DON'T have a nice day

Remember all those big yellow smiley faces popularized back in the 70s?  Well, they're starting to take effect.  Congratulations! We have all become nice. We are nice about everything.  We are so nice that we are at war with ourselves. We have capitulated the very principles we claim to esteem.  We are toxic nice. 

We are nice about our parenting. The value is placed on being our child's friend and not offending their tender sensibilities.  In my own experience I have been advised that there are very cool parents in my child’s very parochial high school that actually drink and get high with their kids. Me and my Neanderthal ways of thinking! No wonder my parents and I didn’t get along so well.  We weren’t bonging.  This new crop of parents really have it figured out. How nice.

We are nice about education: From the Hot Air Greenroom…… I always thought that schools should focus on teaching our children subjects like reading, writing and math. Not so, evidently! That’s for fuddy-duddy, old school philistines. Nowadays, with that thing called Progress and hopeandchange ™ , our children are being taught about things like oral and anal sex and ‘fisting’. Often under the guise of abstinence programs and without the consent, or even the knowledge of, their parents…Montana is just the latest example of where this dangerous sexploitation of your children is occurring.  If the prop passes, Montana kids in the fifth grade, will be taught there are several types of intercourse, and by the sixth grade, the draft document states that students should, “Understand that sexual intercourse includes but is not limited to vaginal, oral, or anal penetration; using the penis, fingers, tongue or objects.”

Real education that included the great books, the Socratic method and a sense of wonder has been downgraded to self-esteemism & how to properly wear a condom.  Techniques over principles.  Nice.

We are nice about our medicine. We don’t like using nasty and offensive words like abortion or euthanasia so we’ve renamed them to much nicer words like “Choice or Mercy”.  This way people don’t have to feel bad if they choose to do something like kill someone. One former hospital administrator here in Arizona was so nice that she saved the life of a young mother…at the expense of her unborn child. (And the mean, cranky bishop of that nun-administrator excommunicated her for that).  You can bet that the “Nice Police” were all over that story.

You know, the Brits are nice too. Back in 2008, they were so nice that they adopted sharia law.  This nice little law treats women as second-class citizens, supports stoning and allows fathers to outright "own" the children of a marriage after the age of 7.  This law sits juxtaposed next to their British legal code for all Muslim-British subjects and if we aren’t careful, this nice duplicity is coming to a municipality near you.  Just ask Canada. This is not to mention anything at all about that nice little Mosque-ish Community Center being ginned up around near Ground Zero. That’s got “nice” written all over it.  And if you don’t support it…you guessed it…Not Nice. 

We’re very nice at church. We’ve tried to please everyone with an all-inclusive liturgy that promotes wide varieties of feel-good, cocktail music performances that neither elevate or inspire.  We’ve made it nice for all folks to participate in parts of the liturgy that used to be reserved for the priest only.  We have formed nice committees that decorate our church, not the way that it should be decorated but according to some nice person’s standards. Why? I told you already…Because it’s nice.  We hate having to tell someone that they might be inappropriately dressed at mass because the “who are you to tell me how to dress” condemnation thought bubble keeps popping into your own stream of consciousness.  Remember the last time you said it?  Or thought it?  What stopped you?  Your own Nice Police.  That’s who.  They are in your brain.

All of this niceness can be disastrous on the digestion.  I had the privilege of hearing Bishop Olmsted at a recent pro-life luncheon exhorting us not to be nice.  He reminded us that the word “nice” comes from an much older word that means, “silly, foolish and nonsensical”. 

Jesus talked about being “nice”.  Maybe not in the same way, but he spoke about having two minds about things or being duplicitous. Being this way is the opposite of yesterday’s gospel passage of “entering through the narrow gate”.  It’s much easier for me to tell you yes, than to tell you no; to try to take the easy way out than to take personal responsibility; to make up a little story about something than to be honest; to show up and make proclamations at church on Sunday and then deceive my boss at work on Monday.   This, as we know, has a real spiritus vomitus feel to it.

Because we no longer believe in absolute Truth any longer, we have come to accept special versions of personal truths because it's nicer to do so and less offensive. This is relativism. It can be given the name Luke Warm and he can turn in to a real problem.

So what’s a nice person to do? (And this is a much for me as it is for you).

1.     Start with yourself.  Charity begins at home!  Before you start rummaging around for that speck in your neighbor’s, or wife’s, or dad’s eye, you might try extracting that huge beam from your own. For how are we to really see the Truth about things, if we cannot see at all?

