The following, originally published on my friend Stuart McCullough’s blog, is reproduced with his permission. Stuart’s blog: http://ecumenicaldiablogspot.com is well worth a visit.
There is a custom in the Catholic Church of a Month’s Mind Mass, which liturgically is the Mass on the 30th day after death or burial. As ‘The Tablet’ finally died as a Catholic magazine with its 5th June 2010 pro-abortion issue, today is it’s Month’s Mind. Others will write, and have written, long polite articles explaining The Tablet’s long and painful spiritual death. So I will focus on a couple of points; personal insulting of women and what is to be done now.
My Wife and I lost a child two years ago through an ectopic pregnancy, for The Tablet to try and use this to promote abortion (by claiming this is an example of the Church permitting “abortion”) is at best evil. This is an insult to countless couples who have had to live through this tragic situation. The only thing that could be worse than this is to think of the Priests & Bishops, under whose pastoral care we are, showing us and our deceased children nothing but contempt by reading this rag.
It is a sin to read this rag or to allow it to be sold in your Church. “But I don’t read all of it, I just like the articles by…..” To support evil financially is not okay even if you don’t read all of it. “I’m just the Curate, not the Parish Priest there is nothing I can do about it.” So ask the PP to stop selling it and if he won’t, ask your Bishop for a transfer! That may ruin your career Father, but Hell is full of the prudent who tolerate evil. “If I stop selling it that will upset some of my parishioners.” Oh dear! Human respect leads to Hell.
“What about the right to debate and free speech?” I doubt that The Tablet will print an article by Bishop Richard Williamson SSPX on World War II or Nick Griffin (BNP) on Race-Relations. No reasonable person believes in unlimited ‘free speech’.
I will stop now, the bottom line is; if you have a subscription to The Tablet cancel it today, if you read it stop today, if you sell it stop today, if you write for it stop today.
…… and I couldn’t resist this:
by Left-Footer
The people at The Tablet
Are feeling low as Hell.
Their lonely little magazine
It‘s Not selling very well.
On tables, shelves, old, yellowing
Unsold, the copies lie.
“What can be done to save our jobs?
What is there left to try?”The sun declines, the wine, undrunk,
Grows tepid in the glasses.
“Why don’t we imitate The Sun,
Pitch at the unchurched masses?“We could be tabloid, topless, pert,
Support the Hierarchy –
Rubbish Hans Kung, attack the Prods
Call ‘We Are Church’ mularky.
“Proclaim Humanae Vitae and
Damn heresy and schism,
Show Stanford and that lot the door
And plug the Catechism.”
“Ok, you’re on, let’s seize the day
No time for indecision!
We’ll be with Benedict all the way.
Maybe call for the Inquisition.”
They did it all. Their phoenix rose
And circulation rocketed.
Their sad hearts quailed with guilt , but oh
The profits that they pocketed!
Catholicism Pure & Simple 
A welcome reminder! Tablet should be avoided…..some “capsules” do damage.
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Or perhaps the Tablet should have some big warning letters stamped on the front page, like those on packets of cigarettes: “READING THIS KILLS (THE SOUL)” !!
I have some very dear friends – devout Catholics – who not long ago also suffered the loss of a much-wanted baby through an ectopic pregnancy. That the Tablet could infer anything as twisted as this being “an example of the Church permitting abortion” really makes my blood boil.
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Many thanks, this is still by far my most read blog post
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People’s understanding of cases where the Church considers a mortal sin to be “forgivable” is very often confused, given the poor state of much of our catechism…
Any and all abortions, and any and all manslaughters, are mortal sins, and they incur an automatic excommunication latae sententiae — that is to say, they incur a requirement for confession, repentance, and a necessary absolution to lift that excommunication.
Instructions and teachings provided to priests and bishops concerning the casuistics of where the committing of such sins can be seen as being enforced for medical reasons, or for self-defense purposes, or any other such grave cause (and thereby mitigated to whichever extent by a diminished power of free will) should NEVER be understood as constituting any kind of “permission” to commit any sins.
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...and any, and all manslaughters… says Jabba, but no mention of murder.
An entierly different category?
Open to interpretation, no doubt.
Toad knows virtually less than nothing about the theological bent of “The Tablet.” But it seems, from what he reads on CP&S, to be practically a Marxist appologia (for which he still has a minute scintilla of sympathy) for our “vitas.”
However, he can’t be bothered to buy it and see for himself..
So, he should keep his counsel.
However, the hatred, from others on CP&S, is palpable. Possibly reasonable.
Oh, well. “Turn the other cheek?”
Best thing Jesus ever said?
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…and any, and all manslaughters… says Jabba, but no mention of murder.
An entierly different category?
No.
And I don’t hate you either.
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Toad wasn’t specifying you Jabba, and he knows you don’t hate him. It was people who seem to actually hate a magazine that puzzled him.
What next?
Hating Hello! ?
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Oh Toad, how you twist things !
Hate is a very strong word. Certainly I disagree with the Tablet’s outlook, and it puzzles me how any faithful Catholic would not. And OK, yes, I hate some of the garbage they write, but for all I know the journalists who write in the Tablet are simply misguided, poorly catechised or plain ignorant of Catholic Doctrine. One couldn’t hate them for that now, could you?
P.S. Or perhaps they are just mischief-makers…. eh, like you ;-).
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