Guess he didn't get the "free gift" part:
Man Accused of Trying to Steal Communion from Priest.

Imagine if they did this in church:
Israeli Soldier Given 21 Days in Prison for Yawning.

Off-Topic: Well, Here's an Irony

Prominent Catholic-Hater Tony Alamo Arrested for Child Sex.

According to Alamo (pronounced "uh-LAW-mo"), once convicted for tax evasion for his money-grubbingmaking practices, the Vatican runs the Illuminati and forged the Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion to pin its worldwide conspiracy on the Jews....

It's sick to know that while participation in, apology for, or ignoring of child molestation should forever put someone beyond the pale, this won't. Alas, such con men abound. Regardless of how pervasive their misbehavior is and how many times it has been exposed by others, or even if they have been punished for their misbehavior by others before, they may find some way to fool others into letting them persist in the ministry. They're never guilty. They speak constantly of "conspirators" who are "persecuting" them (usually by quoting their own words or drawing attention to their deeds). As noted above, these are usually themselves the biggest liars and persecutors of others. This ploy often allows them to hoodwink people into letting them go on with their sins (and sometimes crimes).

It's nice to see justice wins out, here as at Blanco "Monastery." Even the best liar can't fool all the people all the time.

BTW, is it just me or does it look like these two men were separated at birth?

Roscoe P. Coltrane

Tony Alamo

B.C., NOT "BCE"

As a completely off-topic aside, please, in discussing historical events that occurred more than 2008.75 years ago, let's maintain the term "B.C.," not "B.C.E." B.C. means "Before Christ"; in recent times, this has been changed to "B.C.E.," meaning "Before the Common Era." But what do we hold "in common" with those who deny Christ's Birth? What exactly did the Incarnation of Christ establish in "common" with non-believers, except the possibility that we would all become believers? Somehow, I don't think that's what the term's popularizers meant. The requisite division driven into humanity by the great mystery of the Second Person of the Godhead taking Flesh, though lamentable, should not surprise us. It was Christ Who said:

Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law. And a man's foes shall be they of his own household. (St. Matthew 10:34-36).

But B.C. is not PC; the PC is BCE. So, throw out the PC "BCE" and go with B.C.

BJ, over-and-out.

Off-Topic: Abortionist Tiller Takes Communion at ELCA Church

Yes, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) considers the partial birth abortionist "Dr." George Tiller, and his wife, members in good standing. His wife even wrote a devotional for the local church's newsletter at one point.

This website has a picture of the man taking communion.

God have mercy on him and the entire ELCA.

Off-Topic: Greece Has Its First Gay "Marriage"

Performed on Tilos by a "socialist" mayor. Kyrie eleison.

Off-Topic: That's the Orthodox for You!

The citizens of a village in Romania knowingly re-elected a dead man as mayor. Those interviewed said they preferred the deceased Neculai Ivascu to his living rival, Gheorghe Dobrescu. (This takes, "That government is best which governs least" to new extremes.)

In addition to the fact that Romania is estimated to be 87 percent Orthodox, one quotation in the article proved this village is, in fact, an Orthodox village. One of the people who voted for the departed told the media, "I know he died, but I don't want change."

Off-Topic: A Tax Hike I'd Support

California considers a porn tax.

There's an economic truism: "If you tax something more, you get less of it." I'd prefer we had none of this product, but at least this would be a start...like getting Al Capone for not paying his taxes.

The Sermon for William F. Buckley Jr.'s Funeral

The following is the sermon preached in honor of William F. Buckley Jr., whose funeral was last Friday. The homilist was Fr. George Rutler of EWTN.

MASS FOR THE REPOSE OF THE SOUL OF WILLIAM F. BUCKLEY JR.

CATHEDRAL OF SAINT PATRICK

NEW YORK CITY

APRIL 4, 2008

FATHER GEORGE WILLIAM. RUTLER
"NOW BETHANY WAS NEAR JERUSALEM…." JOHN 11:18

In the village of Bethany was the house of Mary and her sister Martha and their brother Lazarus. There Jesus wept when Lazarus died, and then he called into the tomb and Lazarus came forth alive.

