Pre-World Cup, Neocats win Clericus Cup

It’s the biggest foot-balling event in the world before the World Cup’s kickoff in South Africa in two weeks time. Erm. Ok. Fine.

It’s the Catholic Church’s biggest foot-balling event: The Clericus Cup and it’s just bee run, a second time in  a row, by a smoking hot team of international seminarians put up by the Neocatechumenal Way. Their team “Redemptoris Mater” beat the students at the North American College “The North American Martyrs” one : nil in the Clericus Cup final in Rome on Saturday.

Since February, 300 clerics and young priests from 63 different nations took part in the tournament which has been running for four years now. There are 16 teams made up of the different seminarians and the competition is organised by the Catholic Sports Association of Italy.

Thin end of the wedge

We couldn’t help noticing a mildly hysterical tone in some of the headlines in the Times these last couple of days when references were being made to the forthcoming Apostolic Constitution. From the military sounding Rome parks tanks on Rowan’s lawn (accompanied with a picture of the Church on a tank) to Vatican to poach traditional Anglicans and the slightly distasteful Converts may choke on the raw meat of Catholicism the headlines do not require psychic powers to sense a bit of hostility. Anyone?

It was reminiscent of another period in the history of the Catholic Church in this country — the re-establishment of the Catholic hierarchy — when the Times was not very happy with the state of things either (granted in those days, the old Papists were being pretty provocative). A bit of digging came up with a cartoon from an issue of Punch from the period.