Egnorance

All over America, in every public school, teachers should lead students in prayer for the kids wounded and killed at Chardon High.

2012-02-29T06:00:00.081-05:00

From Todd Starnes at Fox News:

Why is school prayer only allowed during tragedies?

By Todd Starnes

Published February 27, 2012

It was supposed to be a fairly quiet week at Chardon High School.

The boys basketball team, the Hilltoppers, was scheduled to play a game Monday night. Parent-Teacher conferences were set for Thursday.

It was just a normal day in Chardon, Ohio.

But normal changed at approximately 7:30 Monday morning.

Gunfire. Screams. Chaos.

A teenager – an outcast – armed with a gun – walked into the school cafeteria. In a matter of moments, five students were gunned down. At least one child died.

Terrified students huddled in classrooms. They called 911. They texted and tweeted. Teachers locked doors and implemented emergency procedures.

And at least one teacher chased the gunman out of the school – an act of bravery that possibly saved lives.

As police try to make sense of the senseless, the school superintendent called on people to pray.

It was a wise decision.

But perhaps lost in the chaos is the irony that in American public schools – people are not allowed to pray.

Liberals have successfully banished God from the classroom, replacing Him with the manmade god of secularism.

Yet in times of great tragedy, school leaders inevitably seek guidance and solace from the same God they’ve expelled. I’ve often wondered – if God is good enough for the bad times, shouldn’t He be good enough for the good times?

It’s a lesson I sadly suspect our nation’s educators will never learn.

Questions for atheists:

Is the superintendent's call for prayer unconstitutional?

Is a teacher leading kids at Chardon High in a prayer for the victims unconstitutional?

Would a sign at the school saying "Pray for our classmates" be a crime?

Do prayers for the kids who were killed and injured make atheists feel "ostracized and excluded"?

Are atheists gonna call the ACLU on these people?

Should the police stop teachers and school officials at Chardon High from leading students in prayer?

If not, why not? Isn't organized prayer in school unconstitutional?

My suggestion:

All over America, in every public school, teachers should lead students in prayer for the kids wounded and killed at Chardon High.

Let the atheists sue us.

Payday for Jessica

2012-02-28T06:00:00.000-05:00

From the L.A. Times:

Jessica Ahlquist (smiling, center) with supporters during
school committee meeting in Cranford, Rhode Island

By Rene Lynch

February 22, 2012, 11:41 a.m.

A Rhode Island teen is learning that it pays to deny the existence of God: Prominent atheists plan to present Jessica Ahlquist with a scholarship of at least $44,000 -- and possibly more.

It seems they were impressed with the way Ahlquist, 16, handled herself amid a roiling controversy that began in July 2010, when she complained about a prayer banner hanging in the auditorium at Cranston High School West that referred to "Our Heavenly Father."

School authorities brushed off her complaint, saying the banner was artistic and historic, as it had been hanging there for decades. Ahlquist later joined the American Civil Liberties Union in a suit alleging that the banner made her feel "ostracized and out of place."

After much legal wrangling, a court ruled that the banner needed to be removed -- and an uproar ensued.

The controversy helped Ahlquist, an atheist, collect thousands of friends and followers on Facebook and Twitter.

But it also sparked outrage on behalf of many others who embraced the banner and wanted the school district to stand firm. A state legislator called Ahlquist an "evil little thing." There were death threats. The financially strapped school district spent tens of thousands on legal fees. And recall threats were lodged against the school board.

Those school board jobs are still in jeopardy; the district voted last week to end the appeals process to save money.

Blogger Hemant Mehta who writes the Friendly Atheist started a campaign to raise scholarship money for Ahlquist, and the American Humanist Assn. is also helping to oversee the fund-raising effort, which runs through the end of the month.

"The way she has handled herself throughout this whole ordeal is admirable far beyond anything most people would expect from a high school student," Mehta wrote.

So far, the fund has raised $44,000 for Ahlquist. Mehta and the association say she earned the scholarship by standing up to critics "with class and style."

Note the execrable tactic of atheists playing to the vanity of a 16 year-old schoolgirl to use her as a pawn in their lawsuit.

The battle we face against the unconstitutional cleansing of free religious expression from civic life is not merely against foes who hate our faith. It is a battle against foes who lack rudimentary ethics-- in this case, they use a schoolchild to censor her Christian friends and neighbors and to expropriate a large legal settlement from her school district as a warning to others who would speak of God in civic life.

They hide behind children, enticing them to lie in court-- Jessica obviously was not harmed in any way by the prayer mural-- and they use her as a pawn to enforce civic atheism.

An uncommonly clear example of political atheism.

"Seat-12" and Pius XII

2012-02-27T06:00:00.016-05:00

Lt. General Ion Mihai Pacepa, the highest ranking intelligence officer ever to defect from the Soviet bloc, in a 2007 essay in National review:

... [W]hen I was at the center of Moscow’s foreign-intelligence wars, I myself was caught up in a deliberate Kremlin effort to smear the Vatican, by portraying Pope Pius XII as a coldhearted Nazi sympathizer...

In February 1960, Nikita Khrushchev approved a super-secret plan for destroying the Vatican’s moral authority in Western Europe. The idea was the brainchild of KGB chairman Aleksandr Shelepin and Aleksey Kirichenko, the Soviet Politburo member responsible for international policies. Up until that time, the KGB had fought its “mortal enemy” in Eastern Europe, where the Holy See had been crudely attacked as a cesspool of espionage in the pay of American imperialism, and its representatives had been summarily jailed as spies. Now Moscow wanted the Vatican discredited by its own priests, on its home territory, as a bastion of Nazism.

Eugenio Pacelli, by then Pope Pius XII, was selected as the KGB’s main target, its incarnation of evil, because he had departed this world in 1958. “Dead men cannot defend themselves” was the KGB’s latest slogan.

Because Pius XII had served as the papal nuncio in Munich and Berlin when the Nazis were beginning their bid for power, the KGB wanted to depict him as an anti-Semite who had encouraged Hitler’s Holocaust... “Seat-12” was the code name given to this operation against Pius XII, and I became its Romanian point man...

[S]oon three young [Romanian intelligence] undercover officers posing as Romanian priests were digging around in the papal archives... [They] succeeded in pilfering hundreds of documents connected in any way with Pope Pius XII out of the Vatican Archives and the Apostolic Library. Everything was immediately sent to the KGB via special courier. In actual fact, no incriminating material against the pontiff ever turned up in all those secretly photographed documents. Mostly they were copies of personal letters and transcripts of meetings and speeches, all couched in the routine kind of diplomatic language one would expect to find. Nevertheless, the KGB kept asking for more documents. And we sent more...

In 1963, General Ivan Agayants, the famous chief of the KGB’s disinformation department, landed in Bucharest to thank us for our help. He told us that “Seat-12” had materialized into a powerful play attacking Pope Pius XII, entitled The Deputy, an oblique reference to the pope as Christ’s representative on earth. Agayants took credit for the outline of the play, and he told us that it had voluminous appendices of background documents put together by his experts with help from the documents we had purloined from the Vatican. Agayants also told us that The Deputy’s producer,Erwin Piscator, was a devoted Communist who had a longstanding relationship with Moscow. In 1929 he had founded the Proletarian Theater in Berlin, then sought political asylum in the Soviet Union when Hitler came to power, and a few years later had “emigrated” to the United States. In 1962 Piscator had returned to West Berlin to produce The Deputy...

The Deputy saw the light in 1963 as the work of an unknown West German named Rolf Hochhuth, under the title Der Stellvertreter. Ein christliches Trauerspiel (The Deputy, a Christian Tragedy). Its central thesis was that Pius XII had supported Hitler and encouraged him to go ahead with the Jewish Holocaust. It immediately ignited a huge controversy around Pius XII, who was depicted as a cold, heartless man more concerned about Vatican properties than about the fate of Hitler’s victims. The original text presents an eight-hour play, backed by some 40 to 80 pages (depending on the edition) of what Hochhuth called “historical documentation.” In a newspaper article published in Germany in 1963, Hochhuth defends his portrayal of Pius XII, saying: “The facts are there — forty crowded pages of documentation in the appendix to my play.” In a radio interview given in New York in 1964, when The Deputy opened there, Hochhuth said, “I considered it necessary to add to the play a historical appendix, fifty to eighty pages (depending on the size of the print).” In the original edition, the appendix is entitled “Historische Streiflichter” (historical sidelights). The Deputy has been translated into some 20 languages, drastically cut and with the appendix usually omitted...

Today, many people who have never heard of The Deputy are sincerely convinced that Pius XII was a cold and evil man who hated the Jews and helped Hitler do away with them. As KGB chairman Yury Andropov, the unparalleled master of Soviet deception, used to tell me, people are more ready to believe smut than holiness.

Toward the mid 1970s, The Deputy started running out of steam. In 1974 [KGB chairman] Andropov conceded to us that, had we known then what we know today, we would never have gone after Pope Pius XII. What now made the difference was newly released information showing that Hitler, far from being friendly with Pius XII, had in fact been plotting against him.

Just a few days before Andropov’s admission, the former supreme commander of the German SS (Schutzstaffel) squadron in Italy during World War II, General Friedrich Otto Wolff, had been released from jail and confessed that in 1943 Hitler had ordered him to abduct Pope Pius XII from the Vatican. That order had been so hush-hush that it never turned up after the war in any Nazi archive. Nor had it come out at any of the many debriefings of Gestapo and SS officers conducted by the victorious Allies. In his confession Wolff claimed that he had replied to Hitler that his order would take six weeks to carry out. Hitler, who blamed the pope for the overthrow of Italian dictator Benito Mussolini, wanted it done immediately. Eventually Wolff persuaded Hitler that there would be a great negative response if the plan were implemented, and the Führer dropped it.

A few years later, Pope John Paul II started the process of sanctifying Pius XII, and witnesses from all over the world have compellingly proved that Pius XII was an enemy, not a friend, of Hitler. Israel Zoller, the chief rabbi of Rome between 1943-44, when Hitler took over that city, devoted an entire chapter of his memoirs to praising the leadership of Pius XII. “The Holy Father sent by hand a letter to the bishops instructing them to lift the enclosure from convents and monasteries, so that they could become refuges for the Jews. I know of one convent where the Sisters slept in the basement, giving up their beds to Jewish refugees.” On July 25, 1944, Zoller was received by Pope Pius XII. Notes taken by Vatican secretary of state Giovanni Battista Montini (who would become Pope Paul VI) show that Rabbi Zoller thanked the Holy Father for all he had done to save the Jewish community of Rome — and his thanks were transmitted over the radio. On February 13, 1945, Rabbi Zoller was baptized by Rome’s auxiliary bishop Luigi Traglia in the Church of Santa Maria degli Angeli. In gratitude to Pius XII, Zoller took the Christian name of Eugenio (the pope’s name). A year later Zoller’s wife and daughter were also baptized.

