Thanks T-bird!

And I would point out, the best model for the pool is how the ice rink is run. The rink has great ice and a great youth program trough Charlie Hager that is a fraction of the cost of suburban programs which allows kids from any strata to take up ice hockey. The same should be true at the pool.

Also, the pool is actually very underutliized. I have swum laps at varrious times when I am the only person in the pool. It is so underutilized, in fact, that the lap swimmers seem unaware of how to circle swim (which you have to do whenever there are more than two people in a lane). And, of course, although there is a sign that directs people to circle swim and to segregate by speed, no one does on the rare occassion when it is crowded. I suggest that it is n ot crowded because lap swimmers are chased away by the high temps.

Well, yea, the letter is overheated- no pun intended. There is almost zero chance anything happens as I have been asking for 20 years. And though it is aimed at getting a Masters team, it argues most strongly for an age group team for kids. The pool is just not meant for the use that it is getting. I can't imagine how much it costs to heat that to 86 or 90 degrees. The typical temperature. Yes, there is a dedicated constituency that enjoys this. But it would make sense if this were moved to one of the many old public pools in the city. There is plenty of parking, for example, near PS 22. And the reverse does not work- you can't really use these smaller pools for a serious swim team. When you think about it, given Pershing field and the fact that so many high schools in town have pools, Jersey City could be a real swimming mecca- not the desert it is. There seems to be a strange desire to prevent swimming as a sport. I was at a meet for my oldest son several years ago at Dickenson. The pool was over 90 degrees. They had the meet anyway. I thought the kids in the 500 were going to die. Also, I realize that some people run cold. But they can wear a wet suit and deal with their discomfort that way. It does not work the reverse. Also, we live in a state where the Ocean temperature rarely gets above 70. How does the idea that swimmable water must be over 85 make sense? Anyway, sorry for the histrionics and don't worry, nothing will happen. The pool will stay 90 degrees. It will break down periodically from rust and over use of chemicals necessitated by the overheating..etc.

We particularly need an alto who can sight read! Come on ladies!

October 6, 2016

Via email only
Jamie Gordon
Aquatics Director
City of Jersey City

Dear Jamie:

A. Introduction

Stevens Institute shut down its Masters Team last night after 12 years. This team has about 75 members and was the direct successor of the Masters Team that I had started at Pershing Field in 1995. (At the time, we swam every morning at 6:00 am and were coached by Jeff Jotz). It was a great success but fell apart when many people left for Hoboken.

Can you consider welcoming the Masters Team back to Pershing Field.? This could be an excellent impetus for allowing Pershing Field pool to play an important role in the athletic scene of Jersey City. You should also consider starting an age group team for the reasons cited below.

B. Pershing Field Pool Is a Competition Facility

Pershing Field pool is a competition facility- six broad lanes wide, at 25 meters long, with 12 feet depth in the deep end and with diving blocks and a great lap clock.

Unfortunately, instead of a premier swimming facility, this pool is used as a glorified therapeutic pool for arthritic elderly , for infants, and for water exercises for women who cannot swim so that the water is kept above 84 degrees and higher. This is a ridiculous misuse of the facility. It costs a fortune to heat the pool in this manner and causes stress to the system.

The accepted guidelines for lap pools is that the temperature be kept at 78 degrees, and to never go above 82 degrees. This makes the pool functionally unusable for real workouts. There are many other pools in the City that should take on the therapeutic role, e.g. PS 16, 22, etc. Have water exercises scheduled at any of these other pools. Have Mommy and Me at these other pools (even though there appears to be a consensus that babies under one year should never swim in a public pool because their immune system is inadequately developed.) These smaller pools cannot be used for competition and therefore are ideal for these other uses. If run properly, Pershing Field should host a Masters Team, an Age Group Team, and be available for drop in swimmers to work out.


C. Masters Team

Masters Teams provide competitive workouts for swimmers aged 18 and up who are not currently in an NCAA program. Today many triathletes swim with Masters teams as well as former college swimmers. The national organization and the state chapter provide support as well as a series of competitions. http://www.usms.org/ The national organization also provides insurance for all participants.

The team that had been at Stevens consisted of about 75 members who paid $60 a month so that the annual budget was $54,576 a year. I think that a program at Pershing Field could succeed along these lines. For instance, the team could charge $30 for residents and $60 for non residents. The income from the dues could be used to compensate a member of your staff who helps to run practices. Practices scheduled in the morning from 6:00 am to 7:15 on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, would not really impact public use at all. Ideally, there would be two evening practices a week as well- say from 7:30 to 8:30 on Tuesday and Thursday. A Saturday morning workout at 9:00 am, for instance, would be immensely popular. In the summer, the entire program could be moved to the Johnston Avenue Pool.

