New Fundamental Law for Hungary: pro-life, pro-family

Hungary has passed a new fundamental law which, among other things, protects the rights of the family and of the unborn child. The new law replaces the communist era constitution. I am grateful to C-Fam for their report on this:  Hungary Defies Critics With New Family Law. They give a link to the draft of 25 April 2011 which was passed, though I don't know whether amendments were made to it (some of the points in the C-Fam report can't be found in the draft.) In any case, there are some elements that look very good.

The Fundamental Law establishes a national holiday on 20 August to commemorate the founding of the state and its founder, St Stephen, as well as 23 of October, to commemorate the 1956 uprising.

Under the Basic Stipulations, Article M (1) states:

(1) Hungary protects the institution of marriage between man and woman, a matrimonial relationship voluntarily established, as well as the family as the basis for the survival of the nation.
(2) Hungary supports child-bearing.
(3) The protection of families is regulated by a super majority law.

Under Freedom and Responsibility, Article II. states:

Human dignity is inviolable. Everyone has the right to life and human dignity; the life of a foetus will be protected from conception.

and how about article XV (2-4). for some common sense:

(2) Parents have the right select the upbringing for their children.
(3) Parents are obliged to care for their minor children. This obligation encompasses the need to ensure the education of their children.
(4) Adult children will be obliged to care for their parents in need.

Predictably, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have complained because of the clause protecting the rights of the unborn child.

SPUC Conference on Maternal Health

SPUC are holding a conference on abortion and maternal health. This is a question that is often used by the culture of death to promote abortion, so it is an important issue to address. You can find all the details at the SPUC website: Abortion or maternal health. there are materials linked there to help prepare for the conference, and you can book for it online.

The main speaker is Professor Robert Walley and he will be joined by legal expert Dr Roger Kiska of Alliance Defence Fund, consultant obstetrician gynaecologist Dr Obi Ideh from Nigeria, and maternal health campaigner Mrs Fiorella Nash.

Fiorella has also written an article for the SPUC blog: Pro-abortion ideology is costing lives of women in developing countries. If there are any complications, childbirth can be risky both for mothers and for their babies. It is right that we should do all that we can to help mothers in developing countries. The pro-abortion lobby has muscled in on this issue with their false assertion that legal abortion equals safe abortion, and their promotion of abortion as an answer to maternal mortality. It is good to see SPUC tackling this question.

Petition against communion in the hand

My good friend, Fr Andrew Wise, of the diocese of Sale in Victoria (Australia), together with Fr John Speekman, has drawn up a petition to the Holy Father which reads as follows:

Your Holiness,

We are convinced of the great spiritual harm inflicted on the Catholic faithful, and the profanation of the Blessed Sacrament that often occurs by the practice of Communion received on the hand.

We implore Your Holiness to personally intervene to restore once again the normative practice of reception of Holy Communion on the tongue alone.

There is also a blog in support of the petition. Andrew Rabel wrote a piece to give a little background to the petition, and Cardinal Arinze has written in support of the piece. Bishop Schneider has also written in support, and has signed the petition. I have also signed the petition. Many ordinary laity receive Holy Communion in the hand because that is what they were taught to do; in some cases they were told that it was the more proper, reverent, ancient, grown-up, or modern way to receive Holy Communion. Bishop Schneider's book "It is the Lord" (sold in England by Gracewing) answers all of the usual justifications for the practice and urgently recommends a return to the practice of receiving Holy Communion on the tongue.

Apart from the major concern over the danger of profanation with Communion in the hand, the "sign value" of receiving Holy Communion on the tongue distinguishes the act of receiving Holy Communion from an ordinary act of taking an ordinary snack to eat. Little toddlers recognise this if they accompany their mother to the altar rail: when Mum receives Holy Communion in the hand, they will often ask "Can I have one?"; this is much less common if Mum receives Holy Communion on the tongue. They are given an early lesson in the difference between the Eucharist and ordinary bread.

Sign the petition here.

