanted secular media coverage, many people still see this as a trivial issue . He hopes the rally will jump-start awareness of the importance of standing up for religious freedom. “The secular media is portraying this as no big deal, but it is a qualitative shift. It is fundamentally different from what has happened before: The federal government is proactively trying to restrict our individual and religious liberty. We want to make that clear across the nation. This is not about contraception; it’s about the federal government intruding where it does not belong.”
Penny Nance, president and CEO of Concerned Women for America, the nation’s largest public-policy women’s organization, shares Kresta’s apprehension. “We are deeply concerned about the dismantling of our constitutional freedoms and the assault on Christian institutions in America,” she stated.
“When religious groups are forced to deny their deeply held religious convictions, it is not called ‘balance’; it is called ‘tyranny,’” Nance said. “Concerned Women for America reminds the president that our nation was founded on Judeo-Christian principles. Further, America’s social safety nets will not hold up without the contributions of Christian institutions — many of them run by the Catholic Church — and that churches and religious institutions provide the strong moral threads of the nation’s social fabric.”
Scheidler also sees the issue as being very widespread. “This is something that carries over into society at large. It’s not just a few out-of-touch pundits and bishops out there,” he said. “There are many women and men who reject the idea that pregnancy and childbirth are diseases that need to be prevented. There are many people who believe this is an encroachment on their religious freedom by the federal government.”
Overbearing government is something American Founding Father Patrick Henry is known for opposing, so it is noteworthy that the rally will be held on the anniversary of his famous 1775 statement — Scheidler said the timing of the rally was unintentional but providential — “Give me liberty or give me death.”
Register correspondent Trent Beattie writes from Seattle.
by Edward Pentin Tuesday, March 20, 2012 6:17 AM
In an important news day from the Vatican today, Bishop William E. Lori of Bridgeport, Conn., has been named as the new Archbishop of Baltimore. He replaces Cardinal Edwin O’Brien who last week took up his new post here in Rome as Grand Master of the Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem.
Bishop Lori was one of three appointments to U.S. dioceses announced today:
* Msgr. David Malloy, until now a priest of the diocese of Milwaukee and a former general secretary of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, has been appointed Bishop of Rockford, Ill., replacing Bishop Thomas Doran. * Fr. Gregory Parkes, who has been serving as Chancellor and Vicar General of the Diocese of Orlando, is appointed Bishop of Pensacola-Tallahassee, taking over from Bishop John Huston Ricard who stood down in March last year.
In Canada, Cardinal Jean-Claude Turcotte, Archbishop of Montreal, has stood down and will be replaced by Archbishop Christian Lépine, until now an auxiliary bishop in Montreal.
Also published today was a summary of the Apostolic Visitation of Ireland. The document makes a series of observations and recommendations. In particular, it notes: “Among the pastoral priorities that have emerged most strongly is the need for deeper formation in the content of the faith for young people and adults; a broad and well-planned ongoing theological and spiritual formation for clergy, Religious and lay faithful; a new focus on the role of the laity, who are called to be engaged both within the Church and in bearing witness before society, in accordance with the social teachings of the Church.”
The report also said visitators “encountered a certain tendency, not dominant but nevertheless fairly widespread among priests, Religious and laity, to hold theological opinions at variance with the teachings of the Magisterium, this serious situation requires particular attention, directed principally towards improved theological formation. It must be stressed that dissent from the fundamental teachings of the Church is not the authentic path towards renewal.” The report can be read in full here.
The Vatican also announced today details of the next meeting of the Courtyard of the Gentiles - a project of the Pontifical Council for Culture aimed at promoting dialogue between believers and unbelievers - which will be in Palermo, Sicily, on March 29 and 30. Further meetings will follow in Bologna, Paris, Bucharest, Florence, Rome and Tirana.
On Sunday evening March 18, 2012, a Solemn High Mass was offered at Saint Francis de Sales Catholic Church in Benedict, Maryland, in reparation for the sins of desecration and sacrilege against the Holy Eucharist, a most grave crime because our Divine Lord Himself truly present is directly attacked and one of the "main sins" of irreligion as taught by the Church and reaffirmed by the Catechism.
Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan of New York is urging his fellow bishops to “prepare for tough times” after the Obama administration told the bishops’ conference that it is not willing to address religious liberty concerns raised by its contraception mandate.
