Sr. Rose Pacatte's blog

Although it is last year's news, I only heard about kosher cellphones today while listening to NPR on the way to an appointment.

I was not able to locate the story on NPR's site, but if I recall well, the story told of the Orthodox Jewish rabbis in the UK who were concerned about the lack of modesty that cellphones can promote among young people in particular because of cameras, Internet access and texting.

The answer? A basic model for cellphones with no "smart" technology. According to the story, cellphone providers didn't think there would be a market so they decided not to produce one, leaving it to those who buy the cellphones to figure out how to disarm the phones and adjust software. This gave rise to enterprise. One man in the U.K. has sold 20,000 modified phones, including to Muslims in Saudi Arabia who share the same concerns about modesty. Other customers like the basic version because they are just easier to use.

'A Smile as Big as the Moon'
9 p.m./8 p.m. central, Sunday, Jan. 29, ABC
8 p.m./7 p.m. central, Saturday, Feb. 4, The Hallmark Channel

In the universe of film and television reviewers, it can get really awkward when trying to talk about the elusive, fragile, frequently manipulated "family" genre. No one can really define a family TV film except in hindsight, I think. When television studios set out to make an "all-in-one" family film, they usually end up reaching fewer viewers than hoped for.

It is also impossible to judge a film or television movie as "good" by what it does not have: no sex, bad language, violence, drugs, etc. Most television family films are just bland or worse yet, bland and preachy because producers favor message over a story.

But here comes Hallmark Hall of Fame with its first film of the year, and I think it is their best love story -- ever. It's not only a good family film -- it's great. The bar has been set. I now have a baseline to judge made-for-TV family films.

In the daily round of emails and Facebook posting comes this news about a Rick Santorum Iowa staffer's opinion that children would be harmed if a woman became president, referring to Michele Bachmann's former GOP bid.

Although Rev. Jamie Johnson, a pastor and the email's author, claims the statement in an email to one person was taken out of context, his view is upsetting people the blogosphere. And he is not backing down.

The email at the heart of the controversy reads in part: "Is it Gods highest desire, that is, His biblically expressed will ... to have a woman rule the institutions of the Family, the Church, and the State?"

According to Box Office Mojo, 2011's 592 films made somewhere between $381 million (with "Harry Potter and Deathly Hallows Part Two") and $325 (with "Redneck Carnage," which I did not see) at the box office.

I saw 119 films in 2011 -- about two movies a week. I was away for four weeks in September and October, so I missed "50/50," about a young man diagnosed with cancer, and "We Need to Talk about Kevin." I did not see "Albert Nobbs" yet, but will let you know when I do. These are films buzzing in the Oscar zone.

Here is my list of 14 films that I found most interesting in 2011. Are they the best? I don't know. But they kept my attention, told a worthy story in an artistic or clever way, shed light on the human condition, showed respect for human dignity though sometimes in a dark way, asked questions and allowed the audience to discover or make meaning without imposing or preaching. And some were wonderfully entertaining.

Click on the film's title for my longer reviews.

Hugo

Among the many themes that emerge or converge in the films of director/ producer/writer Steven Spielberg are lonely children and war, specifically World War II.

These themes can be found in the kids in "E.T.: the Extra-Terrestrial" (1982) as well as the Oscar-winning "Schindler's List" (1993), in which viewers may remember the little Jewish girl in a red coat, waiting for transport to the Nazi death camps. They can be found in "The Color Purple" (1985) (for which Spielberg deserved an Oscar) and one of my personal favorites, this year's "Super 8," where Spielberg captures children who are lonely or estranged from or in tension with their fathers.

I had never heard of Christopher Hitchens, but after a certain event in 1994, I came to know him as one of the English-speaking world's most prolific atheists.

Back then I was living and studying in London, and my community was asked by Channel Four, the alternative to BBC I and II and the commercial channel ITV, to negotiate on its behalf with our sisters in Japan to use footage from an award-winning documentary they had produced on Mother Teresa, "Mother Teresa and Her World." (It was released in 1989 and directed by Shigeki Chiba, who had just released his third film about Mother Teresa; the producer was Sister Joseph Shirai Shoko, a Daughter of St. Paul.)