D. Age Group Team

Even more important than a Masters Team, is the proposal to start an age group team at Pershing Field. This would allow Jersey City children to become competitive swimmers. Right now, in the County Bayonne and Union City have good age group programs. There are no age group opportunities for Jersey City residents at all! Moroever, there had been a program at Stevens Institute where many Jersey City kids swam but it was shut down three years ago. Moreover, the fees charges by Stevens and by Bayonne are exhorbitant (averaging at least $1500 a child see, e.g., http://www.newjerseywave.org/njnjwst/__doc__/Redbook2009-10.pdf

E. Pershing Field as a Fitness Option

If the pool were properly run as a competitive facility, anyone would be able to go at any time to have a real workout. Right now, the pool cannot be used for a real work out. By the time one is half way through one?s warm up, one is over heated and exhausted. The option of the pool for workouts would benefit everyone. Re-imaginging it as a swimming facility rather than as a hot tub is to everyone?s benefit.

Kindly contact me at your earliest convenience as I would love to help in this transition. There are several capable people already on staff who could run these programs and who would, I think, enjoy the stipends generated by them.

Very truly yours,


SWD/ds
Daniel W. Sexton

cc Kevin Williamson, Director of Jersey City Department of Recreation via email only
JC List

Brewster-

It is a lot more complicated. Some writings of Maimonedes who experienced terrible Islamic persecution make it seem that Islam was much worse for Medieval Jewery. A fairly good exploration of the travails of Medieval Jews at the hands of Europeans and at the hands of Muslims is Mark Cohen;s Under the Cresent and the Cross.

I think the reality is that the Jews were persecuted both by Christians and by Muslims, though in some ways the Jews fared better than Christians at the hands of Muslims. Bernard Lewis explains this by the fact that the Christians were a threat to the Muslims and a target. The Jews were an insubstantial minority. Within an Islamic society, Jews could hold relativly high offices etc and not threaten the polity. Moreover, the Jews did not seek to convert the Muslims so the theological tension was much less.

Obviously, you are not a Jew for Jesus and the relationship betweent he two faiths is well known in its iterations even in the Gospel itsel. Who do you say that I am, asks Christ, over and over. Elijah? the Messiah of Israel? the blasphemer?

Shanah Tovah

Yours,

Mao

L'Shana Tova!

Cantantes In Cordibus (CIC)

Now in its 16th year, CIC remains the most ambitious liturgical choir in Hudson County. We sing for the 9: 00 am Latin Mass at the historic St. Anthony of Padua Church on Monmouth and 6th in the now fashionable downtown Jersey City. http://blogs.shu.edu/newarkchurches/archives/886 Simone Ferraresi directs the mixed choir and accompanies on organ. http://home.simoneferraresi.com/ The choir?s repertoire ranges from simple Gregorian Masses, through the glories of the Renaissance to contemporary settings. The choir generally does several orchestral Masses a year. Motets and hymns are also sung. There is a warm up at 8:30 am before Mass and rehearsal after Mass from 10:30 am to 11:30 am. Additional rehearsals are held on Wednesday evening for those who do not sight read or if, on occasion, necessary. Art Manabat, well known in the NY early music scene, acts as the choir manager and assists Simone with artistic direction. We enjoy regular assistance from veterans of the Renaissance Street Singers and have become known for the collaborative production of Tenebrae in Holy Week featuring Allegri?s Miserere. Joseph Orchard, PhD, directs the Men?s Schola which sings the Propers for each Mass from the Liber Usualis. The Men?s Schola meets at 8:00 am before each Mass. This is a friendly group of singers, believers and non believers, who work together with a range of talents to produce a reliably impressive sound. This is also the rare opportunity to experience this music in the context for which it was composed. Call Dan at 201 406 9960 to arrange an audition. Singers are welcome too to drop in for a special feast, e.g. Christmas. Christmas Eve 2016 will feature Monteverdi?s Monteverdi's Messa da Cappella (1641) following the composer?s directions in the original Venetian score.

"In one hearing, Senator Cruz asked if Icann - an international organisation - was bound by the First Amendment to the US constitution defending freedom of speech. No, came the reply from Icann's chief executive, Goran Marby."