In a March 2 letter to all U.S. bishops, Cardinal Dolan explained that White House officials told staffers from the bishops’ conference at a recent meeting that revisiting the mandate or broadening the exemption in order to address “the broader concerns of religious freedom” is “off the table.”
Instead, the administration encouraged the bishops to listen to those who accept the new policy.
“The White House seems to think we bishops simply do not know or understand Catholic teaching,” the newly-elevated cardinal said.
He stated in his letter that “religious freedom is under attack” and that “we will not cease our struggle to protect it.”
The president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops also outlined ways in which the conference will continue its “strong efforts of advocacy and education.”
He said that the bishops’ conference is working to provide catechetical resources on the Church’s teaching about religious freedom, as well as liturgical aids to encourage prayer and inform Catholics about ongoing plans to resist the threats to religious liberty.
“We did not ask for this fight, but we will not run from it,” he said.
Cardinal Dolan then briefed the U.S. bishops on current efforts to fight the mandate, which was issued Jan. 20 by the Obama administration and will soon require employers to offer health care plans that cover contraception, sterilization and abortion-inducing drugs, even if doing so violates their consciences.
After an outcry from people across the political and religious spectrum, President Obama promised an “accommodation” for religious freedom on Feb. 10. Under the proposed change, religious employers would not purchase the controversial coverage directly, but would instead be required to buy health care plans from insurance companies.
But Cardinal Dolan insisted that the revised mandate does not address deeper concerns of religious freedom and the administration’s attempt “to define the how and who of our ministry.” Nor does it offer a solution for the many self-insured ministries or individual believers who wish to follow Church teaching, he said.
Although the bishops have accepted the president’s invitation to “work out the wrinkles,” the process “seems to be stalled,” Cardinal Dolan told his fellow bishops.
He stressed the importance of unity in finding other ways to fight the mandate and assured the bishops that “ample time” would be dedicated to the subject at the conference’s upcoming Administrative Committee meeting and the June Plenary Assembly.
In the meantime, he said, the bishops remain committed to “seeking legislative remedies” for the mandate. However, he voiced his concern about a recent Senate debate in which the issue of religious freedom was obscured under claims that the matter is solely about women’s health.
“We will not let this deception stand,” he said, adding that “the Church hardly needs to be lectured about health care for women” because, due largely to the work of religious sisters, the Church is “the largest private provider of health care for women” in the United States.
“Perhaps the courts offer the most light,” he suggested, noting that the Supreme Court recently ruled in favor of a church’s right to define its own ministry. He said that the bishops’ conference will release more information soon about currently-developing judicial efforts to fight the mandate.
Cardinal Dolan said the bishops will continue pursuing multiple avenues to repeal the mandate, or at least to institute a wider exemption, “so that churches can be free of the new, rigidly narrow definition of church, minister and ministry.”
He expressed a willingness to work with those of “any party” who are committed to defending “the timeless and enduring truth of religious freedom.”
I didn’t get involved in the story of a lesbian woman denied communion at her mother’s funeral which the Washington Post plastered across its front page (“Seeking Communion, Finding Rejection“, in the lower right-hand corner) at first but the more I thought about the scenario the more it irked me.
According to Barbara Johnson’s version of events, and the version of events unquestioningly passed on by the mainstream media, she was denied Communion at her own mother’s funeral by a priest who then proceeded to snub her departed mother by refusing to be present at the burial.
Now Johnson is on a crusade to get the priest, Fr. Marcel Guarnizo, removed from ministry, telling the Post that Fr. Marcel “brought [his] politics, not [his] God into that Church yesterday” and that he will “pay dearly on the day of judgement for judging [her].” She continues:
“I will pray for your soul, but first I will do everything in my power to see that you are removed from parish life so that you will not be permitted to harm any more families.”
Strong words. But who brought their politics into this situation? Fr. Marcel, or Johnson?
The internet is an amazing way to answer questions. It didn’t take me long to discover that Barbara Johnson hardly attempts to keep her private life (or views) private.
For instance, she’s published on the question: “Coming Out in the Heteronormative and Homophobic World of Education” (which alone tells you a lot about her world view) where she shares this personal story:
What’s that? Johnson is a self-professed Buddhist? No wonder she describes herself as a “student of … Buddhist philosophy” on her website.
Maggie, faithful APL mascot, is shown here praying at an abortion mill with her family members on a recent cold Monday evening. Maggie and her family are members of Saint Agnes Catholic Church in Catonsville, Maryland where Father Michael DeAscanis serves as pastor.
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