This is the third in a trilogy of blog posts by Sr. Rose Pacatte looking at some of this year's new holiday television movies. The first post, focusing on "Have a Little Faith," can be found here. The second post, on "Game of Your Life," can be found here.

The Heart of Christmas
Sunday, Dec. 4
GMC, 7 p.m. and 9 p.m. EST

The Gospel Music Channel, now knows as GMC, will air its first primetime made-for-TV movie, "The Heart of Christmas," on Sunday.

It is based on the true story of little Dax Locke, who, at the age of 13 months, was diagnosed with a rare form of leukemia. The family literally moved from Illinois to St. Jude's Hospital in Memphis for 18 months. Julie, Dax's mom, started a blog that touched thousands of people.

This is the second in a trilogy of blog posts by Sr. Rose Pacatte looking at some of this year's new holiday television movies. The first post, focusing on "Have a Little Faith," can be found here.

Game of Your Life
Friday, Dec. 2
NBC, 8 p.m./7 p.m. CST

NBC's latest Family Movie Night film, "Game of Your Life," is about a serious high school video gamer, Zach (Titus Makin Jr.), who receives a scholarship to an institute of digital design. There, teens form groups of writers, designers and producers and must promise to follow certain rules that involve choices, just like the games they are creating.

At its core, the movie is about character: doing the right thing even when no one is looking.

I think this film may be of interest to grown-ups who would like to know more about this digital universe and its ethical demands and challenges, as well as story-telling techniques.

On Sunday, I went to my sister's parish, a historic church in northern California that dates back 100 years and serves about 7,500 rural families. According to the parish website, 95 percent of the parish is white, 61 percent consists of married couples and 13 percent of the parish is 65 years old or older. The parish also shares a school with a neighboring parish five miles away.

I only attend Mass at this church when I visit once a year at Thanksgiving, so I don't know anyone personally except my sister who attends Mass at various churches -- when she goes.

The ushers greeting people at the doors of the church were warm and welcoming.

This is the first in a trilogy of blog posts by Sr. Rose Pacatte looking at some of this year's new holiday television movies.

Have a Little Faith
Sunday, Nov. 27
ABC, 9 p.m./8 p.m. CST

"Have a Little Faith" is this year's Hallmark Hall of Fame's made-for-TV holiday movie. It's based on the 2009 best-selling book by Mitch Albom and in many ways is similar to "Tuesdays with Morrie" -- a book (1997) and film (1999) that made me cry a river.

"Have a Little Faith" is about Mitch's relationship with the rabbi of his youth, Rabbi Lewis (Martin Landau), who asked Mitch (Bradley Whitford) to write and then give his eulogy when the time came. As a journalist, Mitch agreed, but only after he conducted several interviews with Rabbi Lewis. These led Albom to notice stories about faith in Detroit, where he worked. He met Henry Convington (Laurence Fishburn), a former drug addict and ex-con in Detroit who became a reverend and ministers to the people of a poor inner-city church, working to make the lives of his people better.

In the ongoing debate about food in the United States, Congress outdid itself Thursday by siding with the french fry and pizza industries and declaring, or reaffirming, pizza as a vegetable because it has two tablespoons of tomato paste per slice, thereby securing its place on the school lunch menu.

The Rev. Dr. William F. Fore, executive director of the National Council of Churches Broadcasting and Film Commission for 25 years, has placed one of the world's richest treasure houses of online religious information into the care of the Claremont School of Theology.

Fore is the designer and senior editor of Religion-Online.org, one of the most used online resources in the area of religion. According to Google, the site had 10 million hits this year from visitors in more than 200 countries. The site also grants liberal rights to download material and copy for nonprofit educational purposes, asking only that sources be cited.

Under the section "Catholicism," there is a translation of the book "The Christian of the Future" by Karl Rahner (1967), "a reflection on the nature, limits, and possibilities of change taking place in the Roman Catholic Church during and since the Second Vatican Council," available in its entirety on the site.

