Interview With Cardinal Arinze… The State Of The Church In Africa

By DON FIER

Part 2

(Editor’s Note: His Eminence Francis Cardinal Arinze, Prefect Emeritus of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, recently traveled to the United States to speak at The Church Teaches forum in Louisville, Ky.
(At the forum, he delivered an outstanding presentation on the role of the Sacred Liturgy in developing a Catholic conscience. His Eminence graciously agreed to grant an interview to The Wanderer in which he shared his insights on reasons for the remarkable growth of the Church in his native continent of Africa [which includes 54 independent countries], the historical background of Catholic Christianity in Africa, the challenges and future hopes for Catholicism in Africa, and the continent’s expanding role in missionary activity throughout the world.
(Because of the length of the interview, we are presenting it in two parts. The first part appeared in last week’s issue.)

+ + +

Q. Are members of the African clergy serving as missionaries in other parts of the world? If so, do you think their numbers will increase in the coming years?
A. Yes, thanks to God, the priests of Africa are helping to evangelize other parts of their own continent and are also being called to countries in Europe, the United States, and Latin America. And the numbers are increasing. Granted, it is not in apocalyptic proportions but the action is there. … Continue Reading

Soft Treatment For Clinton, Biden . . . But Media Boast Over Hostile Coverage Of Trump

By DEXTER DUGGAN

As the Summer Olympics kicked off in Brazil, the marathon effort against Republican Donald Trump’s presidential candidacy in the U.S. passed the baton to a new runner.
Whatever the physical and mental demands on the world’s athletes in Rio de Janeiro, Trump was getting slugged in ways that would have had referees jumping in to protect the Manhattan billionaire competitor against low blows if he were a preferred liberal Democrat.
A few months ago, continued riots against Trump’s candidacy were bruited as bloody demonstrations against him burst out, with many Latinos participating, against his alleged racism. The open-border controversy bore its bitter fruit.
They waved the Mexican flag, burned the U.S. flag, wore masks, wrecked police cars, and beat people supporting Trump. The upcoming GOP convention in Cleveland appeared under threat. Then the riots simply stopped.
Did someone figure out that the bloody assaults only built sympathy for Trump? The fact that violent turnouts in different states could be turned on and off like a faucet suggested a frightening level of coordination.
So the baton in the race to clobber the GOP nominee was passed to another group skilled in assault, the dominantly liberal media.
The level of obvious venom against Trump in this media coverage grew so repellent that a New York Times writer addressed the issue — not to denounce it flatly, but to explore news media beliefs that Trump was just too dangerous to be allowed to win the White House.
However, Times writer Jim Rutenberg deluded himself that these media previously had a good record of balance and fairness that the horrible Trump now made them discard. … Continue Reading

Reductive Materialism . . . It Takes A Lot Of Faith To Be An Atheist

By JUDE P. DOUGHERTY

“In Brain Map, Gears of Mind Get Rare Look” is the headline given to a front-page report in The New York Times. “Gears” of the mind? Yes. We are told, “In what many experts are calling a milestone in neuroscience, researchers published a spectacular neuro map of the brain, detailing nearly 100 previously unknown regions in an unprecedented glimpse into the machinery of the human mind.” “Machinery” of the human mind? Yes.
Yawn! It was known in antiquity that the brain is an organ of thought, much as the eye is the organ of sight. What was not known is that some groups of neurons become active when we recognize faces, others when we read, and still others when we raise our hands.
To generalize, specific areas of the brain are active when people are engaged in specific activity.
The identification of regions of the brain associated with speech, memory, and sight is interesting, and one willingly gives assent to such reports, relying on the authority of the investigator. What is left unexplained is the abstract character of human thought.
For example, we may experience one or more instance of an element, say, copper, and from that experience learn that copper conducts electricity. From that one experience we are convinced that copper conducts electricity wherever it is found and that that proposition is true even if copper would disappear from the face of the earth.
Though derived from sense experience, that knowledge is held in an abstract, universal way. The intellect has grasped something intelligible in the sensory encounter that transcends the singular report.
Aristotle, in accounting for the phenomena, reasoned to the abstractive power of an agent intellect, itself immaterial. He reasoned that from one or more experience of a sensible entity we can grasp something of the nature of that entity, for there is more in the sense report than the senses themselves are able to appreciate. We form an idea of what the thing is and communicate that idea appropriately.
Ancient notions of abstraction and causality came to be challenged in the 18th century by the British empiricists. … Continue Reading

