Sunday, July 28, 2013

Prayer: Expressing an Inner Desire to Receive Help

Readings for the 17th Sunday in Ordinary Time:

17th Sunday in Ordinary Time

By Deacon Lawrence N. Kaas
July 28, 2013

I would like to share with you today what I would consider three points of interest, all in one way or another dealing with prayer.

The first bit of interest is that of the Holy Father in Brazil. He did not go there only just to schmooze with the kids, although it is obvious that this is very important for him, he nevertheless comes to Brazil in order to pray not only with the young people but with all the people of the region.

So this last Wednesday we find him at a shrine to our Lady called our Lady of Aparecida, for there he wanted to pray. It was important for Francis to add this day and this visit as a time of prayer to our Lady. Who by the way he calls, Mom.

This statue of the Virgin Mary is about 40 cm tall and is black. Partly I suppose because it was found in the river of Paraiba in three pieces. Tradition says that this statue, being black, means it wants to be close to the oppressed and the fact that it was found in pieces symbolizes the broken lives of slaves.

Francis knows full well the power of prayer even spending time in prayer with Pope Benedict, emeritus before going to Brazil. The most important part of Francis's mission is to pray the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass not only for the youth but for the world at large. Much more of this story is available to you on Internet and I would encourage you to look it up and read it so that you too may share the vision of Pope Francis.

Secondly I want to share with you a little bit of the trip that father Statz and I took now just a little over a week ago; and that was to the Shrine of our Lady of Guadalupe, La Cross, Wisconsin, at a workshop sponsored, by Queen of the Americas Guild. This retreat workshop concerned art and architecture that you all may, well know, father and I are both highly interested. The title of the workshop worshiping God through art and architecture is expressed in the words of St. Juan Diego, "I want very much they build my sacred little house here."

This shrine to our Lady is a recently built shrine that expresses what can be done for the love of Jesus through Mary. You walk up a trail of little more than a half-mile long to one of the most beautiful churches built in our time. The trail reminds you that you are on a journey and that journey is to give praise and honor to our Lady under the title of our Lady of Guadalupe. Walking into that church leaves one's jaw hanging down. Then to see the artwork along each long axis of the church likewise is so stunning that words cannot describe and furthermore maybe the lack of words is prayer itself. And wouldn't you know the first very large painting on the left-hand wall as you come into the church is the most beautiful painting of Divine Mercy and St. Faustina. I stood there in awe, really not even able to pray: not only because of its beauty but what it represents in the life of the Church in our world today. Sometimes words are not adequate in prayer so finally we must allow our heart to speak.

And we find that we are to celebrate Mass with Cardinal Burke and father is to concelebrate. Father wants me to come with him to be Deacon of the Mass and I don't want to. Why is a good question. Maybe I just didn't feel adequate enough. But nevertheless that finally is what happens so twice I am the Deacon of the Mass for Cardinal Burke, a very kind and gentle man, called the patron of this shrine of our Lady of Guadalupe. I really didn't get into trouble, however Bishop Madera informed me that I was not incensing correctly. You don't incense down here he said but up here, and I said, okay, I can do that, so the next time you see me incense it will be done correctly by the directions of Bishop Madera. Another point of interest for you might be that maybe you should think twice about complaining when father uses incense because the Cardinal knows how to use incense. He not only had a little spoon to fill the sensor, but a scope, and I mean he scooped it in. Advice to me was maybe you have to hold your breath a little bit once in awhile. I say this looking at you, maybe you need to bring a gas mask or a fluffy handkerchief, than having to hold your breath. All for the praise and glory of God in prayer. For incense rising is a symbol of our prayers rising to heaven.

One other brief point, was a very old Monsignor. who looked to be 110 going on a 120. I looked at him and he so much looked like father Harden, who I knew as our retreat master that I said to him you look very much like father Harden, he said, he's my brother. Small world.

Many homilies could be preached on the words of the our father, as found in the Gospel for today, but I want to draw your attention to the opening words, Our Father, because in these two simple words, is what a little Jewish boy would express as he calls out Abba. With much love, petition and fear of loss. To find and hold onto the father is an answer to all of our prayers. Father, I love you I worship you and give you all Honor and Glory. In finding You the desires of an earthly life are fulfilled, in the heavenly life we will find Eternal Life, to Know You to Love You to Serve You is life itself.

A closing thought: there are many bold claims made for prayer. Some bumper stickers even read: "prayer changes things." Of course, then you and I might ask, what does prayer change? I think we will find that more often than not we will find that things do not change so much around us, as changes are made with in us. Prayer certainly gives us a new perspective on things. Prayer gives us a new power over circumstances. Prayer changes more things than we will ever know!

Each time that we pray, whether we pray, Our Father, Hail Mary, Jesus I trust in you, we express an inner desire to receive the help we need to live a Good Holy life and that we may spend Eternity with You in Heaven.

So you all be good, be Holy, preached the Gospel always, and if necessary use words!
'Thank you' to Deacon Kaas, for letting me post his reflection here.
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Getting a Grip About Poverty, Wealth, and Amos

Depending on who you listen to, 'those Christians' are nutjobs who hate booze and Bingo; or wackadoos who believe that God is a sort of sugar daddy.

Prudes, Poverty, and Profit Prophets

I've run into folks who seem convinced that physical pleasures are naughty.

The way some carry on about 'the world, the flesh, and the devil,' I get the impression that they don't approve of the visible world in general. Lust is a bad idea, by the way, and another topic. (1 John 2:16)

They also generally insist that God made this world, but I have no idea how they'd explain how God made a creation that's basically bad: and not notice. Unless maybe Genesis 1:31 isn't 'Biblical?!' Our current situation, by the way, involves free will and original sin, which doesn't mean what you may have heard.

Since wealth often brings some measure of physical comfort, this lot tends to see affluence as a sin.

Others seem equally convinced that God is obliged to heap wealth on folks who support a particular church or ministry. I haven't heard anyone call it a 'pay for prayer' program, but that's what it amounts to. I've discussed the prosperity gospel before, and it's a bad idea.1

I think folks who equate poverty and virtue, or who expect God to make 'good people' rich, are sincere.

I'm also quite sure that they're wrong.

'My Way or the Highway?'

Deciding that being wealthy is a bad idea can, for an individual, be a milestone on the way to Sainthood. But that doesn't mean that everybody needs to be poor.