2.     Check the integration of your Values versus your Principles.  Your values are your personal special truths composed just for you.  Your Principles are the harder-to-live-up-to core set of beliefs to which you aspire. Your principles are your moral compass.  They get your conscience talking. Values and Principles are two different things. If I value the first commandment then I will make every human effort to attend Mass on Sunday. But if I value anything above this principle, (my pillow, the mall, my vacation plans) then when I am most vulnerable, my selfish values will win the day.  If I value sobriety but I also value the fun I have while drinking, then when I am most vulnerable, my selfish values will win the day. If I value my marriage but I also value being right, then when I am most vulnerable my selfish values will win the day. The most effective people that I know match their values with their principles.  This is a fun experiment…try it.

3.     Scavenger Hunt for real Truth, Goodness and Beauty.  I did a web search on the Doctrine of the Transcendentals and was amazed at what a dearth of knowledge there is out there on the subject. If you study the great philosophers (and the best are located here in the Church), you will find that the perfection of these principles: Truth, Goodness and Beauty is God. Truth is God’s imprint on the mind, Goodness is God’s imprint on the will and Beauty is God’s imprint on the emotions. After employing this study for a time, I guarantee you, your notions of nice-ness will change.

If you really hate the idea of not being nice, try changing your paradigm of that word to Kind.  Personal example:  I was walking my dog along the usual route when I happened to notice a nice lady (sheesh..there it is again!) on her morning run.  Something was different about her.  She had a plastic grocery bag in hand and stopped every so often to deposit litter into it that she spotted along the roadside.  She was the “quicker picker upper”. When she came within earshot, I yelled out to her:  “How kind of you!”  And I really meant it. 

Mind-Blowingly Sacred

THIS, my friends, is Sacred Music.  It is glorious. It is elevating. It is what polyphony sounds like. It is uniquely and universally the music of the whole Church. Enjoy.  Your ears will thank you.

The Better "Mel" Story

With saturation effect firmly in place over the latest Mel Gibson flap, it is appropriate that we have a better, albeit miraculous "Mel" story.  This one hits real lose to home since this "Mel" is a friend of mine.  Please enjoy our two most recent miracles below and watch for all the others that follow from this amazing woman's life. 

By Mark Henry

PHOENIX, AZ, August 4, 2010 (Catholic Online) - It all started out 7:00 a.m. Wednesday morning when Melanie Pritchard texted my wife Tina telling her that she was going into labor and "asking for prayers." After Tina and I returned from morning Mass, Melanie's friend Meghan called Tina in tears telling us that Melanie's heart stopped during delivery and she desperately needed our prayers.

During the frantic drive to the hospital, my wife was distraught. She loved Melanie like a younger sister.  In Melanie's eyes, her greatest accomplishments are being a loyal wife to her husband Doug and dutiful mother to her son Brady.  To the public, Melanie is a nationally known pro-life speaker and the founder of the Foundation for Life and Love, an educational organization that seeks to preserve and promote the dignity and sanctity of human life at all stages. Melanie is the former Education Director for Arizona Right To Life.

Melanie is much in demand as a vibrant speaker to youth and adult groups on pro-life issues, modesty and chastity.  Melanie and her husband Doug teach marriage preparation classes for the Diocese of Phoenix using Pope John Paul II's Theology of the Body writings.  Melanie's Catholic spirituality is steeped in the Culture of Life and thoroughly imbued with the teachings of Pope John Paul II.

My wife first became acquainted with Melanie when Melanie graciously agreed to serve, without pay, as a virtues coordinator in a modesty and chastity apostolate my wife runs.  Melanie is a mentor of countless young Catholic girls, a fabulous role model of motherhood, chastity and modestly and treasured by the pro-life community in Phoenix and beyond.

In the dreadfully long drive to the hospital, we felt helpless and wondered what could we possibly do for Melanie? Well, let's pray a decade of the Rosary. We also prayed to Pope John Paul II that he would intercede for a miraculous healing of Melanie, a prayer that we and countless others would invoke many times over the next 24 hours. After our drive time prayer, we still had quite a bit of time before reaching the hospital so we started calling everyone we knew, requesting their fervent prayers and to pass the word by email.

