Saint Joseph Parish:
Receipts for parish purposes: $1,051.00 from the Sunday envelopes; $48.00 from the second collection (plate); $34.00 from the Dues envelopes; $95.00 from the Building Maintenance envelopes; $25.00 from the Christmas envelopes; $98.00 from the loose.
Total: $1,351.00
Receipts for non-parish purposes: - 0 -
Analysis: When one deducts from the total of the receipts for parish purposes ($1,351.00) our weekly financial obligation to the Diocese, i.e. assessments ($329.54), plus our weekly premium for property and casualty insurance ($464.00), plus our weekly subsidy to Trinity Academy ($358.17), the sum total of which is $1,151.17, one sees that $199.83 is available from this collection for operating the parish.


Saint Vincent DePaul Parish:
Receipts for parish purposes: $850.00 from the Sunday envelopes; $111.00 from the second collection (plate); $15.00 from the Dues envelopes; $8.00 from the Building Maintenance envelopes; $90.00 from the loose.
Total: $1,074.00.
Receipts for non-parish purposes: - 0 -
Analysis: When one deducts from the total of the receipts for parish purposes ($1,074.00) our weekly financial obligation to the Diocese, i.e. assessments ($229.38), plus our weekly premium for property and casualty insurance ($282.46), plus our weekly subsidy to Trinity Academy ($250.98), the sum total of which is $762.82, one sees that $311.18 is available from this collection for operating the parish.

* Usually scheduled on Wednesday, but scheduled on Thursday this week because of a commitment the pastor has on Wednesday afternoon this week.

* Usually scheduled on Wednesday, but scheduled on Thursday this week because of a commitment the pastor has on Wednesday afternoon this week.

“Starting this year, no American will be forbidden from serving the country they love because of who they love.”
                                                                                                                                  President Barack Obama

I consider it more or less a patriotic duty each year to watch the President deliver his State of the Union address to Congress.
So, that’s what I did this past Tuesday (25 Jan). I fired up my DVR so that I could watch it later in the evening, before going to bed.
Whenever I listen to something, I try to process it through my brain. I try not to let myself get carried away with emotions.
I’m especially on guard when I listen to orators like President Obama, who can talk a dog off a meat wagon and who can say the most absurd things in the most enticing way.
First of all (although least important), the sentence cited above is grammatically wrong: “No American” is singular and requires a singular relative pronoun. So it should read “he loves” or “he or she loves” not “they love”. And the “who”, being the object of the verb “love” should be “whom”.
But grammar is the least of my concerns, although I would think that the President of the United States would have someone who can insert proper grammar into his speeches.
What gets me is the patent absurdity of the assertion that no one should be barred from military service because of whom he or she loves!
Of course no one should be barred from military service because of whom he or she loves!
That’s not the point!
The point is this: Should a person be barred from military service if he or she openly solicits sodomy or makes it known to his or her fellow members of the military that he or she is interested in doing so?
I would dare President Obama to revise his sentence as follows:
“Starting this year, no American will be forbidden from serving the country they love because they openly solicit oral or anal intercourse.”
I’d like to see what kind of a standing ovation that sentence would elicit from the assembled worthies in the Halls of Congress!
May God protect all of our sons and daughters in the US military!
Come, Lord Jesus!

WE SHARE THE MAIL
Background: Father Rutler is the pastor of Church of Our Saviour in Manhattan. He is a former Anglican priest, now a convert to the Catholic Church. He is a master of the English language and a man with a great sense of humor. I read his weekly column and always learn something from him. I decided to point out to him a grammatical error in one of his recent columns. Here is my email to him and his to me.
Dear Father Rutler:
I know that I am being bold by suggesting that a grammatical error snuck into one of your writings, but bold shall I be.
In your column of 23 January, you quoted Revelation 2,17 as follows:
"To him who overcomes, to him I will give some of the hidden manna, and I will give him a white stone, and a new name written on the stone which no one knows but he who receives it” (Rev. 2:17).
Should it not be “but him who receives it”?
“But” in this case is an infinitive of separation and, as we all know, infinitives take the accusative.
Pedantically but respectfully,
EBC

Dear Father Connolly:
Ach, ye are weel right. The eunuch translations now get around the pronoun by saying "the one" or "the person." Ugh!
But I plead that I grew up with the Authorized Version (id est King James) that has it as I have it - for who has more right to define the King's English than the King?
King James: "He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches; to him that overcometh will I give to eat of the hidden manna, and will give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name written, which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth."
I am in my Scottish / Stuart mood as this evening at a Burns Supper I am delivering the Address to the Haggis in Lowland Scots dialect. They do not bother with pronouns at all.
Best wishes,
GWR