Some Saints were extremely wealthy, and didn't let that get in the way of doing what's right. That doesn't mean that everyone should have the biggest house in town.

'My way or the highway' isn't, I think, a particularly good way to run a business: or anything else. Believing that everyone in the world should be just like me? That's silly, at best. 1 Corinthians 12 says differently, and that's almost another topic. (August 26, 2010)

Then there's the notion that burying a statue in your yard will magically increase the value of your house. That's wrong on several levels:

Rich, Poor, and Saintly

I think it's easy for Americans to look at folks like Saints Francis and Claire, both of Assisi, and assume that all Catholics should be Italians who live in poverty.

It doesn't work that way.

Saint Louis was king of France. He was not poverty-stricken. At all.

Sir Thomas More, former Chancellor of England, made sainthood because he decided that execution was preferable to going along with a king's plan to start a private little national church. He wasn't in the 'I own a nation' economic class, but he was far from poor.

They became Saints because they "practiced heroic virtue and lived in fidelity to God's grace." (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 826)

Personal wealth or poverty don't matter, apart from providing different opportunities and obstacles. What matters is how we decide to use what we've got.

Snakes and Fish, Scorpions and Eggs

I can see how someone could cherry pick support for 'prosperity gospel' ideas from the Bible.

For example, today's Gospel reading, Luke 11:1-13, includes this:
" 'And I tell you, ask and you will receive; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.

"For everyone who asks, receives; and the one who seeks, finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.

"What father among you would hand his son a snake when he asks for a fish?

"Or hand him a scorpion when he asks for an egg?

"If you then, who are wicked, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the Father in heaven give the holy Spirit 5 to those who ask him?' "
(Luke 11:9-13)
Assuming that money, and the stuff money can buy, is all there is to life - - - that's a flawed assumption, in my considered opinion. I don't mind having money, at all: and I've never turned down a fee, even when I'd have done a job for nothing.

But I grew up in an era when too many Americans had given their kids everything money could buy, and little else. We're still doing disaster cleanup from that sociopolitical debacle. On the other hand, my generation helped correct some long-standing errors:
And that's yet another topic.

Amos and Ephas

Sometimes it's easy to tell who's the bad guy: he's the one with a top hat and narrow mustache.

Fall Production, McQuaid Jesuit, November 18-21, 2009
(from Arts, McQuaid Jesuit, used w/o permission)
" 'Adrift in New York or Her First False Step'
"An old fashioned melodrama"

Real life is a bit more complicated.

Amos was a shepherd who denounced the "hollow prosperity of the northern kingdom," which got him kicked out of Bethel.
"Hear this, you who trample upon the needy and destroy the poor of the land!

"1 'When will the new moon be over,' you ask, 'that we may sell our grain, and the sabbath, that we may display the wheat? We will diminish the ephah, add to the shekel, and fix our scales for cheating!

"We will buy the lowly man for silver, and the poor man for a pair of sandals; even the refuse of the wheat we will sell!'

"2 The LORD has sworn by the pride of Jacob: Never will I forget a thing they have done!"
(Amos 8:4-7)
I could select bits and pieces from Amos, and claim that being rich is a sin. That kind of trouble I don't need. Jeremiah 28:12-17, and all that.

It looks like being rich wasn't the problem. Trampling the needy, unjust meddling with commerce, and using wealth as a club: that was a problem. Sometimes it still is.

Speaking of prophecy for fun and profit, I won't contribute to America's perennial 'End Times Biblical prophecies!' - read all about it, just $19.95, or whatever mass-market paperbacks go for these days. For one thing, I couldn't do that sort of writing with a straight face; and for another, there's Revelation 22:18-19.

We've been on 'standby alert' for two millennia and counting, and that's yet again topic. (Matthew 24:3-4: Matthew 28:16-20; John 14:1-21; and particularly Mark 13:32-37; for starters)
If this post seems a little disjointed, I'm not surprised. It's been a hectic week, and I'm still catching up on sleep. Still, it could be worse. I finished another blog's post at about 4:00 a.m., Friday morning:
Getting a grip about:
1 I've discussed the prosperity gospel and other bad ideas before. (May 17, 2013) Here's some background:
"...The Renaissance and the Reformation have shaped the modern western individual, who is not weighed down by external burdens like merely extrinsic authority and tradition; people feel the need to 'belong' to institutions less and less (and yet loneliness is very much a scourge of modern life), and are not inclined to rank 'official' judgements above their own. With this cult of humanity, religion is internalised in a way which prepares the ground for a celebration of the sacredness of the self. This is why New Age shares many of the values espoused by enterprise culture and the 'prosperity Gospel' (of which more will be said later: section 2.4), ..."
("Jesus Christ The Bearer Of The Water Of Life," 1.1) [emphasis mine]

"...In a New Age perspective, illness and suffering come from working against nature; when one is in tune with nature, one can expect a much healthier life, and even material prosperity; for some New Age healers, there should actually be no need for us to die...."
("Jesus Christ The Bearer Of The Water Of Life," 2.2.3)

"...New Age training courses (what used to be known as 'Erhard seminar trainings' [EST] etc.) marry counter-cultural values with the mainstream need to succeed, inner satisfaction with outer success; ... some New Age devotees are involved not only to become more authentic and spontaneous, but also in order to become more prosperous (through magic etc.). 'What makes things even more appealing to the enterprise-minded businessperson is that New Age trainings also resonate with somewhat more humanistic ideas abroad in the world of business....they are likely to appeal to those businesspeople who have already been involved with more (secular) humanistic trainings and who want to take things further: at one and the same time for the sake of personal growth, happiness and enthusiasm, as well as for commercial productivity.(46)"
("Jesus Christ The Bearer Of The Water Of Life," 2.4) [emphasis mine]
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Friday, July 26, 2013

A Russian Meteor, Ancient Craters, and Coming Events

New imaging technologies help scientists study meteors and see what's been hidden under farmland in Iowa.
  1. Analyzing the Chelyabinsk Meteorite
  2. Iowa Craters
  3. Earth's Top 10 Known Impact Sites
The 'pure science' angle of this news fascinates me, but we've recently discovered a grimly practical application of astronomy.

A Bad Day for Dinosaurs

Now and then a rock several miles across hits Earth. That happened near what's now the Yucatan peninsula about 65,000,000 years back.