I called contacts I had in Catholic media, both new and traditional.  Fortunately, I got through to close friends at Immaculate Heart Radio, St. Joseph Communications and other Catholic media outlets who faithfully responded and immediately started broadcasting prayer requests for Melanie on the radio, internet and other media.  I am a contributing writer for Catholic Online and a member of the Catholic Online Writers Circle. The other members joined the cascade of prayer being offered for Melanie. Of course, Melanie's friends and family had already started prayer requests of their own and impassioned pleas for prayer made to many convents, monasteries and religious orders.

Very quickly news of Melanie's critical condition spread like a digital wildfire with "prayer for Melanie" requests now going "viral" online.   The pray it forward juggernaught to save Melanie had begun in earnest with many specifically praying for Pope John Paul II's intercession to save the life of his loyal spiritual daughter, Melanie.

When we got to the hospital, the news was worse than we thought.  Melanie had suffered an amniotic embolism and there was massive internal bleeding. Her heart had stopped again, twice, and they were rushing her into surgery again. There was a real likelihood of heart and kidney failure.  I learned later that the medical condition Melanie was experiencing was usually fatal.

There was some good news, however, which was that Melanie and Doug's new born daughter Gabriella Cecilia was healthy after her emergency C-Section delivery. Additionally, Melanie's brother Larry, a renowned heart surgeon, was on the scene and keeping a keenly trained medical eye on everything.

Melanie somehow made it through the surgery but then suddenly she took a turn for the worse.  Fr. John Muir, a childhood friend of Melanie and Doug, arrived at the hospital and administered the last rites to Melanie. Melanie's husband Doug was told that Melanie was slipping away and it was time to say his final goodbye to Melanie, the love of his life.  Shortly thereafter, Melanie's parents and sisters also proceeded to Melanie's bedside to bid her goodbye.

By now, legions of prayers were storming heaven from Melanie's bedside, from the local community and throughout the country as well. Prayer vigils were organized at a number of Phoenix parishes and all the way across the country at a Theology of the Body conference in Philadelphia they took a break to pray for Melanie's healing.

Inspirational stories of personal faith conversions of those hearing and reading about Melanie's faithful fight for life started coming in. Melanie's friend Brooke told us about the man in the Midwest who had never attended Church but read the email appeal for prayers for Melanie and was so inspired that he went in to the nearest Church to pray. Brooke's sister, Meghan, told us of the security guard at the hospital who was a lifelong Catholic who had never been to adoration before, but after hearing about Melanie he went to the adoration chapel and spent the night on his knees, in prayer. Father John Parks excitedly told us about the long confession lines after the prayer vigil for Melanie at Mt. Carmel Parish in Tempe, Arizona.

Throughout the country, a rising multitude of prayers were rising up for Melanie and her family.  The sheer magnitude of this prayer groundswell first became apparent to me when one of Melanie's younger tech savvy friends excitedly exclaimed that "Prayers for Melanie" made the "Top 100" on Twitter.  I am told that Twitter has one-quarter of a billion visitors, so being in the Top 100 is pretty amazing.

At the hospital,  Melanie's husband Doug, her parents Jim and Sherry Welsch and their other children exhibited a degree of faith and fortitude that was hard for me to fathom.  Looking back now, I realize that they were being spiritually lifted up in this most difficult of times by the chorus of prayers being offered for them by rapidly increasing numbers of Catholic faithful throughout the country.

Something that really stood out to me was Melanie's father Jim's reply when I asked him how he was doing. This was after Melanie's third heart attack and her life was ebbing away. He replied that he loved his daughter, he was praying for her recovery but the most important thing was that if God was calling Melanie to heaven then he would accept God's will.  To me it was a supernatural manifestation of faith, one that God just could not ignore.

Every hour, against all odds, Melanie continued her fight for life. The fact that she survived the second surgery this Thursday night stunned and amazed a hospital nurse who was in the operating room when Melanie was being operated on.  When this nurse returned to work Friday morning, she exclaimed to Melanie's family that Melanie was a "walking miracle."

When we returned to the hospital Friday morning, we were astounded to see Melanie awake, talking and pushing a walker around and determined to get out of the hospital and taking care of her family. Many who witnessed Melanie's amazing recovery were starting to realize that God had certainly answered the prayers of His faithful. 

It is above my spiritual station in life to discern whether Melanie's recovery is a miracle or not. What I do know is that she has survived against overwhelming odds and that the coming together of such a large and diverse community to pray for her healing is an amazing thing to behold. 

