I was thrilled a couple of months ago when 6 candlesticks and a crucifix made their way back to the “people’s altar” at my parish.  In all fairness, at St. Mary’s Rome we’d always had 6 candlesticks on our high altar (praise the Lord we have one…) but those have been replaced by 2 candlesticks.  We have a seminarian this year who’s been working a lot with our CYO; he had a column in the DRE’s weekly newsletter on Sunday, explaining.  With full credit to him (Michael Revak, Archdiocese of Atlanta, student at Mt. St. Mary’s) here are excerpts from his column.

Many of you have noticed the changes made in the sanctuary lately.  A crucifix has been placed on the altar and 6 candles accompany it…

It was from a simple, practical need for lighting to read prayers in the dark spaces of the Roman catacombs that the Church began to introduce candles into her liturgy.  However, as with all things in the Roman Church, profane items that served a functional need soon became sacred, becoming richly endowed with theological symbolism.

Candles in the liturgy are no exception; they began to take on the very image of the presence of Christ, recalling John’s Gospel, “In him was life an the life was the light of men.  The light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it.”

These physical symbols in the life of the Church are of extreme importance to the faithful, since we are creatures of physical as well as spiritual components.  Christ and His bride, the Church, provide all that is needed for the sanctification of both.

Water and oil are used necessarily in the Sacrament of Baptism, a crucifix recalls our minds to that sacrifice which won for us our salvation, and candles assure us of Christ’s presence, providing us with His light.

These symbols, used in the liturgy, serve to orient both our minds and bodies in prayer.  In our Catholic faith the highest point to which we come in prayer is the altar upon which the un-bloody, acceptable, sacrifice is continually offered at the hands of Christ’s priests.  Without these physical sacramentals our physical and spiritual orientations become confused and vacant and we end up turning in on ourselves.  Worship becomes more about us than about God.

And….boom goes the dynamite:

An example of this dangerous reality began less that 50 years ago when high altars were ripped out of sancuaries, stained glass was replaced with clear glass, and beautiful statues, candelabrums, and traditional Church architecture were abandoned.

The erroneous notion that we did not need these physical sacramentals to orient ourselves in prayer was a sign that we had forgotten who we are and what we owe God.  As result, the liturgy turned from God to man. (The last great remnant of this confusion is the persistence of holding hands during the Our Father, thus removing the focus from Jesus now present on the altar, and placing the focus on ourselves.

It is with this in mind that, in the company and leadership of our Holy Father, Benedict XVI, Father Miceli has returned the crucifix and traditional 6 candlesticks to the altar, that highest place where the faithful orient themselves to give worship to God in the sacrifice of the Mass.

Also known as, “How to slam the “spirit of Vatican II” without even using those words.  Bravo, Michael.

And no sooner to I post about speculation, CNA posts that Dolan has been selected as successor to Egan.

The eagerly anticipated appointment of the new Archbishop of New York appears to be just around the corner. The well-connected Italian journalist Paolo Rodari, who writes for Il Reformista, is reporting that Archbishop Timothy Dolan of Milwaukee will soon be announced as the new head of the most important U.S. diocese.

Church watchers have been itching to hear who will replace Cardinal Edward Egan for almost two years and as Rodari reports, “the announcement should arrive shortly.”

Rumors have been circulating with increasing frequency over the past several weeks, including a January 29 report by Edward Pentin on Newsmax.com that pointed speculation in the direction of Dolan.

Rodari reports today that Il Riformista has “collected leaks” that say “Pope Benedict XVI has decided on Archbishop Timothy Dolan of Milwaukee.”

Rodari also claims that although other American prelates would have preferred a stronger personality to take on the Obama Administration’s animus towards Catholics, Dolan is being tapped as a pastoral leader with a “soft touch.”

To be clear, this isn’t a report from the Vatican, this is a report on a Vatican watcher who says he has good information…

full article.

I am posting this mainly because, at least accoring to USA Today’s Faith and Reason blog, our own Atlanta Archbishop Wilton Gregory is a possible candidate for Archbishop of New York.  You might recall Gregory’s statements last November about how the election of a black president paves the way for the election of a black pope, which we detailed on this very blog.  In my mind, NY can have him, we don’t need someone who is purposely polarizing here in the south where we have to deal with this reputation of being backwards racists as it is.

•Archbishop of Atlanta Wilton Gregory, former president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, “who earned enormous respect for his leadership” during the most explosive years of the clergy sexual abuse scandal, says Allen. If named, Gregory would be the first black archbishop of New York.

