2007 December archive at Being Frank

Archive for December, 2007

Dec

An early present for Cherie!

By James the Least 7 Comments

Categories: Being Frank...

For those who missed it in all their running around on Christmas Eve-eve, Tony Blair (as in former Prime Minister of England Tony Blair) has converted to Catholicism. It was, perhaps, one of the worst kept secrets in Christendom that Tony regularly attended Catholic Mass with his wife, Cherie, and their children for the last 20 years, and that he was likely to convert once out of office. Indeed, this journey has been going on a while now.

So on Friday, barely six months out of No.10, Tony Blair stood beside his wife in the private chapel of Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor and stated to His Eminence “I believe and profess all that the holy Catholic church believes, teaches and proclaims to be revealed by God.”

Not all Catholics are happy, however, with a number raising his questionable voting record on same-sex marriage, stem-cell research and abortion and pointing out that it doesn’t read like that of someone in line with Catholic teaching.

Personally, I’m a bit miffed that he waited until he was out of office to make the jump, and more than a bit miffed at his voting record and actions in Iraq. That being said, I’m very aware that political machines such as Great Britain are definitely more than just one man, and that Monsignor Andrew Faley, assistant general secretary to the Catholic Bishops Conference of England and Wales, is right when he says we do not need to “go over his past actions and ask him to explain them all again. The future starts here”. There’s also something in the Bible about how happy the shepherd is when he finds that one lost sheep, and also something about a prodigal son…don’t know why those stories popped back into my head. ;)

So, welcome in Tony. Now get ye to Reconciliation buddy!

As a final thought, with today being Christmas Eve, everyone will focusing on the big day tomorrow – and so we should. But I’d just like to throw a quick shout out to all those with birthdays today – especially my sister and my sister-in-law. Sometimes you guys risk getting swept away by the preparation for His birthday, and I just wanted to say happy birthday to you all, and to my sisters especially.

That said, my post does extend over to Christmas Day as well, so if you’re reading this on Christmas Day…switch the computer off and go and enjoy the day!!! ;) Happy Christmas everyone!

Dec

My Crazy Family

By eyeWitness 2 Comments

Categories: Being Frank...

My friends and I were sitting round with a glass of champagne last night (because EVERYONE seems to want to catch up for a drink before Christmas, which is lovely but there aren’t enough hours in the day!) and so many people seemed to be talking to me about their dis-functional families. Everyone seems to think their family is the most dysfunctional of all, and no-one else’s could possibly be worse. I have to admit some of their stories made me laugh! There were dads who have to grudgingly sleep in tents outside over the holiday season because so much of mum’s family is coming to stay, there were the annual “all trying to carry in the huge Christmas pine tree and put it up” fights, along with the “Christmas cake and Christmas pudding are so gross why can’t we have another dessert this year” arguments. It seems for many people I know time spent with family is a time to be endured rather than enjoyed! Or others feel they have no family to go to because they genuinely come from an abusive family, and Christmas is a time of year where their lack of a functional family is emphasized for them.

Looking behind the Christmas cheer and goodwill, or perhaps rather because that is exactly what everyone is trying to focus on and create, this time of year seems to highlight to people the imperfection in their families. The reality is no-one has a perfect family. I honestly don’t think anyone does. We all have our odd quirks, crazy Aunties, and skeletons in the closet. There are an array of different opinions on who should be in government, the state of youth today, and whether turkey or ham is best this year. So why not just be honest and laugh at ourselves rather than trying to create perfection among imperfect human beings? If you try for too much perfection Christmas can just end up being a really stressful time that never meets expectation.

You don’t have to compromise your values or concede your opinion by not arguing everything. If you focus on Jesus and God being at the centre of the Christmas season, perhaps that can bring some peace and help you to act towards others with tact, grace and patience, allowing you also to grow. Celebrating that simple fact should be all you need for your Christmas to meet expectation right?ïŠ

Let your conversation be gracious. – Colossians 4:6 NLT

Dec

Somewhere in a galaxy far far awayâ€¦

By Filia Day 4 Comments

Categories: Being Frank...