(Image © Don Davis; from PAINTINGS at www.donaldedavis.com)

Dinosaurs might have survived the Chicxulub impact: if there hadn't been another near-simultaneous asteroid strike, and massive volcanic eruptions.

There's an odd circular feature near the vulcanism, so there might have been three impacts that time. Earth can be a rough neighborhood.

Technology, Ethics, and Asteroids

We (probably) have plenty of time to get ready for the next 'K-T event.' But since cleaning up after even a small rock's demise is a big job, I think being prepared for incoming mountains is prudent.

Provided that legal issues don't get in the way, we'll probably have the technology to move asteroids into safe orbits in several years. Quite a few of those rocks are rich in iron and nickle, so funding shouldn't be a problem in the long run. Asteroid mining could be an important industry in a few decades.

I don't see a problem with changing an asteroid's orbit, by itself. Using science and technology are part of being human. How we use these tools involves ethics, and I've been over that before. (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2292-2295)

As for whether or not it's right to keep an asteroid from hitting Earth, I'll say what I've said before. We're called to holiness, not stupidity.

Asteroids, Spaceships, and a Little History

Two hundred years ago, folks knew about asteroids. A monk named Guiseppe Piazzi discovered the first one, Ceres, in 1801.

Over the next few years astronomers found 2 Pallas, 3 Juno, and 4 Vesta. A few years later they hadn't found any more of these 'minor planets,' and most decided that they could stop looking. Karl Ludwig Hencke didn't agree, and eventually spotted 5 Astraea.

One hundred years back, in 1908, something exploded over Podkamennaya Tunguska River.

Around that time the zeppelin was the latest thing in transportation technology, astronomers were using long-exposure photographic plates to find asteroids, and Konstantin Tsiolkovsky had shown how rockets could carry us to other planets.

Today, robot spaceships are exploring the Solar system, and the White-Juday warp field interferometer may show that Alcubierre's math is a good match with reality:

The Sicilian Connection

Guiseppe Piazzi was born in Valencia, died in Naples, and got a grant from the Viceroy of Sicily to build an observatory there.

Oddly enough, Guiseppe Piazzi wasn't looking for a new planet. Baron Franz Xaver von Zach had 24 other astronomers organized for planet-hunting, and that's another topic.

1. Analyzing the Chelyabinsk Meteorite


(Ural Federal University/V Gorkhovsky)
"Often referred to as the Chebarkul meteorite after the lake where many pieces were found, the space rock appears to be a standard 'chondrite' "
"Russian Chelyabinsk meteorite pieces go under microscope"
BBC News (July 12, 2013)

"Scientists have released microscopic images of fragments of the meteorite that hit central Russia in February.

"A team from the Ural Federal University was able to analyse some of the dozens of samples as soon as they were found.

"But the technique they used allowed them to assess the rock's chemical make-up at the microscopic level even as they snapped pictures of the fragments.

"This will provide extra information on the space rock's formation and journey.

"The fragments represent just a small portion of the remains of the 17m-diameter body that struck the Earth's atmosphere in a spectacular trail of light over the city of Chelyabinsk...."
The meteorite blew in windows and knocked a hole in at least one building when it exploded over Russia this February. I still haven't heard of anyone being killed in that incident, for which I'm duly grateful.


(Reuters//Yevgeni Yemeldinov, used w/o permission)
"Workers repair damage caused after a meteorite passed above the Urals city of Chelyabinsk February 15, 2013." (Reuters)

Rocks, Language, and Reporters

"...The team, led by Urals Federal University's Viktor Grokhovsky, determined right away that the overall chemistry of the meteorite was a familiar 'chondrite'.

" 'The fragments contain a standard number of minerals, including olivine, pyroxene, troilite and kamacite. These minerals that can be discovered only in outer space confirm the fragments' extraterrestrial nature,' he told the Voice of Russia at the time...."
(BBC News)
Maybe there's a problem with the translation here:
"...olivine, pyroxene, troilite and kamacite. These minerals that can be discovered only in outer space...."
The statement, as reported, isn't quite true. The mix of minerals may be distinctly extraterrestrial, but some of stuff, like olivine and pyroxene, is fairly common on Earth.

For example, folks have known about the iron - magnesium silicates we call olivines for thousands of years.

Peridot, an olivine, was a popular semiprecious gemstone back when Egypt had one of the world's leading civilizations: and no, ancient Egyptians did not come from outer space, which is another topic or two.

We've found olivine on Mars, too: so the mineral does 'come from outer space.' Sometimes.

Aztec rulers used quite a bit of jade, which is a pyroxene. Again, this mineral is found on Earth and Mars. Sodium calcium magnesium iron aluminum silicates aren't as common as dirt on this planet, but they're often part of igneous and metamorphic rocks.

Triolite shows up in rocks that come from Earth, but it's rather rare here. It's more likely to be in meteorites that come from our moon, or Mars: so if a rock that's lying around on the surface of Earth has triolite, the odds are pretty good that it came from somewhere else.

Kamacite is a iron-nickel alloy that shows up in meteorites: so that part of Grokhovsky's statement is accurate.

My guess is that Viktor Grokhovsky knows that olivines and pyroxene are native to Earth. We're probably looking at an accurate statement that was translated: and then filtered through two sets of journalists. Small wonder that it got a trifle garbled.

Old Rock, New Knowledge


(Ural Federal University/V Gorkhovsky)
"The X-ray maps show the precise distribution of individual chemical elements"
"...Simon Burgess of Oxford Instruments, which made the X-max silicon drift detector used by the team. "For the researchers who are looking at this meteorite, it's going to be telling them information about which (mineral) phase is associated with which," he [Oxford Instruments' Simon Burgess] told BBC News.

" 'When they get into more detail beyond what the main chemistry of the meteorite is, they may be looking at processes in terms of how it formed, the temperature it formed at, what its history has been since its formation, possibly things about what happened to it during its impact with the Earth.

" 'A lot of that you cannot tell just by crushing it up and getting a "bulk analysis"; you have to look at the chemistry of the individual parts and associations between the different minerals in the meteorite.'..."
(BBC News)
The Chebarkul meteorite may be as old as Earth. By studying it we may learn more about the very early days of the Solar system.

That's nice from the 'pure science' point of view: and could help us learn how and where to look for more falling rocks.

2. Iowa Craters

We call the place Iowa, recalling the Ioway or Báxoje who lived there for quite a while: that's different names for the same folks.