David G. Dalin, in The Myth of Hitler’s Pope: How Pope Pius XII Rescued Jews From the Nazis, published a few months ago, has compiled further overwhelming proof of Eugenio Pacelli’s friendship for the Jews beginning long before he became pope. At the start of World War II, Pope Pius XII’s first encyclical was so anti-Hitler that the Royal Air Force and the French air force dropped 88,000 copies of it over Germany

The discrediting of the Church's moral authority is a recurring tactic in the war against Christianity. The smear against Pius XII and the denial of the well-documented widespread and extraordinarily heroic efforts of Catholics and many other Christians to oppose Hitler and save Jews is being carried on by political atheism's modern water-carriers.

Please read the whole essay. It's fascinating, and it puts the modern slanders against the Church's courageous opposition to Hitler-- and the morally corrupt tactics of the Church's atheist despisers-- in context.

David Klinghoffer on Judaism

2012-02-26T06:00:00.003-05:00

My friend David Klinghoffer has a great post on ignorance and the New Atheists. David does a wonderful job condensing such a massive topic. What really caught my eye was his comment about Jerry Coyne's abject ignorance of his own Jewish intellectual heritage.

David:

Judaism is a faith with a vast and profound tradition in which it expects Jews to school themselves. I don't think there's a faith in the world that assumes more in the way of self-education by its adherents -- knowledge of texts, interpretation, law, philosophy, mysticism, and much else. It's for precisely this reason that Judaism is so susceptible to lampooning by the shamelessly ignorant. It remains, as my wife likes to say, the world's most unknown religion. Unknown by most Jews too! Not that this has stopped many an ignorant Jew from lecturing others about the laughable deficiencies of his ancestors' faith.

For a Christian, I've had what I think is an ample personal acquaintance with Judaism. My best friend when I was a kid was Jewish, and I was invited regularly to Temple, to celebrations of Jewish holidays, and to Bar and Bat Mitzvahs. In college, most of my friends were Jewish, and in my job now perhaps half of my closest friends are Jewish. My wife's side of the family (her father) are Jewish and frequently invite us for celebrations.

I love Jewish culture. Don't get me wrong-- I'm a passionate Catholic (as you may have noticed!), but Judaism has always fascinated me. There is a respect for learning, an intellectual rigor, and a fundamental decency and humor that I much admire.

Last spring I attended a family Bat Mitzvah. The temple service was long-- two had a half hours-- but it was beautiful and fascinating. My niece did a wonderful job learning Hebrew and reciting her part of the service, and I was fascinated by the meticulous analysis of Torah. My non-Jewish family felt the same way.

David is right to tout Judaism's passion for texts and deep learning. So much of what we value in modern Western culture has its roots in the uniquely Jewish understanding of the world. Some of that understanding is transmitted through Jewish culture, and much of it is transmitted through Christian culture, which is deeply rooted in Judaism.

I have no tolerance for anti-Semitism. None. The calumny and outright murder perpetrated against these good people over centuries-- and particularly in this century-- is one of the great shames of mankind. On a proportionate basis, no faith has done such good for mankind, and suffered so much for it, as Judaism.

Of course there are criticisms to be made of individuals who are Jewish-- anti-Christian bias and atheism are all too common in some sectors of the Jewish community-- but it's worth noting that the propensity to such wrongs is related closely not to Judaism itself but to the renunciation of Judaism. Faithful Jews and Christians share so much in common, including our common adversaries.

The rightful attitude of Christians to Jews in one of respect, admiration, gratitude, and even love, as in the love of a child for a parent.

"By the way, how is your eunuch-- Al Roker?"

2012-02-25T06:00:00.003-05:00

Admiral General Shabazz Aladeen on the Today Show.

The story of the two pacts...

2012-02-24T13:00:00.003-05:00

Commentor anonymous on the claim (the slander, actually) that the Catholic Church was pro-Nazi:

[Nazis] made no bones about the religious nature of their crusade - Hitler likened his regimes attacks against Bolsheviks to the Teutonic crusaders stamping out Russian heresy. You may not like the fact that they called themselves Christians, but the historical record says that they did. And the Catholic church made it official: In 1933 the Vatican and the Nazi government signed their Concordat, putting the official Vatican stamp on the alliance of the German church and the Nazi state. Article 16, reproduced below, required that Catholic bishops swear to honor the Nazi government, to make their subordinates honor it, and to hunt for and prevent action that might endanger it. The following translation of the very important Article 16 of the Reichskonkordat was authorized by the Vatican: Article 16 “Before bishops take possession of their dioceses they are to take an oath of fealty either to the Reich Representative of the State concerned, or to the President of the Reich, according to the following formula: “‘Before God and on the Holy Gospels I swear and promise as becomes a bishop, loyalty to the German Reich and to the [regional - EC] State of . . . I swear and promise to honor the legally constituted Government and to cause the clergy of my diocese to honor it. In the performance of my spiritual office and in my solicitude for the welfare and the interests of the German Reich, I will endeavor to avoid all detrimental acts which might endanger it.’”

The 1933 Concordant was one of many that the Church signed with various governments in an effort to secure religious freedom for Catholics. Then, as today, such freedom is under continuous attack.

Cardinal Pacelli (Vatican diplomat and future Pius XII), on return to Rome following negotiation of the Concordant, told the British Ambassador that "I had to choose between an agreement and the virtual elimination of the Catholic Church in the Reich. He described the negotiations with the German government as akin to "negotiating with the devil himself".

The Concordant, of course, was violated massively and immediately by the Nazis, who had no intention of permitting religious freedom.

The Church spoke out repeatedly and emphatically over the next 12 years against Nazi anti-Semitism and brutality.

Here are just a few of countless documents establishing the Church's strong opposition to Nazism:

New York Times headline October 28 1939:

"Pope Condemns Dictators, Treaty Violators, Racism: Urges Restoring of Poland."

New York Times headline January 23, 1940

"Vatican Denounces Atrocities in Poland; Germans Called Even Worse Than Russians."

New York Times headline March 14, 1940:

"Pope Is Emphatic About Just Peace: Jews' Rights Defended"

Now you might ask: why was the Pope in 1939 condemning 'Dictators, Treaty Violations, and Racism' and 'Urging the Restoration of Poland'?

That has to do with another concordant, this time between atheists and Nazis.

Surely commentor Anonymous didn't forget that atheists signed a pact with Nazi Germany. The pact was not an attempt to secure religious freedom, which of course was precisely what the first atheist government of the 20th century was devoted to exterminating. It was a pact to cooperate and share conquest:

Nazi-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact with Secret Protocols

August 23, 1939

In August 1939, the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany signed a non-aggression pact that publicly renounced warfare between the two totalitarian states. Secretly, the two nations divided Poland, parts of Northern Europe, and Eastern Europe into spheres of influence. Two years later, Adolf Hitler broke the pact when he ordered the invasion of the Soviet Union.

Main Agreement

The Government of the German Reich and The Government of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics desirous of strengthening the cause of peace between Germany and the U.S.S.R., and proceeding from the fundamental provisions of the Neutrality Agreement concluded in April, 1926 between Germany and the U.S.S.R., have reached the following Agreement:

Article I. Both High Contracting Parties obligate themselves to desist from any act of violence, any aggressive action, and any attack on each other, either individually or jointly with other Powers.

Article II. Should one of the High Contracting Parties become the object of belligerent action by a third Power, the other High Contracting Party shall in no manner lend its support to this third Power.

Article III. The Governments of the two High Contracting Parties shall in the future maintain continual contact with one another for the purpose of consultation in order to exchange information on problems affecting their common interests.

Article IV. Should disputes or conflicts arise between the High Contracting Parties shall participate in any grouping of Powers whatsoever that is directly or indirectly aimed at the other party.

Article V. Should disputes or conflicts arise between the High Contracting Parties over problems of one kind or another, both parties shall settle these disputes or conflicts exclusively through friendly exchange of opinion or, if necessary, through the establishment of arbitration commissions.

Article VI. The present Treaty is concluded for a period of ten years, with the proviso that, in so far as one of the High Contracting Parties does not advance it one year prior to the expiration of this period, the validity of this Treaty shall automatically be extended for another five years.

Article VII. The present treaty shall be ratified within the shortest possible time. The ratifications shall be exchanged in Berlin. The Agreement shall enter into force as soon as it is signed.

Secret Additional Protocol.

Article I. In the event of a territorial and political rearrangement in the areas belonging to the Baltic States (Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania), the northern boundary of Lithuania shall represent the boundary of the spheres of influence of Germany and U.S.S.R. In this connection the interest of Lithuania in the Vilna area is recognized by each party.

Article II. In the event of a territorial and political rearrangement of the areas belonging to the Polish state, the spheres of influence of Germany and the U.S.S.R. shall be bounded approximately by the line of the rivers Narev, Vistula and San. The question of whether the interests of both parties make desirable the maintenance of an independent Polish States and how such a state should be bounded can only be definitely determined in the course of further political developments.

In any event both Governments will resolve this question by means of a friendly agreement.

Article III. With regard to Southeastern Europe attention is called by the Soviet side to its interest in Bessarabia. The German side declares its complete political disinteredness in these areas.

Article IV. This protocol shall be treated by both parties as strictly secret.

Compare the Soviet atheist concordant with the Nazis and the Vatican's concordant with the Nazis. One concordant was a successful attempt (for a couple of years) to expand totalitarianism. The other was an unsuccessful attempt to secure religious freedom.

That same struggle continues to this day.

A victory for the First Amendment

2012-02-24T06:00:00.000-05:00

From World Magazine:

Church’s authority ‘alone’

SUPREME COURT | An unexpectedly unanimous high court decision protects church hiring decisions | Emily Belz

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS (AP/PABLO MARTINEZ MONSIVAIS, FILE)

WASHINGTON—In one of the clearest rulings for religious freedom in years, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously decided that courts may not intervene in church hiring decisions, protecting the “ministerial exception” that the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission sought to eliminate inHosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church and School v. EEOC.

“[T]he authority to select and control who will minister to the faithful is the church’s alone,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in the court’s opinion. Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, and Elena Kagan wrote separate concurring opinions that said the ministerial exception should be even broader than Roberts allowed in his opinion.

