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Our Lady Of Fatima… The Close Of The Fatima Centenary

January 13, 2018 Featured Today Comments Off on Our Lady Of Fatima… The Close Of The Fatima Centenary

By FR. SEAN CONNOLLY (Editor’s Note: This is the twelfth and final article in a series on the one hundredth anniversary of our Lady’s apparitions at Fatima. Fr. Connolly is a priest of the Archdiocese of New York. The staff and readers of The Wanderer wish to thank Fr. Connolly for his scholarly and inspiring series on this most important centenary.) + + + With the close of the year of our salvation 2017 also comes the close of the commemoration of the centenary of the Blessed Virgin Mary’s apparitions at Fatima. In 1917 God took pity upon our fallen world, which has so self-confidently spurned His presence, by sending His own Mother to call us back to Him by…Continue Reading

Court Strikes Baltimore Forced Abortion Speech Law

January 12, 2018 Featured Today Comments Off on Court Strikes Baltimore Forced Abortion Speech Law

BALTIMORE — The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals on January 5 struck down a Baltimore City Ordinance seeking to impose notification requirements on unlicensed pregnancy centers. The ordinance compelled these pregnancy resource centers to post notices that conspicuously state in English and Spanish that they do not provide nor refer women for abortions or birth control services. The Fourth Circuit found that the ordinance violates the free speech clause of the First Amendment. In contrast to decisions by the Ninth Circuit which validated a similar law in California, the Fourth Circuit found that the Baltimore ordinance was not commercial or professional speech. The court said, “The compelled speech at issue here raises particularly troubling First Amendment concerns. At bottom, the…Continue Reading

Neither Left Nor Right, But Catholic… The Sexual Harassment “Crisis” — Time For Some Clear Thinking

January 11, 2018 Featured Today Comments Off on Neither Left Nor Right, But Catholic… The Sexual Harassment “Crisis” — Time For Some Clear Thinking

By STEPHEN M. KRASON (Editor’s Note: Stephen M. Krason’s Neither Left nor Right, but Catholic column appears monthly [sometimes bimonthly]. He is professor of political science and legal studies and associate director of the Veritas Center for Ethics in Public Life at Franciscan University of Steubenville. He is also co-founder and president of the Society of Catholic Social Scientists. Among his books are: Abortion: Politics, Morality, and the Constitution; The Transformation of the American Democratic Republic, and most recently Catholicism and American Political Ideologies. This column originally appeared in Crisismagazine.com.) + + + The sexual harassment frenzy of the last few months — and it can only be called a frenzy — is disturbing in many ways, and decent and…Continue Reading

Mass Participation In Poland Shows Slight Decline

January 11, 2018 Featured Today Comments Off on Mass Participation In Poland Shows Slight Decline

WARSAW (ZENIT) — According to the report provided by the Institute for Catholic Church Statistics in Poland for 2016, 36.7 percent of all Catholics participated in the Sunday Eucharist, while 16 percent received Holy Communion. This means that compared to 2015, the rate of dominicantes — that is Catholics participating in the Sunday Masses — fell by 3.1 percent, and the rate of communicantes — that is people receiving Holy Communion — by 1 percent. The highest rate of dominicantes (66.9 percent) and communicantes (25.3 percent) was in the Diocese of Tarnow. At the same time, almost 48,000 Masses were celebrated on every Sunday of 2016. Catholics chose most frequently Masses in the morning between 8 and 11. The report…Continue Reading

A Movie Review… A Romantic Movie With A Christian Message

January 10, 2018 Featured Today Comments Off on A Movie Review… A Romantic Movie With A Christian Message

By REY FLORES As a musician, and as a father and husband, I am always open to watching movies involving music, romance, and trying to make wrong things right. Once again Roadside Attractions brings an enjoyable and entertaining story based on a novel by author Heidi McLaughlin. Forever My Girl is a story about a young man from a small town who becomes a famous country music star. Through time, he pretty much has forgotten his roots and is caught up in the typical excesses of musicians who choose a life of fame, fortune, and one-night stands over settling down with a high school sweetheart — for a life of holiness, or at least of peace and tranquility. After having…Continue Reading