Our Lady of the Rosary from the Galera Real

The carving of Our Lady of the Rosary which adorned the Christian flagship, the Galera Real at the battle of Lepanto has been recovered and is being restored. Fr Z advised me of this news earlier today as it is of particular interest for a parish dedicated to Our Lady of the Rosary. Father has himself posted about it: Statue of Our Lady at 1571 Battle of Lepanto comes to light! ABC Salud has an article in Spanish which highlights the importance of the find.

For a brief account of the battle of Lepanto, there was a good post on the feast day last year at Roman Christendom. (An additional point that I like to emphasise is that 12,000 Christian galley slaves were freed as a result of the victory.)

This evening, after speaking to the candidates for Confirmation, I was struck by the position of the crescent moon over our statue of Our Lady. An antiphon used in the Office, and for the Catena of the Legion of Mary is:

Who is she that comes forth as the morning rising, fair as the moon, bright as the sun, terrible as an army set in battle array?

It is good to know that as well as protecting Europe from invasion and slavery, Our Blessed Mother is looking after the suburb of Blackfen. This photo was taken from just outside my front door.

CD 248 - arguments on Twitter

I enjoy interacting with other people on Twitter but find that sometimes I get into rather uncharitable arguments with atheists and even with fellow Catholics. I wonder if it is too much of a temptation.

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As with all social media, Twitter can be used for good or evil. It is an effective way for people to share information, views and arguments. At its best, it can be a part of Pope Benedict’s vision of co-workers for the truth engaging in evangelisation. At its worst, it can be used as a form of cyber-bullying. People can also bully others by writing nasty letters on paper, so there is nothing new under the sun. It is not the means of communication that is the problem but our use of it.

The immediacy of exchanges on Twitter does mean that it can be tempting to try to be sharp or witty, and sometimes to be unkind to others. On the other hand, people who engage in exchanges such as these generally know the territory and, within reasonable limits, can take the rough with the smooth. We need not be over scrupulous about using a means of communication which offers the opportunity for robust debate, but we should be aware of the temptation to anger, jealousy, and pride, as well as looking out for those who may have got out of their depth and need our support and advice.

In our own examination of conscience on this matter, we simply look, as we always do, at the commandments and the virtues and corresponding vices. The virtue of charity is naturally our primary consideration when communicating with others; and charity includes the love of the truth and its eloquent expression. Although we use them in a different way from Cicero and Demosthenes, we are essentially still trying to use the skills of rhetoric to inform, persuade and motivate. Unlike the ancients, we have a gospel to preach from the Word made flesh. If we can use modern tools of communication to do so, that is a genuine apostolate, and one that has been encouraged several times by Pope Benedict.

Catholic Dilemma 248 published in the Catholic Herald

Catholic Dilemmas

Each week I write an article of roughly 350 words for the Catholic Herald which has the title Catholic Dilemmas. This is a good writing discipline since at that length you can't afford to waste words, and it is a challenge to answer some of the questions in the limit. I don't have the option to waffle on longer.

In correspondence with the Editor, Luke Coppen, I discovered that I had been too coy about posting the articles here. Since I am paid a fee for them, I felt that it was not my business just to publish them at will. However publishing is changing fast and the editor is happy for me to post my articles - and indeed to have a link to the Herald to boot. So you'll be getting my CDs, as we call them, regularly from now on - after the print edition of the paper is out.

You might also be able to help by submitting dilemmas. Remember that I have to answer them in 350 words. I do make a point of limiting liturgical articles - I do some, but want to keep a balance between those questions, moral, spiritual, and doctrinal questions and occasional light-hearted and off-the-wall items. Feel free to pose dilemmas in the combox but please don't expect me to reply there. You may help me to get the article written a little earlier than just before the deadline but I can't operate a general internet agony uncle service. (Funerals, Baptisms, visiting to do, Masses to say, you know the sort of thing.)

I just filed CD number 249 today so I'll post up some of the back catalogue in due course. In another post, I'll ask about how to get the whole lot online in the most efficient way possible. (They are all in Word files.)