“It was a strong rebuke to the extreme position taken by the Obama administration,” said Luke Goodrich of the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, who served as counsel to the church in the case. “One of the biggest things is it’s unanimously decided, which nobody was predicting and is a really big deal. … It’s a great day for religious liberty.”

Assistant Solicitor General Leondra Kruger had argued before the court that the church school should only have the protection of freedom of association, the same protection that a labor group has. The court in its opinion characterized that argument as both “remarkable” and “extreme,” noting that the Constitution outlines specific protections for religion beyond those for a labor organization. Religious cases before the Supreme Court often center on the tension between the Free Exercise Clause of the Constitution and the Establishment Clause, but Roberts wrote that in this case, both clauses protect the Lutheran school from government interference.

The high court has never ruled on the ministerial exception before, a standard created in the lower courts, and the opinion shied away from defining who qualifies as a “minister,” saying simply that the teacher in question, a commissioned minister at the Lutheran church school, qualified.

“We are reluctant … to adopt a rigid formula for deciding when an employee qualifies as a minister,” Roberts wrote in the decision. Kagan and Alito, in their concurring opinion, wrote that the “title” of minister “is neither necessary nor sufficient,” given the variety of religions in the United States, but rather courts must defer to the religious organization’s evaluation of the employee’s role.

The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had ruled in favor of the teacher, saying she did not qualify as a minister because she spent more minutes of the day teaching secular subjects than religious subjects. The Supreme Court scoffed at that idea. “The issue before us … is not one that can be resolved by a stopwatch,” Roberts wrote.

During the oral arguments, some of the justices seemed bothered by the facts of the case. The Hosanna-Tabor teacher, Cheryl Perich, had narcolepsy and took leave from the Redford, Mich.-based school, which is affiliated with the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod. Perich eventually returned to work but the school didn’t think she was ready to teach, and Perich threatened a lawsuit if the school did not reinstate her. The school revoked her commission as a minister and then fired her, on the grounds that she had circumvented the church tribunals that handle such disputes. (Alito, perhaps dryly, added 1 Corinthians 6:1-7 in the notes of his concurring opinion, verses that tell believers not to go before “the ungodly for judgment.”)

“She was fired simply for asking for a hearing,” Justice Anthony Kennedy said in the arguments. But the court’s unanimous opinion said the question of whether the church used religious reasons as a pretext for firing Perich “misses the point of the ministerial exception,” which requires courts to preserve churches’ autonomy in selecting leaders.

The EEOC argued that a broad application of the ministerial exception would allow abuse by religious groups, like the hiring of children or undocumented immigrants. Roberts responded that churches are still subject to criminal prosecution, and that courts could consider other types of lawsuits regarding breaches of contracts, for example, “if and when they arise.” But Roberts concluded, “The church must be free to choose those who will guide it on its way.”

Enlightened decision, unlike so much of the gibberish from the Court on the religion clauses of the First Amendment. This is an obvious victory for the Free Exercise Clause, but it is a victory for the Establishment Clause as well. The government must have no role in the doctrinal, administrative, or educational decisions of any church, except in matters of criminal law.

Note the difference between this Constitutionally mandated separation of church and government and the faux "separation" championed by anti-Christian bigots.

Genuine Establishment Clause jurisprudence forbids the use of legal force to entangle action of an institutional church with actions of government. A church can't control government, nor can government control a church.

Faux-Establishment Clause jurisprudence forbids civic religious expression, despite the fact that all religious expression is protected by the Free Exercise Clause. Such "separation of church and state" ideology isn't Constitutional jurisprudence of any sort, but mere anti-Christian bigotry, plainly aimed at establishment of Civic Atheism.

It's a delight that the Court seems to understand what genuine Constitutional freedom of religion really means. It means freedom from government force, both in church administration and in civic religious expression.

Eugenics:" Does the past matter?"

2012-02-23T13:00:00.055-05:00

"Eugenics is the self-direction of human evolution"
Second International Congress of Eugenics. 1921
Held at the American Museum of Natural History.
Leonard Darwin, son of Charles, was the keynote speaker.

Some wisdom from Jonathan Freeland at the Guardian:

Eugenics: the skeleton that rattles loudest in the left's closet

Socialism's one-time interest in eugenics is dismissed as an accident of history. But the truth is far more unpalatable

Jonathan Freedland

guardian.co.uk, Friday 17 February 2012 13.59 EST

Does the past matter? When confronted by facts that are uncomfortable, but which relate to people long dead, should we put them aside and, to use a phrase very much of our time, move on? And there's a separate, but related, question: how should we treat the otherwise admirable thought or writings of people when we discover that those same people also held views we find repugnant?

Those questions are triggered in part by the early responses toPantheon, my new novel published this week under the pseudonym Sam Bourne. The book is a thriller, set in the Oxford and Yale of 1940, but it rests on several true stories. Among those is one of the grisliest skeletons in the cupboard of the British intellectual elite, a skeleton that rattles especially loudly inside the closet of the left.

It is eugenics, the belief that society's fate rested on its ability to breed more of the strong and fewer of the weak. So-called positive eugenics meant encouraging those of greater intellectual ability and "moral worth" to have more children, while negative eugenics sought to urge, or even force, those deemed inferior to reproduce less often or not at all. The aim was to increase the overall quality of the national herd, multiplying the thoroughbreds and weeding out the runts.

Such talk repels us now, but in the prewar era it was the common sense of the age. Most alarming, many of its leading advocates were found among the luminaries of the Fabian and socialist left, men and women revered to this day. Thus George Bernard Shaw could insist that "the only fundamental and possible socialism is the socialisation of the selective breeding of man", even suggesting, in a phrase that chills the blood, that defectives be dealt with by means of a "lethal chamber".

Such thinking was not alien to the great Liberal titan and mastermind of the welfare state, William Beveridge, who argued that those with "general defects" should be denied not only the vote, but "civil freedom and fatherhood". Indeed, a desire to limit the numbers of the inferior was written into modern notions of birth control from the start. That great pioneer of contraception, Marie Stopes – honoured with a postage stamp in 2008 – was a hardline eugenicist, determined that the "hordes of defectives" be reduced in number, thereby placing less of a burden on "the fit". Stopes later disinherited her son because he had married a short-sighted woman, thereby risking a less-than-perfect grandchild.

Yet what looks kooky or sinister in 2012 struck the prewar British left as solid and sensible. Harold Laski, stellar LSE professor, co-founder of the Left Book Club and one-time chairman of the Labour party, cautioned that: "The time is surely coming … when society will look upon the production of a weakling as a crime against itself." Meanwhile, JBS Haldane, admired scientist and socialist, warned that: "Civilisation stands in real danger from over-production of 'undermen'." That'sUntermenschen in German.

I'm afraid even the Manchester Guardian was not immune. When a parliamentary report in 1934 backed voluntary sterilisation of the unfit, a Guardian editorial offered warm support, endorsing the sterilisation campaign "the eugenists soundly urge". If it's any comfort, the New Statesman was in the same camp.

According to Dennis Sewell, whose book The Political Gene charts the impact of Darwinian ideas on politics, the eugenics movement's definition of "unfit" was not limited to the physically or mentally impaired. It held, he writes, "that most of the behavioural traits that led to poverty were inherited. In short, that the poor were genetically inferior to the educated middle class." It was not poverty that had to be reduced or even eliminated: it was the poor.

Hence the enthusiasm of John Maynard Keynes, director of the Eugenics Society from 1937 to 1944, for contraception, essential because the working class was too "drunken and ignorant" to keep its numbers down.

We could respond to all this the way we react when reading of Churchill's dismissal of Gandhi as a "half-naked fakir" or indeed of his own attraction to eugenics, by saying it was all a long time ago, when different norms applied. That is a common response when today's left-liberals are confronted by the eugenicist record of their forebears, reacting as if it were all an accident of time, a slip-up by creatures of their era who should not be judged by today's standards.

Except this was no accident. The Fabians, Sidney and Beatrice Webb and their ilk were not attracted to eugenics because they briefly forgot their leftwing principles. The harder truth is that they were drawn to eugenics for what were then good, leftwing reasons.

They believed in science and progress, and nothing was more cutting edge and modern than social Darwinism. Man now had the ability to intervene in his own evolution. Instead of natural selection and the law of the jungle, there would be planned selection. And what could be more socialist than planning, the Fabian faith that the gentlemen in Whitehall really did know best? If the state was going to plan the production of motor cars in the national interest, why should it not do the same for the production of babies? The aim was to do what was best for society, and society would clearly be better off if there were more of the strong to carry fewer of the weak.

What was missing was any value placed on individual freedom, even the most basic freedom of a human being to have a child. The middle class and privileged felt quite ready to remove that right from those they deemed unworthy of it.

Eugenics went into steep decline after 1945. Most recoiled from it once they saw where it led – to the gates of Auschwitz. The infatuation with an idea horribly close to nazism was steadily forgotten. But we need a reckoning with this shaming past. Such a reckoning would focus less on today's advances in selective embryology, and the ability to screen out genetic diseases, than on the kind of loose talk about the "underclass" that recently enabled the prime minister to speak of "neighbours from hell" and the poor as if the two groups were synonymous.

Progressives face a particular challenge, to cast off a mentality that can too easily regard people as means rather than ends. For in this respect a movement is just like a person: it never entirely escapes its roots.

Ideology has, needless to say, an internal logic. There is no "past" for ideology, in the sense that there is no part of an ideology that can be separated completely from the whole. We embrace different parts of an ideology over time, but the body of thought remains.

Eugenics is a foundation of the birth control movement. Birth control. It was much of the original reason for controlling births, as explicitly and emphatically pronounced by its founders. The same intimate ties link eugenics and Darwinism. Darwin's cousin-- Francis Galton-- coined the term 'eugenics', and Darwin's Origin of Species was subtitled "... the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life." Darwin's application of this theory to human beings-- "The Descent of Man-- Selection in Relation to Sex"-- is grossly eugenic and racist. Darwin's cousin (Galton) and son (Leonard) were the first two presidents of the British Eugenics Society.

And eugenics is not a perversion of Darwin's theory. It is a natural consequence of Darwin's theory, even an 'enlightened' consequence of his theory. If man is evolved by the fierce struggle of natural selection, then care for the weak will degrade the human race, which owes its strengths to the survival of the fittest. If we are to be merciful but not degrade the human race, we must prevent the weak from breeding. Only with eugenics can we be merciful to the weak without committing race suicide.

Eugenics is "the self-direction of human evolution." Eugenics is based explicitly on Darwin's understanding of man.

Many of the ideologies competing for ascendency today-- socialism (democratic, national and international), contraception and population control, and Darwinism, to name a few-- have a sordid past. A eugenic past.

