De Erroribus

One of the perils of compiling the daily feed alone -- and, more often than not, under the gun (or several) -- is the assurance that, every so often, an error or two will pop up.

Luckily, though, when you've got a phalanx of editors, these tend to come to light very quickly... and, suffice it to say, your narrator's as grateful as this readership is brilliant (and candid). But while standing policy has always been to correct inaccurate reportage as soon as it's pointed out, the pace with which items get pushed to the bottom of the main page or into the archives seems to merit giving the corrections an added "bump."

Ergo, as needed, this'll become a running feature... and when it's needed, in deference to traditional piety, it'll go up at the customary Confession Hour.

So, for the record:

• Wednesday's item on the Little Flower initially noted that St Therese of the Child Jesus was the second woman to be declared a Doctor of the Church. While Therese was the second Carmelite nun to be so honored, the 1997 proclamation made her the third woman; in 1970, Teresa of Avila and Catherine of Siena together became the first women doctors.

• Yesterday's post on the 40th anniversary of Humanae Vitae erroneously said that the Pope's message to this week's conference on the encyclical were his first comments to mark the milestone. In fact, B16 first addressed Paul VI's "show of courage" in a May speech to a Lateran University seminar on the still-controversial text.

• Last Sunday's remembrance of John Paul I by then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger mistakenly related that the current Pope was one of three living cardinal-electors from 1978's twin conclaves. Actually, Benedict is one of six surviving voters from the historic sessions: the others are the Korean Stephen Kim Sou Hwan, the Brazilians Eugenio de Araujo Sales and Paulo Evaristo Arns OFM, the US' William Wakefield Baum, and Puerto Rico's Luis Aponte Martinez. While Baum and Ratzinger were the only two Paul VI appointees in the 2005 conclave -- created in 1976, Manila's Jaime Sin was likewise still of voting age, but unable to make it due to illness and died two months later -- the Kansas City-born Baum marked his 80th birthday in late 2006. The college's voting complement currently standing four short of the maximum 120 members under age 80, barring deaths only four more slots will open in 2009 due to superannuation. The relative dearth of impending vacancies will be compensated for, however, when the mother-lode drops just beyond next year -- no fewer than 11 cardinals become ineligible to vote in 2010, joined by another six in the first three months of 2011.
  

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