Married (with a lot) of Children

Crisis Magazine ^ | February 2003 | Tom Hoopes

[Maximilian]

I hate to rain on your parade but parish support for this has been evaporating for years...and for good reason.

"Evaporating for years," yes certainly. "Good reason," no, absolutely not.

It has to do with basic economics since most parishes simply do not have (and would not have) the money to educate these very much wanted children.

Parishes seem to find money for more and more "lay ministries," "social justice offices," etc. But they can't afford their primary duty. Our local parish wants to spend well over a million dollars to build a new "worship space." This goes beyond criminal. I have seen the same thing in many other parishes we have attended.

"Very much wanted" by whom? By the parents, no doubt. But not by the parish. I have known many pastors who look askance at large families as a potential burden. Also as a rebuke to their consciences since they never preach against birth control.

[Maximilian]

That being said....this Bascom family is not entirely fault-free... The Bascoms sound like a flaky and irresposible bunch to me.

There's a huge leap from "not entirely fault-free" to "flaky and irresponsible." No parents are entirely fault free. All of us are going to make mistakes. I'm sure the Bascoms regret not keeping a better eye on the 2-year old. But the tendency to jump all over parents for every mistake is a huge discouragement to parenthood in our society. We need to be charitable and supportive of fellow parents, not judgemental. If society was serious about the best interests of the children, they would be assisting large families like the Bascoms, not throwing them in jail.

[ConservativeStLouisGuy]

It was truly heart-warming to see so many fine people respond to the article that I posted....many thanks for your succinct and warm wishes for my (impending) marriage....I've been a lurker here at Free Republic since the days when Drudge first posted the news about the "Liar-In-Chief" (Billy Boy) and his liason with....well....let's not cause a "barf alert" here....hehehehe....so, again, many thanks to y'all out there. I consider myself very blessed to be in the company of such fine, God-fearing American patriots!! - ConservativeStLouisGuy (Tom)

[ConservativeStLouisGuy]

Thank you for your nice words! I will be 42 this year (Aug) and my fiancee will be 40 -- so even though we might not be able to (biologically) have a lot of children I dare say we will be open to whenever and however children do come along. :-)

[ConservativeStLouisGuy]

Thank you for those nice words! Man, these Free Republic people are the BEST! FReep on!

[ConservativeStLouisGuy]

I am the middle of five children. Back when I was growing up it was NORMAL for families to have 4 or more children. Thanks for responding!

[ConservativeStLouisGuy]

Thank you! My wife-to-be is truly a GIFT from God! She is very special....

[ConservativeStLouisGuy]

Good thoughts....and another thing: the people in Washington are always complaining about how Social Security is "going broke"....guess they "forgot" about those MILLIONS of children who were ABORTED who would have been tax-paying citizens....hmmmm....

[Askel5]

why not crisis? (just curious)

[Askel5]

congratulations! i hope the dreams you've conceived all come true.

[Maximilian]

why not crisis? (just curious)

I used to consider Crisis to be one more useless publication bewailing the current problems in the Church without making the effort to analyze the root causes and demonstrating the courage to take action against them. Instead they have a go-along-get-along attitude towards the powers that be, whether those powers be ecclesiastical (American bishops) or secular (Pres. Bush).

There's a lot of publications that fit into that category, but Crisis crossed over the line from useless into despicable when they attempted to "shoot the messenger" with their attack on Michael Rose. Then in December they ran an article basically accusing all traditionalists (and all popes prior to Vatican II) of being anti-semites. At this point I have to consider them both dangerous and unscrupulous.

Like all Catholic publications, however, none of whom pay much (if any) money, they usually take whatever is sent to them. So a good article like this one can still be published in a worthless magazine.

[Maximilian]

why not crisis? (just curious)

The Astounding Naïveté of Crisis Magazine

[Maximilian]

why not crisis? (just curious)

One more answer: Here are some quotes from the Michael Rose article in New Oxford Review:

When Goodbye, Good Men was published, Alice von Hildebrand (who wrote the Foreword to the Aquinas edition) and Fr. Kenneth Baker, Editor of Homiletic & Pastoral Review, both warned me that I would be attacked, but I never seriously considered that the attack would come from Crisis magazine and other so-called conservative Catholic publications. The net effect of these reviews has been to draw attention away from the issues in the book and focus on the author. Unfortunately, for Crisis, Michael Rose has become the issue. In many ways this mimics what has transpired in Catholic seminaries over the past several decades. (And certainly mimics what happened in Kellenyi’s case.) Those who dare go against the status quo are singled out for particularly harsh treatment and persecuted to no end. The stock tactic is to discredit the source by calling him psychologically unfit. In this case, Crisis’s argument rests almost entirely on discrediting the primary source, Joseph Kellenyi. But if Kellenyi is not a crackpot, which he is not, then Crisis’s article entitled "A Question of Integrity" would more aptly apply to Crisis magazine itself.

Crisis magazine’s defense of a troubled and shrinking liberal seminary seems strangely out of character, and I hope it reflects a temporary lapse in judgment. The Pope has ordered a "serious" investigation of seminaries affiliated with the U.S. Church, with particular regard to dissent, homosexual cliques, and the abuse of psychological testing. Those who wish to cover up these crippling problems will no doubt brandish the Crisis article. That Crisis has been willing to do the dirty work for liberal Catholics reveals an astounding naïveté — and let’s hope we’ve seen the last of such gullibility.