But it's not past. It's just not discussed.

So we must discuss it.

Fakegate: global warming alarmists can't hide their moral decline

2012-02-23T06:00:00.009-05:00

Dr. Peter Gleick

There's a huge scandal in the works in Dr. Peter Gleick's fraud in the Heartland Institute email theft. From John Hinderacher at Powerline:

GLOBAL WARMING ALARMISTS RESORT TO HOAX

We are remiss in not having written about the Peter Gleick scandal. Gleick is a founder of the liberal Pacific Institute and a member of the National Academy of Sciences. He is an expert on water resources, not climate; like many left-wingers in irrelevant fields of study, he has irrationally strong feelings about global warming. So, as Gleick has now admitted, he obtained documents from the Heartland Institute under false pretenses–that is, by lying–and published them in hopes of discrediting the Institute...

Of course the headline "Global Warming Alarmists Resort to Hoax" is as shocking as "New York Giants Play Football". This is what these guys do. Gleick admits that he lied to a staffer at the Institute in order to obtain the emails, which is a serious breach of ethics (a crime, I believe) especially troubling for a leading scientist. Although some of the (innocent) emails appear to be genuine, one of the documents-- a "Confidential Memo: 2012 Heartland Climate Strategy" appears to an amateurish forgery, probably forged by Gleick himself.

Hinderarcher:

... I think it is obvious that Peter Gleick fabricated this document–the only one he posted that makes the Heartland Institute look bad–because the real ones he stole from Heartland didn’t serve his partisan purpose. Or, if he didn’t make it up himself, he got it from an ally who fabricated it. No knowledgeable person could mistake Gleick’s hoax for a legitimate top-secret Heartland memo...

It's important to realize that Gleick is in the highest tier of scientists. He was (until a couple of days ago) the chairman of the American Geophysical Union's Task Force on Scientific Integrity (!) and was slated to serve on the board of the National Center for Science Education (he has since withdrawn). He is President of the Pacific Institute (an environmental advocacy organization) and has been a recipient of a McArthur "genius" grant. Judging by the amateurish forgery of the "Strategy Memo", the Nobel Prize in Literature will continue to elude him.

Please read the Powerline post above, and follow its links. The evidence that the "Strategy Memo" is a forgery is compelling. It's a fascinating story. It brings home quite nicely that inevitable impression an honest person must draw from observation of the global warming movement:

The global warming movement is a crime syndicate, run by actual criminals, with a large cadre of opportunistic amoral scientists, politicians and far left ideologues who have hopped on the train, hoping to cash in on the fraud.

Global warming cranks jump the shark eat the polar bear cub

2012-02-22T14:58:00.000-05:00

Global warming nuts will go to astonishing lengths to dupe the public. Hysteria over endangered polar bears appears to be based on junk science, so the hysterics are now touting... filial polar bear cannibalism...

At long last, do these frauds have no shame?

Justice Scalia on the Lemon Test

2012-02-22T06:00:00.000-05:00

Supreme Court Justice Scalia on the Lemon Test that forms the basis for much judicial censorship of civic religious expression, quoted by attorney Donald McClarey on American Catholic:

[McCleary] In few areas of the law has the Constitution been more twisted and deformed than in the area of First Amendment allowance of religious expression in schools. Justice Scalia gave a useful summary in 1993 in the Lamb’s Chapel v. Moriches Union Free School District case:

[Scalia] As to the Court’s invocation of the Lemon test: Like some ghoul in a late night horror movie that repeatedly sits up in its grave and shuffles abroad, after being repeatedly killed and buried, Lemon stalks our Establishment Clause jurisprudence once again, frightening thelittle children and school attorneys of Center Moriches Union Free School District. Its most recent burial, only last Term, was, to be sure, not fully six feet under: our decision inLee v. Weisman, 505 U. S. —-, —- (1992) (slip op., at 7), conspicuously avoided using the supposed “test” but also declined the invitation to repudiate it. Over the years, however, no fewer than five of the currently sitting Justices have, in their own opinions, personally driven pencils through the creature’s heart (the author of today’s opinion repeatedly), and a sixth has joined an opinion doing so. See, e. g., Weisman, supra, at —- (slip op., at 14) (Scalia, J., joined by, inter alios, Thomas, J., dissenting); Allegheny County v. American Civil Liberties Union, Greater Pittsburgh Chapter, 492 U.S. 573, 655-657 (1989) (Kennedy, J., concurring in judgment in part and dissenting in part); Corporation of Presiding Bishop of Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints v. Amos, 483 U.S. 327, 346-349 (1987) (O’Connor, J., concurring); Wallace v. Jaffree, 472 U.S. 38, 107-113 (1985) (Rehnquist, J., dissenting); id., at 90-91 (White, J., dissenting); School Dist. of Grand Rapids v. Ball, 473 U.S. 373, 400 (1985) (White, J., dissenting); Widmar v. Vincent, 454 U.S. 263, 282 (1981) (White, J., dissenting); New York v. Cathedral Academy, 434 U.S. 125, 134-135 (1977) (White, J., dissenting); Roemer v. Maryland Bd. of Public Works, 426 U.S. 736, 768 (1976) (White, J., concurring in judgment); Committee for Public Education & Religious Liberty v. Nyquist, 413 U.S. 756, 820 (1973) (White, J., dissenting).

The secret of the Lemon test’s survival, I think, is that it is so easy to kill. It is there to scare us (and our audience) when we wish it to do so, but we can command it to return to the tomb at will. See, e. g., Lynch v. Donnelly, 465 U.S. 668, 679 (1984) (noting instances in which Court has not applied Lemon test). When we wish to strike down a practice it forbids, we invoke it, see, e. g., Aguilar v. Felton, 473 U.S. 402 (1985) (striking downstate remedial education program administered in part in parochial schools); when we wish to uphold a practice it forbids, we ignore it entirely, see Marsh v. Chambers, 463 U.S. 783 (1983) (upholding state legislative chaplains). Sometimes, we take a middle course, calling its three prongs “no more than helpful signposts,” Hunt v. McNair, 413 U.S. 734, 741 (1973). Such a docile and useful monster is worth keeping around, at least in a somnolent state; one never knows when one might need him.

The Lemon Test is a fine tool for slashing religious freedom when it is needed. Yet it is easily sheathed when discretion, rather than censorship, is the prudent course. Highly adaptable. Kind of a juridical Swiss Army knife, for anti-Christian bigots.

[Scalia] For my part, I agree with the long list of constitutional scholars who have criticized Lemon and bemoaned the strange Establishment Clause geometry of crooked lines and wavering shapes its intermittent use has produced. See, e. g., Choper, The Establishment Clause and Aid to Parochial Schools–An Update, 75 Cal. L. Rev. 5 (1987); Marshall, “We Know It When We See It”: The Supreme Court and Establishment, 59 S. Cal. L. Rev. 495 (1986); McConnell, Accommodation of Religion, 1985 S. Ct. Rev. 1; Kurland, The Religion Clauses and the Burger Court, 34 Cath. U. L. Rev. 1 (1984); R. Cord, Separation of Church and State (1982); Choper, The Religion Clauses of the First Amendment: Reconciling the Conflict, 41 U. Pitt. L. Rev. 673 (1980). I will decline to applyLemon–whether it validates or invalidates the government action in question–and therefore cannot join the opinion of the Court today. [n.*]

I cannot join for yet another reason: the Court’s statement that the proposed use of the school’s facilities is constitutional because (among other things) it would not signal endorsement of religion in general. Ante, at 10. What a strange notion, that a Constitution which itself gives “religion in general” preferential treatment (I refer to the Free Exercise Clause) forbids endorsement of religion in general.

Scalia makes an excellent point. How can endorsement of religion be unconstitutional, when the first two clauses of the Bill of Rights explicitly single out religious freedom and free exercise for Constitutional protection. Would the First Amendment itself be ruled unconstitutional in today's "separation of church and state" show trials? It does after all explicitly endorse religious expression as a fundamental right of prime importance, with pride of place before freedom of speech and of the press and of assembly.

[Scalia] The Attorney General of New York not only agrees with that strange notion, he has an explanation for it: “Religious advocacy,” he writes, “serves the community only in the eyes of its adherents and yields a benefit only to those who already believe.” Brief for Respondent Attorney General 24. That was not the view of those who adopted our Constitution, who believed that the public virtues inculcated by religion are a public good. It suffices to point out that during the summer of 1789, when it was in the process of drafting the First Amendment, Congress enacted the famous Northwest Territory Ordinance of 1789, Article III of which provides, “Religion, morality, and knowledge, being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged.” 1 Stat. 52 (emphasis added). Unsurprisingly, then, indifference to “religion in general” is not what our cases, both old and recent, demand. See, e. g., Zorach v. Clauson, 343 U.S. 306, 313-314 (1952) (“When the state encourages religious instruction or cooperates with religious authorities by adjusting the schedule of public events to sectarian needs, it follows the best of our traditions”); Walzv. Tax Comm’n of New York City, 397 U.S. 664 (1970) (upholding property tax exemption for church property); Lynch, 465 U. S., at 673 (the Constitution “affirmatively mandates accommodation, not merely tolerance, of all religions . . . . Anything less would require the `callous indifference’ we have said was never intended” (citations omitted)); id., at 683 (“our precedents plainly contemplate that on occasion some advancement of religion will result from governmental action”); Marsh, supra; Presiding Bishop, supra (exemption for religious organizations from certain provisions of Civil Rights Act).

For the reasons given by the Court, I agree that the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment forbids what respondents have done here. As for the asserted Establishment Clause justification, I would hold, simply and clearly, that giving Lamb’s Chapel nondiscriminatory access to school facilities cannot violate that provision because it does not signify state or local embrace of a particular religious sect

McCleary concludes:

[McCleary] One of the things that I have always detested about my profession is that too often the law is used to accomplish what cannot be accomplished at the ballot box. A significant faction among American elites wish to drive religion from the public square. A solid majority of the American people disagree. Therefore the Constitution is contorted, by such judicial contrivances as the Lemon test, and twisted to arrive at an end that would never receive popular approval in elections. Our most precious civil right is our right to govern ourselves and cases like the Cranston mural case chip away at that civil right each and every day and transform government by the consent of the governed into government by the consent of judges. The Founding Fathers, who viewed the Judiciary as “the least dangerous branch” to liberty, would be flabbergasted at this development.

The Founding Fathers would be mortified at judicial suppression of Christianity, but I'm not so sure they would be flabbergasted. They understood tyranny quite well, in a very personal way, which is why they failed to grant the judicial branch the absolute Constitutional power of judicial review.

