The Sheepcat

Technical Difficulties

The motherboard on my computer fried itself on Saturday, so Internet access has been a bit of a nuisance to arrange, not to mention that I've had other things on my mind besides blogging. I hope to be back up and running normally pretty soon.

Good News from Our Favourite War Zone

Hallelujah! U.S., British Forces Rescue Iraq Hostages.

And now this evening I read that Afghan President Hamid Karzai has assured Stephen Harper than respect for human and religious rights will be upheld in the case of Abdul Rahman, still officially facing the death penalty for having converted to Christianity. Still, you'd like to think it wouldn't need to reach the point of international crisis before Mr Rahman's rights were protected.

Knit One, Hurl Too

You Knit What?? has some choice designs to make anyone queasy. Knittyknitty calls this the "Worst. Felted. Bag. Ever." I'm no expert, but I can't disagree. And then, "because every girl needs a purse that looks like the lining of a stomach," there's this. And this is pretty wretched too. Other previous offenders here and here and here.

Somebody stop me. I have work to do today.

What Is Sex For?

Touchstone Archives: Designed for Sex. This piece was first published in the July/August 2005 issue. Well worth reading. I'm convinced that appealing to natural law is the only way we're going to make headway in debates over marriage and a host of other issues. Without natural law, what we have to offer is bound to look like a set of arbitrary rules.

The Brave New World of Neurology

Clueless Christian looks back on a career in neurology, and ahead to a time when neurologists will be expected to declare who is not fit to live.
Link: CANN.

Sacred Music in Toronto: The Tallis Choir

The Tallis Choir, which did such a splendid job in December with its namesake composer's Spem in Alium (a stunning forty-part motet), performs Allegri's Miserere and Palestrina's Stabat Mater at St Basil's Church this Saturday at 7:30 p.m.

Bread and Circuses

Oh my. I missed this story the first time around--about a stampede in the Philippines that killed more than seventy people. Sancta Sanctis looks at the miserable situation that made this tragedy possible, nay inevitable.

For the sake of His sorrowful passion, have mercy on us and on the whole world.

Lent--New, Improved, Penitence-Free

Pontifications looks at The Sin of Authenticity. With links to the stunning homily that started it all. Mark Shea's got it right: "Boston Jesuits move deep into the realms of self-parody."

Cracking Some Heads of Dissident Priests--Why Not?

In light of the statement of dissent published by 19 dissident priests in Quebec, I went to read Waiting in Joyful Hope. True to form, Fr. Dowd pointed to some excellent reflections at The Great Pumpkin on the how the Roman Catholic Church should deal with dissenters (Part 1) (read the comments too) and Part 2, where Linda quotes him extensively. I confess I had been rather troubled in my Protestant days by 1 Corinthians 5, and Fr Dowd explains it well. Most certainly the corrective force of ostracism as recommended to the Church in Corinth is undermined these days by the existence of so many ecclesial communities, so that if one body attempts to discipline a member, well, there's always some other denomination down the road where the sin in question isn't considered a problem.

And God bless Fr Dowd for his reflections on frustration.

Beyond this, though, I see a sad trend among some Catholics whose love and defense of Faith seems to make them myopic when it comes to Hope. The result is that they try harder and harder to defend the faith to the point of getting frustrated and wondering if it's all worth if, wondering where it's all going — in other words, losing hope. And when Hope is lost, Charity is not far behind. It is possible to have faith and still be on the road to perdition.

Robert Latimer Demands "Honesty"

Tonight the CBC broadcast an interview with Robert Latimer, who is serving a life sentence for murder in the "mercy killing" of his daughter Tracy, who was disabled. Mr Latimer is trying to have his case re-examined. He demands "honesty" from the authorities, but laments, "They're far too important to be honest." And he complains about the statement in the Supreme Court judgment to the effect that there were alternative means of pain management he could have used instead. He wants to know what they were. To what end, I wonder. So that he can continue to insist that the alternatives were inadequate?

It's a sad case, to be sure, but what he did was still murder. Tracy's life was not his to take; her quality of life was not his to declare too low. Asked if he would do anything differently if he had another chance to relive the twelve years, he showed no remorse for the killing. Instead, looking back further, he says what he would have changed was getting better medical attention for his daughter at the time of her birth, when the damage to her brain occurred. It's fantasy to imagine that even perfect medical care could eliminate suffering; but health care has become one of Canada's most devoutly held religions, so it's not surprising that many observers consider him a hero.

"They stole a lot from us," says a bitter Robert Latimer. Contrast his self-pitying nonsense with the compassion shown by Jean Vanier, founder of L'Arche. At the end of January I heard a webcast of him and Dr Balfour Mount, a pioneer of the hospice movement in Canada. Witnessing the great humility of these latter men, one can see that it is a failure of compassion, a self-centred attempt on the part of the caregiver to escape from his or her own pain, that is ultimately behind so-called mercy killing.

Samantha Mitchell, who is disabled, is quoted in the CBC feature: "In one sense I feel compassion; but I don't feel compassion for him as a murderer."