David Lee, BBC

By "proved correct" I meant that it turned out in that instance, i.e. Sandy, to be correct, not that it was proven to be infallible.

In Sandy, was n't it the Euro model that proved correct?

Well Jersey City is reported at .047. Isn't that near to the recommended level?

Dear Friends;
A. We ?re All Proselytizers.
Firstly, Rich- I have never subscribed to the idea that one should not proselytize. And in fact we all do it all the time. It basically means trying to bring people around to your point of view. It is, to my mind, the other side of the coin of seeking. We each try to figure out the mystery of this existence and if it means anything and if there is such a thing as good and evil, right or wrong.
The Cynics were a cult in ancient Greece but have followers everywhere at every time who sneer or yawn and say there is no truth. The objection to proselytizing is like the objection to talking about politics. Religion and politics are the most intense and meaning of all topics. True, one needs to give it a rest at time or even limit it. But not ban it.
The word itself, btw, is from ancient Greek (????- (pros-, toward) and the verb ??????? (?rchomai, to come) in the form of ?????????? (pros?lytos, a new comer).[3] Historically in the Koine Greek Septuagint and New Testament, the word proselyte denoted a gentile who was considering conversion to Judaism. Though the word proselytism originally referred to Early Christianity(and earlier Gentiles such as God-fearers), it now refers to the attempt of any religion or religious individuals to convert people to their beliefs, or any attempt to convert people to a different point of view, religious or not. Proselytism is illegal in some countries.
I don?t know but I have a theory about the anti-proselytizing point of view. It sort of took the Victoria rule to never address controversy or heated subjects. I think this is true when you have a guest. My Jewish, Protestant and Muslim friends are not subjected to sermons when they come to my house or if we are eating socially- unless they bring it up. But this does not apply to neutral ground, the public square, the office water cooler, etc. One just needs to respect others and not drive them nuts with your beliefs.
I think too there is a bizarre fallacy that exports concepts from the screwed up First Amendment jurisprudence on Church and State. In 1971, SCOTUS in Lemmon v. Kurtzman required that activities that the government support be secular, not religious. Leaving aside the myriad problems in this area, people someone think that one must reserve one?s religious faith to the private sphere. The opposite is true. The First Amendment protects Americans so that each of us can proselytize as well as pray. The US is the best at this. I suppose a place like North Korea is the worst.

B. Right to Be A Private Ninny
Dr. Riveria, you are correct. And I find Dan Falcone? approach regrettable but it is absolutely his right. It makes no sense, however. I wonder what it takes to put something like this up? JCLIST has been around and has a purpose. Things like Next Door are pretty good. I have mostly avoided Facebook as it seems like a hole. Is there a more open forum now that I might find congenial. Btw, it took 48 hours for the press to admit the weekend bombings were Islamic terror. The press is private and they can censor too. Strange thought that things seem less open than they used even with all the new media. I spent Sunday with a friend who has been in China for 30 years. He asserts that the internet has made the government more tyrnaical than ever and that the average Chinese knowns nothing that the government does not want it to know and, on the other, the government knows everything about anyone who approaches dissidence. I asked my wife?s friend what she thought about the situation of Christians in China (I did not say persecution because I did not want to offend her). Although her English is pretty good (and even though she?s raising her kids Jewish), she said ?what is a Christian.?

C. The Cross a Scandal, a Stumbling Block- and now, a Joke
Your joke ridicules the most sacred symbol in Christianity. To believers it is the sign of the incomprehensible love of the infinite and almighty God for each of us. To non believers, it represents a Jewish Rabbi cruelly executed 2000 years ago. Why the myrth in either case? You paint me and all Christians with the brush of neurotic self absorbed masochists. You should read Candida Moss, the Notre Dame tenured professor who makes her living denying the cult of martyrdom that is central in the Church?s understanding of itself. And, of course, you somehow reserve your wit from commenting on Islam.

