President Clinton committing adultery and having sex with an intern – Media says move along.
Presidential Candidate John Edwards committing adultery while his wife has cancer – Media says move along.
Sarah Palin’s 17 year old daughter committing fornication and keeping the baby – Media says what a moral outrage and front page story!
When an artist wants to be provocative and to "start a conversation" they all seem to be provocative in the same way. The banality of being provocative. Yes to push the envelop your "art" must:
Artists are a lot of teenager who often rebel in exactly the same way and wear/pierce/tattoo exactly the same things as a sign of their "individuality."
An Italian museum has defied Pope Benedict by refusing to remove a statue of a crucified green frog clutching a beer mug and an egg.
The Vatican had condemned the modern art sculpture as blasphemous.
The board of the Museion museum in the northern city of Bolzano voted it was a work of art, however.
Of course we get the typical hyperbole with Pope’s fury as crucified frog statue goes on display at Italian museum.
I knew television commercials havr gotten really bad, which is why I pretty much record everything so I can skip through commercials. Last night I caught a bit of some Clint Eastwood movie on AMC only to be treated to a commercial for Trojan’s Vibrating Touch a masturbation aid for women. It was so bad it made me long for erectile dysfunction commercials instead.
It was really nice to see the number of responses by several bishops about Nancy Pelosi’s faulty Church history lesson. This is exactly the type of response that should be more common. Though I wonder which is worse 1) Misrepresenting the Church on a Sunday news show or 2) Voting for something intrinsically evil? It seems to me that a diocese should respond whenever a lawmaker from their dioces votes for something intrinically evil. This can be done charitably, but forcibly as Archbishop Chaput has done.
So far as I know Archbishop Chaput has been the only bishop to come out and mention that Sen. Biden is pro-abortion and specifically that he should not be receiving Communion. I would like to see the USCCB also make a statement about this. A selection of a pro-abortion Catholic should not go unnoticed by the Bishop’s conference since it will certainly not go unnoticed by Catholics and others.
I get the feeling many bishops don’t want to speak up because they don’t want to be seen as political and that is just a bit icky. This is certainly how it is always framed by the media when they do. It is just a sad thing that the Culture of Life is something political in the first place. I would love nothing more than if the political parties were all fully pro-life and all of are arguments could come down to just prudential decisions. Pray that this may be so. But speaking up for the unborn is not political, it is something required by the Gospel. Speaking up against evil whether it is when the Republicans promote torture and at times ESCR or when the Democrats the party of death promotes the myriad ways of the Culture of Death is something that must be done in political season and out of political season. If one party gets condemned more than the other it not partisanship, but because they are out of line with the natural law. So when a bishop does speak up for the truth – email or write to thank them. But most of all pray for your own bishop.
My blog friends Steve Dillard, Christopher Blosser, and Jay Anderson have started up the Catholics Against Joe Biden blog. I certainly hope they are as effective as the Catholics Against Rudy effort was. All pro-abortion politicians are annoying, but pro-abortion Catholic are a special effrontery to the Gospel of Life. Sen. Joe Biden is not as pro-abortion as Sen Obama is, though very few people on the face of the planet are. Sen. Biden’s voting record is decidedly mixed and I applaud him on his vote that were pro-life and pray that he repents of his votes that weren’t.. It is rather sad that like other Democrats that seek power in the Democratic Party that he was once pro-life. Even from a political perspective being pro-abortion is a liability for the most part and few such as President Clinton manage to overcome it (though by pretending to hold a more moderate view).
The new blog has a good synopsis of his voting record.
Maybe there are some Catholics that will be upset by a pro-abortion Catholic veep that would have been willing to vote for Obama otherwise – but it is probably a small group. Though I also suspect that there are many Catholics who don’t realize how radically pro-abortion Sen Obama is, though finally this issue is getting some mainstream coverage. We are not likely to get a sequel to the Sen. Kerry so-called Communion wars since Sen. Biden’s diocese currently doesn’t have a bishop. Bishop W. Francis Malooly will be installed on September 8th.
I do hope that this ticket goes the way of other tickets that included a pro-abortion Catholic. Kerry-Edwards, Mondale/Ferraro, and Obama/Biden would make a nice tripple-play.
Dawn Eden reminded me of this quote from Sen. Biden in 2005
The next Republican that tells me I’m not religious, I’m going to shove my rosary beads down their throat.
Many people are not aware of the Uvula Mysteries.as one of my Plurk friends replied are only prayed on election day.
In the Uvula Mysteries you have the following meditations
For there is no truth in their mouth;
their heart is destruction,
their throat is an open sepulchre,
they flatter with their tongue. Psalm 5.
Let the high praises of God be in their throats and two-edged swords in their hands, Psalm 149
You brood of vipers! how can you speak good, when you are evil? For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. Matthew 12
Not what goes into the mouth defiles a man, but what comes out of the mouth, this defiles a man." Do you not see that whatever goes into the mouth passes into the stomach, and so passes on? But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a man.
"Their throat is an open grave,
they use their tongues to deceive."