Critics Say… Facebook Bias Crippling Catholic Ads

January 9, 2018 Featured Today Comments Off on Critics Say… Facebook Bias Crippling Catholic Ads

By KEVIN JONES DENVER (CNA) — A Facebook-based Catholic fundraising campaign suffered “critical” delays in the key donation period between Thanksgiving and Christmas, and Facebook’s new scrutiny of ads aimed at religious audiences is to blame, one social media expert has charged. Matthew Meeks served as an adviser to a fundraising initiative of the Virginia-based Mater Ecclesiae Fund for Vocations. The fund, founded in 2004, aims to help aspiring Catholic priests, nuns, and monks who face heavy student loan burdens. Meeks told Catholic News Agency that new Facebook policies for ad approval created delays that “caused us to miss the bulk of Giving Tuesday, a day where the Fund for Vocations had planned to kick off a campaign through the…Continue Reading

The Times Rides To Mueller’s Rescue

January 8, 2018 Featured Today Comments Off on The Times Rides To Mueller’s Rescue

By PATRICK J. BUCHANAN What caused the FBI to open a counterintelligence investigation into the Trump campaign in July 2016, which evolved into the criminal investigation that is said today to imperil the Trump presidency? As James Comey’s FBI and Special Counsel Robert Mueller have, for 18 months, failed to prove Donald Trump’s “collusion” with the Kremlin, what was it, in mid-2016, that justified starting this investigation? What was the basis for the belief Trump was colluding, that he was the Manchurian candidate of Vladimir Putin? What evidence did the FBI cite to get FISA court warrants to surveil and wiretap Trump’s team? Republican congressmen have for months been demanding answers to these questions. And, as Mueller’s men have stonewalled,…Continue Reading

Play It Again, Sam

January 7, 2018 Featured Today Comments Off on Play It Again, Sam

By DONALD DeMARCO Movie buffs know all too well that the words “Play it again, Sam” were never uttered in the film Casablanca. Ilsa, played by Ingrid Bergman, did say to the piano player (Dooley Wilson) “Play it,” but did not articulate the word “again.” Sam, however, did play the haunting song, As Time Goes By, again and again. Posterity has more than made up for that missing word. Woody Allen’s 1972 movie, Play It Again, Sam was based on his 1969 Broadway play by the same title. There is an international record label known as “Play It Again, Sam Records.” That persistent phrase also titles a 1989 work for solo viola by Milton Babbitt. It is a song and…Continue Reading

A Book Review… A Story Of Universal Truths For All Times

January 6, 2018 Featured Today Comments Off on A Book Review… A Story Of Universal Truths For All Times

By MITCHELL KALPAKGIAN The Time Before You Die: A Novel of the Reformation, by Lucy Beckett (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2016), 355 pp.; $16.95. Available from www.ignatius.com or call 1-800-651-1531. This moving historical novel with intense drama and great moral depth is based on the story of a Carthusian monk in Mount Grace Priory in York. He witnesses the turbulent, revolutionary changes of King Henry VIII’s dissolution of the monasteries, the schism of the Anglican Church’s separation from Rome, the terror of Queen Mary’s reign, and the birth of Lutheranism that divided England into Catholic and Protestant enemies. This riveting book views these cataclysmic events through the span of Robert Fletcher’s life from his entrance into the monastery to his…Continue Reading

Louisiana Issues Guidelines For Free Speech In Schools

January 5, 2018 Featured Today Comments Off on Louisiana Issues Guidelines For Free Speech In Schools

NEW ORLEANS — Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry and U.S. Cong. Mike Johnson released a 15-page document as a valuable resource regarding the religious and free speech rights of students in public schools, according to Liberty Counsel. The Louisiana Student Rights Review: Answers to Common Questions About Religious Freedom in Schools provides answers to 26 “frequently asked questions” regarding issues such as student-led prayer and when students can pray. The document also references cited court cases and Child Evangelism Fellowship’s Good News Clubs. Liberty Counsel represents Child Evangelism Fellowship nationally and has never lost a case at any court of final resort regarding the Good News Clubs. The released guidelines, which Cong. Johnson and Attorney General Landry plan on mailing…Continue Reading