Here is a paradox of holy religion: such utter domesticity is so close to the unutterable mystery of Temple. Bethany was near Jerusalem. About fifteen furlongs. Furlongs. William F. Buckley Jr. could have translated that. It is just a little more than the distance between the corner of Park and 73rd Street and this cathedral. In the life of the one we remember today, his home was never far from Jerusalem. Park Avenue and 73rd Street was near Jerusalem and so were Sharon and Camden and Stamford. The key to all that William was and did is that wherever he was and whatever he did, reading a book or writing one, opening a bottle of wine or sailing some sea, he was near Jerusalem. He left this world from his desk in the garage of the house of the one he most loved who had died less than a year before. Their Bethany was near Jerusalem.

After our friend had published a book about sailing across the Atlantic Ocean, an interviewer on television showed a certain condescension about yachting as a socially useless activity. He found tedious the long descriptions of navigation and asked the author if there is any real difference between sailing from east to west and from west to east. There came from Buckley a response as from an oracle: "Yes. They are opposite directions." Bethany lies east of Jerusalem and to reach the holy city you must travel west. William F. Buckley Jr. has now traveled west. But he started in Bethany where our earthly home is.

He did his work using such domestic tools as words, and though some thought them only amusing and clever, those words were strong enough to help crack the walls of an evil empire. A fatal flaw in the materialist dialectic of Marxism was its underestimation of the power of evil, embracing it like a useful energy. When cynics mocked the very idea of evil, he mocked the mockers, and angered them most by their inability to stay angry in his congenial presence. It was as if an ancient voice could be heard speaking through him: "Be of good cheer, I have overcome the world" (John 16:33).

His indignation at the wrong ways of men was not savage like that of Jonathan Swift, for it was well-tempered and confident of victory. He fit Newman's definition of a gentleman as one who is "merciful towards the absurd." Nearly fifty years ago he wrote, "We deem it the central revelation of Western experience that man cannot irradicably stain himself, for the wells of regeneration are infinitely deep...Even out of the depths of despair, we take heart in the knowledge that it cannot matter how deep we fall, for there is always hope." Once on a retreat, he led the others in praying the Stations of the Cross. The Third Station: Jesus falls a first time. The Seventh Station, Jesus falls a second time. Then with a solemn and astonished voice: the Ninth Station, Jesus falls a third time. He knelt and all of us knelt, and then he got up, and we got up with him.

When he wrote his first book about God and man at the age of twenty-five, and launched his magazine at twenty-nine, the inspiration could have seemed the naïveté of callowness, but now we know it was the courage of innocence. At long last, when he sold his boat and silenced his harpsichord, he suddenly seemed much older. It is inadequate to say that he lasted eighty-two years. It is more resonant with his sonorous life to say that he began four score and two years ago. By one of those quirks which are either inexplicable fate or explicable providence, as a young boy he passed by an airfield in Britain at the very moment the prime minister was waving a piece of paper and proclaiming peace in our time. The rest of his life testified that there can be no concord with evil, for evil always seeks to devour the good, and peace at any price is very expensive.

His first and formative academy was his father's dinner table where he was taught that the most important things in life are God, truth, and beauty. This reverses the classical order of beauty, truth, and goodness, because in Athens the philosophers searched the heavens for a beauty that would explain truth and reveal what is good, while in Sharon the Buckleys believed that the eternal logic of the heavens had come to earth, and by showing goodness in the radiance of his Holy Face, Christ touched us with the truth, and those who were touched became beautiful. Since William Buckley's death, many people have told how he brought them to belief in God, and there are those who became priests because of him. His wide circle of friends encompassed those of different beliefs, but its width was the measure of his own unfailing confidence in the Holy, Catholic, Apostolic, and Roman Church. Faithfulness and patience as husband and father, and goodness to others, were joyful because of this. With the Psalmist (Psalm 45:1) his tongue was the pen of a ready writer, and while some write well but do not speak well, or speak well and do not write well, he did both, in a consistent crusade against reducing any human enterprise to a merely human calculus; for then the right to life itself would be at best constitutional but not sacred. Secular humanism is vestigial humanism, charity without a cross, and because it will never lead man up the ladder to heaven, it builds little hells for man on earth. Politics is a bore if it is only politics, and so with any art or science that sees only itself. Our friend knew that Communism was worse than a social tyranny because it was a theological heresy. His categories were not right and left but right and wrong. What graces he had to change a century came by his belief in Christ who has changed all centuries.

