Celebrating Babies on this very Special Day.

Hi everyone! Guess what?! Today is World Down Syndrome Day (21.03 - 3 x 21 chromosomes, get it?!)! As such, we thought...

Posted by Ollie & Cameron on Monday, March 21, 2016

Requiem Mass for Our Dear Friend, Fr. Robert Palladino, on Friday, March 11 at 11 AM

CANTORES IN ECCLESIA BULLETIN - March 7, 2016
Cantores Website About Cantores About Blake Applegate, director Directions to Holy Rosary Church Directions to St. Stephen's Church Donations Contact Us CANTORES IN ECCLESIA P.O. Box 2783 Portland, Oregon 97208-2783 Telephone: 503.295.2811 Email: cantores@ cantoresinecclesia.org Cantores in Ecclesia is also on	The Requiem Mass for our dear friend, Fr. Robert Palladino, will be celebrated in St. Mary's Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception on Friday, March 11, at 11 am. Although his sudden death came as a shock, we are grateful that years ago he had given Dean Applegate instructions for the music he wanted sung by Cantores in Ecclesia. In his beautifully calligraphed hand, he indicated the readings, plainsong and motets he had chosen for his funeral, when that time came. Sadly, that day arrived far too soon for us all. Fr. Palladino died in his home on Friday, February 26. We will always be indebted to him for his decades of support, encouragement and friendship. To say he will be greatly missed only understates our loss. St. Mary's Cathedral is located at 17th and NW Davis in Portland. The above picture of Fr. Palladino was published as part of a substantial and deeply deserved tribute to him in The New York Times on March 4 (online), and in the print version of the paper on March 6. To read this tribute in full, please click HERE.

LA’s Religious Ed Congress hosts transgender Catholics -

VOCAL helped  the gender terms of Patti, born male and Mateo, born female in this article.  Another note of interest, during this workshop there was apparently no one giving the Church's side of transgenderism.  Mr. FitzMaurice who is a homosexual, organized this workshop. 

Archbishop José Gomez during the closing Mass of the 2013 Religious Education Congress. (photo credit: Victor Aleman/Angelus)

The following comes from a March 7 Crux article by Michael O’Loughlin:
LOS ANGELES – Tens of thousands of Catholics descend on Los Angeles each winter to sharpen their ministry skills, partaking in dozens of workshops and seminars about liturgy, prayer, Bible, and parish life as part of the LA Religious Education Congress. With close to 40,000 participants, it’s the largest annual gathering of Catholics in North America, a celebration of all things Catholic.

But event organizers this year took a cue from popular culture and included a new session, one that attracted a standing room only crowd of 750 people, nearly all of whom jumped to their feet for a sustained round of applause after talks from two young, committed Catholics.

The name of the session? “Transgender in the Church: One Bread, One Body.”

Father Christopher Bazyouros, director of the office of religious education for the Archdiocese of Los Angeles

The Rev. Christopher Bazyouros, the director of the office of religious education for the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, said including the discussion in the program was an important first step for the Church in grappling with an issue that exploded onto the national consciousness last June when Caitlyn Jenner appeared on the cover of Vanity Fair, announcing to the world that she is transgender.
“There aren’t many places for Catholics to discuss these things that are thoughtful, intentional, and that gathers people who have had this experience,” he said. “Many Catholics want information about this topic, they want things to help them understand this situation.”

To that end, conference organizers invited two transgender Catholics to speak, both of whom were surprised and gratified that they were included. And both used their presentations to urge acceptance by the wider universe of Catholics.

Anna Patti (born male), a 23-year-old Michigan resident, told the crowd she didn’t believe “God made a mistake” with her, as some have said of transgender people.

In an interview after her presentation, she said having the opportunity to speak freely about her struggles and her joys was “an unexpectedly affirming experience.”

“I hadn’t realized how silenced I felt within the Church,” she said. “At Mass I always sit in the back row in the back corner, making myself as visibly small as possible. Here was the opposite, where people wanted to learn about an issue that is so often immediately condemned.”
“It was beautiful,” she said of the crowd’s reaction.

Mateo Williamson (photo from Dignity USA‘s giveoutday.org page)

Mateo Williamson (born female), a 24-year-old medical student at the Jesuit-run Loyola Medical School in Chicago, described with joy his deeply Catholic upbringing, part of a family that included several priests and nuns.

After his talk, he said many young people thanked him for sharing his story about living as a transgender man in the Church.

“Pope Francis’ charity, compassion, and call to mercy, it’s changed the tone in the Church,” he said. “He hasn’t been explicit about trans people, and there’s nothing in the Catechism, but there’s been a change among people in general to understand something they maybe haven’t encountered before.”
Pope Francis has spoken out repeatedly against so-called gender ideology, but Patti said she doesn’t interpret those comments as hostile to trans people.

In fact, she thinks the pope’s remarks about gender not being just a social construct actually support the transgender community by pointing out that gender identity is innate.

The LA Congress workshop sold out quickly, and some of the audience, which included several priests, seminarians, and nuns, said the fact it happened at all gave them hope about the future of the Church.