[Source]

From left: The Rev. Scott Young, executive director, University Religious Conference, UCLA; Jesuit Fr. Eddie Siebert, founder and president, Loyola Productions; Martin Sheen; Emilio Estevez; David Alexanian; Dr. Craig Detweiller of Pepperdine; Sr. Rose Pacatte, FSP, Pauline Center for Media Studies, film columnist for NCR. (Frederic Charpentier of Frederic Photography)On Nov. 5, Catholics in Media Associates (CIMA) of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, in collaboration with Mt. St. Mary's College Chalon Campus, hosted a screening and panel discussion of Emilio Estevez's new film "The Way."

The main attraction, besides the film, was the participation of the film's star, Martin Sheen, his eldest son writer/director, Emilio Estevez, and producer David Alexanian. The panel was moderated by communications professor Dr. Craig Detweiller of Pepperdine University. Other panelists were Jesuit Fr. Eddie Siebert, president of Loyola Productions and chaplain to CIMA, the Rev. Scott Young, executive director of the University Religious Conference at UCLA, and me.

I had the honor of interviewing Sheen about the film for NCR, so being part of this event was an added grace. I can't think of another way to put it.

This is the second in a two-part interview with Raymond Perrier, the director of South Africa's Jesuit Institute, which initiated the Hope&Joy program. Read the first part of the interview here.

NCR: Unity seems a strong theme of "Hope&Joy."
RP: We needed to find a device, a methodology, that would ensure that all people could come together across the full spectrum of Catholicism, to provide a platform where everyone who identifies themselves as Catholic could sit comfortably.

This device, or idea, is that our church is the church of Vatican II. In one way or another, we have ended up with everyone included in "Hope&Joy."

A Vatican III initiative would have delighted a few, but it would have been alienating and jumping way ahead. "Hope&Joy" says: Let's complete Vatican II before we start new things. There is so much of the Second Vatican Council to explore, contemplate, and put into practice.

The people have bought into this idea.

Raymond Perrier, 45, is the director of South Africa's Jesuit Institute. He looks younger than his years, has a ready smile and is known for his outgoing personality. He is engaging and articulate, and it is easy to see how his energy might be interpreted by some as ambition rather than passion to do something meaningful for the people of God in South Africa.

The new business center of Johannesburg is in Sandton, north of the city. New office high-rises dot the horizon and the convention center and underground shopping center at Nelson Mandela Square is world-class and impressive.

One night last week, after speaking to a group of academics at St. Augustine College, we had to cross the city to get home. We were stopped by police at a check point so they could verify the driver's license. Often, I am told, the police ask for money when they stop people. It's illegal but it happens anyway. There are cameras on the roads and highways to check for road or speed violations (just like home) as well as unregistered vehicles. I am not sure how offenders are tracked down.

There are several major shopping malls here. I had to replace the adapter cord for my laptop one morning and our driver (we employ two local young men who have now been with us for years) took me to a nearby mall, where I found what I needed with no trouble.

What is different in Johannesburg from my last visit? The airport renovations are complete, since they were initiated for the soccer World Cup held last year. It was so much faster getting through immigration and customs! You can still see signs and banners about the World Cup as you leave the airport, and a statue as well.

Workers still have to travel an hour or more to and from work, and many walk long distances. Four years ago, many women walked along the side roads carrying things on their heads. So far, I have only seen one woman do this. Maybe I have to get out more.

Earlier this year, I was invited by our community of Daughters of St. Paul in Johannesburg, South Africa, to take part in a two-year program running up to the 50th anniversary of the beginning of the Second Vatican Council.

Pope John XXIII announced his intention to call for a council Jan. 25, 1959, a mere three months into his pontificate. He convoked the council on Oct. 11, 1962, and Pope Paul VI closed the council Dec. 8, 1965.