At more than a month's remove from his death, a homily yields to that kind of eulogy which he would call precisely a panegyric. The Greeks like Lysias or Isocrates developed this form of speech for Olympiads and other public sporting occasions to see how far an orator could go in praising the dead without actually lying. This does not suit here today for two reasons. Our friend, skier and sailor, was not drawn to public sports arenas. When a friend invited him to a Yankee game, he declined, saying that he had already seen one. More importantly, in the record of his life is little tension between praise and honesty to tease the art of lauding him. By a moral adaptation of a law of optics, he loomed larger the closer you examined him. From his own side of the lens, he saw not according to worldly size or influence. He could write at length on immanentizing the eschaton and also pray the rosary for a schoolboy who was having difficulties with his homework.

One night, he announced it was time for his confession, and we stumbled around the church looking for the light switch. Then he said, "No problem. I can get around this church in the dark." He would have disdained turning that into a cheap metaphor, but he did walk his way through the dark by remarkable paths. Many times the college boy in him still sang "We are poor little lambs/ Who have lost our way...We are little black sheep/Who have gone astray." He may have sung that with perfect insincerity, for he never lost the way, and while he has passed he is not forgotten with the rest. We commend him to his Lord who is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. May he now be numbered among the elect, and in this heavenly election he will not demand a recount.

The Lord raised Lazarus from the dead in Bethany and Bethany is not far from Jerusalem. William, who frequently had the last word, wrote this:

"Granted, that to look up at the stars comes close to compelling disbelief – how can such a chance arrangement be other than an elaboration – near infinite – of natural impulses? Yet, on the other hand, who is to say that the arrangement of the stars is more easily traceable to nature, than to nature's molder? What is the greater miracle: the raising of the dead man in Lazarus, or the mere existence of the man who died and of the witnesses who swore to his revival?"

Fr. Rutler speaks eloquently of William F. Buckley Jr., and grief is still too compelling for me to add anything to his words. May this great man rest in peace.

Interesting: Benedictine Byzantines?

I just discovered an interesting group: "Benedictine Sisters of the Byzantine Church." It looks like the group began in 1951, when a number of Byzantine Catholics entered a Benedictine convent but decided to remain Byzantine Rite Catholic ("Uniate"). I'm not sure exactly how they combine these two elements in practice; I just thought the combination interesting.

Off-Topic: News to Make You Cry, and Laugh

Orthodox News:

Ancient Irish cemeteries found in Camblin. A published description notes, "Burials were all in the Christian manner." Other ancient artifacts were also unearthed.

Nubia's Orthodox heritage in peril from Islamic jihad. Yes, contrary to Black Militant propaganda, Christianity is an historic religion for African-Americans. The National Islamic Front of Sudan wants to flood ancient Christian sites yet unexplored.

News to Make You Cry:
Secular Confirmation: Abstinence is Self-Defense.

And News to Make You Smile:
Maybe It's a Tiny Armenian Monk? (That's not intended as an insult.)

Lenten Disruptions, Version 2.0

It seems nearly every year during Lent, the media revive some long-discredited rumor to discourage Christians: the "tomb of Jesus," the Gospel of Judas, The Da Vinci Code, etc. For some reason, canonical Orthodox always seem to pick fights with each other about contraception during Lent. And it seems as though nearly every year since I started this blog, during Lent (or, more tellingly, around Holy Week) someone issues some allegation against me that I'm supposed to waste time and energy combating, rather than working out my own salvation.

Right on cue, I understand from someone privy that a new round of rumors about me has been posted on a number of vagante haunts. I gather these include a number of false allegations. Some of you may know better than I the details of who posted what where, and when; I doubt it would be spiritually beneficial for me to learn. But before I could end the discussion of this unfortunate topic, I gathered the chief allegation claims that I made a number of telephone calls, over the course of two years, to His Grace Bishop GABRIEL of ROCOR to pass on negative information about some vagante or other.

At the risk of dignifying the charge, let me simply respond: I have never been in touch with Vl. GABRIEL by telephone, telegram, mail, FAX, e-mail, personal audience, telegraph, hologram, or courier pigeon. I have never communicated with Bp. GABRIEL of ROCOR in any way, shape, fashion, or form at any time in my life. Indeed, I'm sure Bishop GABRIEL would be the first to say so.

