NEW ORLEANS TO BE INVADED BY GOP

From TPM:

Conservative activists, presidential hopefuls and Republican officials descend on New Orleans Thursday for the 3-day Southern Republican Leadership Conference -- the first big test of 2012 mettle since President Obama scored his health care victory. It's also the first major GOP event in a city devastated by Hurricane Katrina in 2005, which contributed to the end of Republican rule in Washington.

From Sarah Palin to Mike Pence the Republicans who may challenge Obama two years from now will attempt to win over conservatives at one of the premiere events for the GOP. Just about everyone considering a bid will appear, except former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, who is finishing out his book tour. Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty will address the conference via video. Pawlenty is opting to attend a welcome-home ceremony for soldiers returning from Iraq instead.

Below is the list of Republican hopefuls who will grace New Orleans with their awesome presences.

Former Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA)
Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX)
Former Gov. Mike Huckabee (R-AR)
Gov. Bobby Jindal (R-LA)
Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN)
Former Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK)

Ta-dah! A star-studded event, surely. Shall I make my reservations? Ah, but they're coming Thursday, so it's probably too late to reserve one of the best rooms.

I say bring it on, guys. Bring your money with you, and spend, spend, spend like there's no tomorrow. Lots of - ah - interesting entertainment, you know. New Orleans needs your bucks.

Another potential candidate, Liz Cheney, will appear.

The conference opens Thursday morning and the first big speaking events will be that night when Mary Matalin, Cheney, Newt Gingrich and JC Watts address the crowd. Friday kicks off the big show, with Palin, Jindal and Texas Gov. Rick Perry speaking in the afternoon. Saturday afternoon will feature Pawlenty's video address, Paul, Pence, Santorum, RNC Chairman Michael Steele and Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour.

And our governor, Bobby Jindal, will not simply have a night with the stars, he will BE one of the stars.

THREE NEW BLOGS

1. Joshua at Sic Deus Lixet Mundum. Joshua is not only a new blogger but a new Episcopalian. He was received into the Episcopal Church on Ash Wednesday. Welcome into the fold, Joshua.

2. Laurie and Mary at Dirty Sexy Ministry. What to say about Laurie and Mary? The two young women are Episcopal priests, from Louisiana, of all places!!! and they are quite naughty, as you would never guess by the name of their blog.

3. Episcopal Bear at - well, um - Episcopal Bear. EB left the following comment at Wounded Bird:

Psst! Grandmère Mimi?

Off topic, but wanted to let you know that I've shamelessly swiped your "Windsor Compliance" statement. Crediting you as the source, of course!

Check out Episcopal Bear, my new blog & contribution to Teh Librul Wing of Teh Episcopal Blogosphere.

New Bloggers, hear me. Now that I've linked to your blogs, you'd best keep writing, so I won't need to do a retraction of my recommendations. I hate it when I have to do that.

I'M SORRY! I'M SORRY!

From the AP via the Times-Picayune:

It was the Catholic calendar's holiest moment — the Mass celebrating the resurrection of Christ. But with Pope Benedict XVI accused of failing to protect children from abusive priests, Easter Sunday also was a high-profile opportunity to play defense.

"Holy Father, on your side are the people of God," Cardinal Angelo Sodano told the pontiff, whom victims of clergy sexual abuse accuse of helping to shape and perpetuate a climate of cover-up. Sodano, dean of the College of Cardinals, dismissed those claims as "petty gossip."

The ringing tribute at the start of a Mass attended by tens of thousands in St. Peter's Square marked an unusual departure from the Vatican's Easter rituals, infusing the tradition-steeped religious ceremony with an air of a papal pep rally.

Dressed in gold robes and shielded from a cool drizzle by a canopy, Benedict looked weary during much of the Mass, the highlight of a heavy Holy Week schedule. But as he listened intently to Sodano's paean, a smile broke across the pope's face, and when the cardinal finished speaking, Benedict rose from his chair in front of the altar to embrace him.

"[A]n air of a pep rally"? I suppose the characterization will be labeled as more persecution by the media.

Jewish leaders, and even some top Catholic churchmen, were angered after Benedict's personal preacher, in a Good Friday sermon, likened the growing accusations against the pope to the campaign of anti-Semitic violence that culminated in the Holocaust.

The preacher, the Rev. Raniero Cantalamessa, told Corriere della Sera daily in an interview Sunday that he had no intention "of hurting the sensibilities of the Jews and of the victims of pedophilia," expressed regret and asked for forgiveness.

He was quoted as saying that the pope wasn't aware of what the sermon would say beforehand, and that no Vatican officials read the text before the Good Friday service.

The apology satisfied one Jewish leader, Elan Steinberg, vice president of the American Gathering of Holocaust Survivors and their Descendants.

"Now that he has apologized and the Vatican has distanced itself from those remarks, the matter is closed," Steinberg said in a statement.

Since Fr Cantalamessa apologized, I won't say more about the matter, either.

Meanwhile back in Anglicanland comes another apology.

From the BBC:

The Archbishop of Canterbury has expressed his "deep sorrow" for any difficulties caused by his comments about the Catholic Church in Ireland.

His claim that the Church had lost all credibility because of its handling of child abuse by priests was criticised by both Catholic and Anglican clergy.

The Catholic Archbishop of Dublin, Diarmuid Martin, said he was "stunned".