I was routinely looking through the NZHerald last week and I cam across an article talking about how astronomers viewed the “death star” galaxy (sounds like something out of Star Wars if you ask me) wreaking havoc on other galaxies. To tell you the truth, I’m not much of a scientist (accept maybe a social scientist) but from what I understand, it seems to be merging with another galaxy and somehow this is creating some sort of supermassive black hole. One astronomer commented “It’s … like a bully, a black hole bully, punching the nose of any passing galaxy.” Apparently, the merger is destroying solar systems in the galaxy through the emission of high amounts of radiations. According to the author, this means that if any life exists on the planets, then it wouldn’t survive.
As we approach the end of advent and I have been pondering the incarnation and the birth of Our saviour, I began to think a little about the implications of extra terrestrial life. (Weird, I know…not really the most obvious correlation). I mean, if there was other life (with spiritual souls) on other planets somewhere in another galaxy – what does this mean for us as Christians? Did they fall as well? If they did fall, would Christ have had to die again for their sins? Is this even logically possible from what we know of the nature of God? Is their another Catholic Church out there on another planet? It’s all quite hypothetical, but I think it could be a useful exercise discussing it!
I have to admit though, I’m a bit human-centric. I tend to like the idea the Blessed Trinity created such an expansive and beautiful universe just to make us happy.

Dec

It Was A Very Good Year

By Methuselah's Beard 11 Comments

Categories: Being Frank...

“This blog was conceived to be about more than furthering agendas of frustrated Catholics who have exhausted other avenues – but I suppose thems the breaks when it comes to free speech…”

“Captain, am a bit over your frustrations and agendas being aired on this site. “

Well, it’s obvious that another year is about to draw to a close and people on the blog have just about had enough of each other.

Fortunately, I don’t have any frustrations and agendas to air on the site. Some might say I don’t have anything useful to air at all. Very funny. This is probably my last actual post for the year. Due to the low readership on Friday’s, I think I should be able to recycle posts from throughout the year. Or even better, recycle some of the more popular posts from the history of Being Frank. Do you think anyone will notice?

It’s the time of year when newspapers, magazines, sports channels, run their best of programmes or give out some form of annual awards. So taking a leaf out of the mainstream media, here are MB’s 1st annual Christmas awards.

The PBXVI Man of the Year award – Seeing it’s the inaugural awards and it’s named after him, the award has to go to Benedict XVI who’s doing an admirable job leading the Church and who also recently released his second encyclical. Although someone has recently suggested his wardrobe needs an upgrade (Franco Zaffarelli I think), PBXVI looks pretty styley to me (please don’t ask why there’s no woman of the year award, although I’m sure there have been many, many worthy winners of this award).

The ‘Can you feel the love tonight’ award – I think this has to go to any combination of JPIII, Chris Sullivan, The Captain, and The Dumb Ox. There have been other worthy contributors, but really can anyone argue with the selections?

The ‘Flogging a dead horse’ award for those recurring topics… Well quite a few to choose from here. Just war, death penalty, women priests, does Trinity mean more than 3 etc etc. Will these keep making annual comebacks like Mike Tyson, or finally fall away never to be resurrected again like Mike Tyson’s career? Watch this space.

‘The wind up toy that I can’t think of as I don’t know any’ award for most contentious poster goes to none other than Chris Sullivan. Chris, I admire the way you stick to your guns and put forward your points with conviction. And although I’ve never met you, I’m sure you’re a nice guy too.

The ‘Franco Zaffarelli best user name’ award – Well there are quite a few good ones floating around. I think I’ll have to go for Three Veg. Simple, effective, and also health conscious.

The ”Heaven’s Gate’ best movie of the year’ award must surely go to The Golden Compass. Discuss.

The ‘Dan Brown best book of the year award – I haven’t really read too much this year, so the award must go to Youtube which is almost as informative as a book….

The ‘Most Blatant Plug’ award goes to James the Least. See Monday’s effort.

I guess this could go on all day but I’m really only amusing myself… so to all of you out there, have a happy and holy Christmas and a great New Year’s! And for everyone going to Hearts Aflame, you’re in for a great time! (HA organisers – you know my bank account details).

