Commentary by Susan Brinkmann, OCDSKeeping Christ in Christmas is very much a personal matter, but our Baptismal call invites us to do more to bring Christ into the culture, which all of us can do by standing firm in our right to publicly express our beliefs during this sacred season.
An FBI request for unredacted documents obtained by the Senate during their 2015-2016 investigation of fetal body part trafficking within the abortion industry, is a clear signal that the Bureau may be preparing to launch its own investigation into possible criminal activity.
Commentary by Susan Brinkmann, OCDSIn what is the umpteenth example of pro-abortion hypocrisy, a New York Times editorial by an abortion activist is calling upon Facebook to censor “fake news” sites like Life News for spreading what she calls “false information” about abortion and its impact on women, the unborn, and society.
Commentary by Susan Brinkmann, OCDSWith a sigh of (partial) relief, I am happy to report that the controversial teen magazine, Teen Vogue, has shut down its print edition and will revert to an on-line version only.
Women’s Wear Daily is reporting that the magazine has been shuttered in a cost-cutting effort by owner Conde Nast that resulted in the slashing of 80 jobs. While its other publications, such as GQ, Glamour, Allure, Bon Appetit, will experience a reduction in the number of issues, Teen Vogue, which was cut from 12 issues to just 5 last year, was shut down entirely with the hopes of capitalizing on what it describes as “tremendous audience growth” on-line.
“As audiences continue to evolve around content consumption, we will modernize and calibrate how, where and when we produce and distribute our content to be in sync with the cultural moments and platforms most important to our audiences,” the publisher said in a statement to The Hollywood Reporter. “Though the quarterly print editions will cease publishing on a regular schedule, we will explore re-imagined special issues timed to specific moments (vs. months) as we do in social."
The fate of its new editor, Elaine Welteroth, who sparked one controversy after another since she took over the magazine last year, is still unknown. There is speculation that she will become the editor-in-chief of Glamour or Allure.
Welteroth is the editor who began to introduce far-left politics into the magazine as well as sexual content so vile that it sparked magazine burnings and a backlash of parental outrage.
For example, the magazine came under fire in February of this year for an article suggesting the “perfect gifts” for post-abortive teens. The choices included “angry uterus heating pads” and a Ruth Bader Ginsburg coloring book.
In July of this year, the magazine published an article entitled “Anal Sex: What You Need to Know” which provided teen girls with graphic instructions on how to engage in sodomy. When confronted for this dangerously irresponsible article, the magazine’s digital editor, Phillip Picardi resorted to the usual tactics used by the intolerant left by branding all complainers as “homophobic.”
This resulted in a literal firestorm online when Elizabeth Johnson, known as The Activist Mommy, posted a video of herself burning the magazine. It went viral and sparked a campaign to #pullteenvogue.
Whether this controversial year had anything to do with the decision to cut the magazine is anyone’s guess; the publisher insists that it did so for financial reasons.
However, Teen Vogue isn’t entirely out of our hair yet. They’re sponsoring the first Teen Vogue Summit in Los Angeles next month which will feature Hillary Rodham Clinton and several other “activist” speakers. The two-day event will offer a variety of workshops and @Werk immersion sessions. With a hefty price tag ranging from $299 to $549, it’s debatable how many teens will actually be attending this event.
The other problem is that Phillip Picardi, who defended the magazine against its “homophobic” critics, will be the digital editor of the on-line version of the magazine.
Even though it’s good that this raunchy magazine will no longer be staring us in the face as we stand in line at the supermarket, parents need to remain vigilant about what their teens are reading on-line. This is especially true with girls who are being bombarded with negative messaging packaged as “fashion” and “trendy looks.”
As our Young Women of Grace study teaches, women are not the sum total of their body parts. We are meant to infuse this dark world with the bright light of our feminine genius, to allow our unique sensitivity and generosity to melt the coldness of hearts that divide us, to bring our life-giving maternity into a culture that embraces death, to allow our receptivity to open the doors to respectful dialogue.
Women have too important a role to play in this world to allow ourselves to be sidelined by the “body beautiful” crowd who is only too content to keep us on the cover of magazines where we will remain just another pretty face.