Dr Rowan Williams later telephoned Archbishop Martin to insist he meant no offence to the Irish Catholic Church.

BBC religious affairs correspondent Robert Pigott said Dr Williams' words represented unusually damning criticism from the leader of another Church.

Did Archbishop Williams speak anything but the truth? It seems to me that he had nothing for which to apologize. Once again, the ABC waffles and ends up pleasing no one.

STORY OF THE DAY - NO MORE SECRET

I will always remember the day the sun
shone dark on your hair & I forgot
where we were & kissed you lightly on
the nose & suddenly there was no more
secret.


THOSE WERE THE DAYS!




Not the best quality picture or sound, but the best I could find of the original performance of the song by Mary Hopkin. There's another with sound quality that's a bit better, but the video is so terribly out of sync that it makes me crazy.

From StoryPeople.

I KNOW IT'S STILL EASTER, BUT...

GLOBAL FACTS ABOUT SEX


AT ANY GIVEN MOMENT:


FACT:

79,000,000 people are engaged in sex - right now.


FACT:

58,000,000 are kissing.


FACT:

37,000,000 are relaxing after having sex.


FACT:

1 odd person is reading this blog.


YOU HANG IN THERE SUNSHINE......


Doug strikes again!

CHRIST IS RISEN! ALLELUIA, ALLELUIA!

 

GRECO, El - "The Resurrection" - 1577-79
Church of Santo Domingo el Antiguo, Toledo

EASTER COLLECT

Almighty God,
through your Son Jesus Christ
You overcame death and opened to us
the gate of everlasting life;
grant us so to die daily to sin,
that we may evermore live with him
in the joy of his resurrection:
who lives and reigns with you
and the Holy Spirit,
one God now and for ever.
Amen.

(New Zealand Prayer Book, p.593)

Painting from the Web Gallery of Art.

HAPPY EASTER!

 

 

 

From Doug and me to all of you.

TENEBRAE RESPONSORIES

 

MadPriest at Of Course, I Could Be Wrong posted a Hipcast of a lovely version of the Holy Saturday Victoria: Tenebrae Responsories. You may want to have a listen. I liked the music so that I bought the album from eMusic.

CHRIST IN THE TOMB

 

HOLBEIN, Hans the Younger - "The Body of the Dead Christ in the Tomb" - Kunstmuseum, Öffentliche Kunstsammlung, Basle

Indeed, the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing until it divides soul from spirit, joints from marrow; it is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. And before him no creature is hidden, but all are naked and laid bare to the eyes of the one to whom we must render an account.

Since, then, we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast to our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin. 16Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

Hebrews 4:12-16

Not a pretty picture, is it? Click on the painting for the enlargedment. The painting shocked me upon first view, but it seems a realistic portrayal of a decaying body.

Note on the painting from the Web Gallery of Art:

Portraits apart, this is perhaps Holbein's most striking image. Since Dostoevsky's observations in the nineteenth century, which dwelt on the forbidding aspects of physical decay and bodily corruption, the painting has been seen as the product of a mind steeped in the apocalyptic horrors that were unleashed by the first phase of the Reformation. But what is known of Holbein's phlegmatic interpretation of the human condition belies this interpretation. Modern authorities suggest that Holbein intended to stress the sheer miracle of Resurrection and its imminence, since the minutely-observed level of decay in the gangrenous wounds suggests that we see Christ's body three days after death.

An inscription in brush on paper, 'IESUS NAZARENUS REX IUDAEORUM', borne above the painting by angels holding the instruments of the Passion, precludes its use as a predella panel (at the base of an altarpiece), as does our viewpoint of the body. Instead, a role as an object of contemplation, a reminder of Christ's sufferings and mortification and his subsequent triumph, is suggested. Such practices flourished from the late middle ages and account in part for the many representations of the dead Christ from Lombardy (the Bellinis in Venice also produced several). Mantegna's famous version grapples with artistic as well as religious problems in its dramatic foreshortening, which are not fully resolved. By contrast, Holbein's draughtsmanship appears masterly.

An unverified tradition asserts that a drowned body fished out of the Rhine served the painter as a model for the figure of Christ lying in the tomb. Even if it is not true, the legend is a telling testament to the terrifying realism of Holbein's depiction of a corpse in a state of rigor mortis.

NO BLESSING FOR YOU

Ruth Gledhill in the Times:

Like a Druidic emissary from Tuatha Dé Danaan, the mythic inhabitants of Ireland, the Archbishop of Canterbury will lob a spiritual depth charge at Pope Benedict XVI on Monday when he damns the Catholic Church in Ireland as having lost all credibility.

Dr Williams also reveals on the BBC Radio 4 programme Start the Week that he is withholding his blessing from Anglicans who choose to take advantage of the Pope’s offer of a special home in the Catholic Church for disaffected Anglicans. “God bless them. I don’t,” he says, witheringly.

Ruth also comments on Fr Cantalamessa's sermon at the Good Friday service which the pope attended on Good Friday.

His [Dr Williams] difficulties are as nothing compared with the child abuse tsunami that threatens to drown Roman Catholicism. Yesterday it got a whole lot worse for the Roman Catholic Church when the Pope’s personal preacher, Father Raniero Cantalamessa, likened accusations against the Pope and the Church in the sex abuse scandal to the “collective violence suffered by the Jews”.

H/T to Марко at Amictus Sindone for the link to the Times.