Spain's rulers said they owned the territory for a while, the French called it La Louisiane, New France in English, before handing it back to Spain, and losing a war. Then  France got liberated by folks who didn't like kings.

After several years of idealism and wholesale executions, a Corsican general named Bonaparte collected what remained of France, retrieved La Louisiane, and sold it to the United States.

The folks who actually lived there hadn't been consulted during those deals, and sided with the English when the United States bought the territory. I can't say that I blame them, and that's another topic.

Long before any of that happened, the real estate we call Iowa was occupied by corals, hadrosaurs, plesiosaurs, and mastodons: not all at the same time, of course.

Now and then something big fell out of the sky, which gets me back on-topic.

Decorah Impact Structure


(Created using ESRI's ArcScene; by Adam Kiel, Northeast Iowa RC&D; via USGS, Livescience; used w/o permission.)
"A three-dimensional view of Decorah, Iowa, and the Upper Iowa River with the location of the Decorah Impact Structure marked with the white dotted line. Scene is looking due north...."
"Meteorite Crater Under Iowa Confirmed in New Images"
Andrea Thompson, OurAmazingPlanet Managing Editor, LiveScience (March 6, 2013)

"Buried beneath the rocks, dirt, buildings and roads of the city of Decorah, Iowa, lies a 470 million-year-old meteorite crater.

"Unlike the craters on the pockmarked surfaces of the moon and Mars, this crater can't be seen by looking down at Earth's surface, at least not by the human eye.

"But recent aerial surveys primarily aimed at getting a better picture of the minerals that underlie the region got a look at the crater structure using instruments that detect the variations in gravity of different types of rock, as well as their ability to conduct electricity...."
Quite a bit changes in 470,000,000 years. Continental drift recycles ocean floors while rearranging land masses. Iowa has been flooded and drained a few times, alternately collecting sediments and getting them eroded into a new landscape.

Phrases like 'ancient as the hills' are meaningful in a poetic sense. Compared to a human lifespan, a hill seems permanent. I think the metaphor is still valid, even if we've long since learned that landscapes change.

Ancient Crater, Today's Mineral Resources

"Iowa Meteorite Crater Confirmed"
USGS press release (March 5, 2013)
"USGS Airborne Surveys Back Up Previous Decorah Research

"Recent airborne geophysical surveys near Decorah, Iowa are providing an unprecedented look at a 470-million-year-old meteorite crater concealed beneath bedrock and sediments.

"The aerial surveys, a collaboration of the U.S. Geological Survey with the Iowa and Minnesota Geological Surveys, were conducted in the last 60 days to map geologic structures and assess the mineral and water resources of the region.

" 'Capturing images of an ancient meteorite impact was a huge bonus,' said Dr. Paul Bedrosian, a USGS geophysicist in Denver who is leading the effort to model the recently acquired geophysical data. 'These findings highlight the range of applications that these geophysical methods can address.'

"In 2008-09, geologists from the Iowa Department of Natural Resources' (Iowa DNR) Iowa Geological and Water Survey hypothesized what has become known as the Decorah Impact Structure. The scientists examined water well drill-cuttings and recognized a unique shale unit preserved only beneath and near the city of Decorah. The extent of the shale, which was deposited after the impact by an ancient seaway, defines a 'nice circular basin' of 5.5 km width, according to Robert McKay, a geologist at the Iowa Geological Survey.

"Bevan French, a scientist the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History, subsequently identified shocked quartz - considered strong evidence of an extra-terrestrial impact - in samples of sub-shale breccia from within the crater....

"...The Iowa and Minnesota airborne geophysical surveys are targeting an igneous intrusion, known as the Northeast Iowa Igneous Intrusive complex, that may be similar to the Duluth layered igneous complex exposed in the Lake Superior region of northern Minnesota. Known copper, nickel, and platinum group metal resources were deposited during the formation of the Duluth complex. Both of these complexes are associated with a large structural feature known as the Midcontinent Rift, which is exposed in the Lake Superior Region but is covered by younger rocks as it extends to the south through Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas, and Missouri.

"This geophysical survey is part of a larger USGS effort to evaluate the concealed mineral resource potential of the greater Midcontinent Rift region that formed about 1.1 billion years ago."
About "the concealed mineral resource potential:" I'm not bothered by the idea that humans use natural resources. It's our job:

Manson Impact Structure


(Adapted from Iowa Geology 1999, Iowa Department of Natural Resources, via Iowa Department of Natural Resources, used w/o permission.)
"Cross-section view of the geologic features of the Manson Impact Structure."
"Iowa's Manson Impact Structure"
Raymond R. Anderson, Iowa Department of Natural Resources
Adapted from Iowa Geology 1999, Iowa Department of Natural Resources

"Seventy-four million years ago, near the end of the Cretaceous Period, central Iowa lay near the shoreline of an inland seaway that separated eastern North America from rapidly rising mountains to the west. The low-lying Iowa landscape was home to a rich and varied population of plants and animals, including dinosaurs and small mammals. These organisms lived in a fern-rich, mixed conifer and deciduous forest with a warm, moist climate much like today’s Gulf Coast. The environment dramatically changed when a stony meteorite, over one mile in diameter, weighing about 10 billion tons and traveling about 45,000 miles per hour, blasted through the atmosphere and crashed to earth.

"In the fraction of a second that it took the meteorite to penetrate about one mile into the ground, the shock wave created by the initial contact with the surface reached the back side of the meteorite and its potential energy was transformed to kinetic energy, the equivalent of about 10 trillion tons of TNT. An electromagnetic pulse moved away from the point of impact at nearly the speed of light, and instantly ignited anything that would burn within approximately 130 miles of the impact (most of Iowa). The shock wave toppled trees up to 300 miles away (Chicago, Minneapolis, and St. Louis), and probably killed most animals within about 650 miles (Detroit and Denver). The blast left a crater over 24 miles in diameter centered in an area of unimaginable death and destruction.

"Today there is no land surface expression of the crater that exists 100 to 300 feet below the town of Manson (Calhoun County), which lies near the center of the crater that bears its name...."
Decorah's 470,000,000 year old crater isn't the only one in Iowa. More recently, while the Rocky Mountains were under construction, Iowa had oceanfront property. It was a good time to be a dinosaur.