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A new animated holiday comedy based on the first Christmas is opening in theaters on November 17.
Commentary by Susan Brinkmann, OCDS
After actress Mila Kunis announced that she is making monthly donations to Planned Parenthood in the name of Vice President Mike Pence, pro-lifers responded with a brilliant display of the determination that has kept them in this fight for forty years by pouring donations into pro-life organizations in the name of the Vice President.
A 74 year-old man who stole the hearts of America by walking the streets every day in search of a kidney for his ailing wife has finally found a donor!
During today’s General Audience, Pope Francis went off-script to scold people who use cellphones during Mass to take pictures, calling this behavior a distraction that takes our focus away from the Eucharist.
The heroic virtue of John Paul I, the pope who reigned for just 33 days in 1978, has been officially recognized, paving the way for him to be declared “venerable.”The Catholic Herald is reporting on an announcement by the Congregation for the Causes of the Saints that they have voted unanimously in favor of the “heroic virtues” of Pope John Paul I. This means Pope Francis can now sign a decree declaring him “venerable.”
Miracles are already under investigation and, if certified, could lead to his beatification in the near future.
Albino Luciani was born into a desperately poor family on October 17, 1912, in Canale D’Agordo, a little village in northern Italy. He knew what it was like to suffer hunger as a child and to be forced to beg for food, especially during World War I.
“Our family had very, very little money,” his brother Edoardo told the John Paul I Association in an interview, “but . . . all of us always had smiles on our lips and we knew the most joyous and carefree childhood. My father, when he was working at home, used to whistle from morning till night.”
Albino’s earliest impression of the Church was equally positive. As he would write many years later, in his childhood he felt that “the Catholic Church not only is something great, but also something that makes the poor and the little ones great, honoring and uplifting them.”
These humble roots never left the heart of the man who would one day be known as the “smiling pope.” After becoming a priest, he was a gifted preacher who delighted people with fascinating sermons that contained simple stories that were full of wisdom.
A brilliant man, he was also known for his astounding memory which allowed him to recite long passages from the books he had read.
As he moved through the ranks of the Church, he found himself participating in all four sessions of the Second Vatican Council in Rome and brought these teachings back to his congregation.
As the John Paul I Association recounts, Albino had hoped that Pope Paul VI would decide that some form of artificial birth control might be allowed but when Humanae Vitae was issued in 1968, he wrote to the people of his diocese asking them to join him in a “sincere adherence to the papal teaching.”
Even after becoming Patriarch of Venice, he would be widely criticized for this position but he never wavered in his insistence on obedience to Church teaching. In spite of the criticism and the rampant dissension in the Church that was occurring at the time, he remained beloved by the people because of his humility and simplicity. He would often put away his pectoral cross and walk through the streets of Venice talking with people. When he traveled, he took the steamboat with the rest of the people rather than a private vehicle.
This simplicity of heart remained even after he received his cardinal’s hat from Pope Paul VI at the consistory in March 1973.
Through it all, Albino remained a man of prayer, the Association writes.
He said, “I speak alone with God and Our Lady, I prefer to feel like a child rather than an adult. The miter, the skullcap and the ring disappear; I send the adult on vacation and the bishop too, with the staid, serious and dignified behavior that go along with them, in order to abandon myself to the spontaneous tenderness that a child has for his father and mother.”
When Pope Paul VI died in August 1978, the cardinals looked for a man who would carry on the reforms of Vatican II and also teach authentic doctrine. Albino was their choice.
“He was elected by an overwhelming majority of the cardinals on the first day of the conclave,” the Association writes. “He amazed the world at his first appearance on the balcony of St. Peter’s to give his blessing by his smile, which radiated the love of God. He took the first double papal name in history, and was the first Pope qualified to put a ‘First’ in front of his name in a thousand years.”
He would reign for just four weeks before dying suddenly of a heart attack in the middle of the night on September 28, 1978.
The heart of this great man of the Church can be summed up in the words he spoke in his first sermon to the people of Venice.
“God sometimes loves to write great things not on bronze or marble, but actually on dust, so that if the writing remains, not wiped out or dispersed by the wind, it will be clear that the merit belongs completely and solely to God. I am the dust.”
Pope John Paul I, pray for us!
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