They did, however, underestimate the resourcefulness and deliberate malignity of anti-Christian bigots. The Founders composed the Constitution in the years just before the Cult of Reason introduced the world to the fruits of civic atheism, imposed by law.

... "Although it sounds funny, it is very, very, very insulting to women," "shocking," "out of touch" and "moronic." "Going back centuries here. It's astonishing,"...

2012-02-21T13:00:00.021-05:00

Foster Friess, high-profile donor for Rick Santorum:

"back in my days, they used Bayer aspirin for contraception. ... The gals put it between their knees, and it wasn't that costly."

It's an old quip-- I heard it when I was in high school (in the 90's-- ha-ha). It's not exactly a joke, but it's clever. Makes a great point. Nice aphorism.

A bevy of self-appointed professionally offended people are... offended:

Dem lawmakers rip Santorum backer over 'aspirin' birth control joke

By Geneva Sands-Sadowitz - 02/17/12 06:20 PM ET

Foster Friess, a top financial supporter of Rick Santorum, generated a storm by using an old joke suggesting women control pregnancies by keeping their knees together.

Democratic lawmakers ripped Friess on Friday for his remarks on contraception, calling his aspirin comment, "shocking," "out of touch" and "moronic."

"It's an affirmation of the fact that intelligence is not uniform across the board. Mr. Friess is obviously very good at some things that have made him very rich, but he also appears to have moronic tendencies," said Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) on MSNBC's "Jansing & Co."

Foster Friess, referencing an old joke about closed knees when discussing the controversy over mandatory access to contraception, told MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell on Thursday, "back in my days, they used Bayer aspirin for contraception ... The gals put it between their knees, and it wasn't that costly."

"Although it sounds funny, it is very, very, very insulting to women," said Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.), also appearing on MSNBC.

The conservative donor asked for forgiveness Friday in a statement that read, "I can understand how I confused people with the way I worded the joke and their taking offense is very understandable. To all those who took my joke as [a] modern-day approach, I deeply apologize and seek your forgiveness."

"I'm glad he at least apologized," added Cummings.

Santorum responded to the controversy Friday, telling CBS News that while his supporter's remark may have been in bad taste, it was not "reflective of me or my record on this issue."

He accused the media of a "double standard" for creating a furor over Friess's comments and ignoring controversies surrounding President Obama.

Friess is the top financial contributor to a super-PAC supporting the former Pennsylvania senator and presidential hopeful.

Ire towards Friess made it's way onto the Senate floor Friday during testimony where mostly female Democratic senators blasted their GOP colleagues for what they called a "war on women."

"It seems that yesterday on national television one of the chief financial backers for Rick Santorum, the Republican candidate that's now surging towards the nomination suggested that contraception was once as simple as a woman putting aspirin between her knees. Really? Shocking, appalling, an insult," said Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) Friday.

A House hearing Thursday that featured a panel consisting of entirely of male religious figures opposed to Obama's contraception policy, also sparked outrage and gave Democrats a political talking point this week.

The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearing was held to examine whether the administration's birth control mandate intrudes on religious freedom.

Murray told MSNBC that the combination of the all-male House panel and Friess's remarks made her feel like she was "waking up on a set of the Mad Men," an AMC television show about advertising executives in the nineteen-sixties.

"Going back centuries here. It's astonishing," she added.

"... it is very, very, very insulting to women". No. What's insulting to women is the contraceptive ideology that women are incapable of chastity and are so addicted to rutting that the only way to keep them from getting knocked-up is to give 'em free no-baby pills.

As a priest told me a few years ago, contraceptive ideology is a deep insult to men and women. It is the assertion that we so lack integrity and continence that we have to be chemically treated to prevent the natural consequence of our acts. Contraceptive ideology treats us like barnyard animals.

It is easy to dismiss the idiot brouhaha about this clever quip by pointing out that the flacks who fake offense are slimy pols, pandering to the base, stoking contributions, etc.

But there's a deeper tactic at work here. It has long been a weapon in the leftist arsenal in liberal democracies, and it's surprisingly effective, given its banality.

Fake offense-- political correctness-- is a form of soft censorship. Histrionics shut people up-- it's not worth being called ... "very, very, very insulting to women," "shocking," "out of touch" and "moronic." "Going back centuries here... astonishing,".

The reason for using soft censorship here is obvious: the quip about aspirin between the knees makes a very good point. The best contraception is chastity. It's a point for which the contraceptive cult has no good answer. To answer it requires impugnment of chastity, which would of course be an admission of cognitive dissonance for the "safe sex" claque. Not worth the candor.

Chastity, not pharmacology, is the key to sexual health-- physical, mental, and spiritual health.

The mystery deepens

2012-02-21T06:00:00.005-05:00

This is not a parody.

From The Washington Post:

Motive of shooter who targeted military sites is unclear

Yonathan Melaku was sneaking through Fort Myer and Arlington National Cemetery, his backpack filled with plastic bags of ammonium nitrate, a notebook containing jihadist messages, and a can of black spray paint. The 23-year-old former Marine was heading to the graves of the nation’s most recent heroes, aiming to desecrate the stones with Arabic statements and leave handfuls of explosive material nearby as a message.

Before police foiled the plan in June, the vandalism was to be Melaku’s sixth attack, months after he went on a mysterious shooting spree that targeted the Pentagon, the National Museum of the Marine Corps and two other military buildings in Northern Virginia. A video found after Melaku’s arrest showed him wearing a black mask and shooting a 9mm handgun out of his Acura’s passenger window as he drove along Interstate 95, shouting “Allahu Akbar!”

It was all part of a solitary campaign of “fear and terror,” federal prosecutors said. But authorities and Melaku’s defense attorney said no one knows for sure what led Melaku — a naturalized U.S. citizen from Ethi o pia, local high school graduate and former Marine Corps Reservist — down that path or what message he was trying to send...

Quite the mystery. What could possibly have motivated a guy caught yelling "Allau Akbar" and spray-painting American soldiers' graves with Arabic messages and shooting at the Pentagon?

The Washington Post needs a crack investigative team-- maybe Woodward and Bernstein-- on this stumper. And a Deep Throat.

I'll betcha Yonathan is a... a... Tea Partier... and Sarah Palin surely had something to do with this...

George Orwell, call your office.

(HT- the Daily Caller)

Vichy Catholicism

2012-02-20T13:00:00.017-05:00

From George Neumayr at the American Spectator: The Little Sisters of Limousine Liberalism.

Excerpt:

I called up the Catholic Health Association (CHA) yesterday. I wanted to nail down the exact compensation figures for some of its executives, including the salary and benefits of Sister Obamacare, also known as Daughter of Charity nun Carol Keehan, who last week helped Barack Obama engineer his latest con job -- the bogus conscience "compromise" designed to hoodwink Catholics into voting for his reelection.

As it has been widely reported, Obama conferred with Sister Keehan before his announcement last Friday. Then, lo and behold, she praised his revision as an inspiring resolution to the thorny issue of "religious freedom" soon after the sham event concluded.

So let's get down to brass tacks. How much is Sister Keehan worth for such political interventions? The checkered Catholic hospitals Keehan represents as chief executive officer of the Catholic Health Association stand to receive gobs and gobs of cash from the federal government if Obamacare holds up past 2012. Consequently, the members of the association are more than happy to pony up huge salaries to executives skilled at manipulating the Catholic electorate for Obama...

Collaboration from the CHA was essential in Obama's push for Obamacare and for government control of healthcare. Obama's political allies in the private sector are paid handsomely, as befits socialism.

Collaborating with statism is good work, if you can get it.

"The Sanger racism smear is totally irrelevant..."

2012-02-20T06:00:00.019-05:00

Commentor KW:

The Sanger racism smear is totally irrelevant unless you’re suggesting that there is an ongoing eugenics conspiracy being perpetrated by some shadowy operatives at the highest levels of PP, which is of course exactly what the right wants you to believe. The entire “You think conservatives are racist, well the liberals are secretly trying to exterminate black people” bullshit conspiracy theory relies on dubious quotes by one woman some 70 or 80 years ago. That’s it, That’s all they’ve got.

This is perplexing: why are Planned Parenthood defenders so passionate about discounting Margaret Sanger's obvious eugenic ideology and racism?

After all, if modern contraceptive and abortive ideology shared nothing in common with Sanger and her eugenic/racist ideology, one would expect that modern defenders of PP would merely assert "Sanger was a eugenic racist who we utterly repudiate. PP has nothing to do with her or her ideas, except for a regrettable organizational continuity."

Yet the defense of Sanger by defenders of PP is emphatic. It understandably leads many people in the pro-life movement to conclude that many of Sanger's precepts still inform Planned Parenthood. Why else would they be so solicitous of Sanger?

The siting of Planned Parenthood clinics in minority neighborhoods and the overtly racist response of Planned Parenthood employees to telephone stings would certainly support the pro-life view that Sanger's odious ideology still permeates the pro-choice movement.

Consider this 1992 letter by Roe v. Wade co-counsel Ron Weddington, who wrote President Clinton to urge the president to rush RU-486 (the morning-after pill) to market as soon as possible:

"[Y]ou can start immediately to eliminate the barely educated, unhealthy and poor segment of our country. No, I’m not advocating some sort of mass extinction of these unfortunate people. Crime, drugs and disease are already doing that. The problem is that their numbers are not only replaced but increased by the birth of millions of babies to people who can’t afford to have babies. There, I’ve said it. It’s what we all know is true, but we only whisper it, because as liberals who believe in individual rights, we view any program which might treat the disadvantaged as discriminatory, mean-spirited and… well… so Republican.

[G]overnment is also going to have to provide vasectomies, tubal ligations and abortions. . , . There have been about 30 million abortions in this country since Roe v. Wade. Think of all the poverty, crime and misery . . . and then add 30 million unwanted babies to the scenario. We lost a lot of ground during the Reagan-Bush religious orgy. We don’t have a lot of time left."

Cliff note version:

'Think how many human weeds we have exterminated, and think how much dead weight of human waste we still need to prevent'

Pure Sanger.

Faulkner understood. The past is never dead. It's not even past.

Chesterton: Why I am a Catholic

2012-02-19T06:00:00.004-05:00

G.K. Chesterton, from The Catholic Thing:

Why I am a Catholic

Nine out of ten of what we call new ideas are simply old mistakes. The Catholic Church has for one of her chief duties that of preventing people from making those old mistakes; from making them over and over again forever, as people always do if they are left to themselves. The truth about the Catholic attitude towards heresy, or as some would say, towards liberty, can best be expressed perhaps by the metaphor of a map. The Catholic Church carries a sort of map of the mind which looks like the map of a maze, but which is in fact a guide to the maze. It has been compiled from knowledge which, even considered as human knowledge, is quite without any human parallel.