Faith And Personal Identity

By DONALD DeMARCO

In the year 2001, one hundred years after the Russian Orthodox Church excommunicated Leo Tolstoy, his great-great-grandson, Vladimir Tolstoy, requested that the Church review Tolstoy’s teachings on the grounds that the excommunication of this great writer was a hindrance to national unity.
Tolstoy had no belief in the immortality of the soul and regarded Christ as merely a man. His novel, Resurrection, published in 1899, includes strong criticism of church ritual.
Tolstoy provided clear testimony of his rejection of the Church when he wrote: “It is perfectly justifiable that I have renounced the Church that calls itself Orthodox….I renounce all the sacraments….I have truly renounced the Church, I have stopped fulfilling its rites, and I have written in my will to my close ones that they should not allow any clergymen from the Church near me when I will be dying.”
Church officials made it clear that they stand by the church’s 1901 decision. Moreover, they pointed out that Tolstoy excommunicated himself.
I recall interviewing a cleaning lady for our home. She informed us that she did not do dusting and her bad back prevented her from doing any lifting as well as executing a variety of other chores that are usually associated with cleaning a house.
Her forte, strangely enough, was gossip, and I felt that this alone would not get the house clean. Nonetheless, she identified herself as a “cleaning lady.”
I wished her well, while thinking to myself that she should probably pursue some other line of work. It was clear enough that her self-identification had nothing to do with who she is or what she does. … Continue Reading

Truth And The Housing Crash

By JAMES K. FITZPATRICK

I can’t think of anything in Church doctrine that prohibits Catholics from participating in partisan political spin. We have a right to put the best face possible on the agenda of the political party we favor.
Outright lying is a different matter. As are slander and defamation of character. We have an obligation to draw the necessary lines in this matter, a duty to seek and defend the truth in pursuit of the common good in debates over public policy.
Where is this heading? Don’t you feel at times that the adversaries in some of the major political debates of our time talk past each other; that if someone could get them to sit down and discuss the issue rationally they might reach a common ground? That, for example, those who scream at each other over the slogan “Black Lives Matter” should be able to agree that all life is sacred — but also that African-Americans have a right to protest individual acts of police brutality in their community.
Similarly, shouldn’t the people who are at odds over the Obama administration’s reluctance to use the term “radical Islam” be able to agree that it is wise not to unnecessarily insult moderate Muslims, but also important to accurately identify the elements in the Muslim world who are hell-bent on killing us? You get the impression that the talking points are more important to the disputants in this matter than the truth.
The angry exchanges between the left and the right about who was responsible for the subprime mortgage crisis, and its role in causing the 2006 real estate crash and the recession that followed, is another example. It looks as if this will be one of the hot topics in the upcoming presidential campaigns. The Democrat and Republican Party representatives sent to the talk shows appear to be more concerned with affixing blame on each other than on presenting the American people with an accurate understanding of what happened. … Continue Reading

What If We Get Tuition Vouchers, And No One Cares?

By JAMES K. FITZPATRICK

I hesitate to write what I am about to write. There are many well-run Catholic elementary and high schools, with dedicated and skilled administrators and teachers. Yet facts are facts. I bet many of you have heard Catholic parents with children in public schools say the same thing that I have heard: “Why would I send my kids to a Catholic school? The teachers are liberals and feminists who couldn’t get a job in the local public schools.”
The people who say this tend to live in stable suburban communities, where the local public schools are a source of community pride because of the academic success their graduates enjoy, along with the athletic teams, debate teams, theater groups, and science clubs that they offer to their students.
I did not hear much of this public school boosterism back when I lived in the New York City area, but it is commonplace in the diners and among the crowds at community events in the section of Connecticut where I live now. I routinely see adults wearing the polo shirts and baseball caps of the local high school athletic teams.
Consider the implications: It means that even if our legislators were to pass laws giving us tuition vouchers and tax credits, it might not mean that people will be lining up to get their children into Catholic schools. If we want to change that state of affairs, we must do something to enhance the current image of a Catholic education.
It is difficult to predict when critical mass will be reached in the push for tax credits and vouchers being made available for most American parents. But there is reason to think that the pressure is building. Just a few weeks ago on National Review’s online edition, former Florida governor and presidential candidate Jeb Bush added his voice to the chorus in an article entitled, “Saving America’s Education System.” … Continue Reading

Unlike Democrats . . . Republican Party Platform Includes Strong Moral Affirmations

By DEXTER DUGGAN

Political-party platforms, issued for their national conventions every four years, are both a wish list and an affirmation of what’s important to them.
Not everything they stand for will be achieved, but they want voters to know how a party sees itself and its commitments.
Sometimes the platforms have unintentionally comical aspects, like the Democrats in 2016 pledging to fight for affordable health-care premiums. However, they claimed to have done that six years ago, ramming through unyielding Obamacare in 2010 without a single Republican vote.
That was supposed to have made premiums way lower, but Barack Obama’s lies only resulted in costs rocketing higher. Having learned nothing — or at least admitting nothing about their failure — the Democrats pledge to continue that fight now.
This week The Wanderer looks at the Republican platform. Next week, the Democrats’.
Of most interest to many readers are protection of, or restoration of, the core moral values supported by the Republican platform, but forcefully rejected by the Democrats.
Each party wants to prove itself to groups that stand behind it. For Republicans, that’s people who want a healthy, inspiring, and united States of America; for Democrats, that’s bickering, contentious groups that yearn to weaken, befuddle, or even tear apart the nation.
Famous liberal Democrats of the 20th century like U.S. Senators Daniel Patrick Moynihan of New York and Henry M. Jackson of Washington would be driven out of that party today as hopeless reactionaries. … Continue Reading