Guild of Blessed Titus Brandsma meeting at Blackfen

The Guild of Blessed Titus Brandsma will be holding its next meeting at Blackfen on Saturday 18 February 2012. Here are the details:

10:30am Low Mass (Our Lady’s Saturday)
11:00am Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament with Confession, followed by Benediction
12:00pm Talk by Fr Sam Medley SOLT: “Blogging as an instrument of ecclesial communion”
1:00pm Lunch (donations welcome)
2:30pm Informal meeting of the Guild
3.30pm Final prayers and departure

All Catholics who use the new media, either as bloggers or users of social networking sites, are welcome to attend the Guild meeting and/or join the Guild of Blessed Titus Brandsma.

Address: 330a Burnt Oak Lane, Sidcup, Kent DA15 8LW
Directions are here

We had a bit of a discussion about whether to have the meeting at Blackfen again. Some were worried that it might be imposing on our hospitality. That is certainly not a problem: I am more than happy to host such a group and there are plenty of people here who are willing to help out. From my side, I was worried that Blackfen is a little out of the way, and I didn't want to hog the show, but others said that they liked coming here last time and wanted to come again. The next meeting will probably be elsewhere so that it is fairer to people who don't live in London and the South East.

If anyone would like to come but has problems over expenses for train fares etc. just let me know (in the strictest confidence - email info@blackfencatholic.org.) The lunch is provided on a donations basis so if you have already had to shell out to get here, you don't need to give anything, and those who have a bit of spare cash can cover the cost: given the normal generosity of people the parish isn't going to lose out.

From one mother to another

Simcha Fisher who writes for the National Catholic Register is always worth reading. Today she speaks To the mother with only one child. Her advice is drawn from her own experience of being a mother of one child - but also from her present experience of being a mother of nine. (Mothers of nine were all at one time mothers of one.)

Her article is a master-class of what the Fathers of Vatican II referred to as the lay apostolate. This was not invented in the 1960s; before then there was a thriving lay apostolate in the Church. Unfortunately, for various reasons, it was, to a large degree, emasculated after the council, in favour of lay ministry.

The difference is this: as a priest, I can distribute Holy Communion, I can read out the scriptures, I can celebrate the Liturgy. If lay people do these things, they are essentially helping the priest.

As a priest, I cannot campaign in a trade union for the social teaching of the Church, I cannot gather employees of a bank to say the Rosary during the coffee break, I cannot run a business that gives its employees decent conditions of work. Only lay people can do those things - and there would be many more (and probably better) examples to lengthen the list.

And I cannot tell a mother from experience, about the joys and trials of bringing up children - only a lay woman can do that. As Pope Benedict said (to the Scottish Bishops on their 2010 ad limina visit):

Hand in hand with a proper appreciation of the priest's role is a correct understanding of the specific vocation of the laity. Sometimes a tendency to confuse lay apostolate with lay ministry has led to an inward-looking concept of their ecclesial role. Yet the Second Vatican Council's vision is that wherever the lay faithful live out their baptismal vocation – in the family, at home, at work – they are actively participating in the Church's mission to sanctify the world. A renewed focus on lay apostolate will help to clarify the roles of clergy and laity and so give a strong impetus to the task of evangelizing society.

Simcha Fisher has given a fine example of the lay apostolate that Pope Benedict was encouraging.

Please stop saying "vibrant"

Can we all stop using the word "vibrant", please.

I have mixed feelings about the film Braveheart but one line that I do like is when Mel Gibson as William Wallace rides out to the parley on the battlefield at Stirling and says "Ah'm goin tae pick a fight". I have waited for a propitious moment to pick this one, fearful of being seen as attacking any particular person who has recently used the word "vibrant" in print (in fact, only today I saw two examples) but I dive in because scarcely a day goes by without seeing something described as vibrant.

Politicians, Bishops, schools, supermarkets, councils, advertising agencies, the local environmental and climate change awareness group, the police, social services, and Uncle Tom Cobley and all, nowadays describe themselves, their activities or their "communities" as vibrant.

Are the communities vibrating or quivering in some way?

Faith Magazine latest issue online

I haven't read it yet, but this is just a heads-up that the January edition of Faith Magazine is now online. Sir Dan of the blogosphere tells me that William Oddie is especially worth looking at. I'll be attending to it over my cocoa later.