Dec

Who/what do we care about?

By The Captain 20 Comments

Categories: Being Frank...

Hmmm, am a little bit over the whole “let’s bring down CIT” rampage that’s taken over the blog over the past few days.

This blog was conceived to be about more than furthering agendas of frustrated Catholics who have exhausted other avenues – but I suppose thems the breaks when it comes to free speech…

I was having a “discussion” with friends the other day about animal rights versus human rights and how I obviously thought the abuse of humans was worse than the abuse of animals. I thought my friends were disagreeing with that, but as we continued to “discuss”, I came to understand they were actually pointing out that one is simply an extension of the other.

It’s about looking after those weaker than ourselves, they said. I have to say I found that argument quite compelling, and fairly logical. Until I mentioned abortion.

WELL! Of course, that’s completely different! And not only is it completely different, I was pretty much abused for bringing it up. How could I be so insensitive?!?

Don’t think I’ll be venturing down that line again any time soon… Plenty of food for thought though, I can tell you.

Dec

Watching the arguments from my mind…

By Tuppence 23 Comments

Categories: Being Frank...

It is fascinating to watch the Bev McDonald/CIT/Sr Elaine Wainwright debate going on – not to try to step outside it in any way, but just to breathe a sigh of relief.

I can see your face scrunching up in confusion – sigh of relief? Nothing has really been resolved… Everyone is still furiously writing to NZ Catholic… The ‘conservatives’/'liberals’ have still not ‘given in’ to the other…as if it’s a simple matter of winning the argument.

I am sighing in relief because I am watching played out in our conversations and our newspaper something which has caused me great personal anxiety for a number of years. I have struggled as young person to reconcile having those nearest and dearest, those I most highly respect, sitting on vastly different, often entirely contradictory opinions about the state of our Church/the role of the Magisterium/the ins and outs of our faith (insert whatever you will).

It is difficult to really emphasise how much pain this caused. Untainted by years of ‘Church politics’ and ‘Church personalities’, I felt this huge burden to try to figure out who on earth was actually telling the truth. I would think…”Well, if this is the Church, and we all profess to believe Christ, his message and his presence in the Eucharist…then by golly, that has to turn my world upside down…by golly, we better give our every effort to heed as best we can the message of the Holy Spirit.”

I have personally encountered, and know well, some of the people on both sides of the debate – and finally I no longer feel like a piggy-in-the-middle in my own mind. I’ve said this to a one of them before…”I wish the different ‘sides’ would actually sit down in a room together and BE FRANK…” When was the last time a pro-CIT actually sat down to coffee with an anti-CIT and didn’t brush past the issue when it arose? Does there exist well-formulated and solid debate on the specific points of disagreement? Surely this would be an important step towards considering a combining of institutions. Or are those ‘personalities’ so wedded to their own ‘take’ on the Berlin Wall, oops, I mean, the Church, that debate is not possible. It seems a little arrogant to think that oneself has ‘got it’ – but what do I know, I’m young and have yet to duel the big guns of Church politics.

I treasure the Church’s tradition AND the Church’s dynamism. I know that the Church is not, in essence, an authoritarian Berlin Wall, but a divine and human vessel prone to be hijacked at times because humans are indeed fallen creatures. When that love for the faith and compassion for the Church is lost, is not one’s heart hardened? The image that comes to me is that WE ARE CHURCH….not just ‘those guys’ or ‘us’…WE ARE ALL THE CHURCH and as Karl Adams once said, the Church will forever be in a state of reforming itself. We are one body and unless we ache for authentic unity, unless it bothers us deeply, we are liable to succumb to the dualistic ‘us and them’. And let’s not forget that the Church is not just us down here – its all those souls up there – how much more must they yearn for us to listen carefully to the Spirit.

Doesn’t being Catholic consist of being challenged to dig deeper and get to the essence of the conflicts…to discern with the poorest of spirit and humility what God is really asking of His people? I sincerely hope there never comes a day where someone writes me off and labels me as ‘belonging to the other side’ – that doesn’t come from difference of opinion, that comes from a lack of engagement and a hardened heart.