The Wanderer Interviews Cardinal Arinze . . . The State Of The Church In Africa

By DON FIER

Part 1

(Editor’s Note: His Eminence Francis Cardinal Arinze, Prefect Emeritus of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, recently traveled to the United States to speak at The Church Teaches forum in Louisville, Ky.
(At the forum, he delivered an outstanding presentation on the role of the Sacred Liturgy in developing a Catholic conscience. His Eminence graciously agreed to grant an interview to The Wanderer in which he shared his insights on reasons for the remarkable growth of the Church in his native continent of Africa [which includes 54 independent countries], the historical background of Catholic Christianity in Africa, the challenges and future hopes for Catholicism in Africa, and the continent’s expanding role in missionary activity throughout the world.
(Because of the length of the interview, we are presenting it in two parts.
(The second part will appear in next week’s issue. In part two, His Eminence talks about African clergy serving as missionaries in other parts of the world and about African Traditional Religion.)

+ + +

Q. The Catholic population of the Church in Africa has grown from two million to approximately 200 million during the last century. Please reflect on the reasons for such exponential growth.
A. Growth in faith falls under the umbrella of Divine Providence — in the final analysis only God can give us an adequate answer. Nevertheless, we human beings, with our little brains, can reflect a bit.
First of all, we must pay tribute to the missionaries that have come to parts of Africa (generally south of the Sahara Desert) over the past 500 years, primarily during the last 200 years. They have done outstanding work. Many congregations contributed — in my own country of Nigeria the Irish missionaries have been particularly instrumental. Divine Providence prepared the people of Africa for the reception of Christianity through their prior religious background. The missionaries promoted school education, including religious instruction, which became a key to the all-around development of the people. … Continue Reading

Despite Obama Storming . . . Pence Seeks To Explain Trump’s Attraction For Locked-Out Americans

By DEXTER DUGGAN

PHOENIX — Was that Barack Obama trying to rain on Donald Trump’s parade?
As Republican Trump’s vice-presidential running mate, Mike Pence, came to Arizona’s capital city for an evening campaign rally, a drenching summer rain soaked this desert metropolis that often goes for months without a drop of Heaven-sent moisture.
Rush-hour traffic crept along as the downpour left some streets sloshing from curb to curb on August 2.
Earlier that same day, haughty Democratic renegade Obama at the White House presumed to tell Republicans to drop Trump as their presidential candidate because the successful Manhattan billionaire is so unfit and unprepared.
Obama’s unconscious irony probably elicited more snickers across the nation than there were raindrops drowning Phoenix. Talk about being trapped inside a D.C. bubble, if not a raindrop.
The bumbling, lying former community organizer who makes a mess of whatever he tries is telling Republicans who deserves to be in the White House?
Trump might want to make a campaign commercial from callow Obama giving this characteristically grating lecture, impatiently instructing voters on who’s no good. Boomerang City on Obama and his Democrats.
And the growing daily fury of the dominant media against Trump reveals a corrupt establishment that will resort to anything to maintain its power and control.
Think back to Todd Akin running for a U.S. Senate seat for Missouri in 2012, or George Allen running for re-election to a Virginia U.S. Senate seat in 2006. Both Republicans sank after a hurricane of slanted, unrelenting coverage against them by dominant liberal media that would love to drown Trump, too. … Continue Reading

Catholics Gone Wild

By REY FLORES

As if Pope Francis didn’t already have most of us nervous, here comes another curveball from Rome.
The Pope just announced a 13-member commission (good thing we Catholics don’t believe in bad luck omens like the number 13), who will discuss and study the possibility of having female deacons in the Church.
This must be great news to all of the busybody pantsuit types who like to push priests aside and try to run parishes.
Altar girls across liberal Catholic American parishes (like Tim Kaine’s) can now also aspire to become deacons when they grow up.
What this latest from the Pontiff mainly does is encourage the misguided women who truly want to become priests. It simply stokes their desire to pressure the Church to allow for the ordination of women.
But the Pope shouldn’t raise false hopes in these women. This only brings more conflict and division to an already fractured Church which is in need of much healing and unity. We have enough adversaries outside the Church. The last thing we need is to create even more maelstroms within our own Church.
Speaking of “misguided,” the latest “Catholic” politician to go off the rails is none other than Vice President Joseph R. Biden.
Just this past week, Biden officiated his very first wedding. “Married” were two White House staffers named Brian and Joe. How lovely for Joe and the newlyweds.
The slimy New York Magazine website even gushed: “Joe Biden Officiates Wedding of World’s Luckiest Couple.”
Catholics are not allowed to attend a same-sex wedding — let alone officiating one. … Continue Reading