One of the things that drew me to the Church is the depth of the wisdom of its Magisterium. The sublimity of its teachings is astonishing. It is a tapestry of wisdom-- the sacramental nature of marriage, the unalienable worth of every human being, the mystery of the Incarnation, the sagacity of its ethical teachings.

The Church is a map to a maze, a map to life, and a way through life to genuine freedom.

"How many Unitarians does it take..."

2012-02-18T06:00:00.011-05:00

From Clean Humor:

Question:

How many Unitarians does it take to change a lightbulb?

Reply:

"We choose not to make a statement either in favor of or against the need for a light bulb. However, in your own journey you have found that light bulbs work for you, that is fine. You are invited to write a poem or compose a modern dance about your light bulb for the next Sunday service, in which we will explore a number of light bulb traditions, including incandescent, fluorescent, three-way, long-life and tinted, all of which are equally valid paths to luminescence."

Was Margaret Sanger misquoted?

2012-02-17T13:00:00.132-05:00

Commentor RickK on my post about Lloyd Marcus' essay at American Thinker:

[Crus]- you did what Michael did - just take a website with an agenda and treat it as truth. Crus, while we disagree on much, I think we can agree on what constitutes truth. Regardless of what Sanger may have said or written, it still matters whether she actually wrote those specific words. If Michael is free to put words in her mouth, or to pass along as truth the fabrications of others, then I am free to put words in your mouth based on my understanding of your worldview. I don't think I have that right, and so neither does Michael. It's not a quibble - it's about the difference between truth and falsehood.

Here is the excerpt from Marcus' essay that I posted:

[Marcus] Abortion is the thread which joins each wacko anti-America patch of the secular-progressive quilt. Why? Why is the left so fanatical about killing human babies? If it is about "choice," as they claim, why are they infuriated when a woman "chooses" to have her baby? Case in point: the left's hysterical outrage over the Super Bowl ad in which Tim Tebow thanked his mom for not aborting him.

"Colored people are like human weeds and are to be exterminated." So said Margaret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood. Seventy-eight percent of Planned Parenthood clinics are in black neighborhoods. Blacks make up only 12% of the population, but 35% of America's aborted babies are black. Half of black pregnancies end in abortion...

[emphasis added now by me]

On RickK's advice, I checked to see of I could find a specific reference for that quote from Sanger. It is referred to on many websites, but I could not find a clear attribution for those words to her published writings or statements.

I think it is reasonable to retract that part of my post, and I do so.

Sanger-- the founder of Planned Parenthood-- wrote and spoke enough hate to keep those of us who detest eugenics busy for a lifetime, and there is no need or place for fabricating her quotes. My gratitude to RickK for pointing out the apparent misquotation.

That said, the misquotation seems to reflect genuine sentiments that she unambigiously expressed about people who failed to meet her eugenic standards.

Eugenics was utterly and usually explicitly racist. Sanger had a "Negro Project" in which she devoted considerable attention to contraception in the black community and she courted black leaders to support the application of her contraceptive ideology. She also spoke to the Ku Klux Klan on a number of occassions about her contraceptive ideology, and although she did not recount the content of her speeches, it's safe to assume that she did not champion greater "Negro" fertility.

Sanger was a close ally of overt racists. She frequently featured essays by racists and eugenicists in her magazine, the Birth Control Review, of which she was founder and editor. Lothrop Stoddard, who was appointed by Sanger to the board of directors of the Birth Control League, which was later renamed Planned Parenthood, also contributed to Sanger's Birth Control Review. Stoddard wrote in his own book "The Rising Tide of Color Against White World-Supremacy" that

"We must resolutely oppose both Asiatic permeation of white race-areas and Asiatic inundation of those non-white, but equally non-Asiatic regions inhabited by the really inferior races."

Here is a well-attested quote from Sanger herself, from her December 10, 1939 letter to eugenics leader Dr. Clarence Gamble:

“We should hire three or four colored ministers, preferably with social-service backgrounds, and with engaging personalities. The most successful educational approach to the Negro is through a religious appeal. We don’t want the word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population. And the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members."

Sanger was very interested in the black community. As you might surmise, Sanger's interest in a race was not necessarily a consequence of her admiration for it.

The freedom not to provide birth control

2012-02-17T06:00:00.055-05:00

An editorial from the New York Times, with my commentary.

The Freedom to Choose Birth Control

Published: February 10, 2012

In response to a phony crisis over “religious liberty” engendered by the right,

The whole point of the first two clauses of the First Amendment is to remove sneer quotes from religious liberty.

President Obama seems to have stood his ground on an essential principle — free access to birth control for any woman.

All men and women have legal access to contraception. Mostly free or damn cheap. New York City a year ago (on Valentines' Day!) announced the world's first Condom App for your smartphone, which will provide walking directions to the nearest 5 of the 3000 venues that give out free rubbers-- so "it's unlikely that a person would ever be very far from a gratis prophylactic." Now that's affordable healthcare! If you have a cardiac arrest on Second Avenue, odds are against a nearby defibrillator, but they can put a free condom on you while they're waiting for EMS.

That access, along with the ability to receive family planning and preventive health services, was at the foundation of health care reform.

Birth control access was "the foundation of health care reform"? Are they kidding? Birth control isn't even health care. Pregnancy isn't a disease.

The ostensible foundation of health care reform was to provide affordable health care to all. The actual foundation of health care reform was to expand government power, as this power grab makes clear.

Mr. Obama’s new rule on birth control coverage lets institutions affiliated with a religion shift the cost of coverage to their insurance companies,

Oh. So it's not free.

but Mr. Obama assured Americans it would not result in other women, or the rest of the country, subsidizing that shift.

The whole health care boondoggle is about making people subsidize people.

By refusing to back down on Friday,Mr. Obama took an action that will help reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies, abortions and medical complications from pregnancy.

What about chastity? Always works. It's actually free.

Nonetheless, it was dismaying to see the president lend any credence to the misbegotten notion that providing access to contraceptives violated the freedom of any religious institution.

"Free exercise" doesn't mean just free talk. Exercise means living in accordance with your religious beliefs.

Churches are given complete freedom by the Constitution to preach that birth control is immoral, but they have not been given the right to laws that would deprive their followers or employees of the right to disagree with that teaching.

What a stupid assertion. Vile really.

People have the Constitutional right to live in accordance with their religious beliefs-- free exercise. That right is corporate as well-- it applies to Churches as well as to parishioners. It applies as well to people who have irreligious beliefs and practices.

The is no right to force anyone to pay for the beliefs or practices of another. If people who believe in contraception want to use it, they are free to buy it. They have no right to use government to force the Catholic Church to buy it for them, directly or indirectly.

If a religious body does not like a public policy that affects its members, it is free to try to change it, but it cannot simply opt out of society or claim a special exemption from the law.

The law is unconstitutional, so of course "a religious body" can opt out.

Note the liberal hypocrisy: a voluntary prayer in a school is a Constitutional crisis, requiring immediate federal court injunction to protect some atheist who claims harm from merely seeing a prayer.

But liberals claim that the federal government can force the Catholic Church to violate the basic precepts of its faith.

Besides, contraceptive access is already in place in 28 states, and has been the law in New York for a decade, without inflicting the slightest blow to the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church, which has complied.

Liberal jurisprudence: 'a series of unconstitutional state laws makes an unconstitutional federal law constitutional.'

Mr. Obama had already gone too far out of his way to exempt churches and their religious employees from the preventative care mandate. It was not necessary to carve out a further exception for their nonreligious arms, like Catholic hospitals and universities, which employ thousands of people of other faiths.

An obvious purpose of the contraception mandate is to drive the Catholic church out of healthcare.

But Republican candidates and lawmakers know a good wedge issue, and they used this one to portray Mr. Obama as anti-religion and pro-government oppression.

Spot-on.

It was also a good excuse to take another whack at the health care reform law. The White House’s failure to foresee this mischief produced several days of stammering.

The Obama White House understood exactly what they were doing. They didn't capture the presidency by being stupid.

If the president had simply made today’s announcement two weeks ago — explaining that the savings from expanded birth control access means no additional cost to any employer — he might have avoided the political grief.

Playing a shell game with cost won't make the issue go away. The Bishops have made that clear.

The Catholic Health Association of the United States, which represents Catholic hospitals, said it was “very pleased” with the announcement, while the bishops conference said it was still studying the new rule.

The CHA is a tool. They have shamelessly sold themselves to the left.

The president’s solution, however, demonstrates that those still angry about the mandate aren’t really concerned about religious freedom; they simply don’t like birth control and want to reduce access to it.

I am very much concerned about religious freedom. And I don't like birth control and I want to reduce it.

Senator Marco Rubio, a Republican of Florida, has introduced a bill that would allow any employer to refuse to cover birth control by claiming to have a religious objection. The House speaker, John Boehner, also supports the concept.

Let's pray the bill passes.

Rick Santorum said Friday that no insurance policy should cover it, apparently unaware that many doctors prescribe birth control pills for medical reasons other than contraception.

Santorum knows that. He also knows that many perscriptions for "non-birth-control" birth control are for birth control.

The White House promise that free birth control pays for itself will still have to be tested.

If it "pays for itself" it isn't free. Revenue-neutral isn't free. The moral issue depends not at all on revenue neutrality.

The rule announced Friday would be objectionable if it turns out that nonreligious employers are subsidizing the exemption of religious employers, in effect paying more for their insurance because they have to cover birth control.

That's how insurance works. You pay more for coverage you want.

For women, and for society at large, the principle of keeping open access to birth control is a major step forward.

If women (and men) want contraception, they are free to pay for it. Contraception isn't healthcare, and forcing people to pay for other people's lifestyle is wrong.

Forcing religious institutions to pay for contraception is unconstitutional and immoral, and is a major new salient in the left's war on Christianity.

Defining killing down

2012-02-16T15:00:00.000-05:00

From my hero Wesley J. Smith.

Wesley is the most dedicated defender of human life I know. He brings attention to a terrifying shift in bioethics. I see it happening as well in my own practice. There is a rapid shift from traditional understandings of the ethics of organ donation and of care for the disabled to the new paradigm: bring severely disabled people into the organ donor pool and end their lives with organ donation in mind.

