Apr

25

Snapshots

April 25, 2008 |

An American hero comes home this weekend.  Sgt. Matt Maupin, from Cincinnati, was missing in action in Iraq for the past four years.  His remains were finally found last month.  His body arrives in Cincinnati tomorrow morning.  There will be a 20-hour visitation at his community’s civic center.  The funeral is Sunday at Great American Ballpark (the Reds’ park) and is expected to draw a packed house.  All Cincinnati stations are covering it, as is the Armed Forces Network.  Thousands are expected to line the 15 or so miles to the cemetary.  Sgt. Maupin is being escorted home by his brother, Marine Sgt. Micah Maupin.  This family is all-American - we owe them the deepest of our gratitude.  They have paid a steep price for our freedom and continue to put it on the line.  May God bless them and comfort them.

Back in October, an Ohio state representative from northern Ohio was giving a presentation on how a bill becomes a law to a high school class when a photo of a topless woman appeared on the screen.  HE BLAMED IT ON HIS TEENAGE SON!!  It has now come out that he lied, and also that he knew the woman and the other women whose pictures were on the memory stick he was using for the presentation.  What’s worse? - that he was getting these women to take their clothes off for him, that he was dense enough to put the photos on the memory stick he was using for presentations to high school students, or that HE BLAMED IT ON HIS SON!!  Jeez!  In any case, the House Minority Leader asked him to resign.  He is now history.

Today is the Feast of St. Mark - check out this summary of his life and writings at Catholic Culture.  Did you know that it is believed that the “Upper Room” referred to in Acts 12 was the home of St. Mark’s family?

How do we get lapsed Catholics to come back home?  Check out Catholics Come Home especially these videos - Epic and Movie.  If you haven’t already seen these videos, you should.  In fact, every Catholic should watch them - jaw-dropping.  Here is a good summary of the good work they are doing.

I’m not sure there is a right answer to the question of what to do about the kids involved in the Texas polygamist sect - but they need our prayers.  May Mother Mary take special care of them.

Padre Pio’s remains are on display and being venerated in San Giovanni Rotondo in Italy.  Hundreds of thousands are expected to come.  St. Pio was a man of our times who led his life completely and perfectly for the Lord.  If you don’t know much about him, google him and start reading.  Inspiring!

Fr. Kyle at Called by Name wrote about a recent experience at Barnes & Noble’s where he noticed that there was a table in the main walkway of the store titled “Thought Provoking.” The table had books on it which are supposed to, I guess, provoke our thoughts.  In any case, there wasn’t one book about Christianity on it, but there were several books from atheist and other anti-religious authors.  Fr. Kyle cornered some poor guy and inquired into the lack of Christian selections on the table.  His answer shouldn’t be surprising - “the list comes to us from New York.”  I had a similar experience during the last election cycle when I noticed that a B&N “Political Issues” table had selections from only one side of the ideological spectrum (can you guess which one).  And some of the selections were quite crass and insulting at that.  When I inquired about the one-sidedness of the selections, I too was told that “the list comes to us from New York.”


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