This post is a little haphazard..but it’s frank, and if I recall, that’s the purpose of this blog…so I hope the above made sense…yell at me please, or let me know if you have been feeling similar. I don’t think any of my blogs have been as laboured as this one…

Dec

Pluggity, plug plug

By James the Least 3 Comments

Categories: Being Frank...

I attended the wedding of two very dear friends of mine at the weekend. It was a wonderful wedding – one of those ones that people will talk about for quite a while – and one I enjoyed thoroughly. It would be fair to say that the couple are fairly well known in New Zealand Catholic circles, and there was quite a large turnout to St.Patrick’s Cathedral in Auckland for the wedding. There were also more than a couple of the Being Frank community present at the Nuptial Mass and I enjoyed the opportunity to chat with quite a few of you – about the happy couple (of course) but also about this blog, about the NZ Catholic and about some of the other related projects out there. So, I thought I’d take some time to bring the rest of the community in on the discussion and to continue it with those who are interested.

First of all, the most popular question I have been asked lately by people who know me outside of the site is how big/popular is Being Frank? I don’t place too much faith in statistics (especially website ones) but I can definitely vouch for the fact that if you are reading this post, you are not alone. :) Each month, we receive six figure hit-counts from thousands of people around the world, and I’d just like to thank you for visiting and spending some time here. Aside from the interesting numbers, I raise this because if you follow the comment threads, there are a handful of commenters who take part in the ongoing (and in-depth) discussions and you could be forgiven for thinking that those are the only people reading the site. Not true. Check out any blog and you’ll most likely be seeing only a small fraction of the total audience taking part in the discussions or commenting on posts. FYI. :)

But I’m left wondering, can we get more? Of course we can – tell all your friends. :) And if you’re a lurker (i.e. one who reads but doesn’t participate) think about creating an account and taking part in the discussion – even if only to say “hi” and thank the poster for their post. We’re always happy to meet a fan. ;)

The next point of discussion at the weekend was the latest issue of the NZ Catholic. Specifically, the conversation focused on the two and bit pages of letters to the editor discussing the issues raised in this post about CIT. One of the letter writers even referred to our blog and the Ox’s post on Catholic education. The issues being discussed are obviously heating things up, but all I discussed this with have remarked that they were interested to see such vociferous debate taking place in the pages of the NZ Catholic. The consensus was that it was good to see that quite a number of people are reading the paper and wanting to discuss what it contains.

But I’m left wondering, can we get more people reading the paper? I think we absolutely can. I know the editor reads this blog from time to time, and I have recently been telling him that one of the things they should look to do is to switch formats. I think that the type of content that has been getting the most acclaim lately (e.g. the full-page article on returning to Reconciliation) is best suited for a monthly magazine format. I think that if the NZ Catholic looked to switch to such a format, that more of the younger generation (i.e. 25-40…i.e. not that young!) would look to purchase the magazine in addition to the existing readers still having their summary of the news available in a form factor that suits reading with a cup of tea. I’m really interested in what you think about this – am I way off base? Or is there some merit to my ramblings? Tell me (and the editor, if he’s reading the comments) what you think.

The last point I talked to on the weekend was the other projects that are out there – specifically (shameless plug) The 15th Station podcast. For those of you who don’t know it, the 15th Station is a free monthly download MP3 (i.e. audio file) that you can download and listen to on your PC or portable media device. It has a panel of speakers each month and we talk about a summary of the news in the previous month. Check out the latest episode for a discussion on the Pope’s latest encyclical, the 4,210 New Zealand pilgrims heading to Sydney for World Youth Day, the movie “The Golden Compass” and the ‘war’ on Christmas. It’s a pretty good start in the audio space for Catholics in our country (and around the world).

But I’m left wondering, can we get more? Are there any of you out there who would be interested in taking part in projects like this in the future? Anyone else out there who is keen to explore podcasting, or maybe even has one themselves? Let us know about it in the comments (either here or there).

That’s a lot to discuss the week before Christmas, but maybe you’ve got a bit of spare time between work Christmas functions and shopping to jot down some ideas? I’d love to hear from you.