Again, I don't know the specifics of who posted what when, or where. I do not wish to hear the specifics about this or other rumors; indeed, I did not wish to hear the substance of this falsehood. I do not intend to spend a moment reacting to such people. I do intend to forgive whomever was involved, pray for their well-being, for their enlightenment — and for their malice to end. And then, I hope to set about trying to have an effectual Lent.

I know others have also been hurt by a recent number of anti-WRO onslaughts. There's no point in getting angry or upset over their mean-spirited falsehoods or rushing to their blogs and boards to duke it out with them. (Ya think you're going to get an even playing field?) I can't imagine what Adversary-al Accuser would want us to do so and thus rob us of all the joys of Lent. But I — and I hope you, dear reader — won't fall for it. I would guess this is not the first falsehood these individuals (whoever they are) have posted, and that their history and behavior exposes them for what they are, anyway.

In reality, there is absolutely no profit in trying to talk with those with a Pseudodox axe-to-grind. As Ari Adams has noted about discussions with vagantes:

it gets old and soul-wearying...[Our assailants will] twist any answer given into whatever mockery they choose to advance their selves...

Personally - I get tired of the pretend friendships, people claiming: "I'm for traditional Western rite Orthodoxy", "I'm for Church Unity", etc. All the while they back-bite and slander those holy WRITE clergy actually labouring in the field, then have the gall to call it 'parochial differences' or claim our Western rite clergy are 'liars'. Frankly - I'm scandalised. I'm not interested in the kind of 'Orthodoxy' these critics (whether they consider themselves pro or anti Western rite) are selling - and I'm tired of them expecting us at every challenge (new blog, yahoo board, recent rumor, or forum posting) to come out and battle them for the 'heart and soul' of the Western rite and Orthodoxy....

So true, particularly since most of the "challenges" are not new, they are often simply means to spread falsehoods about canonical Orthodox clergy/laity/jurisdictions, and most of these people are outside Orthodoxy themselves. Ari rightly notes that Western Orthodox:

have enough battle in our own 'cells': fighting our own sin, a culture that is increasingly hostile, and the pain, misery and poverty of humanity around us. We don't need 'cocked up' wars with opponents who want to blab on and on about liturgical minutiae but don't seem to know a single thing about Christian friendship, overcoming doubt about God and the Church.

Please join me in not focusing on these things, not allowing such misbehavior to replace the new birth of Easter with a stillborn Lent. Let's get into church and pray. Most of all, let's not allow their actions to blind us to the real task at hand: repenting of our own sins, growing in Christ's image and likeness, and in so doing seeing thousands around us being saved.

Save the Bible from Politicians

Barack Obama says the Sermon on the Mount Justifies Same-Sex Unions.

Reply: Barney Frank tells him to drop it.

Off-Topic: Two Proposals for Journalists

This post got me thinking....

If any influential reporter, newscaster, anchor, editor, copy writer, teleprompter loader, etc., employed by the "mainstream media" happens to be reading this, may I suggest a modest proposal? In the interests of even-handed coverage, either:

1. Refer to the temporal founder of Islam only as "Mohammed," rather than "The Prophet Mohammed"; or
2. Always refer to the Founder of Christianity as "Our Lord and God and Savior Jesus Christ."
   

It only seems fair. What do you think?

Off-Topic: Higher Criticism...of the Koran

Our friend The Traveling Priest has discovered a news story of potentially staggering importance:

An article about the rediscovery of an archive of documents purporting to provide evidence of the development of the text of the Koran over time.

Why is this important?

For over a century the Bible has been subjected to many different kinds of analysis as to sources, historical settings, literary forms, and language....

The prevailing understanding of the Koran among Muslims is that it is a direct dictation to Mohammed and word for word a replica of the perfect word of God. If it can be shown that the text of the Koran has undergone revisions, compilations, or other kinds of adjustments over time it would be a crucial readjustment of what is probably the central tenet of Islam, that Mohammed was a direct revelator of God's word. The implications could be staggering.

Keep your eyes open for this story.

Fr. Chagnon is right that the Koran is considered to be a direct revelation from the Archangel Gabriel to Mohammed, which cannot be altered in any syllable. He overlooks one likely result of this story: the violent murder of any reporter, scholar, or researcher who pursues it.

