Can this be what Pope Francis has in mind when he calls for church as first-aid station? Director for Planned Parenthood for Master’s in Public Health degree-holders?

Hardly. His advice to church leaders and followers can’t mean that, can it?

This little piggy went virtual, but users and investors should beware, it seems.

Reactions, as from Archbp Dolan of NYC:

“As a priest and bishop, I particularly welcome his reminder that the clergy are primarily to serve as shepherds, to be with our people, to walk with them, to be pastors, not bureaucrats!

Rev. Thomas Reese, SJ:

“Reading this interview gave me greater insight into my Jesuit vocation and into our Jesuit pope,” he said. “What is clear is that he does not think like a classicist who sees the world in unchanging categories. He is a storyteller like Jesus, not a philosopher. He thinks in narrative, not philosophical principles. He thinks like a pastor understanding the history of the church but wanting to move with God’s people confidently into the future. He trusts that the spirit [sic: capitalized by Reese, not by LA Times piece,
unfortunately] is alive and well in the people of God.”

Kathryn Jean Lopez (at Fox News):

“Whatever your politics,” she concluded, “be careful what you read into this. He’s talking to you. He’s talking to me. He’s reminding himself. The news isn’t that he isn’t ‘a right-winger,’ as he tells us. It’s that he’s a pastor. He’s a priest, not a politician.’

Bill Donaghue of Catholic League:

“The pope is right that single-issue Catholics need to rise above their immediate concerns,” he wrote on his organization’s website. “He did not say we should not address abortion or homosexuality; he simply said we cannot be absorbed by these issues. Both the left and the right should heed his message.”

A major LGBT lobby:

The Human Rights Campaign, which supports lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender rights, hailed the pope’s remarks, saying they should lead to “transformative change” throughout the Catholic Church.

Me: It’s a splendid bit of advice for pastors, capturing the spirit (small “s”) of Catholic preaching and mass-celebration in 95% of the churches and at the masses I attend. A nice corrective to overemphasis when it arises.

It flashes no red light for activists seeking to protect the church’s independence from hyperactive LGBT and other propagandists (promoters?) and legislators et al. who would impinge on it — such as this about compulsory sex-education at UCLA and the rights of conscientious objectors. I can see a bishop calling attention to such a matter as a function of his pastoral responsibilities. So can the Pope, I’m sure.

$50 million for doors etc.

Note, however, that it’s part of a $31 billion spending program signed into law by Gov. Quinn, a.k.a. Santa Claus, in July of ’09.

See how the governor can play Santa Claus to voters throughout the state, fiddling all the while as state’s deficits mount.

At the Republican National Committee Breakfast, Morrison Hotel, July 27:

Only in the last few weeks, I have been reading quite an article on the experiment of almost complete paternalism in a friendly European country. This country has a tremendous record for socialistic operation, following a socialistic philosophy, and the record shows that their rate of suicide has gone up almost unbelievably and I think they were almost the lowest nation in the world for that. Now, they have more than twice our rate.

Drunkenness has gone up. Lack of ambition is discernible on all sides.. Therefore, with that kind of example, let’s always remember Lincoln’s admonition. Let’s do in the federal Government only those things that people themselves cannot do at all, or cannot so well do in their individual capacities. [italics
added]

Important, important, important.

Let us now praise a writer who has Obama figured.

Think we are terminally distracted by cell phones, etc.? You or your kid won’t be at this school.

. . . that we know not the day nor the hour. As do most mass-murder or -catastrophe stories.

Like what Jesus said of the Second Coming: “Of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven.” Same for death, which like Sandburg’s fog crawls on cat feet.

Walk out the door, and there you go. Odds are immensely greater outside some doors than other, predictability varies immensely. Nonetheless, beyond ordinary or even extraordinary precautionary measures, there’s nothing anyone can do about it.