(Karen Carr, via "TheFernleaf" and Iowa Geological and Water Survey, used w/o permission)
" 'Dinosaur Society Hadrosaur,' by natural history and wildlife artist Karen Carr, courtesy of 'TheFernleaf'  "

Then, about 74,000,000 years ago, a mile-wide rock hit Earth. Going from 45,000 miles an hour to a full stop released around 10,000,000 megatons of energy: rather abruptly.

I'd just as soon not find out what a blast like that would do to our emerging global civilization.

The 'Manson impact' wasn't the big one for dinosaurs, by the way. That happened about 9,000,000 years later and a few thousand miles farther south.

3. Earth's Top 10 Known Impact Sites


(Detlev van Ravenswaay, Science Source, via National Geographic News, used w/o permission)
"An illustration of the Chicxulub impact crater in the Yucatán Peninsula."
"Asteroid Impacts: 10 Biggest Known Hits"
Brett Line, National Geographic News (February 14, 2013)
"The asteroid 2012 DA14 will miss Earth on Friday, but there's a long history of hits.

"There's one physical connection that isn't going down after Valentine's Day this year: Earth and asteroid.

"The asteroid known as 2012 DA14 will narrowly miss Earth this Friday, the closest asteroid flyby on record. But the planet has not always been so lucky.

"Earth's craters are enduring testaments to direct asteroid hits. And though millions-in some cases billions-of years of erosion have made it difficult to determine the exact size of the meteorites, there is a general scientific consensus around the world's largest craters, which mark the largest asteroid impacts...."
Four of the top 10 craters listed came from impacts in the last 100,000,000 years: a pair from around  67,000,000 years ago, and another roughly 35,250,000 years back.

Granted, we had something like a 5,300,000 year gap between the earlier set, and 700,000 years between the most recent. This 'top 10' list doesn't include smaller craters like the ones in Iowa, so if there is an 'asteroid season' on Earth it probably wouldn't show up in this set of data.
  • Vredefort Crater
    Free State, South Africa
    • 2,000,000,000 years b.p.
  • Sudbury Basin
    Ontario, Canada
    • 1,800,000,000 years b.p.
  • Acraman Crater
    South Australia, Australia
    • 580,000,000 years b.p.
  • Woodleigh Crater
    Australia, Australia
    • 364,000,000 years b.p.
  • Manicouagan Crater
    Quebec, Canada
    • 215,000,000 years b.p.
  • Morokweng Crater
    North West, South Africa
    • 145,000,000 years b.p.
  • Kara Crater
    Nenetsia, Russia
    • 70,300,000 years b.p.
  • Chicxulub Crater
    Yucatán, Mexico
    • 65,000,000 years b.p.
  • Popigai Crater
    Siberia, Russia
    • 35,700,000 years b.p.
  • Chesapeake Bay Crater
    Virginia, United States
    • 35,000,000 years b.p.

Falling Rocks

We live in a 'falling rocks' zone. Every day about 100 tons of sand and gravel become meteors.

Most of this cosmic debris is so small that we never notice it. Some makes a vapor trail bright enough to inspire 'wishing on a shooting star' folklore.

Every century or so, something like Kamensk-Uralsky's recent light show or the Tunguska event happens.


(Reuters/Amateur video via Reuters TV, used w/o permission)
"Trail of a meteorite crossing the early morning sky above the city of Kamensk-Uralsky February 15, 2013, is seen in this still image taken from video footage from a dashboard journey recorder...." (Reuters)

Kilometer-wide rocks fall out of the sky every few hundred thousand years. Bigger ones hit less frequently, so we probably won't have another 'Chesapeake Bay' impact for a million years.

On the other hand, those are average intervals. Asteroid collisions don't seem to happen on a schedule. We may have ten million years before the next 'big one.' Or we may have ten years.

I'm not worried, anxious, about falling rocks. I am, however, concerned, interested because I live on a planet that occasionally gets in the way of asteroids.

Now that we know about asteroid impacts, and are developing the necessary technology, I think we should start preparing for the next incoming mountain.

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Sunday, July 21, 2013

The Lights of Reason and Faith

I've said it before: "...I'm a practicing Catholic, so I don't have to check my brain at the door when I enter a church...."

One of the reasons I became a Catholic is that what I believe has to make sense. The logic I found in documents like "Humanae Vitae" made me take Catholicism seriously, but there's a 'warm fuzzy' side to Catholicism, too.



I've learned that the emotional perks are nice when they happen. We also recognize the "dark night of the soul," and that's another topic. Topics. (November 24, 2009, August 26, 2009)

Four Hands

I've started reading "Lumen Fidei," the latest encyclical letter. Pope Francis is listed as author, but he says that Benedict XVI started work on it:
"...'It's an encyclical written with four hands, so to speak, because Pope Benedict began writing it and he gave it to me,' Pope Francis said. 'It's a strong document. I will say in it that I received it and most of the work was done by him and I completed it.' "
("Pope Francis Releases his First Encyclical Letter," USCCB)
I put a news release about "Lumen Fidei" at the end of this post.

"A Law of the Mind"

Without reason, I wouldn't know right from wrong.
"Conscience is a judgment of reason whereby the human person recognizes the moral quality of a concrete act that he is going to perform, is in the process of performing, or has already completed. In all he says and does, man is obliged to follow faithfully what he knows to be just and right. It is by the judgment of his conscience that man perceives and recognizes the prescriptions of the divine law:
"Conscience is a law of the mind; yet [Christians] would not grant that it is nothing more; I mean that it was not a dictate, nor conveyed the notion of responsibility, of duty, of a threat and a promise. . . . [Conscience] is a messenger of him, who, both in nature and in grace, speaks to us behind a veil, and teaches and rules us by his representatives. Conscience is the aboriginal Vicar of Christ.50"
(Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1778) [emphasis mine]
Reason is a light that lets me see how my actions might affect others, and myself. But it's not the only light:
"...There is an urgent need, then, to see once again that faith is a light, for once the flame of faith dies out, all other lights begin to dim. The light of faith is unique, since it is capable of illuminating every aspect of human existence...."
("Lumen Fidei," Pope Francis)
Faith is important. So is reason. I've been over this before:
"Faith and reason are like two wings on which the human spirit rises to the contemplation of truth...."
("Fides et Ratio," Encyclical Letter, John Paul II (September 14, 1998))
"Man's faculties make him capable of coming to a knowledge of the existence of a personal God. But for man to be able to enter into real intimacy with him, God willed both to reveal himself to man and to give him the grace of being able to welcome this revelation in faith. The proofs of God's existence, however, can predispose one to faith and help one to see that faith is not opposed to reason."
(Catechism, 35) [emphasis mine]
"Human virtues are firm attitudes, stable dispositions, habitual perfections of intellect and will that govern our actions, order our passions, and guide our conduct according to reason and faith. They make possible ease, self-mastery, and joy in leading a morally good life...."
(Catechism, 1804)
Related posts:
"Pope Francis’s First Encyclical Emphasizes Life-Changing Faith"
United States Conference of Catholic Bishops news release (July 5, 2013)

"'Lumen Fidei' says faith like a light illuminating all of human existence Faith lets us see like Jesus, pope says Faith not for the fainthearted, says Pope Francis

"WASHINGTON-'Lumen Fidei' ('The Light of Faith'), the first encyclical of Pope Francis, says that faith is like a light illuminating all of human existence.