Interestingly enough, the cause of Pope John Paul II's canonization has apparently been delayed since Sister Marie Simon-Pierre's previously thought miraculous recovery from Parkinson's disease may have been premature with the recurrence of Sister Marie's medical condition.  If this is true and the postulators for John Paul II's cause are one miracle short they may need to look no further than what just happened to Melanie Pritchard here in Phoenix.  If a faithful pro-life Catholic mother, wife and leader like Melanie Pritchard could advance the canonization of her spiritual mentor Pope John Paul II, it would be fitting indeed.

Please continue to pray for the continued healing of Melanie and prayerfully consider supporting her work at the Foundation For Life And Love.

Martha, Mary & the Cross

My most current graduate course is taking my brain to places where angels fear to tread: the synaptic gap, as it were. So the simple fact that I'm able to put any creative thoughts together is nothing short of a miracle. My class is covering psychopharmacology, or in less vulgar vernacular, uppers, downers and all-arounders. It is fascinating stuff. I'm learning about how the brain is wired together, how it seeks to balance itself and how it gets "stuck" sometimes in places where it should not be, namely addictions. I'm learning about what lurks in the medicine cabinet of pill poppers and I'm wondering why they use names such as Oxycontin, Talwin, Propoxyphene and Darvocet rather than better descriptors such as "powderthatwillmakeyoupuke", "willaddictuforever", "demonpill", "killingmepainfully" "donteventhinkaboutit". This is not to say that people should give up their pharmaceuticals. There are plenty of sound medical reasons why meds are necessary to good mental health. But there should be balance, caution and wisdom in these choices...


So speaking of balance, did you happen to catch the Gospel from yesterday? Mary chose the better part of sitting at the Master's feet whilst Martha ran around in an amphetamine-like delirium cooking, baking, sweeping, fixing, serving, ing, ing ing. She was probably ready to ING Mary in the kisser for doing all of that sitting. We all know a Martha or two. They are busy folks… running around doing important stuff. They are your PTA presidents. They organize the classroom Christmas party (or should I say--Winter Wicca Solstice Celebration); they have mastered the fine art of busy-ness and when they sit down, they are probably quilting or knitting or constructing something out of popsickle sticks for their four year old. Trust me, it will be of Smithsonian quality when they are done. They can make forts out of cardboard boxes that rival dwellings in Better Homes and Gardens and design jewelry out of polyurethane. They French braid with one hand and thumb wrestle with the other. They actually MAKE their children's halloween costumes and could proudly and accurately do veterinary surgery on Rover atop picnic table gurney if push came to shove. Their hand-crafted Christmas cards are done in October and mailed by November 1. Why do you think Martha Stewart is named Martha, anyway??

And then there's Mary. Sweet, slow, unshakable, contemplative Mary. Just sittin around taking it all in. I am certain that the Mary's of the world are responsible for much of the prescription drug abuse by the Martha's of the world, but that will save for another day. I'm soooo glad that the Lord fixed this situation by saying: "Mary has chosen the better part". I'm just sure that Martha shrugged her shoulders, giggled and staggered off to fill the dishwasher. Ah, but there's the rub. Jesus was never convenient. Nor was He politically correct in my estimation. He poetically magnified this situation: Martha, you’re busy and anxious about many things.

You see, I think we are each individually made up of both qualities of these powerful women. We have moments of Marthathon and moments of Marydom. The key to it all is keeping a balance of the best of both. The single best representation of how this works in my view is a view of the cross. The horizontal beam represents our Martha. It is the position that we take in the world in relation to our neighbor. It is our service to our fellow man. It is our outstretched hand to the leper at the side of the road; the careful touch of a bandaid on an injured knee. A readiness to listen to a hurting friend who has need of an available friend. Martha represents the necessary action which supports our words and thoughts. Martha points up the reality that “faith without works is dead”. Martha’s activity was not the problem here per se, it was her attitude: she became “burdened by the service”. She lost sight of what Mary was seeing.

Jesus admonishes Martha and explains to her that there is more to life than mindless activity, even though the activity in and of itself may be good. He reminds her that He IS the Life and Mary has chosen the better part by her single-minded focus on that one timeless Principle.

Mary, keeping the LORD as her priority was planted at His feet and fixed on His direction. Mary reminds us of the vertical beam of the cross; the one that reaches heavenward. It is truly, the posture we must aspire as we remain teachable, trainable followers. Martha may be a clean, rushing river that over time, carves out a canyon whereas Mary is a deep, plentiful, still aquifer that is tapped in time of drought and supplies life-giving sustenance. Mary’s gaze is prayer. Martha’s unburdened activity is also prayer. When we balance the two, we see their intersection: the cross.