But the hit piece by Sandra Miesel (in the same month that this article by Michael Rose was run in NOR) shows that we have not "seen the last of such gullibility." Apparently Crisis has set itself up as hit man against those on the right who step out of line. As Michael Rose says, "Those who dare go against the status quo are singled out for particularly harsh treatment and persecuted to no end. The stock tactic is to discredit the source by calling him psychologically unfit." This sounds exactly like the same tecnique used in the Sandra Miesel article. It will be a long time before they lose the reputation as being the supposedly "conservative" Catholic magazine that in the words of Michael Rose is "willing to do the dirty work for liberal Catholics."

[Utah Girl]

Congratulations on your upcoming nuptials. I always like to hear of those who have found the loves of their lifes and are getting married.

[Hermann the Cherusker]

You need to move to a flusher diocese.

In Philadelphia, elementary school discounts for multiples still exist, tuition is extremely low, and for High School its only $3300 per child, with a maximum of two tuitions being paid at any one time and many scholarships available.

[rmvh]

Parishes seem to find money for more and more "lay ministries,"...

Very true...

Yes, It seems evident that the percentage of money, of total available to the typical parish, is increasingly going to areas of little spiritual value (as you say)...But...The amount of money flowing into parish coffers is very rapidly declining for a wide range of reasons, not the least of which is a Church leadership essentially adrift from theological truths and accepting instead avenue which are leading to the destruction of civility if not humanity...To name a few: increasing acceptance of (1)abortion...(2)homosexuality-sodomy....(3) divorce.

It is also "grinds" on many Catholics that Church leadership is taking stands in the secular world for which it has absolutelu no information...e.g. Vigorous public proclamations against attacking Iraq by a totally unimformed clergy which lacks the strategic and tactical information and intelligence essential to understanding global threats.

I see most of this reflected by changes so evident at the University of Notre Dame, of which I am an alumni.

[narses]

My apologies for what appeared to have been a bombastic post. I wasn't suggesting you were or were not doing any specific thing. Your tag line has haunted me though. If you are right, and I believe you are, is not the USCCB schismatic in fact? Are they not by ommission creating a vocations crisis? Isn't there an obligation for the shepherds to educate their flocks?

[sitetest]

Dear narses,

When a bishop acts sinfully, foolishly, stupidly, even criminally and in many cases, even disobediently, that doesn't make him schismatic. It doesn't make him heretical. It makes him sinful, foolish, or stupid, or criminal, or even disobedient.

It is such a stretch from the harmful actions of some bishops against Catholic education to the idea that the USCCB is schismatic. In the Archdiocese of Washington, the policies implemented that caused the wild increase in tuitions were implemented during the administration of our archdiocese by James Cardinal Hickey, a man thought by most to be highly orthodox. But, being a product of public schools in his midwestern hometown, perhaps he didn't think that Catholic schools were all that necessary to the Catholic education of children. After all, we do have CCD, don't we? I strongly disagreed with his decisions regarding our schools.

In my view, the bulk of money from Catholic giving ought to be put to the support of Catholic elementary schools, high schools, and colleges. As well, if this were the case, it is likely that the orthodoxy of at least the elementary and high schools would be increased. These schools would then rely heavily on the money coming from Catholic parishes. The power of the purse would be wielded by ordinary parish priests, and the people in the pews (usually, it is the more orthodox folks who bother to come to Mass every week and put an envelope in the basket).

But Cardinal Hickey was the bishop, not me.

I think his decisions in this regard were terribly mistaken, and did great harm to the laity of Washington. But that doesn't make him schismatic. At worst, it means that his prudential judgement failed him, and us, in Washington. That failure, if that is what it was, was counterbalanced by many good and excellent and ORTHODOX things that he did during his time as our Ordinary.

Other bishops have acted differently. A poster here tells us all to come to the Archdiocese of Philadelphia. There, the archbishops have acted wisely and prudently, and have often twisted the arms of the secular authorities to provide significant assistance to Catholic school families, thus helping to keep costs within reach of middle class families. The cardinals and archbishops of Philadelphia are to be highly praised for their actions.

But that doesn't make those who have acted stupidly or foolishly to be in schism.


sitetest

[Francisco]

I'm one of ten children. We'd go out as a family, and my dad would get the comments "Are those ALL your children???"

My wife and I have 8 (beautiful) children. My wife gets this exact expression quite often. A few times she had just 5 or 6 of our children with her when she was asked "Are those ALL your children???" And my one daughter would reply (very innocently), "no, our brothers are at baseball."

[narses]

When the hierarchy acts regularly and often in opposition to Rome and to the faith, they stray from being simply "sinful, foolish, or stupid, or criminal, or even disobedient". They act in ways that show a deliberate intent, they act in concert and their results are clear. You cannot educate your children in Church schools. Many others cannot. Government schools do not produce vocations, that is a well known fact. A vocations crisis is the excuse for many of the women run parishes, and yet they closed our schools. You may be right in a cannonical law sense, but in a natural sense, the creation of a new Church in America, run by laywomen (often divorced laywomen, too often lesbians) is the end result. That reality says the Church in America has seperated itself from the Church of Rome.