Conflicting data

Today's D&C features a page 1, above-the-fold article claiming that NY State led the nation in the number of people leaving the state between 2000 and 2008.

Entitled, "N.Y. tops in people loss," the story is based on a report just released by the Empire Center for New York State Policy. This report, which can be found here, says that it is "[b]ased on the latest data from the Census Bureau and the Internal Revenue Service."

Table 2 of this report claims to show the 2000-to-2008 population changes in each county in the state. However, when I saw that Monroe County had supposedly lost 20,783 people over those 8 years I began to suspect something was amiss.

You see, the U.S. Census Bureau has its population data on line and the loss it reports for Monroe County over the same 8 year period is a substantially smaller 6,252.

Curious as to the difference in combined population loss for the 12 counties which comprise DOR as reported by these sources, I created the following table from the on line Census data and Table 2 of the ECFNYSP report.

And so, if the ECFNYSP report is to be believed, DOR has lost 2.3% of its overall population over the last 8 years, while the census data on which it is supposedly based indicates that loss to be 0.7%.

While neither figure is significant in comparison with our 25.3% drop in Mass attendance over the same period, does anyone have any doubt which set of numbers DOR will cite the next time it blames declining Mass attendance on "demographic shifts?"

Satan's M.O.

From Fr. Dwight Longenecker ...

The Slippery Slope

Here is how Satan spreads his lies:

1. Natural Law is ignored, undermined or made to look stupid by particular instances where it seems not apply.

2. Subsequently religious and civil authorities have their laws questioned because they are 'too strict' too 'black and white', 'unworkable' or 'lacking in compassion'.

3. Relativism is therefore introduced. An understanding gradually grows that 'there are no objective rules' that apply to all people at all times.

4. Individualism is the next step. 'I guess I have to decide what is right for me in my situation.'

5. Sentimentalism: People who live in a sinful situation demand that they not be judged. They deserve compassion and understanding. They are nice people really...but they have a problem. They're sick. They're wounded. Who are you to judge?

6. Dialogue is demanded. "You need to listen to us and to our stories. Then you will understand we are just like you."

7. Once sympathy is won, the goalposts are moved. Now they are not 'sick' or 'wounded' they're just 'different'. They expect to be accepted despite their 'differences'.

8. Equal rights are expected by those who are acting against God's law. "We are not asking you to approve us. We are simply asking you to tolerate a difference of opinion. Simply allow us to be who we are!"

9. Equal rights are demanded. Legislation and lobbying and protests are now in order. The pressure group for sin starts to get aggressive. They do so out of 'hurt' and 'woundedness.' Once they get their 'rights' (they claim) they will be happy and won't be so aggressive.

10. Tolerance being won, they will not stop. They now demand not only that you tolerate, but that you approve. They've moved from being 'sick' or 'wounded' or 'disabled' by their condition to tolerance, and now they proclaim their condition to be 'good'. As Thomas More was not allowed to remain silent on the King's 'great matter' but had to approve, so the pressure group insists on approval.

11. What was once tolerated now becomes mandatory. Society must integrate the new morality into every level--right down to schools and churches and scout groups. Everyone must adopt the new morality or suffer.

12. Persecution of those who resist.

13. Devil's real happy.

This process happens on an individual level, a family level, a community level and a societal level. The bigger the level the longer it takes, and for it to take effect at the societal, community and family level it must first work on the individual level.

This means you and I must watch for the signs in our own moral life and be alert. Any of us can go down this path, and any of us may be victims of those who are already well down the path of evil and darkness.

John Beaulieu coming to Bishop Kearney

This Wednesday at Bishop Kearney ...

Mother of Sorrows to lose 7th, 8th grades?

5th, 6th and 7th grade students at Our Mother of Sorrows school brought the following letter home today ...

10/20/2009

Dear Parents and Guardians of 5th, 6th and 7th graders,

The Department of Catholic Schools has NOT made any determination concerning the continuation of 7th and 8th grade at Our Mother of Sorrows.

Enrollment in 7th and 8th grade is the determining factor. The Superintendent of Catholic Schools, Mrs Anne Wilkins-Leach and the Associate Superintendent for Curriculum, Sr Margaret Mancuso SSJ are most anxious to meet with us to discuss the situation. This meeting will be scheduled in the very near future. I am waiting for confirmation from our superintendent. It is imperative that at least one parent or guardian of each student in grades 5, 6, 7 must attend this meeting.

In addition to Our Mother of Sorrows, Siena Catholic Academy offers a 7th and 8th grade program within the Monroe County Catholic School System. In order for you to make an informed decision, principals have agreed to distribute information for the independent Catholic High Schools that also have a 7th and 8th grade program.

Your commitment ot Our Mother of Sorrows School is testimony of your support to Catholic Education. We look forward to meeting with you.

Sincerely,

Mr. Samuel Zalacca

Principal

The parent who sent me this letter also wrote,

I thought that closing 13 of our schools would be enough for a few years but obviously it won't be. I doubt no matter the enrollment that they will keep those 2 grades open after this year. As many of us have thought, the goal is to not have the diocese fund ANYTHING regarding the schools, as seen by the paltry 5% they have designated from the annual appeal. Its again so disheartening, as parents are continually asked to give and make sacrifices, which we do, but in the end it makes no difference.