I’m probably a Mary trapped inside of a Martha if that makes any sense. I still feel like I need to be “doing something” with my prayer. Somehow I will figure out a way to reconcile the two. The synergy of Martha/Mary may in fact be the Martha leading me gently to Mary and together we dissolve into His gaze.

“And it will not be taken from her”. (Luke 10:41)

An Open Letter to HS Principals

A Speech Every American High School Principal Should Give
(Dennis Prager...hmmm, I think he's on to something)


"To the students and faculty of our high school:

I am your new principal, and honored to be so. There is no greater calling than to teach young people.

I would like to apprise you of some important changes coming to our school. I am making these changes because I am convinced that most of the ideas that have dominated public education in America have worked against you, against your teachers and against our country.

First, this school will no longer honor race or ethnicity. I could not care less if your racial makeup is black, brown, red, yellow or white. I could not care less if your origins are African, Latin American, Asian or European, or if your ancestors arrived here on the Mayflower or on slave ships.

The only identity I care about, the only one this school will recognize, is your individual identity -- your character, your scholarship, your humanity. And the only national identity this school will care about is American. This is an American public school, and American public schools were created to make better Americans.

If you wish to affirm an ethnic, racial or religious identity through school, you will have to go elsewhere. We will end all ethnicity-, race- and non-American nationality-based celebrations. They undermine the motto of America, one of its three central values -- e pluribus unum, "from many, one." And this school will be guided by America's values.

This includes all after-school clubs. I will not authorize clubs that divide students based on any identities. This includes race, language, religion, sexual orientation or whatever else may become in vogue in a society divided by political correctness.

Your clubs will be based on interests and passions, not blood, ethnic, racial or other physically defined ties. Those clubs just cultivate narcissism -- an unhealthy preoccupation with the self -- while the purpose of education is to get you to think beyond yourself. So we will have clubs that transport you to the wonders and glories of art, music, astronomy, languages you do not already speak, carpentry and more. If the only extracurricular activities you can imagine being interesting in are those based on ethnic, racial or sexual identity, that means that little outside of yourself really interests you.

Second, I am uninterested in whether English is your native language. My only interest in terms of language is that you leave this school speaking and writing English as fluently as possible. The English language has united America's citizens for over 200 years, and it will unite us at this school. It is one of the indispensable reasons this country of immigrants has always come to be one country. And if you leave this school without excellent English language skills, I would be remiss in my duty to ensure that you will be prepared to successfully compete in the American job market. We will learn other languages here -- it is deplorable that most Americans only speak English -- but if you want classes taught in your native language rather than in English, this is not your school.

Third, because I regard learning as a sacred endeavor, everything in this school will reflect learning's elevated status. This means, among other things, that you and your teachers will dress accordingly. Many people in our society dress more formally for Hollywood events than for church or school. These people have their priorities backward. Therefore, there will be a formal dress code at this school.

Fourth, no obscene language will be tolerated anywhere on this school's property -- whether in class, in the hallways or at athletic events. If you can't speak without using the f-word, you can't speak. By obscene language I mean the words banned by the Federal Communications Commission, plus epithets such as "Nigger," even when used by one black student to address another black, or "bitch," even when addressed by a girl to a girlfriend. It is my intent that by the time you leave this school, you will be among the few your age to instinctively distinguish between the elevated and the degraded, the holy and the obscene.

Fifth, we will end all self-esteem programs. In this school, self-esteem will be attained in only one way -- the way people attained it until decided otherwise a generation ago -- by earning it. One immediate consequence is that there will be one valedictorian, not eight.

Sixth, and last, I am reorienting the school toward academics and away from politics and propaganda. No more time will devoted to scaring you about smoking and caffeine, or terrifying you about sexual harassment or global warming. No more semesters will be devoted to condom wearing and teaching you to regard sexual relations as only or primarily a health issue. There will be no more attempts to convince you that you are a victim because you are not white, or not male, or not heterosexual or not Christian. We will have failed if any one of you graduates this school and does not consider him or herself inordinately lucky -- to be alive and to be an American.

Now, please stand and join me in the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag of our country. As many of you do not know the words, your teachers will hand them out to you."