Arthur FitzMaurice, who speaks frequently about LGBT issues in the Church and who organized the workshop, said he believes it was the largest discussion devoted to transgender issues and Catholicism in the Church’s history. He said that organizers have already asked him to plan a similar workshop next year.

NEW VIDEO. Planned Parenthood OC Changes Abortions to Harvest Intact Fetuses for Lo...

Catholic Archdiocese of St. Louis Disbands Girl Scouts For Doing What CRS *Actually* Does - Could other Dioceses Follow?

*VOCAL is a member of Reform CCHD Now which is now part of the Lepanto Institute.                                                             

"For months, Catholic Relief Services have been playing the role of the wizard in The Wizard of Oz: nothing to see behind the curtain!  Pay no attention!

Then the Archdiocese of St. Louis did something so absolutely extraordinary...

I had to share it.

The Catholic Archdiocese of St. Louis finally gave the boot to the Girl Scouts of America because of  its intimate relationships with abortion and contraception providing organizations, such as Planned Parenthood. Specifically, the Archdiocese of St. Louis mentioned a favorite of Catholic Relief Services -- OxFam -- as a reason why Catholics could no longer trust them:

4. Organizations that GSUSA promotes and partners with are in conflict with Catholic values, such as Amnesty International, Coalition for Adolescent Girls, OxFam and more. This is especially troubling in regards to sex education and advocacy for “reproductive rights” (i.e. abortion and contraceptive access, even for minors)

What’s interesting about this is that according to a list of grants dispensed by Catholic Relief Services (CRS) for fiscal year 2014, CRS gave nearly half-a-million dollars to Oxfam.  We are currently analyzing the latest list of CRS grants for fiscal year 2014, but on average, between 86% and 90% of CRS’s grants to domestic organizations go to agencies that are acting in direct conflict with Catholic moral and social teaching.

To date, Catholic Relief Services has responded with "internal investigations" -- intimating that Catholic organizations investigating their practices are involved in "slander" and are "maliciously" raising questions as to why CRS is giving hundreds of thousands of dollars to an organization that is now condemned by at least one Catholic bishop.

CRS is clearly and deliberately intimidating the Lepanto Institute and other Catholic laypersons, religious, priests and bishops in order to silence any analysis of their anti-Catholic and prejudicial giving processes.

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE ON OXFAM AND WHY CATHOLICS NEED TO SPEAK UP.

To date, CRS has been very happy to attack and destroy anyone who even dares raise the question as to why Catholic donations are going to unCatholic organizations.  Now that the Archdiocese of St. Louis has marked OxFam as one of the bad guys, will CRS finally end the marketing campaign and threats of intimidation?  Or will they simply ramp it up?

We suspect CRS will simply double down on the attacks.  Which is why I am writing to you today: to please send us your maximum possible contribution so we can end once and for all the deceptive funding practices at Catholic Relief Services!

For some time, the Lepanto Institute has made it our mission to bring these facts to light, in service to our priests and bishops, in order to restore Catholic sanity and fulfill our Catholic mission -- to "restore all things in Christ" for the salvation of souls.

Millions of Catholics who faithfully work for and in service to Holy Mother Church are being deceived by a coterie of well-heeled bureaucrats willing to compromise what you and I believe as Catholics.  But when our donations and charity are used to fuel the fires of the culture of death, that is WRONG.

Without your gift of $35 or more, these facts might never come to light.  Our bishops and priests might very well be kept in the dark by these professional bureaucrats, and faithful Catholics every Sunday would give in charity to support things such as contraceptives, abortifacients, or worse when they believe they are feeding the poor, helping families, or building up the Catholic Faith.

It's time we -- as Catholics -- stood up with a clear voice and give our priests and bishops the support they need to investigate "institutionalized Catholicism" at places such as Catholic Relief Services -- organizations that serve themselves, but hedge on our Catholic faith.

That's the reason why the Lepanto Institute exists, to warn our priests and bishops and remain true to the teachings of the Holy Catholic Church.

It has been said that the solution for what ails the Catholic Church isn't diversity or community or dissent... but one word: FIDELITY.

If you believe as I do that the universal call to holiness is not a mere abstraction, but something our Blessed Mother desires most ardently for the souls of mankind, then I need your help -- and I need to show your support so we can continue to take on the enemies of Mother Church and keep the attention up and focused.

For one, I am so glad to see that the Archidiocese of St. Louis took this step!  We need to continue to show support for our priests and bishops who take courageous stands such as these in the face of the intimidation tactics, threats, and lies that are so often used to promote evil.

Can I count on your support for $35 or more today?

Please pray for the Church and for Lepanto's mission as we continue to unearth the truth and "restore all things to Christ." (1 Col. 1:20)

Christus Vincit!"

Michael Hichborn
President
Lepanto Insititute

PS:  REMEMBER that nothing we do here at the Lepanto Institute is done without the prayers and support of faithful Catholics such as yourself.  Bringing this information to light is hard -- we know it's hard to see -- but unless it is done, more victims of this senseless and outrageous pattern of deception will emerge.  Such deception is dangerous to our faith, our priests, and to Holy Mother Church, and we here at the Lepanto Institute remain dedicated to prayerfully and faithfully raising the tough questions -- all in faithful service to our bishops and priests.  Christus vincit! Christus regnat! Christus imperat!