Catholic Culture Clash Links -- 12-2-10

Jonah Goldberg at NRO says This Pope Plays It Right. Jonah stated that before his father's passing,  his father stated “We need more rocks in the river” and explained that his father meant that we need more people like Pope Benedict XVI, and things that stand up to the torrent which offer respite from the current.  Goldberg talks about how the media misreported the Pope's condom comments, and badly.  While he is not in full agreement with the Vatican on matters of sexuality Jonah respects the Church's position.  There is a distinction made by the Pope between the bad and the less bad in his comments on the use of condoms.  But, Pope Benedict never states that condoms are acceptable, or good.  Jonah Goldberg explains this distinction, also.

Remember those Andy Griffith propaganda commercials which aired promoting Obamacare before election day?  Well, Andy Griffith has either been duped or he is misleading fellow senior citizens.  Do you want to take a stab at how much taxpayer money was used to air those commercials?  The Obama administration spent a whopping  $3,184,000 of taxpayer money to air those propaganda commercials which has even been found by groups like Factcheck.org to be untruthful.  The Examiner shows us what the documents released to Judicial Watch revealed:

“Mr. Griffith is featured in three Medicare television ads and provided his services to the government at no charge pursuant to a gratuitous services agreement. These three spots, ‘1965,’ ‘Music to My Ears,’ and ‘Cozy Chair,’ [were only aired] in September and October 2010. The production for the three advertisements cost $404,000; the total amount budgeted for the national media placement is $2.78 million, which breaks down per ad to $754,000 (‘1965’), $1,112,000 (‘Music to My Ears’), and $1,390,000 (‘Cozy Chair’).”

In press statements touting the new Griffith advertising program the Obama White House described its purpose: “The Affordable Care Act [Obamacare] will strengthen the health care system for all Americans, but senior citizens in particular stand to benefit from the new law. And the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) is getting a little help delivering the good news from a well-known TV star: Andy Griffith.”

Factcheck.org says that the advertisements intentionally misinform. In addition, Factcheck.org states that the health care law will in fact result in medicare cuts, and will specifically affect those seniors who have Medicare Advantage Plans.  Besides this law being a total debacle which will result in mega-rationing, this law is now costing the American taxpayers way too much money, and all for lies.

Pope Benedict reaffirms the Church's position on women's ordination. 'In his new book, the Pope states: "The church has 'no authority' to ordain women. The point is not that we are saying we don't want to, but that we can't," he said. This requires obedience by Catholics today, he added.



"This obedience may be arduous in today's situation, but it is important precisely for the church to show that we are not a regime based on arbitrary rule. We cannot do what we want," the pope said.'

The Pope responds to his critics who argued that ordination was restricted to men only because priestesses would have been unthinkable 2,000 years ago by saying: "That is nonsense, since the world was full of priestesses at the time," the pope answered. "All religions had their priestesses, and the astonishing thing was actually that they were absent from the community of Jesus Christ."  He is spot on!! The only  priestesses in existence in those times were pagan.

The Pope is right in stating in his book, that the Church does not discriminate against women.  Just look at how many positions women hold within the Church Today.  'The Pope stated "Women have so eminent a significance that in many respects they shape the image of the church more than men do," he said, noting famous religious figures such as Blessed Teresa of Calcutta.'