(Hat tip: Fr. John Chagnon)

Off-Topic: ABC Says Get Ready for Islam; Bioethics Problems

1. The Archbishop of Canterbury says England's acceptance of fundamentalist Islamic law is "unavoidable."

2. Speaking of politics and religion, the Beatles' favorite guru died. His teachings also formed the basis of a U.S. political party.

3. "Christian" clergy blessed an abortion clinic.

4. Here's a reason to be pro-life from self-interest.

5. Religious people have increasingly turned their eyes to the ethical implications of biological and technological breakthroughs. Here's another:

Sperm cells have been created from a female human embryo in a remarkable breakthrough that suggests it may be possible for lesbian couples to have their own biological children.

Now the world can state men are truly meaningless.

Off-Topic: Dr. D. James Kennedy, RIP

It's not news by now, but the radio and television evangelist Dr. D. James Kennedy passed away early Wednesday morning at the age of 76. Dr. Kennedy is best remembered for inventing the "Evangelism Explosion" method of lay evangelism and for his radio and TV ministries. Kennedy, the recipient of multiple earned advanced degrees, possessed two characteristics rarely associated with the term "televangelist": education and integrity. His peppered his sermons with quotations from Herodotus, Plato, and Cicero. His rich tenor soothed millions, and his sermon text was ever as crisp as his delivery. And to date, I do not know of a single allegation of financial or personal misconduct against him. (Many vangates who would piously hold him in judgment don't have such a record of "walking the walk.") It must be noted, he proclaimed an unabashed Calvinism marked by muted but sometimes harsh anti-Catholicism, neither of which I share. Yet for the morass of radio preachers, he was nearly as "high church" as one ever got. (A sad commentary: influential media purveying "old time religion" only cover the era before Geneva if one tunes into "The Lutheran Hour," and then only by a fraction.)

On a personal level, I remember vividly the first time I heard Dr. Kennedy on the radio -- trapped as a passenger with a driver who listened to the local fundamentalist station and had told me Kennedy was "different from most televangelists." I rolled my eyes. I was pleasantly surprised to encounter a sermon (and ultimately a series of sermons) that were later transcribed into his book Why I Believe, an apologetic for the Christian faith. It was true; he was not like the average televangelist. (And I later got a copy of the book.) Decades later, not all his historical claims withstand scrutiny, but the bulk of his argument has remained and has undoubtedly brought many agnostics to faith in Christ as their "Lord, God, and Savior." He was a Calvinist who may have believed that I, an Orthodox Christian who believes in a lifelong synergistic and ascetic struggle, was not a Christian. I recognize the errors inherent in Calvinism. But TULIP was hardly the focus of his average sermon: instead he focused on the "basics" of proclaiming the Divinity of Christ and calling all to Him. Kennedy touched millions with messages like those I heard so long ago. May his good fruit outweigh the errors committed in ignorance, and may his memory be eternal.

Update 1: His family has established a memorial website.

Update 2: I see DailyKos has weighed in with a typically loving response: "Another Hate Merchant Meets His Maker." The president had more charitable comments.

Blogs That Make Me Think

I've been tagged. Julio Gurrea of Hispania Sancta asked me to post the five blogs that make me think. (If he'd e-mailed me, I might have known I was tagged earlier.) :) The instructions are:

1. If, and only if, you get tagged, write a post with links to 5 blogs that make you think;
2. Link to this post so that people can easily find the exact origin of the meme;
3. Optional: Proudly display the 'Thinking Blogger Award' with a link to the post that you wrote (here is an alternative silver version if gold doesn't fit your blog).