D. Real and Objective Value of Catholicism
There has been other criticism that I am carried away or delusional when I assert the independent value of Catholic culture apart from the truth question. Rich, I think, thought my statement that Catholic music was without parallel to be ethno centric and wrong. It may be wrong but there is, nonetheless, a strong argument to be made for it. The entire system of modern tonality- intervals, the scales, the ideas of harmonic progression and the contemporary rejection of these all comes out of Catholic music. A music PhD from any top place spends half his time studying the Catholic Mass (pre 1970). Virtually ever great composer seeks to compose a Mass. Palestirina, Monteverdi, depress, Mozart, Bach, Beethoven, e Vaugh Williams, etc. I was dropping my sone off at his Ivy league college and remarked how pleasant the Catholic architecture was. He was bewildered. I explained that his dorm followed the design of a mediaeval Benedictine cloister. Modern philosophy and its rejection of realism can?t really be understood unless one understands the 13th century synthesis that Aquinas achieved. Europe may be dying but I hope European culture finds root in emerging countries perhaps, Africa above all and it can carry on what had been true, as expressed by Belloc, ?Europe is the faith, and the faith is Europe.?
This value of Catholicism has always been recognized and even if one found its dogmas ridiculous or abhorrent, one still grudgingly gave credit where credit was due.

Yours,

Dan

Webmaster!

So first you take down a post that linked a NJ.Com story about a Muslim who had descrated Our Lady of Victories on JFK Blvd- ostensibly because by drawing attention to this violent Islamic terror in our midst, I was committing hate speach. Oi vey. Where does one begin.

Then a posting about a Sung Latin Mass for the Exaltation of the Cross is removed. Why? Rich Mauro wrote and wondered if this belonged on this board. I was going to ask him, what possible grounds could there be for not allowing it? As Yvonne pointed out, Catholic music is recognized by all as without parallel and as the font of all art music in the West. A significant number of our singers and instrumentalist are not believers, many of them being Jewish. The Mass itself has been termed by many anthropologists and cultural historians to be the "perfect drama" in the words of TS Elliot.

Proust, a free thinker, writing when Chartres Cathedral was threatened wrote a defense in which he provided one of the most moving accounts ever made of Catholic liturgy.

Your continued censorhip is offensive, ignorant and regretable.

Yours,

Mao

Welcome Rich!

I am generally not particularly handy but did make a do-it-yourself project of two houses in Jersey City, top to bottom. I rented the sander from Home Depot. These houses had been abadnoned and neeeded a lot of clean up. It sounds like you are talking about much less of a job. However, if you're living in it at the same time, the saw dust is a task to manage. I was lazy and used a water based polyuerthane. The floors being from the 1860 had a nice color and there was no need for a stain. It is probably worth it if you can to use an oil based poly. So if I can do it, I suspect that there are a lot of contractors out there who can also.

Good luck.

Dear Mr. Falcone:

Are you being disengenuous? You removed a discussion about a Muslim who had been arrested for desecrating OLV in Greenville. That is a type of censorship. It is your right to do so, I think, since this is a privately run site and there are no First Amendment rights here. Therefore, I simply asked why did you remove it? Perhaps you have some rules you could share with your loyal customers? I pointed out, further, that you clearly have no rule against attacks on Christianity and upon Christians even when the attacks are personal and vulgar.

Yes, functionally, this thread re-introduced the topic you had censored. Now you say you are going to remove it again. Why?

YOurs,

Maoi

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cvz9PvczUMI

This is my song, O God of all the nations,
A song of peace for lands afar and mine.
This is my home, the country where my heart is,
Here are my hopes, my dreams, my holy shrine.
But other hearts in other lands are beating,
With hopes and dreams as true and high as mine.

My country's skies are bluer than the ocean,
And sunlight beams on clover leaf and pine.
But other lands have sunlight too, and clover,
And skies are everywhere as blue as mine.
O hear my song, thou God of all the nations,
A song of peace for their land and for mine.

I think Wishful Thinking has a point. If Christians fail and the temple is deserted, at least its ruins remind those who are here what went before.

Here is one of my favorite poems by an old nasty atheist,
poetry | prints | cine | home

Philip Larkin - Church Going

Once I am sure there's nothing going on
I step inside, letting the door thud shut.
Another church: matting, seats, and stone,
And little books; sprawlings of flowers, cut
For Sunday, brownish now; some brass and stuff
Up at the holy end; the small neat organ;
And a tense, musty, unignorable silence,
Brewed God knows how long. Hatless, I take off
My cycle-clips in awkward reverence.

Move forward, run my hand around the font.
From where I stand, the roof looks almost new -
Cleaned, or restored? Someone would know: I don't.
Mounting the lectern, I peruse a few
Hectoring large-scale verses, and pronounce
'Here endeth' much more loudly than I'd meant.
The echoes snigger briefly. Back at the door
I sign the book, donate an Irish sixpence,
Reflect the place was not worth stopping for.