"The encyclical, begun by Pope Benedict XVI, his successor Pope Francis said, was released by the Vatican July 5.

"Dated June 29, the feast of Sts. Peter and Paul, 'Lumen Fidei,' considers the role of faith from the days of Abraham until modern times.

" 'The light of faith is unique, since it is capable of illuminating every aspect of human existence,' the pope said. 'A light this powerful cannot come from ourselves but from a more primordial source: in a word, it must come from God.'

"Faith heralds the transforming power of belief in Jesus, said Pope Francis.

" 'Faith does not merely gaze at Jesus, but sees things as Jesus himself sees them, with his own eyes: it is a participation in his way of seeing,' the pope said.

"Pope Francis offered his signature down-to-earth comparison.

" 'We trust the architect who builds our home, the pharmacist who gives us medicine for healing, the lawyer who defends us in court,' he said. 'We also need somebody trustworthy and knowledgeable where God is concerned. Jesus, the Son of God, is the one who makes God known to us.'

"Pope Francis noted faith's impact on the family, especially young people.

" 'Faith is no refuge for the fainthearted, but something which enhances our lives,' Pope Francis said. 'It makes us aware of a magnificent calling, the vocation of love. It assures us that this love is trustworthy and worth embracing, for it is based on God's faithfulness which is stronger than our every weakness.'

"The pope also pointed out that faith provides perspective in the search for truth, so that believers do not fall prey to great totalitarian movements on one side and relativism on the other. He warned of 'a massive amnesia in our contemporary world.'

" 'The question of truth is really a question of memory, deep memory, for it deals with something prior to ourselves and can succeed in uniting us in a way that transcends our petty and limited individual consciousness. It is a question about the origin of all that is, in whose light we can glimpse the goal and thus the meaning of our common path,' he said.

"Pope Francis addressed several contemporary concerns, including the environment and development of people.

" 'Faith,' he said, 'by revealing the love of God the Creator, enables us to respect nature all the more, and to discern in it a grammar written by the hand of God and a dwelling place entrusted to our protection and care.

" 'Faith also helps us to devise models of development which are based not simply on utility and profit, but consider creation as a gift for which we are all indebted; it teaches us to create just forms of government, in the realization that authority comes from God and is meant for the service of the common good.'

"He cited faith as a way to unity among peoples.

" 'Faith likewise offers the possibility of forgiveness, which so often demands time and effort, patience and commitment. Forgiveness is possible once we discover that goodness is always prior to and more powerful than evil, and that the word with which God affirms our life is deeper than our every denial. From a purely anthropological standpoint, unity is superior to conflict; rather than avoiding conflict, we need to confront it in an effort to resolve and move beyond it, to make it a link in a chain, as art of a progress toward unity.'

" 'The Light of Faith'('Lumen Fidei') is available from USCCB in print ($6.95) and e-book ($4.95) editions in English and Spanish. More information on ordering can be found at www.usccbpublishing.org or at l 800-235-8722 to order anytime."
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Friday, July 19, 2013

When the Volcano Stops Screaming - - -

A sound that's too low for humans to hear may let us predict when a volcano is about to erupt:
  1. A Screaming Volcano
  2. 'Volcano Forecasts:' Eventually
My native culture has some odd ideas about science and religion, like 'faith means not thinking.'

Depending on your frame of reference, that assumption is rather new, or mildly antique. Either way, it's not true.

"The Sin of Thinking?"

Non Sequitur's Church of Danae and her "faith based physics" is fiction. Folks trying to warp reality around their preferences isn't.

I doubt that many churches actually say 'thinking is a sin.' On the other hand, I've heard folks insist that what we're learning about the universe can't be true because 'it's not in the Bible.' I understand how someone might assume that religion and reason don't mix.

I'm Catholic, so I'm expected to think. Using reason is part of being human. (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1730-1731)

The light of reason lets us see beyond appearances to the deep truth of things. We can intuitively grasp the first principles of reality, and uncover new truths through reasoned analysis.

Being made in the image of God gives us enormous power and responsibility: and I've been over that before. (March 17, 2013)

Science and Religion

I see no problem with a lively interest in God's creation. It's filled with wonders and beauty, and is basically good: not perfect, but good. (Genesis 1:3-31; Catechism of the Catholic Church, 390-409, 282-284)

I like this creation, but some folks seem uncomfortable with it. Somewhere along the line, Plato's ideal universals, immaterial forms that are superior to their material 'shadows,' got hitched to a distaste for the material world.

The sort of dualism that sees physical existence as beastly or worse is a recurring blooper in Christian circles.

Faith and Reason

My faith isn't disturbed because one and one always equal two. I expect an orderly God to create an orderly universe, and I've been over that before, too. (April 25, 2011)

When folks discover a rational explanation for some natural phenomenon, that doesn't make me doubt that there's a rational God.

Faith and reason get along just fine:
  • Faith isn't against reason
    (Catechism, 35, 154-155)
  • We can know God by studying the created world
    (Catechism, 36)
    • But it isn't easy
      (Catechism, 37)
  • God's revelation
    • Confirms what reason shows
    • Reveals what reason can't show
    (Catechism, 38)

Belief and Seeking Truth

A fellow named Nietzsche had a talent for writing memorable one-liners. He also saw religion as unreasonable, emotional, and blind to truth. That was in 1865.

I see why folks who don't like religion, or feel that God shouldn't exist, say religion is unreasonable. Frothing radio preachers of my youth made religion look like a psychiatric disorder.