The program is titled "Hope&Joy," drawn from the opening words of the final document of Vatican II, "Gaudium et spes," or "The Pastoral Constitution of the Church in the Modern World." This document was not envisioned or planned before the council convened like the others, but emerged from the work and input of the council participants, and, one might surmise, their associates and consultants and the Holy Spirit. It was promulgated on Dec. 7, 1965, one day before the end of the Second Vatican Council. (I am not sure yet why they chose hope and joy rather than the exact translation "joy and hope.")

I grew up in San Diego listening to my Connecticut born and bred mother praising the wonders of New York City. Her parents took her and her siblings there often to visit an aunt who lived and prospered there. For some reason the Museum of Natural History was the place she most often described for us kids.

After three years in the convent in Boston, we novices went by car to New York in November 1970, to have an experience of our apostolate of evangelization with the media and to see what convent life was like in a smaller community than that of the provincial-novitiate house.

We drove our van down the Hudson Parkway and under the George Washington Bridge, with the Cloisters to our left, and the shrine of Mother Cabrini, Sr. Anthony told us. But I fell into something that must be like ecstasy as Manhattan was revealed via the view from the then-elevated West Side Highway. It wouldn't be closed until 1973 and completely closed and demolished until 1989.

Over the weekend my niece invited family members to join a Facebook word game we could all play. I clicked into "Apps" on my Facebook page and noticed that I had been invited to join more than 50 games, but one really got my attention: Vatican Wars.

It's a "new social game", a fantasy game, where you can become the pope. As a priest and candidate for pope you have to decide what Jesus would say if he were here today based on these issues: abortion, same sex marriage, if priests can marry, birth control and the ordination of women.

I clicked through and saw that I had only two choices: to be a Templar (socially conservative) player or a Crusader (socially liberal). Each team plays together to try to get one of their members elected pope.

The latest TV movie from the NBC-Walmart-Proctor & Gamble family friendly triad airs this Saturday, Sept. 3, at 8/7c on NBC: "Game Time: Tackling the Past".

It's a football movie starring Catherine Hicks and Beau Bridges as the parents whose oldest son Jake (Ryan McPartlin) is a pro football player. While his achievements on the field have brought him near a place in the Hall of Fame, his career and ambition have kept him from his family for 15 years. When his dad has a major heart attack, Jake goes home to more devastating news.

This is a rather formulaic made-for-TV movie, but the cast and performances are appealing, especially from Hicks and Bridges. The unique thing about previewing the film was that the marketing company organized an online screening with Hicks, who plays the peace-keeper in the family. During the screening journalists could log in and type-chat with Hicks throughout. I really enjoyed this -- it was as if we were all sitting in a living room chatting while watching, just like families do.

Texan Luke Chisholm (Lucas Black) is an amateur golf champion who is on the brink of turning pro. His dad Martin (Joseph Lyle Taylor) is his life-long trainer and caddie. Martin stomps off when Luke ignores his advice and loses the game and his chance at getting a place on the pro golf tour.

Luke has an angry meltdown and goes his own way. He runs his car off the road in to avoid hitting a bull and discovers he is in the tiny town of Utopia. A rancher, Johnny (Robert Duvall) comes to his aid and brings him to the town diner where he meets Sarah (Deborah Ann Woll) and her mom Lily (Melissa Leo) at the diner; they all think of Johnny as a kind uncle. Sarah's sometimes-boyfriend Jake (Brian Geraghty) is immediately jealous of Luke.

Johnny invites Luke to his ranch bed-and-breakfast to be tended to by the rather peculiar manager (played by an uncredited Kathy Baker).

Johnny, a retired pro golfer, senses that Luke is on the verge of giving up golf or worse. He invites the young man to stay for a week, promising that in seven days he will change Luke's game.

On August 15, I wrote about "News Bites" on my blog.

In today's Los Angeles Times, Stephen Baker, a former senior writer for Business Week and author of "Final Jeopardy: Man vs. Machine and the Quest to Know Everything", reflects on Mitt Romney's August 11 sound byte, "Corporations are people, my friend."