Yet stop I did: in fact I often do,
And always end much at a loss like this,
Wondering what to look for; wondering, too,
When churches will fall completely out of use
What we shall turn them into, if we shall keep
A few cathedrals chronically on show,
Their parchment, plate and pyx in locked cases,
And let the rest rent-free to rain and sheep.
Shall we avoid them as unlucky places?

Or, after dark, will dubious women come
To make their children touch a particular stone;
Pick simples for a cancer; or on some
Advised night see walking a dead one?
Power of some sort will go on
In games, in riddles, seemingly at random;
But superstition, like belief, must die,
And what remains when disbelief has gone?
Grass, weedy pavement, brambles, buttress, sky,

A shape less recognisable each week,
A purpose more obscure. I wonder who
Will be the last, the very last, to seek
This place for what it was; one of the crew
That tap and jot and know what rood-lofts were?
Some ruin-bibber, randy for antique,
Or Christmas-addict, counting on a whiff
Of gown-and-bands and organ-pipes and myrrh?
Or will he be my representative,

Bored, uninformed, knowing the ghostly silt
Dispersed, yet tending to this cross of ground
Through suburb scrub because it held unspilt
So long and equably what since is found
Only in separation - marriage, and birth,
And death, and thoughts of these - for which was built
This special shell? For, though I've no idea
What this accoutred frowsty barn is worth,
It pleases me to stand in silence here;

A serious house on serious earth it is,
In whose blent air all our compulsions meet,
Are recognized, and robed as destinies.
And that much never can be obsolete,
Since someone will forever be surprising
A hunger in himself to be more serious,
And gravitating with it to this ground,
Which, he once heard, was proper to grow wise in,
If only that so many dead lie round.

Keely is the architecht. http://www.patrickkeely.com/

He was remarkably diverse- from St. Michael's neo classical, to Bridget's English Gothic, to St. Patrick's French Gothic.

And yes, it was an Irish congregation.

The Latin Mass congregation downtown keeps begging the archidiocese to give us a church. They would rather give it to anyone but a traditional Catholic.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvouc8Qs_MI

I Vow to Thee My Country!

Asif:

If you are a devout Muslim, I can see how discussing the nature of Islam in an objective manner would be difficult. Certainly, there are many Muslims of good faith who decent folk. However, one must be able to discuss things. I am a devout Catholic, albeit not a very good one! However, I try to engage the various other theses about Christianity, e.g. Gibbons thesis that it is a slave religion that destroyed Rome (also basically the thesis of Nietzhe), or that it is wish fullment (Feurbach), etc etc.

Denouncing anyone who discusses Islam in a critical manner as hateful is anti intellectual.

There is an point of view where Islam is more like a fascist or Marxist ideology than a religion. This is based, for example, on Islamic theology and political theory as well as its apparent contstruction after, not before, its initial conquests in the 7th century.

It is my opinion that Islam is incompatible with the Western Way of life- be it Chritian or secular, Catholic or laicite. If we are to accept Muslim immigrants it must be on our terms. No aspect of Islam should be regularized. No Islamic holiday should be recognized. No official should be allowed to swear on the Koran. No minor children should enter marriage. No polygamy should be sanctioned. Gential mutilation of minors must be outlawed. Sharia dietary laws should not be accomodated in any institution. Mosques and other Islamic instutitions should not be favored with tax exempt status. I realize that this would require a Constitutional Amendment and it will never be enacted because the founders had no concept
that this would be a threat.

Is this overstating it? I don't think so. I started my college career as a religous studies major. We were all Co-existers then and Jungians at heart. A fantasy version of the Ivy league feminst version of Islam was presented. We danced liked dervishes and some smoked hasish. The actual record is very different. Scholars like Christopher Luxembourg have revealed an entirely different origin of Islam (he by the way writes under a pseudenom lest he be killed).

I have little enthusiasm for Trump but the idea that we need to fundamentally change this country (Obama's main theme and the promise of Hilary) is anathema to me and crazy.

Sunday is September 11th. I lost friends in that holocaust inspired by Jihad. How dare you call me and others haters. We simply want to live in peace. We have a well grounded fear that our civilization is under attack from without and within.

Please address the issues and resist hysterical personal attacks.