Then there's how some folks react to Darwin's ideas about evolution. Getting upset about how the world changes seems silly, at best. (May 15, 2012; January 18, 2012)

Some tried defending faith by agreeing that it doesn't make sense. They want to see faith:
"...either as a leap in the dark, to be taken in the absence of light, driven by blind emotion, or as a subjective light, capable perhaps of warming the heart and bringing personal consolation, but not something which could be proposed to others as an objective and shared light which points the way...."
("Lumen Fidei," Pope Francis) [emphasis mine]
This 'faith is a feeling' approach doesn't make sense: not to me.

I have nothing against emotions. They're part of being human. (Catechism, 1763-1770)

But we're supposed to make decisions by using reason: not necessarily 'because we feel that way.' (Catechism, 1767, 1951, 1954-1956)

1. A Screaming Volcano


(USGS/AVO, via BBC News, used w/o permission)
"The researchers studied the eruption of Redoubt in 2009"
"Volcanic 'scream' precedes explosive eruptions"
Simon Redfern, BBC News (July 15, 2013)

"A change in the frequency of earthquakes may foretell explosive volcanic eruptions, according to a new study.

"The seismic activity changes from steady drum beats to increasingly rapid successions of tremors.

"These blend into continuous noise which silences just before explosion...."
BBC News linked to 10 minutes of seismic sound and harmonic tremor from Redoubt Volcano in 2009, sped up to run in 10 seconds: "RedoubtScream," on soundcloud.com. It reminds me of an old fashioned tea kettle, when the 'I'm done' whistle starts up.

Volcanic Glissando

"...Those quakes continuously rose in pitch like a volcanic glissando - a musical glide from one pitch to another.

"Subterranean magma plumbing systems sit beneath volcanoes and feed pressurised molten rock toward the surface before eruptions.

"As the magma flows through deep conduits and cracks, it generates small seismic tremors and earthquakes.

"Scientists have noted earthquakes preceding volcanic eruptions before, for example drumbeat earthquakes were the first sign of renewed magmatic activity in Mount St Helens in April 2005.

"But the new analysis of Alaska's Redoubt volcano shows that the tremor glided to higher frequencies and then stopped abruptly less than a minute before eruption...."
(Simon Redfern, BBC News)
Authors of the Redoubt study say that maybe brittle fractures cause the 'scream.' Then again, they're not sure about exactly what's going on inside the volcano.

Similar tremors happened before the 1997 and 2003 eruptions on Montserrat, so listening for this sort of drumbeat-and-scream pattern may help predict eruptions. University of Cambridge's Dr. Marie Edmonds pointed out that we still don't know whether the pattern happens without a volcano going off.

Music and the Universe

I don't take 'music of the spheres' seriously as a way to explain planetary orbits and music.

Even so, I keep running into reports of sounds and sound-like natural phenomena that are a bit musical. Maybe there's a 'musical' angle to the universe that we haven't found yet.


(Marshall Space Flight Center, NASA, used w/o permission)
"...The oscillations we see on the surface are due to sound waves generated and trapped inside the sun. Sound waves are produced by pressure fluctuations in the turbulent convective motions of the sun's interior...."
("Solar Physics,' Marshall Space Flight Center, NASA)

2. 'Volcano Forecasts:' Eventually

"Volcanic ash closes regional airport in central Mexican city of Puebla"
Associated Press, via FoxNews.com (July 12, 2013)

"An airport serving Mexico's fourth-largest city has suspended operations due to volcanic ash from the Popocatepetl volcano.

"The international airport in Puebla was temporarily closed as a precautionary measure...."
Closing a city's airport is serious, but it could be worse. Back in 2000, Mexico evacuated about 50,000 folks in three states around Popocatepetl.

These days we know enough about volcanoes to have a general idea of when it's time to move away. I think it will be years, at least, before 'volcano forecasts' are as comparatively reliable as weather forecasts are today: but we're learning.

Related posts:
More:
Excerpts:
"Lumen Fidei"
Pope Francis (June 29, 2013)

"...2. Yet in speaking of the light of faith, we can almost hear the objections of many of our contemporaries. In modernity, that light might have been considered sufficient for societies of old, but was felt to be of no use for new times, for a humanity come of age, proud of its rationality and anxious to explore the future in novel ways. Faith thus appeared to some as an illusory light, preventing mankind from boldly setting out in quest of knowledge. The young Nietzsche encouraged his sister Elisabeth to take risks, to tread 'new paths… with all the uncertainty of one who must find his own way', adding that 'this is where humanity's paths part: if you want peace of soul and happiness, then believe, but if you want to be a follower of truth, then seek'.[3] Belief would be incompatible with seeking. From this starting point Nietzsche was to develop his critique of Christianity for diminishing the full meaning of human existence and stripping life of novelty and adventure. Faith would thus be the illusion of light, an illusion which blocks the path of a liberated humanity to its future.

"3. In the process, faith came to be associated with darkness. There were those who tried to save faith by making room for it alongside the light of reason. Such room would open up wherever the light of reason could not penetrate, wherever certainty was no longer possible. Faith was thus understood either as a leap in the dark, to be taken in the absence of light, driven by blind emotion, or as a subjective light, capable perhaps of warming the heart and bringing personal consolation, but not something which could be proposed to others as an objective and shared light which points the way. Slowly but surely, however, it would become evident that the light of autonomous reason is not enough to illumine the future; ultimately the future remains shadowy and fraught with fear of the unknown. As a result, humanity renounced the search for a great light, Truth itself, in order to be content with smaller lights which illumine the fleeting moment yet prove incapable of showing the way. Yet in the absence of light everything becomes confused; it is impossible to tell good from evil, or the road to our destination from other roads which take us in endless circles, going nowhere...."
[emphasis mine]
"Theology Today: Perspectives, Principles and Criteria (2011)," Chapter 3
International Theological Commission (2011)