Report from the Diocese of Buffalo

Kelly over at Catholic Ponderings was asked how things were going in her diocese.  Her reply follows ...

Things are great! Many parishes merged last year which shook a lot of people up, of course. It was done with the input of anyone who was willing to attend meetings and I think many have found it to be a blessing (though many refuse to admit it).

Our Bishop fights hard for our schools and frequently states that they are our most important ministry. We have seminarians at our very own seminary. Only one PA and he is an ordained permanent Deacon at a very small, rural parish that is linked to another. Our Cathedral looks like one. Lay homilies are forbidden. You will find that it is a minority of parishioners who assume the orans posture during the Our Father. In our parish, the priest who was teaching at our school instructed the children to NOT hold hands.

In the DOB, people kneel during Communion and do not sit until the priest finishes purifying the vessels and takes a seat himself. Many of our religious sisters wear habits - and the sisters who teach at our school in a full habit. Our Bishop addressed the laity in regard to Spiritus Christi and the virus they were spreading to Buffalo.

Candles, sanctus bells and incense are all seen as good things. We also do not have general confession - though I have known people who travel to the DOR so that they can be forgiven without confessing to a priest - or so they thought until I corrected them.

Is the DOB perfect? No, plenty of humanity to go around. But, many people from the DOR send their children to our school in LeRoy, and some even travel forty minutes to attend Mass with us. You can find out Diocesan newspaper here.

:) Dominus vobiscum!

"Too much fluffy-ruffle stuff"

I got a kick out of this one ...

When parochial teachers of Rochester, N. Y. gathered for an annual conference, 800 priests and nuns heard a speech by Rev. Francis Peter LeBuffe, S. J., business manager of the able Jesuit weekly America. An expert at making points of dogma crystal clear, Father LeBuffe had a blackboard handy, covered it with white, red, green, yellow chalk marks demonstrating the meaning of the Trinity, Original Sin, Transubstantiation, Incarnation. And then Father LeBuffe went on to say:

"Whether we like it or not, we Catholic teachers must realize that our courses in Religion are not being taught as they should be. They are frequently voted by the students to be 'the worst-taught courses in the curriculum.' We must teach fundamental dogmas rather than the frills and accidentals of Religion. . . . There is too much fluffy-ruffle stuff in pious books—entirely too much. I would like to take 90% of the spiritual books written and make a glorious bonfire of them, and their authors too, because they do not tell fundamental truths."

While the language points to a bygone era (this was written 72 years ago), the problem described sounds remarkably contemporary.

Source here.

"This awful seminary"

A few weeks back Cleansing Fire posted this photo of 25 members of the Fathers of Mercy and asked if anyone could identify the third priest from the left in the top row.

It turned out the cleric is Fr. Frank Fusare, C.P.M.

What made this exercise interesting is that Fr. Frank was at one time a diocesan priest here in DOR. He was ordained by Bishop Clark in 1996 and the combox conversation around the post (especially here) indicated that he had been driven out of the diocese because he insisted on preaching what the Church teaches on homosexuality.

I was interested in learning more about Fr. Frank and quickly found out that he was one of three presenters on Saint Joseph Communications' Confronting the Gay Agenda - The Catholic Truth About Homosexuality. Intrigued both by the title and Fr. Frank's experience in DOR I ordered a copy.

Fr. Frank's presentation is entitled The Effects Of The Homosexual Agenda and is a detailed account of what homosexual activists hope to achieve and the effects their success would have on society.

But what is really of interest is the following excerpt from the early part of his talk where he is, in a sense, establishing his credentials (my transcription and emphasis):

I can make these claims with 100% certainty - 100% - because I've not only read about this issue but for years I've heard with my own ears what militant, active homosexuals have to say by viewing their rallies and listening to their speeches and because I was forced to attend a seminary that protected militant homosexuals.

Now let me stop for a second and tell you that before I was a member of the Fathers of Mercy I was a priest in a diocese in this country, so the Fathers of Mercy did not send me to this awful seminary, it was the diocese that I was from originally.

That diocese, of course, is DOR and the seminary is St. Mary's in Baltimore, the "Pink Palace" of Michael S. Rose's Goodbye, Good Men.

In Chapter 4 of his book Rose writes,

According to former seminarians and recently ordained priests, the "gay subculture" is so prominent and accepted at St. Mary’s Seminary in Baltimore that students have long nicknamed it "The Pink Palace."

Father Andrew Walter, ordained for the Diocese of Bridgeport, Connecticut in 2000, spent several semesters at the Baltimore school as a seminarian for the Diocese of Patterson, New Jersey. The problem was so bad when he was there, he explained, that "some of the students and faculty used to get dressed up in leather to go to ‘the block,’ Baltimore’s equivalent to 42nd Street in Manhattan."

Seminarians, sometimes accompanied by faculty members, would do this regularly, Walter explained. "They would meet in the foyer, and then head for the gay bars."

That's the seminary that Bishop Clark forced Frank Fusare to attend.

Elsewhere in his book Rose quotes Fr. Charles Fiore of Wisconsin,

If the bishops and rectors don't know that this kind of rot is eating away-at the innards of the church, at its future vitality, that's misfeasance. If they know but do nothing to stop it that's malfeasance! And the faithful should demand a top-to-bottom housecleaning where such situations exist. Certainly they are not morally obliged financially to support this ecclesiastical incompetence.

I couldn't agree more.