I enjoy reading a wide variety of online religious writers, and I take something away from each of them. However, the five blogs that most frequently make me examine or ruminate upon something deeper would be (in no particular order):

1. The Ochlophobist. Always insightful, he gets away with making longish posts, because each new sentence enlightens rather than grates. His recent, thoughtful exploration of contraception was a welcome change from the usual bloviation and angry condemnation that plagues the topic.
2. Qatl Qitl Qutl. Eric Jobe is a genuine scholar, and his linguistic insights help me see things from a new perspective. It's a snobbish retort to say, "Unless you understand the original languages, you can never fully understand the Bible"; Eric Jobe has never made it -- but he proves if you do know the original languages, that knowledge can add new depths to your faith.
3. Ad Orientem. Ad Orientem has the ability to make me think on every issue: politics, social events, church news, and theology. The blog defly traverses these, which would bog down any other commentator, with a skill and felicity rare on any specialized blog. If it weren't a sin, I'd be jealous. :)
4. Hispania Sancta. I'm not just saying this because he tagged me. :) Julio's rare posts help us focus on what's truly important: are we passion-filled hypocrites, expounding on high doctrine which indulging in low-living? His resources on purity and the deformities visited upon us by narcissism are most impressive.
5. Conversi ad Dominum. Fr. John W. Fenton of Holy Incarnation Church in Detroit (AWRV) renders his readers a valuable service in posting his sermons online, something every Orthodox priest consider doing. Moreover, his scholarship and knowledge of St. Maximos the Confessor (among many others) gives his regular posts a depth lacking in others. There is always much to contemplate.

Honorable Mentions: Ari Adams' two blogs (he just isn't posting as much anymore; real life taking him away from his readers), Orthodox Tidings, Glory to God for All Things, and Energetic Procession. Occidentalis (Subdn. Benjamin Andersen) and Fr. Matthew Thurman's blog used to rank high in the pecking order. RIV(irtual)P.

Tagging: Eric Jobe, Eric John, and Ari Adams.

Finally, I'll tag you: I'm always looking for a good read. What should I be reading? I'd genuinely appreciate your recommendations.

Off-Topic: The Bible As Tramp's Prop

Look who found the Bible? Paris Hilton. Yes, that Paris Hilton. In a transparent move to avoid paying the penalty of her misdeeds, copied by faux penitents from Manuel Noriega to vagantes everywhere, Hilton is toting the Good Book. The story's sickening, accompanying picture notes Hilton could find a Bible, but she couldn't find a bra.

Robert Webber, RIP

I'm saddened to report that author and lecturer Robert Webber, the pioneer of "Ancient Future Worship," has passed away. Here is an obituary from Northern Seminary, where he founded the Institute for Worship Studies (which now bears his name).

Webber was known in those circles for his advocacy of more traditional forms of worship. His book and program, Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail, brought many "snake-belly-low" independent Christians into the Episcopal Church, pre-1979. I know some of these "Bob Webber Episcopalians" made their way into Orthodoxy (usually in the Byzantine rite), whether Antiochian or otherwise.

Webber did not enter Orthodoxy (nor, as some of his followers did, Roman Catholicism), because he seemed more than content as an evangelical. I was never terribly comfortable with his call for evangelicals to adopt, add, or amalgamate older worship patterns into their hymnfests and sermon-a-thons. Webber, who understood the mechanics of worship, seemed never to confront the fact that those varying ancient rites 1) were not "adopted" for human convenience; 2) were not intended to be adapted to human whim; and 3) were inextricably tied to a theology and ecclesiology with which they were meant to be accepted in toto. Evangelical Protestantism may well beautify its worship with bits-and-bobs of ancient liturgy, but ultimately it leaves the pastor in a position of absolute autonomy in matters "liturgical" and theological.

Shortly before his death, Webber admonished evangelicals to rediscover “the faith articulated by the consensus of the ancient Church and its guardians in the traditions of Eastern Orthodoxy, Roman Catholicism, the Protestant Reformation, and the Evangelical awakenings,” as though these bodies were interchangeable. (This has been much analyzed elsewhere.)

However, in the theological and doxological fog of 20th century Evangelical Christianity, Robert Webber raised a vital standard for his Christian brothers and sisters: make worship, not education or infotainment, the central component of your church service. In that capacity, he deepened the spiritual lives of many, reintroducing them to parts of their lost heritage. Orthodox must now give his followers "the rest of the story."

RIP.

Off-Topic: News Roundup

Not only that, but see what happens when you make them watch Oprah: Pollution may change male frogs into female frogs

And I thought cell phones were irritating: Police: Using laptop in car caused deadly head-on...

The Next Blanco Monk? ROCK GREAT PETER TOWNSHEND: PRAY FOR BRITNEY... (What's the Blanco similarity? This. BTW, Britney could use prayer.)