The Santorum forum pt VIII: Rick's Arizona and Michigan primary saints

Reprinted on Spero News and RenewAmerica.

Satan is attacking the great institutions of America, using the great vices of pride, vanity, and sensuality... -Rick Santorum, from a speech to Ave Maria University in 2008

[Romanus] made a pilgrimage to the reputed spot of the martyrdom of St. Maurice, and...healed two lepers along the way. News of this miracle reached Geneva...and the bishop and all the townspeople turned out to greet him. -from Butler's Lives of the Saints on St. Romanus of Condat

On the outbreak of the First World War....[Fr. Brottier] enrolled as a volunteer chaplain and spent over four years on the front. He flung himself into the most dangerous situations, ministering to the sick and dying...almost miraculously [surviving] in positions where the average life expectancy was measured in weeks rather than months. -from Butler's Lives of the Saints on Bd. Daniel Brottier

Will the White House age Rick as missionary work aged Daniel?

During Wednesday's (Ash Wednesday's!) Republican debate, Rick Santorum was attacked (among other things) for his 2008 claim which thirty years ago (remember Ronald Reagan?) would have been cheered, but even today every devout Christian knows is true; that Satan is alive and well and thriving in America. As his Republican opponents (especially Romney and Paul) conspire with the Obamanites and the MSM to "paint" (remember the ad!) Rick's Catholic Christian conservatism as mean and extreme, let's look ahead to what heavenly help Santorum can look forward to against the powers and principalities Rick must overcome to win next Tuesday's Arizona and Michigan primaries.

Mormons, contraception, and Santorum: will Rick be 'pierced' by Macfarlane's 'sword'?

Reprinted on RenewAmerica and Spero News.

John Lanning was a bishop in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, [and] the director of public relations for LDS...Lanning's job was simple: foster in the minds of Americans that the LDS was a family-oriented, harmless, and ordinary Christian church...For over forty years Lanning had served the LDS diligently and brilliantly...and by the 1990s his public relations campaign had worked...[but] over time Lanning's attitude toward his religion had changed from unthinking acceptance to an exciting search for inconsistencies...his doubts increased...Lanning...considered suicide. He could no longer pray because he no longer believed in God--or at least...not the cartoon Mormon version of gods. "Who are you!?" John called out, his voice filled with misery. "Are you Lucifer or Jesus or something else?" -from Pierced by a Sword, by Bud Macfarlane Jr.

Lanning had been dead for twelve minutes by the time the ambulance arrived at the LDS hospital. Lanning entered a tunnel of light...and a being of light stood at the end of the tunnel...the being took the form of a woman...in a [black] hooded garment. He was anxious to see her face...but when he did he screamed. There were dark holes where her eyes should have been, and giant warts on skin as old and dry as the desert...her name...was Death. "Contraception, my sweet. Contraception has made you mine!" she cackled, as her skeletal fingers beckoned him to...the flames [and] the lake of fire. -from Pierced by a Sword, by Bud Macfarlane Jr.

To elect a Mormon to the American presidency would...be a disaster. -Jimmy Akin, senior apologist for Catholic Answers and contributing editor for Catholic Answers Magazine

Having just finished re-reading Bud Macfarlane's Pierced by a Sword, his classic 1995 novel of Catholic apocalyptic apologetics, I am struck by how much his prophecy comes into play in the 2012 presidential election. For if Michael D. O'Brien's novel Father Elijah correctly predicted the increased promotion of abortion and loss of religious liberty the election of an Obama-esque president would bring, a "Pierced" Romney-like character shows that going from a lying, smiling socialist to a smiling, lying Mormon is like going from, well, the frying pan into the lake of fire. But if John Lanning escaped the flames (if not martyrdom) perhaps Pierced says there's still hope for us (and the US) too...

Parable of the "prodigal papa": Michael D. O'Brien's "The Father's Tale"

Reprinted on RenewAmerica and Spero News.

To enter into the domain into which this book takes its readers is to find oneself in the precincts of Holiness...The scrim that lies between ordinariness and That Which Lies Beyond...is pierced. -from author Thomas Howard's The Father's Tale review

The best of Michael O'Brien's novels. He creates characters like Dickens, explores human relationships like Austen, and has the epic scope of Tolstoy and Dostoevsky...will merit inclusion in any list of the world's greatest novels. -from Fr. Joseph Fessio's TFT review

There are no perfect parents in this world, Andrew. None. We all make our mistakes, and we leave marks and gaps in our children's lives. But we do love them--imperfect love, as all human love is. Then, when children become adults and have their own families, they begin to understand. They in turn learn the need for forgiveness. In prison I learned to forgive my own father, and saw that he needed to forgive his father. No one is exempt from this. It goes all the way back to Adam and Eve.

You're saying that you want me to forgive you...the best father in the world?

Yes, whenever you are ready... -from The Father's Tale

Despite the glowing book-jacket compliments, conventional wisdom says that when the average 2012 "reader" looks up (or picks up!) Catholic writer/artist extraordinaire Michael O'Brien's latest and greatest novel The Father's Tale (Ignatius Press, 2011) and discovers it has ONE THOUSAND AND SEVENTY TWO pages (not counting "Author's Notes") 99% percent of the texting, twittering masses will put it down forever, never to explore the eternal wisdom contained within. But orthodox Irish writers, whether it be the Canadian O'Brien or the American O'Toole, are too much dreamers to believe in conventions, so if O'Brien can pierce "ordinariness" and what "Lies Beyond"; bridge heaven and earth in a work of fiction, surely an O'Toole review should be able to close the gap between those who (still) read books and those who can't handle more than 150 characters. Granted, the gap between those who read and write and those who twitter and tweet is almost as great as the gap between heaven and earth, but O'Brien and O'Toole (both prodigal father's themselves) believe in the power of writing's "secret weapon," the Eucharist...

Campaign 2012: The Ballad of Rick Santorum

Today is the day the music (aka Buddy Holly, Richie Valens, The Big Bopper) died. Let Rick Santorum's ballad bring the music alive again !!

Rick Santorum feels we should stick to our core principles, constitutional as well as spiritual; we can't do this without God! This song was written with these values in mind, echoing the unvarnished record and beliefs of a man of Faith, Rick Santorum. -Jack Bond, 1-28-12, Feast of St. Thomas Aquinas