Yours,

Mao

Sad story. He should have been discharged immediately and not allowed to "take back his suicide threat." The Marines know how to train men and we civilians need to give them some leaway. I probably would have washed out. Its sort of a mystery however. I read an article on who survives SEAL training and it is always surprising. The most Alpha guys sometimes are the first to go. Hazing and bootcamp are suppossed to try to crack you to make sure yoiu are battle ready. I suppose it needs to be softened a bit given how soft we are. Ever see Full Metal Jacket. I hated it but it made its point.

So this sad story stays up on the board even though it is being politicized far beyond what the facts seem while stories that clearly show the dangers of Islam and threats posed by Muslims are censored?

What a great country!

The man who disbelieves in any future life whatever is also a believer in Hell. For in this life one makes, now and then, important decisions; or at least allows circumstances to decide; and some of these decisions are such as have consequences for all the rest of our mortal life. Some people find themselves consequently in circumstances such that the whole of their mortal life must be a torment to them. And if there is no future life, then Hell is, for such people, here and now.
?T.S. Eliot, from a letter to Paul Elmer More, August 10,1932

And why on this board which is suppossed to be an open forum, albeit not one where First Amendment protections apply, is one not allowed to critise Islam or Muslims? Yes it contradicts the co-exist model. Is that not allowed? Of course, I am not infallible and I may well be wrong. But isn't that the purpose of a discussion.

...ad nauseam ad hominems...

Yes, with apologies to Feurabach, I still believe in Heaven. Indeed, I believe in the Four Last Things: Death, Judgement Heaven and Hell. Because of his transcendence, God cannot be seen as he is, unless he himself opens up his mystery to man's immediate contemplation and gives him the capacity for it. The Church calls this contemplation of God in his heavenly glory "the beatific vision":How great will your glory and happiness be, to be allowed to see God, to be honored with sharing the joy of salvation and eternal light with Christ your Lord and God, . . . to delight in the joy of immortality in the Kingdom of heaven with the righteous and God's friends.6

Dear Mr. Falcone:
It appears that the thread entitled in Arabic, May His Peace Be Upon You, which featured a link to a NJ.Com article about desecration of Our Lady of Victories Catholic Church in Greenville by a Muslim was removed yesterday. The post was originally made several weeks ago and several commentators, Asif, prominent among them demanded that I be banned and that the thread be removed. I was called various obscene and vulgar names and my motives were impugned. Yesterday, I posted a short article from Libero Quotidiano, a major Italian newspaper out of Milan, translated into English by Francesca Romana and linked at the website Rorate Caeli. This article detailed how desecration of Catholic churches by Muslims is now widespread throughout western Europe. The article noted that in Westphalia alone, a relatively small German state, has had over 3,504 raids of desecration have been recorded in the last few years.
These are facts. The proactive use of the peace greeting made its own point. If the juxtaposition created discomfort maybe that means it generated actual thought.
I note that rabid anti Christian sentiment runs through virtually every post on this site and I am unaware of any censorship. Indeed, I would object to any effort to silence those who hate Christianity as it is good thing to hear each other and, when possible to discuss
Your censorship demonstrated more elegantly than I could have expressed the pervasive and irrational state of discourse today. Facts are denied, stories, buried, messengers attacked.
I would, nonetheless, appreciate your account in your own words for your actions.
Yours,
Mao

Just goes to show you that the most effective enemies of Christianity these days appear to be the priests and bishops who, while doing anything but evangelizing, sell off the precious patrimony that previous generations sacrificed for. The 4th Street Arts people are not to blame. They think they have saved a building, and I guess they have. They along with most priests, including the Pope, have zero sense of the sacred- just walk in any Mass these days with the fey priest acting like Oprah and talking all about himself in some narcissitic frenzy. The idea of a Catholic Church is that it is the porta caeli, the gate of heaven, where the sacrifice of Calvary is renacted in the bloodless sacrifice of the Mass, a recaptiulation of all the sacrifices of Ancient Israel and of Our Lord on Calvary. Having the church turned over to Indie Rock events with the band set up in front of the high altar, the site of the Holy of Holies is just too painful for any true Catholic. Canon law does not even contemplate the possiblity of a Church being abadondoned like this.

As for the bad priests, of course, there are exceptions- good, holy self sacrificing priests who would die a martyr's death. But these good priests are an embarrassment to the rest and they get the worst assignements, etc. The Archdiocese has wanted to close either or both Holy Rosary and St. Anthony. Stay tuned to that. Maybe in 20 years there will be one Catholic Church left in Jersey City, down from 25 and the population will be like 350,000, up from 275,000. Such is the new spring time of Vatican II.