Wesley Smith:

The killing-for-organs pushers

By Wesley J. Smith

If you want to see where our culture may next go off the rails, read professional journals. There, in often eye-crossing and passive arcane prose of the medical intelligentsia, you will discover an astonishing level of antipathy to the sanctity of human life — to the point now that some advocate killing the profoundly disabled for their organs.

Case in point: “What Makes Killing Wrong?” an article published in the January 19, 2012 edition of the Journal of Medical Ethics. The authors argue that death and total disability are morally indistinguishable, and therefore harvesting organs from living disabled patients is not morally wrong. Bioethicists Walter Sinnott-Armstrong, of Duke University, and Franklin G. Miller, from the National Institutes of Health’s Department of Bioethics (which should really get the alarm bells ringing!) arrive at their shocking (for most of us) conclusion by claiming that murdering the hypothetical “Betty” isn’t wrong because it kills her, but rather, because it “makes her unable to do anything, including walking, talking, and even thinking and feeling.”

How do they get from deconstructing the definition of death to harvesting the disabled? First, they change the scenario so that Betty is not killed but severely brain damaged to the point that she is “totally disabled.” But their definition of that term encompasses hundreds of thousands of living Americans who are our mothers, fathers, children, aunts and siblings, uncles, friends and cousins — people with profound disabilities like that experienced by Terri Schiavo and my late Uncle Bruno as he lived through the late stages of his Alzheimer’s disease:

Betty has mental states, at least intermittently and temporarily, so she is not dead by any standard or plausible criterion. Still, she is universally disabled because she has no control over anything that goes on in her body or mind.

Since Betty “is no worse off being dead than totally disabled,” they opine, it is no worse “to kill Betty than to totally disable her.” Not only that, but according to the authors, “there is nothing bad about death or killing other than disability or disabling,” and since she is already so debilitated, then nothing wrong is done by harvesting her organs and thus ending her biological existence. And thus, in the space of not quite five pages, killing the innocent ceases to be wrong and the intrinsic dignity of human life is thrown out the window, transforming vulnerable human beings into objectified and exploitable human resources.

Alas, Sinnott-Armstrong and Miller are not on the fringe. And while they certainly don’t represent the unanimous view, they can hardly be called radical — at least by the standards of the medical/bioethical intelligentsia. Indeed, for more than a decade articles have been published in the world’s most notable medical and bioethics journals arguing in favor of killing profoundly disabled patients for their organs. Here is just a sampling:

● Bioethics: “If a patient opts for VAE [voluntary active euthanasia] in a society that permits it, and then chooses termination via RVO [removing vital organs], it seems clear that no more harm is done to others than if he were terminated by any other means.”

● Journal of Medical Ethics: “In the longer run, the medical profession and society … should be prepared to accept the reality and justifiability of life terminating acts in medicine in the context of stopping life sustaining treatment and performing vital organ transplantation.”

● Nature: “Few things are as sensitive as death. But concerns about the legal details of declaring death in someone who will never again be the person he or she was should be weighed against the value of giving a full and healthy life to someone who will die without a transplant.”

● New England Journal of Medicine: “Whether death occurs as the result of ventilator withdrawal or organ procurement, the ethically relevant precondition is valid consent by the patient or surrogate. With such consent, there is no harm or wrong done in retrieving vital organs before death, provided that anesthesia is administered.”

● The Lancet: “If the legal definition of death were to be changed to include comprehensive irreversible loss of higher brain function, it would be possible to take the life of a patient (or more accurately stop the heart since the patient would be defined as dead) by a lethal injection and then to remove the organs for transplantation …”

● Critical Care Medicine: “We propose that individuals who desire to donate their organs and who are either neurologically devastated or imminently dying should be able to donate their organs without first being declared dead.”

It is important to note here that transplant medicine remains an ethical enterprise and that doctors are not yet doing the deed. But if we want to keep it that way, it is important that these proposals not be allowed to germinate.

Here’s the good news. Sunlight is the great disinfectant. Most people will oppose killing for organs. Thus, the best way to prevent this dark agenda from ever becoming the legal public policy is to expose it in popular media every time it is proposed.

This is a surprisingly rapid shift taking place in bioethics. The trend is to narrow the gap between severe disability and death. It's most recent iteration began with the creation of a faux diagnosis-- Persistent Vegetative State-- and more recently with the creation of Minimally Conscious State, to be applied to those PVS folks who didn't get the memo that they weren't supposed to be aware.

The overall goal seems to be to certify severely disabled people unworthy of resources to keep them alive so that their lives can be intentionally ended, and to make them organ donors.

This is real, and it is coming.

Camelot

2012-02-16T06:00:00.120-05:00

Mimi Alford

Johnny, we hardly knew ye.

JFK, Monster

Timothy Noah

February 8, 2012

I knew that John F. Kennedy was a compulsive, even pathological adulterer, given to taking outlandish risks after he entered the White House. I knew he treated women like whores. And I knew he had more than a few issues with his father about toughness and manliness and all that. But before I read in the newspaper that Mimi Alford's just-released memoir, Once Upon A Secret: My Affair With President John F. Kennedy And Its Aftermath, described giving Dave Powers a blow job at JFK's request and in his presence, I didn't know that Kennedy had an appetite for subjecting those close to him to extreme humiliation.

The likelihood that Alford is making this story up is extremely remote. She didn't come forward on her own. She was outed, partially in a 2003 Robert Dallek biography, and then by name by the Daily News, as "JFK's Monica," because when she began her affair she was a White House intern and a 19 year-old rising sophomore at Wheaton College. (In the book Alford reveals that Sally Bedell Smith was actually the first journalist to contact her--by phone, about a year before the Dallek book came out--and that she declined to speak to her then.)

Alford's story is entirely believable. She was an attractive, naive recent graduate of Miss Porter's School. Miss Porter's was also the alma mater of Jacqueline Kennedy and of a slightly older White House secretary named "Fiddle" with whom Kennedy was also having an affair, or so the First Lady believed--there was also a purported dalliance with Fiddle's close friend "Faddle," a secretary in the press office--and it isn't lost on Alford that this descendant of Boston's lace-curtain Irish had a thing for Social Register girls. Her fourth day on the job she was invited upstairs to the private residence. Kennedy led Mimi into his wife's bedroom (the First Lady was away), unbuttoned her blouse, touched her breast, pulled down her underwear, dropped his pants, climbed on top of her, and fucked her. When she told him she was a virgin he became a bit more compassionate, but neither in that sexual encounter nor in any other did he ever kiss her on the lips.

This part of Alford's story doesn't really add anything to what we already know about Kennedy. Nor does it really change my opinion of the 35th president. But this part does:

Dave Powers was sitting poolside while the President and I swam lazy circles around each other, splashing playfully. Dave had removed his jacket and loosened his tie in the warm air of the pool, but he was otherwise fully clothed. He was sitting on a towel, with his pants leg rolled up, and his bare feet dangling in the water.

The President swam over and whispered in my ear. "Mr. Powers looks a little tense," he said. "Would you take care of it?"

It was a dare, but I knew exactly what he meant. This was a challenge to give Dave Powers oral sex. I don't think the President thought I'd do it, but I'm ashamed to say that I did. It was a pathetic, sordid, scene, and is very hard for me to think about today. Dave was jolly and obedient as I stood in the shallow end of the pool and performed my duties. The President silently watched.

Afterwards, Alford says she was "deeply embarrassed," and as she climbed out of the pool she "could hear Dave speak in as stern a tone as I ever heard him use with his boss. 'You shouldn't have made her do that,' Dave said. 'I know, I know,' I heard the President say. Later, a chastened President Kennedy apologized to us both." Alford believes that Kennedy showed "his darker side ... when we were among men he knew. That's when he felt a need to display his power over me." Kennedy didn't just have a thing for Social Register girls; he had a thing for humiliating Social Register girls. He also had a thing for humiliating his fellow Irishman, Dave Powers.

Maybe Kennedy wasn't this much of a creep all that much (though Alford also tells of him once forcing her to take an amyl nitrite "popper" in Bing Crosby's living room). But the poolside ritual of humiliation is not easy to reconcile with any kind of worldly tolerance for Kennedy's peccadilloes. Perhaps the fairest conclusion to make is that Kennedy did some good things in his public life (and also some bad), but that he was capable of monstrous cruelty that's hard to forgive and also hard to equate even with that of successors like Lyndon Johnson or Richard Nixon (or with any in his less polished younger brother Ted, whose own private life had plenty of dark moments but whose public accomplishment ultimately outshone JFK's). Clinton shared many vices with President Kennedy, but I can't imagine him ever doing anything like this. I don't usually say this about scandal stories, but Alford's tale ought to occasion further reassessment of a president we already knew to be morally compromised.

The fact that JFK was a promiscuous jerk is not news. Its no surprise that an ambitious narcissistic politician burdened with the Kennedy genome rutted like a bunny. His infidelity, aside from the impeachable national security risk ("Comrade Kennedy, your vife finds out about your любовница unless you vemove de missiles from Turkey..."), is between his wife, his kids, and God.

What's disgusting is the other betrayal. Kennedy raped Mimi Alford. I mean raped. She was a 19 year old kid doing an internship (presumably unpaid) in the White House Press Room. She was no doubt encouraged by her family to take the position at the White House to expand her horizons and perhaps help her prepare for a career. It must have been a thrill for a young lady.

Shortly after her arrival, she's plied with booze (and later amyl nitrite), and taken by the most powerful man in the world up to a bedroom (the President's wife's bedroom), alone, and rather matter-of-factly undressed and mounted. Apparently Camelot softened up a bit (figuratively) when she told him she was a virgin. The kid subsequently was used as a haute blow-up doll when the Commander in Chief had need, and she was used to orally calm the nerves of a presidential aide in the White House pool, while ein Berliner watched.

It was rape. Oh, maybe not indictable in court, but rape. She was a teenager in a horrendously compromised position and was used by the most powerful man in the world for his pleasure. Kennedy even told her he'd call on her after her marriage. What class.

But, you say, she was of an age at which she can make decisions for herself. Nonsense, I reply. The coercion involved is so enormous that it's impossible for a young person to give genuine consent. It's grievously morally wrong, at nineteen no less than if she had been fifteen.

People still make excuses for Kennedy, and he was protected by a coterie of toadies in the government and in the press. Such behavior is execrable, and people who know about it have-- and always had-- a responsibility to call it out.

This kind of thing happens in colleges and medical schools all too often, albeit with much less discrepancy in power. People in positions of power have a responsibility to help and protect young people in their charge. We need to have zero tolerance for sexual conquests driven by discrepancy of power and authority.

