Thanksgiving Prayers from Twitter

Mark Alves Content Ideas

[An updated 2012 and 2009 collection of Thanksgiving prayers on Twitter is available]

This Thanksgiving, I’m thankful for the new friends I’ve met on Twitter, the micro-blogging social network. Since it’s time to update my original collection of Thanksgiving prayers for Catholics, I turned to Twitter for inspiration. Try one of these yourself or share with a fellow parishioner.

Do you have a favorite Thanksgiving prayer to share? And are you thankful I refrained from using the word “Twanksgiving” here?

Update: This post is included in Catholic Carnival #200 at Just Another Day of Catholic Pondering. Check it out.

Obama Communion Controversy Letter

Mark Alves News

Update: November 15, 2008: St. Mary’s site is restored, although it looks like the bulletin with Fr. Newman’s letter is unavailable.
Update 2: Diocese of Charlston Repudiates Fr. Newman’s Comments (PDF and video); and Catholic News Service article and Fox News article

 

It’s been a busy week on this blog for older posts. The latest one getting a spike in traffic is my review of St. Mary’s of Greenville, SC. As I type this, the St. Mary’s site is unavailable. If you are looking for more information about the South Carolina priest denying Eucharist to Obama voters, try these sources:

9 November 2008

Dear Friends in Christ,

We the People have spoken, and the 44th President of the United States will be Barack Hussein Obama. This election ends a political process that started two years ago and which has revealed deep and bitter divisions within the United States and also within the Catholic Church in the United States. This division is sometimes called a “Culture War,” by which is meant a heated clash between two radically different and incompatible conceptions of how we should order our common life together, the public life that constitutes civil society. And the chief battleground in this culture war for the past 30 years has been abortion, which one side regards as a murderous abomination that cries out to Heaven for vengeance and the other side regards as a fundamental human right that must be protected in laws enforced by the authority of the state. Between these two visions of the use of lethal violence against the unborn there can be no negotiation or conciliation, and now our nation has chosen for its chief executive the most radical pro-abortion politician ever to serve in the United States Senate or to run for president. We must also take note of the fact that this election was effectively decided by the votes of self-described (but not practicing) Catholics, the majority of whom cast their ballots for President-elect Obama.

In response to this, I am obliged by my duty as your shepherd to make two observations:

1. Voting for a pro-abortion politician when a plausible pro-life alternative exits constitutes material cooperation with intrinsic evil, and those Catholics who do so place themselves outside of the full communion of Christ’s Church and under the judgment of divine law. Persons in this condition should not receive Holy Communion until and unless they are reconciled to God in the Sacrament of Penance, lest they eat and drink their own condemnation.

2. Barack Obama, although we must always and everywhere disagree with him over abortion, has been duly elected the next President of the United States, and after he takes the Oath of Office next January 20th, he will hold legitimate authority in this nation. For this reason, we are obliged by Scriptural precept to pray for him and to cooperate with him whenever conscience does not bind us otherwise. Let us hope and pray that the responsibilities of the presidency and the grace of God will awaken in the conscience of this extraordinarily gifted man an awareness that the unholy slaughter of children in this nation is the greatest threat to the peace and security of the United States and constitutes a clear and present danger to the common good. In the time of President Obama’s service to our country, let us pray for him in the words of a prayer found in the Roman Missal:

God our Father, all earthly powers must serve you. Help our President-elect, Barack Obama, to fulfill his responsibilities worthily and well. By honoring and striving to please you at all times, may he secure peace and freedom for the people entrusted to him. We ask this through Our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God for ever and ever.

Amen.

Father Newman

Contact Us

111 Hampton Avenue
Greenville, South Carolina 29601

telephone 864.271.8422
fax 864.370.9880

More Veterans Day Prayers

Mark Alves Content Ideas

My post, Veterans Day Prayers for Your Parish Website, from a previous Veterans Day is getting some serious search engine traffic. I’ve updated the list with new resources and to adjust some URLs that changed over time (another good reason to 301 redirect your pages!).

You’re Only As Good As Your Most Outdated Web Page

Mark Alves Church Marketing
By PlayingWithPSP on Flickr
By PlayingWithBrushes via Flickr

Someone stopped me at my church’s Volunteer Fair today to ask, “Is the parish web site up to date? Are you having a hard time keeping it accurate?”

In my mind I checked off the many updates we recently completed, but quickly surmised that such a list would be devoid of relevance to the questioner. If you’re asked this question, know that the person is focused on a particular omission.

It didn’t matter that she hadn’t even visited the site herself. A fellow volunteer had complained to her—with justification—about finding outdated information regarding our elementary school’s Oktoberfest fundraiser. In her mind, the entire site’s reputation was shot based on this second-hand account.

Oh, I could have explained that the school hadn’t emailed me this year’s update, or that the information should actually reside on the school’s site instead of the church’s site, or that the site had 100 other features that were timely, or that my dog ate my server. Do you think such explanations are going to change your visitors’ opinions of your site? Nope. [Full disclosure: I don’t have a dog.]

Tomorrow I’ll track down the Oktoberfest organizer at day two of the Fair so that I can get the latest facts and begin to make amends.

I was fortunate to attend an unrelated event where I could receive this feedback. Will you have the same luck? Is there an old page out there that’s the weakest link for your site’s reputation?