On the same token, the Abp. of NY is a pretty important position…someone like Chaput would be great there.  A plain spoken, hardcore faithful Catholic bishop would be fantastic for them and for the country.

article…

And to the troll who’s attempted to add at least 25 comments to various posts here: You seem like a very sad and hate-filled  person, which is ironic when you consider that you refer to me as hate-filled.  I’ll be glad to live in my delusional fantasy world, because I at least I am happy and not miserable like you.  Perhaps if you spent time reading a different blog, you’d be happier, too.  Please be aware that  I am not going to approve your comments…you are wasting your time.

There’s big stuff going down in the Church right now.  Two key stories – one is the stories of the double life of the founder of the Legionaries Of Christ, and the other is the controversy being created by B16 de-excommunicating the Lefebvrevists, including one who’s a holocaust denier.

This is where the blogs I refer to as the “relevant Catholic blogs,” the ones that the professional bloggers run, step up and give us blow-by-blow accounts.  There’s no way I can keep up.  Go over to American Papist and read all about it.  I just did and there’s no point in my copying and pasting everything Thomas has said.  Give him the hits.

…along with several other good-luck trinkets.  This has been hitting the blogs all of a sudden the last couple of days, and us Catholics are making hay of the way our President carries a miraculous Mary medal as well as a Madonna and Child medal.  Rightly so, they are invoking our Mother on behalf of our President, that she would intercede on behalf of him and us for his conversion.

Forgive the cynicism of my headline, then, but I call this “voting present” on religion.  Why?  Because of all the stuff he’s carrying for “good luck.”  Let’s go to the tape:

From Time’s political blog…

Amongst the things that Barack Obama carries for good luck are a bracelet belonging to a soldier deployed in Iraq, a gambler’s lucky chit, a tiny monkey god and a tiny Madonna and child.

He’s carrying around a smorgasbord of good luck items among which two are Christian and specifically Catholic.  Again, forgive my cynicism but this just looks like running the gamut, so to speak.  Juxtaposing Christian “trinkets” with other trinkets makes me question what level of esteem he gives the Marian medals compared with the others. That and he’s so darned political that I would think the only reason he carries those items is because focus groups have told him those are the most politically popular things for him to carry.

All that said, I agree – whether he gives a flip about what he’s carrying, we should certainly pray for him through our Mother.

It’s always encouraging when we get news like this:

Researchers who tried to use mouse, cow and rabbit eggs to make human clones said on Monday the effort failed to produce workable embryos but added that they showed human cloning should work in principle.

Mixing human and animal cells does not appear to program the egg properly, said Dr. Robert Lanza of Massachusetts-based Advanced Cell Technology.

“The idea was to simply to plunk a patient’s DNA into an empty cow or rabbit egg — and presto — you reprogram the DNA back into a stem cell,” Lanza said in a telephone interview.

But teams that have tried to do this have always ended up with what looks like a cell dividing over and over to become an embryo, but which eventually fizzles out.

“For the last decade, we’ve carried out literally hundreds of experiments trying to create patient-specific stem cells using animal eggs,” Lanza said.

The article goes on to explain that these cells just quit dividing after a period of time instead of continuing to grow and split.  Obviously there’s something missing.  I wonder what it might be that is missing?  The hand of the Creator?  The soul?  Interesting to speculate on why it doesn’t work, seeing as science tells us it is theoretically possible.

More

From the Phildelphia Bulletin, Abp. Raymond Burke has some harsh words for US Bishops for their vaccilating stance on moral issues.

In the interview, Archbishop Burke said that the USCCB document led to “confusion,” among Catholics, contributing to the widespread Catholic support for Mr. Obama.

“There may be times when a Catholic who rejects a candidate’s unacceptable position may decide to vote for that candidate for other morally grave reasons,” reads the USCCB document. “Voting in this way would be permissible only for truly grave moral reasons, not to advance narrow interests or partisan preferences or to ignore a fundamental moral evil.”

“While it stated that the issue of life was the first and most important issue, it went on in some specific areas to say ‘but there are other issues’ that are of comparable importance without making necessary distinctions,” said Archbishop Burke.

“The economic situation, or opposition to the war in Iraq, or whatever it may be, those things don’t rise to the same level as something that is always and everywhere evil, namely the killing of innocent and defenseless human life,” continued the archbishop.

Political groups like “Catholic for Obama,” used the argument to square their support for a pro-choice candidate with their faith. Mr. Obama has been called the “most pro-choice president” in the nation’s history, advocating legislation that would remove all restrictions on abortion. The Catholic Church teaches that abortion is an intrinsic evil.

Little bit of ire for CNS also:

“The bishops need to look also at our Catholic News Service, CNS, they need to review their coverage of the whole thing and give some new direction, in my judgement,” he said.

CNS came under fire during the election by pro-life Catholics for playing down Mr. Obama’s support for abortion.

How I’d love for Burke to be my Bishop.