"The venom of asps is under their lips." Romans 3
Senator Biden certainly picked a set of mysteries that fit politicians to the T.
Dawn Eden also quipped in her hilarious style "Keep your rosaries off my uvula!"
Democrats have invited more than two dozen religious leaders to pray or speak at their upcoming convention with a notable exception: Denver Archbishop Charles J. Chaput, a policy wonk and the leader of Colorado’s largest religious denomination.
Well this is not exactly a surprise. The Archbishop is not one to hold his tongue just to get along. When he recently spoke to the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR) he brought up the topic of holy obedience, a message not exactly warmly received by this group.
But the Democrats does have Sister Catherine Pinkerton who is on Obama campaign’s Catholic Advisory Council and hold to a relativisitc version of the seamless garmet. When you play word association with these types this is what happens.
You will almost certainly always get an answer that is a prudential matter in relation to something intrinsically evil.
Though I do wonder historically if Bishops are invited to the conventions generally from either the Democratic or Republican Party? I don’t know the answer to this.
Update: A commenter mentions that Cardinal Mahoney spoke at the Democratic Convention – figures.
In a related note Archbishop Chaput was interviewed last night on the Hugh Hewitt show in a fairly long interview about his new book Render Unto Caesar: Serving the Nation by Living our Catholic Beliefs in Political Life
American Papist on the new Cathedral in Oakland currently being constructed.
And it’s not like we can hope for a natural disaster to free us of this aesthetic effrontery – it’s rated to withstand a 1000 year earthquake. Well, I guess we can always pray for a miracle.
My own theory is that they are working for bragging rights about who can build the ugliest cathedral in California.
Via Lex Communis comes this article.
In most of the United States, 24 abortions are carried out for every 100 live births. In New York, 72 abortions occur for every 100 live births.
The continuing boom in abortions–90,157 were performed in the city in 2006, the last year for which statistics are available–apparently means that many women are using abortion as their birth control method of choice. That concerns health advocates, who point out that the procedure sometimes causes complications and is more expensive than contraception. The high rate also shows that these women are not protected against AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases.
“No doctor would ever tell a woman that abortion was one of the choices she should rely on for contraception,” says Iffath Hoskins, chief of obstetrics and gynecology at Lutheran Medical Center in Brooklyn.
The high rate is especially troubling because it indicates that more city residents are turning to abortion. Years ago, most abortions in the city–up to two-thirds in some years–were performed on women from out of town who flocked to New York because of its liberal abortion policies. Now, however, 93% of the abortions in New York City are performed on city residents.
The easy availability of abortion and not enough access to affordable contraception may be reasons behind the city’s high abortion rate. An average of 250 abortions are performed in the city each day at more than 200 clinics and doctor’s offices. And even though free or low-cost contraception is offered through 59 publicly funded programs at 218 sites in New York state, mostly in New York City, more could be provided, says Deborah Kaplan, deputy commissioner of the city Department of Health and Mental Hygiene.
“To me, the problem is access,” says Ms. Kaplan. “If we improved access to contraceptives, there would be a reduction in abortion.”
"I keep pouring gas on the fire and it keeps getting bigger. If only I had more gas."
The question for pro-choicers is why is a high rate of abortion troubling anyway? If it really is a morally neutral act than it doesn’t matter if there is one or one thousand. So what if it is a backup-contraceptive?
That would be good news to taxpayers. In a time of fiscal constraints, abortion is costing the state at least $16 million in Medicaid spending annually, and city taxpayers still more through a city Health and Hospitals Corp. policy that provides free abortions to poor women at its facilities. The surgical costs alone are between $1,000 and $1,800 per abortion, compared with the $425 average annual cost for birth control pills.
Whatever you subsidize you get more of.
But the biggest concern over the high abortion rate is the impact it is having on women’s health.
Most health experts agree that it is wise to keep abortion safe, legal and available in New York, but some are also concerned that too many women are not using other methods to prevent unwanted births.
Surgical abortion always carries risks, though slight, of complications–including ones that can tear or scar the uterus and compromise a woman’s ability to have healthy children in the future, Dr. Hoskins says.
What there are risks? How did did that make it into the aritcle, must be a mistake by the editors..Next we have one of the strangest bits of logic I have seen.
It may be especially difficult for black women in communities where men are scarce, due to incarceration or addiction problems, to insist that their partners use condoms.
Yes scarce men cause pregnancies.
A reader sent me a link to a voters guide
from the Sisters, Servants of
the Immaculate Heart of Mary in Monroe, Michigan.
Catholic Answers in their voting guide
list five non-negotiable issues that are always intrinsically evil.
Abortion, Euthanasia, Embryonic Stem-Cell Research, Human
Cloning and Homosexual “Marriage.” The UCCB’s Faithful
Citizenship also mentions these issues with a lot of emphasis on
abortion and making it clear that it is not just one of several issues.
Now if I ask you how many of these items
made it into the Sister’s voting guide, what would be your answer.
If you answered zero then bingo – pat yourself on the back.
