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Showing posts from 2015

Catholic Stuff You Should Know

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http://catholicstuffpodcast.com/ So, the other day my work decided to replace my Blackberry work phone, which I am amazed they still make such ancient devices, with an iPhone. Don't get all excited, it is an iPhone 5, which to Apple lovers must be ancient. I was never a fan of Apple, but whatever, I'm less a fan of Blackberry. One cool thing about the phone is the "Podcast" app. I'm sure this will make me sound so old school since I'm certain this is not a new thing. I typed in "Catholic" in the search because I'm not so sure what other topics I could possibly devote 0-60 minutes listening to. I found the Catholic Stuff You Should Know (CSYSK) podcast. I was at first skeptical. I owe it to years of being in trad, and at times, rad traddy circles. Whatever, I listened to an entire program which was less than 30 mins. The topic was Distributism , which I have only heard discussed among traddy Catholic circles and so I was surprised this group...

Review: Exodus Gods and Kings

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This is another one of those films where the trailer was much better than the film itself. Even if I had no religious biases or preferences for older cinematic versions of the Exodus story, I would have to say that this film falls flat even as movies go in general. It was quite lengthy at 2 hours and 40 minutes. What bothered me most about this film was that it seemed to be confused in its perspective on how it interprets the Exodus narrative. The first half of the film has rather strong skeptical undertones, naturalistic explanations to the plagues of Egypt, but then all of a sudden the rationally or scientifically inexplicable deaths of Egyptian first born and the parting of the Red Sea takes place. Is Moses schizophrenic or not? Did he hit his head a little too hard or not. Is the might of his side the might of military expertise or is the God of Abraham really with Moses, or rather Moses with God? Hard to say. In summary, this film did very little to inspire me, neither on a pu...

Hand of God

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Just finished watching this documentary. Yet another account of the systemic problems inherent to the hierarchical structure and culture of the Catholic Church. Not quite sure what to make of all of it yet. I'm beginning to get the impression that the abusers in the clergy of the Church are not limited to the direct abusers themselves, but also the enablers most especially those that had overseeing power over these perverts who turned the other way as these crimes took place through the decades. Knowing the cycle of child sexual abuse, that these priests were also likely abused themselves. you have to wonder how far back this cycle goes. I have concluded that this is not a fault of the liberalizing theology and praxis that came during and after the Second Vatican Council, but is a systemic flaw in the power structures of Holy Mother Church.

FRONTLINE: Secrets of the Vatican

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Watch the full Documentary Here This documentary was suggested to me yesterday on Netflix. I was not anticipating the nature of it would be on the scandals that impacted the Benedict XVI pontificate. I wanted to recommend it so that you can hear the case from the "other side" whatever sides those may be. There are real issues facing the Church and it hits more to the core of the religious Catholic experience than liturgical abuse and heresy. This documentary covers the huge scandals of the Church including the Legionnaires of Christ founder and sexual pervert Marcial Maciel . If there were a worse place to go for the worst of the souls in hell, I would imagine it would be for the crimes committed by men such as this man. It also covers the scandal of the Vatican Bank as well as the homosexual double lives of Vatican and Roman clergy.