George M. Sipe @[email protected]

Phil Gigliotti explores the question "are there few who are saved?" in his excellent podcast.

If you haven't run across him in the past, check-out his podcasts at https://giftofgrace.podbean.com and his website at http://giftofgraceministries.org.

Phil was recently on Kresta in the Afternoon. I discovered him on Peter Herbeck's Fire on the Earth.

Those intent on scandal and promotion of abortion will raise a false moral equivalence between abortion and capital punishment. Before he was pope, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger as Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith wrote in "Worthiness to Receive Holy Communion: General Principles" --

Not all moral issues have the same moral weight as abortion and euthanasia. For example, if a Catholic were to be at odds with the Holy Father on the application of capital punishment or on the decision to wage war, he would not for that reason be considered unworthy to present himself to receive Holy Communion. While the Church exhorts civil authorities to seek peace, not war, and to exercise discretion and mercy in imposing punishment on criminals, it may still be permissible to take up arms to repel an aggressor or to have recourse to capital punishment. There may be a legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging war and applying the death penalty, but not however with regard to abortion and euthanasia.

I have been thinking about #elon buying #twitter and am hopeful this is a turning-point away from #censorship of free (usually conservative) speech.

A side effect will be an influx (already begun) to the fediverse of those who no longer trust Twitter to be a "safe space" of leftist-only viewpoints. I am betting that these Twitter refugees will quickly want to suppress speech they don't like here, resulting in a ton of moderation reports. Many of those will likely be rejected, resulting in a renewed push to ban "hateful" instances.

Of course, Twitter refugees, liberals, conservatives, and everyone else is welcome here. Many of the refugees will not find that acceptable (and be "deeply disturbed").

It will be interesting to see how this plays out.

Disney is doubling down on woke. Their old mission of providing wholesome, family entertainment is out. Their new one is woke extremism, including sexual grooming for children of all ages. They have been sliding this way for years.

Catholic Vote notes their new spokesperson's woke credentials: The Walt Disney Corporation has hired Kristina Schake as a chief spokeswoman. Schake is a former Hillary Clinton presidential campaign flack and the leader of President Joe Biden's COVID-19 vaccination education campaign. She has also served as the global communications director for the Big Tech company Instagram and, before that, as special assistant to President Barack Obama and communications director to his first lady.

“When making the Sign of the Cross, therefore, we confess three great mysteries:

the Trinity,
the Passion, and
the remission of sins,

by which we are moved from the left, the hand of the curse, to the right, the hand of blessing.”

—St. Francis de Sales

Funny!

This is the Babylon Bee's Man of the Year.

Their selection got them kicked off Twitter until they delete it. They won't.

Holy Family statue restored and 3 suspects arrested in Florida case.

https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/250636/arrests-holy-family-statues-vandalized-catholic-church

"It is because of God's infinite love for us that He commands us to make use of the Sacrament of Penance. It is in this sacrament that we release the past to God's mercy, the present to His love, and the future to His providence."

-- Fr. William Casey via Catholic Exchange

#PSA

Google is canceling their plans for FLoC due to the firestorm caused by this privacy invasive scheme.

Google has announced a new plan called "Topics", which is mostly FLoC with a totally different name.

How can you protect yourself? It is actually very simple in this case. Literally, use ANY OTHER BROWSER than Google Chrome.

For example, Chromium, which is Chrome without Google's baked-in evil schemes. Alternately Apple Safari, Microsoft Edge, Firefox, Vivaldi, Brave, and a host of others.

“The implicit assumption of pro-abortion activists is that the female body is somehow a defective version of the male body — which they take as the norm — and that women can be free and equal only if they are permitted to kill their unborn children. Rather than structuring our laws and forming our culture to foster solidarity and support for women, the pro-abortion movement treats the child as an intruder, a 'parasite,' and a threat to neutralize.”

–Ryan T. Anderson and Alexandra DeSanctis

...authors of the forthcoming book: Tearing Us Apart: How Abortion Harms Everything and Solves Nothing

(found at Catholic Vote)

I am the way, the truth, and the life.

This Christmas morning, John 14:6 stands out to me. It is the point of our Lord's incarnation, the bottom line, and most succinctly and importantly - our call to action.

Give Jesus the birthday present He really wants -- you. In return, you will receive everything.

Remember this at the Most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. The sacrifice we offer to join with our Lord's superabundant, once for all sacrifice is ourselves.

Merry Christmas!

God, who is outside of time, created time for our benefit. It is within time that we get to know Him, choose conversion of heart, grow in holiness, and welcome the love of our Father... or not.

Deuteronomy 30:19-20 --
I call heaven and earth today to witness against you: I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. Choose life, then, that you and your descendants may live, by loving the LORD, your God, obeying his voice, and holding fast to him. For that will mean life for you, a long life for you to live on the land which the LORD swore to your ancestors, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give to them.

Anti-Catholicism in political circles is now nuanced on a per-person basis. Decades of "catholic" politicians have proven that Catholicism can be claimed as an identity without interfering whatsoever with political priorities. "Cultural catholicism" (not actual Catholicism) is eased by poor formation, lack of interest and often buoyed by bishops and priests who support the political agenda (don't look to these shepherds to address the cancer of this public scandal).

These bad Catholics, who will oppose the Church with all their heart, and with all their soul, and with all their mind, are politically considered the "good catholics". The faithful Catholics are the hated ones, as prophesied long ago by Isaiah (5:20).

We have reached the point where the most active, determined, relentless anti-Catholics are politicians who call themselves "devout Catholics" (Biden, Pelosi).

This is no deep insight on my part. Everyone knows this (or at least those who actually obey the first commandment).

Crisis has an interesting article on the topic this morning.

https://www.crisismagazine.com/2021/choosing-the-presidency-above-catholicism

Cardinal Robert Sarah on gender ideology.

Do you...

- love your politics and wish to change the Church

* OR *

- love the Church and want to change yourself?

In the news, we frequently hear of Catholic politicians (directly or via surrogates) who proudly and loudly call themselves "devout". Several things jump out:

1. Actual, faithful Catholics do not promote themselves as "devout".

2. These same politicians are 100% committed to opposing the true, moral teaching of the Church in many areas (abortion, euthanasia, marriage, gender, trans, worthy reception of sacraments, etc.).

3. They either (a) subordinate Christ and His Church to the idol of politics or (b) believe in an alternate and opposite reality where they can somehow remain in a state of grace despite their enthusiastic immorality.

This is bad because:

1. They are causing great harm to society.

2. They are causing scandal in the Church.

3. They are ransoming their own soul.