For them the most important issues are Militarism,
Immigration, Global Climate Change (bet you knew that would be in
there), and Peace.
Ironically their section on militarism
starts with the fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Soviet
Union. I guess they thought this happened because people
threw some blood on some missiles or something. For them
militarism means actually having a military that might be able to
defend us.
Their section on immigration says that the
Minuteman “mounted their own attacks on immigrants” so their definition
of “attack” must be pretty loose. And of course the border
fence is all about racism doncha know. They cite Church
documents yet fail to find the fact that the Church says “Political
authorities, for the sake of the common good for which they are
responsible, may make the exercise of the right to immigrate subject to
various juridical conditions, especially with regard to the subject to
various juridical conditions immigrants duties toward their country of
adoption.” The problem with so many social justice types is
that they are very selective on Church teaching. If they
advocated a very open immigration policy while at the same time
limiting illegal immigration they would be much closer to the mark.
In their section on global warming they quote Nobel Peace Prize winner
Wangari Maathai who thinks that HIV/AIDS was created by Western
governments to kill Africans. Well since she also believes in
global warming I guess she is consistent. At least they
mentioned the fact that biofuels are reducing food supplies and
increasing food prices. Though this is only the result of the
global warming hoax in the first place.
There section on Peace I think was written
by Rep. Dennis Kucinich
since it has that recommendation for the “Department of Peace” in it.
It is not that I disagree with everything they say in this document, it
is just so lopsided and sounds like it was issued by Sen. Obama instead
of an order of Sisters in the religious life. There was
another nun that talked about peace and set a much better example:
But I feel that the greatest destroyer
of
peace today is abortion,
because it is a war against the child, a direct killing of the innocent
child, murder by the mother herself. And if we accept that a mother can
kill even her own child, how can we tell other people not to kill one
another? How do we persuade a woman not to have an abortion? As always,
we must persuade her with love and we remind ourselves that love means
willing to give until it hurts. Jesus gave even His life to love us.
So, the mother who is thinking of abortion, should be helped to love,
that is, to give until it hurts her plans, or her free time, to respect
the life of her child. The father of that child, whoever he is, must
also give until it hurts.
We will certainly never move towards a
non-violent culture while we ignore the most violent of institutional
murder.
They also the follow the infallible guide to identify
progressive religlious orders. That is they have plenty of
links to the U.N. Millennium Development Goals and zero to
the Vatican. Sustainability gets 50 hits on a search while abortion
gets one and hen it is just included as a bunch of issues.
Though I guess the easier tell-tale sign is that no one wears
habits and it is impossible to differential pictures of a groups of
progressive nuns from a woman’s groups in a retirement home.
From an interview with Professor P.Z.
Myers from the National Catholic Register.
I decided to call his bluff. “Has
Christianity contributed anything to humanity?” I asked him.
“Well,” he said in a matter-of-fact tone, “there is this general
property of religion — it’s great at building community. Religion has
been a good thing for many individuals; it has brought them together
and given them comfort. But over all, religion … holds back humanity.”
What, I asked, about the Church’s role in founding the first Western
hospitals, universities, banks and even many breakthroughs in science?
He interrupted me, irate and incredulous:
“No, people made those contributions to
Western Civilization.”
What a cringe-inducing answer. It really makes me sorry for
him that his hatred of Christianity has destroyed any vestige of
objectivity. Say for example somebody asked me.
“Do you think science has contributed to humanity?
What about science’s role in developing medicine, technology,
and helping us to come to a greater understanding of the universe?”
“No, people made those contributions to
Western Civilization.”
I would deserve a good slap to my head for
such an answer.
Jeff Gardner of NCR sums it up.
As I talked with Myers I was struck by
an
irony: For a scientist whose
job it is to observe cause and effect, he has a poor understanding of
the cause, Catholicism, and its effects on world culture. He does not
see Christianity as an elevating force in the world, but rather as a
strange superstition — akin to banging a pot to scare away the moon.
Fr. Stanley Jaki showed how it was the
Catholic Church because of her
theology became the midwife for the scientific method in the first
place in his must-read book “Science and Creation: From Eternal Cycles to
an Oscillating Universe” The title is a bit
off-putting, but it gives an in depth overview of cultures and how
their understanding kept them developing science. Carl Olson
comments on the article and
says:
Perhaps this will help do away with one of the greatest myths of our
time: that scientists are objective, ideologically-free, and
intellectually-balanced people who care only about the facts. Not so.
Not even close. They put on their pocket protectors one pocket at a
time, just like the rest of us, and some of them, like Myers, are
intellectually brilliant in this or that scientific discipline, but are
completely clueless about nearly anything else, including basic respect
and common civility. That we are shocked that Myers talks and acts as
he does indicates that the joke is on us–except, of course, it isn’t a
joke. It is, I think, far more common than most people realize. Perhaps
it’s time we stopped buying the bill of goods sold by those like Myers
who claim to be intellectually superior and scientifically objective
while all they really want to do is gleefully slash our tires. Kudos to
Gardner for helping expose this jerk.