Baker is to be applauded for his civil discourse on what speaks as whom.

The fact that Romney defaulted to this statement in his response to a heckler about corporations being people is worth much reflection, reflection that Mr. Baker offers here.

I hope his reflection bites us awake.

I rest my case.

I became a media literacy education specialist because I started paying attention to the news. Now I am a recovering news junkie because after Tim Russert died, no one seems civil and especially I don't enjoy the Sunday morning talk shows any more. The news isn't what it used to be; it's infotainment at best.

However some news bits and bytes get my attention because they "bite" -- though for different reasons.

Politicians that blame the "lame stream" media get a lot of broadcasting sound bytes that can take a politicians' meaning out of context -- or not. It depends on one's perspective I think.

Here's what I heard on the news yesterday and again this morning:

Family Night on NBC is a project sponsored by Wal-Mart and Proctor and Gamble (P&G) that started in 2010 as a response to a study that revealed that parents wanted more family-oriented shows.

In general, I have not been impressed by the message-based stories. The last Family Movie Night on June 6, "Field of Vision" was about bullying in schools, and it was well-intentioned but also long and dry.

However, "Who is Simon Miller?", that airs tomorrow on Saturday, Aug. 6, is a very watchable story about a dad (Loren Dean) who is a geologist but also a spy. When he gets into trouble, his wife and teenage kids get involved.

This may sound like a plot for "Spy Kids" but it’s low tech and the family is a very ordinary family -- Caucasian American family.

NBC has upped the writing and "Who is Simon Miller?", while predictable and sparkling white, kept my attention. But I think it works because it rests on a formula that deserves some questioning about what makes a good "family" movie -- and exactly which families NBC thinks is worth making "good" movies for.

The HBO documentary "Mann v. Ford" premieres tonight, Monday, at 9 p.m. EST.

When I lived in Staten Island, N.Y., in the 1970s, I remember waking up many mornings, breathing deeply, and saying to the other nuns, "Ah, smell New Jersey." Of course, the Staten Island landfill took over the airways in the early 1990s when I lived in Staten Island once again. By then, the slaughterhouse in Elizabeth, N.J., at the end of the Goethals Bridge was closed, and the refineries did something to at least make the unbearable heavy smell of chemicals diminish so we could breathe New York's garbage.

After several schedule changes, tonight ABC will air "Beyond Belief" about Marian apparitions tonight on PRIMETIME. (See my earlier blog: ABC to air documentary on Mejdugorje.)

A friend sent me this notice: If you wish to "TIVO" it for future viewing, it is titled "Primetime Nightline: Beyond Belief" in the TIVO system (with "The Miracle Mysteries" used in the description field).

For what it is worth, the prosecutor should not have laughed during Jose Baez' closing statements. Baez is a defense attorney and this was his first capital murder case. He tried his best and I think the jury identified with Baez -- the government (Goliath) mocking a person trying their best (David) has no fans -- even when it seems a mother killed her child -- the worst of crimes -- or was responsible for her death.

Although Republican Gov. Chris Christie, 48, of New Jersey has said emphatically that he is not running for president, the television networks love him. True, his standing in the polls took a hit when his budget deal passed in the state legislature this week, but last Sunday morning on "Meet the Press" moderator David Gregory questioned Christie's blunt style and Christie called himself "huggable and loveable." He also said he would endorse the most authentic Republican candidate who would run for president in 2012

In Rob Reiner's 1995 romcom "The American President," Leo Solomon, played by John Mahoney of "Frasier" fame, heads a lobbying firm in D.C. He scolds the high-powered and overpriced lobbyist he just hired to convince Congress to oppose the president. She is Sydney Ellen Wade, played by Annette Bening, and she was the date of President Andrew Shepherd, played by Michael Douglas, the night before at a White House state dinner.

According to Ave Maria Press, ABC's Nightline will air a documentary about Mary, the Mother of God, on Wednesday, June 29, to coincide with the 30th anniversary of the first apparition at Mejdugorje. The documentary will look at other apparitions and Mary's influence as well.