Three threads by me.
Dr. Alan Keyes Released from Jail -- And Will Bear Witness on Notre Dame Campus Again
SOUTH BEND, Ind., May 9 /Christian Newswire/ -- Dr. Alan Keyes and 20 peaceful pro-lifers were arrested yesterday after they walked onto Notre Dame's campus praying the rosary and pushing baby strollers carrying baby dolls covered in "stage blood" to protest the invitation of Notre Dame to President Obama to deliver the commencement address at this year's graduation.
Dr. Keyes will be leading peaceful witnesses again on campus this coming Tuesday and Friday -- and is calling on others to join him.
Dr. Keyes said upon being released from jail, "I went on campus to bear witness to the truth that the invitation by the University of Notre Dame to Barack Obama is a travesty and abomination against the truth that is characteristic to our Catholic and Christian faith. Obama's actions deserve condemnation, not honor.
"I am issuing a call to everyone of like mind that we must come together now to bear witness to the world, to send a message to destroy this scandal and spread the truth of the Christians' dedication to life.
"I am going back on campus to prayerfully bear witness. Come, join me, let us trespass together so that in our trespasses we might find ourselves fully in obedience to the will of God."
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Is ND Catholic enough? Obama visit prompts examination of identity
SOUTH BEND — As soon as it was announced March 20 that President Barack Obama would be the University of Notre Dame's commencement speaker and receive an honorary degree, the reaction started.
Online petitions by some Catholic groups were launched that day, denouncing the decision by the Rev. John I. Jenkins, Notre Dame's president, to honor Obama, who is pro-choice and who on March 9 had given approval for expanded fetal stem-cell research.
Pro-life activists have flooded into town, conducting rallies and petition drives, standing at Notre Dame's main gate holding large photos of aborted babies. Airplanes have been flying above the city towing banners, and trucks are being driven along city streets, showing graphic abortion photos and demanding Notre Dame cancel the president's visit to campus, where 85 percent of undergraduates and 53 percent of faculty identify themselves as Catholic.
The Most Rev. John M. D'Arcy, bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend, announced he will not attend commencement because of Obama's presence.
"Even as I continue to ponder in prayer these events, which many have found shocking, so must Notre Dame," D'Arcy said in a written statement a few days after the announcement of the president's visit. "Indeed, as a Catholic University, Notre Dame must ask itself, if by this decision it has chosen prestige over truth."
Some are demanding that Jenkins be fired for honoring a president who doesn't adhere to moral teachings of the Catholic Church. . .
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Roman Catholics’ War Over Abortion (NYT Barf Alert!)
Discord is nothing new for Roman Catholicism. But the controversy surrounding the appearance of President Obama at the University of Notre Dame’s commencement on May 17 suggests that run-of-the mill discord among American Catholics is escalating into something closer to civil war.
Just watch that airplane circling over the famous Golden Dome of Notre Dame’s Main Building and the spire of the university’s Basilica of the Sacred Heart. The plane pulls a banner with a picture of an aborted fetus.
The group flying the banner is unhappy not just with the university but also, according to a spokesman quoted in The South Bend Tribune, with “the pro-life community at Notre Dame.”
“If they were doing a good job of reaching the campus,” he said, “it’s unlikely Obama would have been invited.”
Now listen to Bishop Robert W. Finn, bishop of the Kansas City-St. Joseph Diocese in Missouri. “We are at war!” he told an anti-abortion convention on April 18. “We are engaged in a constant warfare with Satan.”
Although this war must never involve violence, he said, and Christians must love the human enemies who come under Satan’s power, “even without their fully realizing it,” he went on to say that the most dangerous enemies were not those openly attacking the church but “more subtle enemies.” These included Catholics who “attack the most fundamental tenets of the church’s teachings.”
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"We will not be silent.
We are your bad conscience.
The White Rose will give you no rest."