"...62. The truth of God, accepted in faith, encounters human reason. Created in the image and likeness of God (Gen 1:26-27), the human person is capable, by the light of reason, of penetrating beyond appearances to the deep-down truth of things, and opens up thereby to universal reality. The common reference to truth, which is objective and universal, makes authentic dialogue possible between human persons. The human spirit is both intuitive and rational. It is intuitive in that it spontaneously grasps the first principles of reality and of thought. It is rational in that, beginning from those first principles, it progressively discovers truths previously unknown using rigorous procedures of analysis and investigation, and it organises them in a coherent fashion. 'Science' is the highest form that rational consciousness takes. It designates a form of knowledge capable of explaining how and why things are as they are. Human reason, itself part of created reality, does not simply project on to reality in its richness and complexity a framework of intelligibility; it adapts itself to the intrinsic intelligibility of reality. In accordance with its object, that is with the particular aspect of reality that it is studying, reason applies different methods adapted to the object itself. Rationality, therefore, is one but takes a plurality of forms, all of which are rigorous means of grasping the intelligibility of reality. Science likewise is pluriform, each science having its own specific object and method. There is a modern tendency to reserve the term 'science' to 'hard' sciences (mathematics, experimental sciences, etc.) and to dismiss as irrational and mere opinion knowledge which does not correspond to the criteria of those sciences. This univocal view of science and of rationality is reductive and inadequate...."
"Communion and Stewardship: Human Persons Created in the Image of God"
International Theological Commission (2004)

"...70 With respect to the immediate creation of the human soul, Catholic theology affirms that particular actions of God bring about effects that transcend the capacity of created causes acting according to their natures. The appeal to divine causality to account for genuinely causal as distinct from merely explanatory gaps does not insert divine agency to fill in the 'gaps' in human scientific understanding (thus giving rise to the so-called 'God of the gaps'). The structures of the world can be seen as open to non-disruptive divine action in directly causing events in the world. Catholic theology affirms that that the emergence of the first members of the human species (whether as individuals or in populations) represents an event that is not susceptible of a purely natural explanation and which can appropriately be attributed to divine intervention. Acting indirectly through causal chains operating from the beginning of cosmic history, God prepared the way for what Pope John Paul II has called 'an ontological leap...the moment of transition to the spiritual.' While science can study these causal chains, it falls to theology to locate this account of the special creation of the human soul within the overarching plan of the triune God to share the communion of trinitarian life with human persons who are created out of nothing in the image and likeness of God, and who, in his name and according to his plan, exercise a creative stewardship and sovereignty over the physical universe...."
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Wednesday, July 17, 2013

An Unusually Quick Response to "Defend Us In Battle"

I remembered about my shift at the Adoration chapel today: a half-hour after it started. Adding to my frustration, a time-sensitive chore had to be done before I went there.

I was anything but calm as I swung into the parking lot and signed in. Happily, someone had been able to fill in for me: but my nerves were jangling.

Following my usual routine after getting seated in the Adoration chapel, I said the St. Michael's prayer.

This time, during the phrase "defend us in battle," I felt tension drop out of me.

I'm used to having my moods shift rapidly: but not in that direction.

The rest of my time in the chapel was calm, quiet, and shorter than usual. This week is going to be more hectic than usual: but I'm glad I spent time with the Blessed Sacrament.

Somewhat-related posts:
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Sunday, July 14, 2013

An Hour with Jesus: Staying Awake

The Adoration chapel near St. Paul's in Sauk Centre, Minnesota, is a quiet place.

Light filtering through south-facing windows fills the room with soft light. Even when someone else is there with me, the only sound is a soft murmur from fans in some distant part of the building.

For some folks, it's a wonderfully calm place for prayer, meditation, and adoration of the Blessed Sacrament.

I'd enjoy taking a nap there, but that's not why I go each week.


Looking into the Adoration chapel near St. Paul's, Sauk Centre, Minnesota. June 26, 2013.

Oops

I signed up for an hour each Wednesday afternoon at the Eucharistic Adoration chapel last month. I've only missed two shifts so far: once because I forgot about the new routine; once because I had to be in North Dakota that day.

Happily, someone was there the day I forgot. It's important for someone to be on hand 24/7 while the chapel is open.

Transubstantiation and All That

That's because my Lord is there: really, physically present in the Eucharist. We call what happens transubstantiation.

It's a hard idea to swallow. Small wonder that folks didn't like it two thousand years back.

Quite a few folks stopped following Jesus when my Lord gave the conditions necessary for eternal life. Like Simon Peter said, though: if we want to live, staying with Jesus is the only option. (John 6:53-60; 66-69 - Matthew 26:26-28; Mark 14:22-24; and Luke 22:19-20, too)

Failure and Trying

I was not a happy camper when I remembered my promise to be at the Adoration chapel: with about seven minutes to go on my shift. I detest making mistakes.

I didn't see a point to 'coming in late' with so little time left on the clock, so I called the lady in charge of scheduling at the chapel and explained the situation.

I suggested that my failure to show up might indicate that I wasn't qualified to be a 'regular' at the chapel. On the other hand, I wanted to keep trying.

The two of us discussed schedules, habits, and ways to help me remember. Spending an hour at the chapel is a routine now, so I don't expect a repeat of that memory lapse. Not soon, anyway.

Feelings

I'm a very emotional man: but try to make decisions based on reason, not feelings. Actually, I think my mercurial mood ricochets help me understand why reason is important.

Some decisions I've made by 'trusting my feelings' haven't had happy results, and that's another topic.

Maybe some folks feel 'uplifted' after an hour at the Adoration chapel. I don't, and didn't expect to.

I'm there because it's a good idea: a way to express my love for Jesus. It's also 'the right thing to do.'
"Because Christ himself is present in the sacrament of the altar, he is to be honored with the worship of adoration. 'To visit the Blessed Sacrament is . . . a proof of gratitude, an expression of love, and a duty of adoration toward Christ our Lord' (Paul VI, MF 66)."
(Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1418)
They've got books, pamphlets, and prayer cards in the chapel. I've been spending much my time there reading parts of the Old Testament.

My hour with the Blessed Sacrament still feels like 'doing nothing,' sometimes. But although emotions are important: so is doing what I should, whether I feel like it or not. Compared to what some folks have gone through, I've got it easy. More topics.

Posts about faith and feelings:
Other related posts:

The Adoration chapel near St. Paul's, Sauk Centre, Minnesota. June 26, 2013.
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Marian Apparition: Champion, Wisconsin

Background:Posts in this blog: In the news:

What's That Doing in a Nice Catholic Blog?

From time to time, a service that I use will display links to - odd - services and retailers.

I block a few of the more obvious dubious advertisers.

For example: psychic anything, numerology, mediums, and related practices are on the no-no list for Catholics. It has to do with the Church's stand on divination. I try to block those ads.

Sometime regrettable advertisements get through, anyway.

Bottom line? What that service displays reflects the local culture's norms, - not Catholic teaching.