We send our daughters away to colleges and internships and entry level jobs to be treated with respect for their humanity and with care for their future. Sexual conquest of a young powerless woman-- in this case a teenager-- by a powerful man in authority over her-- in this case, the most powerful man on earth-- is, morally, a form of rape, even if she "consents". We recognize the coercive effect of disparity of age and power in laws against statutory rape. This is no different.

"Camelot"? What a lie.

Maybe Mimi Alford's father was in that sixth-floor window...

What have they got against babies?

2012-02-15T15:00:00.011-05:00

Great essay from Lloyd Marcus at American Thinker.

Excerpt:

Abortion is the thread which joins each wacko anti-America patch of the secular-progressive quilt. Why? Why is the left so fanatical about killing human babies? If it is about "choice," as they claim, why are they infuriated when a woman "chooses" to have her baby? Case in point: the left's hysterical outrage over the Super Bowl ad in which Tim Tebow thanked his mom for not aborting him.

"Colored people are like human weeds and are to be exterminated." So said Margaret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood. Seventy-eight percent of Planned Parenthood clinics are in black neighborhoods. Blacks make up only 12% of the population, but 35% of America's aborted babies are black. Half of black pregnancies end in abortion...

And it seems they're really pissed at black babies...

Addendum (2/16/12): I cannot find a reliable reference for the quote from Sanger-- "Colored people are like human weeds and are to be exterminated."-- that Marcus used in his essay. I believe the quote is spurious, and I retract it.

Sanger's passionate support for eugenics is of course very well documented and is a matter of public record.

A note to Sister Keehan

2012-02-15T06:00:00.006-05:00

Sister Carol Keehan is the president and CEO of the Catholic Health Association, which represents 600 Catholic Hospitals and 1400 other health-care facilities in the US.

She has been a fervent supporter of President Obama's health care mandate. When conservative Catholics raised questions about the likelihood that the mandate would be used to override conscience clauses already in law, Sister Keehan brushed the concerns aside. Her engagement of the Obama administration on health care was pure collaboration, without the base alloy of prudence.

I will leave for a future post Sister Keehan's bizarre view that Catholic social teaching requires state control of healthcare. The Church has always taught the primacy of subsidiarity-- the principle that solutions to problems of governance be solved on as local a scale as possible. The Leviathan State-- the concentration of power in the hands of federal politicians and bureaucrats-- is hardly the teaching of Christ, or of the Church. The responsibility of the state is to create an environment most conducive to human flourishing, not to extract money at gunpoint from the populace to impose its own version of flourishing (and to buy votes). Christ didn't teach that the remedy for sin was the encroachment of Tiberius' Imperium. God's Kingdom isn't a political suzerainty, and certainly not of the Left. The Church is, and has always been, the counterbalance to absolute power of the state. The millennialism of state power is a totalitarian Christian heresy, soaked in misery and blood. Prudent Catholics know that. Leftist Catholic naifs don't.

There are many approaches to improving American healthcare. The first approach is to acknowledge that it is the best healthcare on earth. Period. The second is to acknowledge the Law of Unintended Consequences. Efforts to "improve" health care will change it, not always for the better. Medicare provided free care for the elderly, and contributed enormously to the explosion of health care costs, which impedes the provision of care for the non-elderly. Hawaii found that making state-funded health care available for all children caused many families to drop their private health care insurance, which would have bankrupted the state system. The third is to encourage prudent changes that make health care even better and more affordable and accessible. Healthcare savings accounts, tax breaks, changes in health insurance laws to encourage competition and to shift coverage more toward catastrophic care would all be of help, with Medicaid-type assistance for people unable to get care. Reform of Medicare would also be desirable. The elderly in the US are the wealthiest segment of the public. Why should young families struggling to pay their own bills pay for the healthcare of their far richer parents?

Vincible ignorance is a sin. Sister Keehan is of that variety of Catholic who believes that "we're from the government and we're here to help" isn't a joke. To wit, referring to Obama's demand that Catholic institutions pay for insurance for contraception, sterilization, and abortifacients, she told the New York Times:

“I felt like he had made a really bad decision, and I told him that,” Sister Keehan said of the president. “I told his staff that. I felt like they had made a bad decision on principle, and politically it was a bad decision. For me another key thing was that it had the potential to threaten the future of health reform.”

Note to Sister Keehan: the government stomping on your rights and telling you what to do is "the future of health reform".

On the Religious Left's collaboration with Obama's contraception mandate

2012-02-14T14:00:00.001-05:00

Mark Tooley at American Spectator has a great essay on the Religious Left and their support for forcing churches and religious institutions to pay for contraception.

Excerpt:

For much of the Religious Left, the instrumentalities of the Sexual Revolution are themselves holy rites more sacred than any civil right or protection from government interference. And having largely denied the ethical teachings and historic doctrines of their own faith, these religious voices have largely distilled religion down to mandating, usually by government coercion, the fulfillment of various physical needs. They offer a religion without soul or transcendence. More disturbingly, their material demands ultimately entail suppressing or coercing more traditional religionists, not to mention all who cherish individual rights of speech and faith. If all their wishes were fulfilled, the ultimate result would be more authoritarian than any theocracy of the Middle Ages, unmediated by grace or charity.

JT Eberhard's dad on why he posts so much on atheism

2012-02-14T06:00:00.052-05:00

I know you were wondering.

Poppy, with my commentary:

Why do I post about atheism so much?

February 6, 2012 at 11:30 am JT Eberhard

[JT] My father has written another good one.

[JT's dad] Some time ago, my good friend Kevin asked “Why do you post about atheism all the time?”

I'll betcha' Eberhard's dad doesn't know anyone named "Kevin".

Valid question. I have pondered it at length. So, for my theist facebook friends, here is why.

Atheists are stigmatized in our culture.

Atheists can't get stigmata. Even St. Francis had to work at it for 30 years, and he was uncommonly holy.

A great many people who contribute to that stigmatization do not realize that not only do they know some atheists, but that they have found them to be perfectly acceptable human beings.

Right. Billions of Christians have no idea that they know atheists, who we presume would be identifiable by the horns protruding through their hair, right next to the '666' etched in their scalp. We realize that atheists could keep their tails tucked in their pants, but the horns would be hard to hide.

Until these good people are made aware of the atheists around them who are indistinguishable from every other good person,

Except for the horns...

they may buy into and promulgate the existing institutionalized stigmatization.

"Institutional stigmatization"? What institutes exclude atheists? Higher education? Science? Hollywood? The arts? The media? They're infested with atheists. A sneer at Evangelicals and an eye-roll at the Catholic Church are the coin of the secular realm.

In short, if you know me and like me, then let me inform you I am an atheist, and I am still that very same person whom you knew and liked.

But you can't be an atheist! You seem so... so... human.

Informing you of my lack of belief does not suddenly outfit me with horns, a forked tail, and a pitchfork.

'666' on your scalp is sufficient.

Until we come out of the closet as individual atheists, we will continue to be stigmatized and marginalized as a group.

Why not stay in a group closet? They have spacious walk-in's...

The second reason is that I am a very strong supporter of the Constitutional separation of church and state which is under nonstop attack by theists.

There's "Constitutional" and there's "separation of church and state". But "Constitutional separation of church and state" is an oxymoron, like "friendly lawsuit" (to pick an example atheists could relate to).

News to Poppy: "separation of church and state" ain't in the Constitution, no matter what your friends say.

I suppose I could fight that without declaring my atheism; however, it is simpler to self-identify as one of the groups the Christian Taliban is wanting to use the government to marginalize into second-class citizenry.

"Christian Taliban" is one of those oxymorons, Poppy. In fact, it's been Christians who've been keeping the Taliban at bay for 1400 years. You atheists tried it once, and the Taliban kicked your задница.

Make no mistake: there is a radical religious right that is determined to turn us into a theocracy.

Sure. For 200 years we had prayer in schools, creches in the town square, and Ten Commandments on our courthouse lawns. And America was a nightmarish theocratic Torquemada-ville.

Oh... wait... no it wasn't...

Their ongoing goal is to use our government as a proselytizing, indoctrination, and enforcement arm for their narrow minded version of religion.

Atheists are just trying to mind their own business, and Christians are such censors.

The third reason is that, frankly, I am annoyed by gullibility, ignorance, stupidity, propaganda, falsehoods, poor logic, and bad arguments.

So don't buy Dawkins' books.

I am disgusted with people who don’t know jack shit about science demanding to determine what is taught as science.

Hey. My thoughts exactly.

I am sick of people wanting to force their Iron Age morals onto everyone, despite mountains of studies and evidence that show them to be wrong.

Preach it bro'!

I think it is pathetic that people use religion to marginalize entire classes of people based on gender, sexual orientation, and color.

Yea. People who are denied basic rights need a helping hand.

Some other reasons:

In the entire history of Congress, there has only been one avowed atheist, Pete Stark. We are not represented and will not be represented until we speak out.

Pete Stark represents you well.

Because it took until 1961 for atheists to be guaranteed the right to serve on juries, testify in court, or hold public office in every state in the country.

Yea. We let them testify in court, and now we can't get them to stop testifying in court.

Because religion is not satisfied with merely existing quietly in the homes and hearts of the faithful. Its very nature compels the believer to proselytize, preach, promote, convince, convert and prevail.

Religion sticks its nose into everything.

Because the idea that skepticism and questioning are the same as cynicism, nihilism, and despair.

Atheism. The antidote to cynicism, nihilism and despair.

Because I can, and the only punishment thus far is societal, not legal…..at least for the present.

One gets the sense that Poppy's propensity to write so much on atheism has more to do with inadequate medication than it does with anything resembling insight. It's hard to best an atheist when it comes to stringing oxymoronic banalities into an ideology.

Contra Pops, the Christian understanding of man is the basis for our rights. Along with the vast majority of Americans, I believe that Christianity belongs in the forefront of our civic life. Free exercise of religion-- open acknowledgement of our debt to God for our right to life, our right to liberty and our right to pursue happiness-- is protected by our Constitution.

We Christians have always respected the genuine rights of our atheist neighbors. Atheists are the least persecuted religious group on earth.

State atheism, on the other hand, is always-- always-- totalitarian.

Islamic fanatics and secular fanatics

2012-02-13T13:00:00.002-05:00

Dennis Prager points out that in the U.S. we have our own fanatics, of the secular strain.

An excerpt:

The Muslim world is threatened by religious fanaticism. The Western world is threatened by secular fanaticism.

Both seek to dominate society and to use state power to do so. Both seek to eliminate the Other -- for Islamic fanatics, that means non-Muslim religions and secularism; for secular fanatics, it means Christianity and virtually any public invoking of God. The Islamists impose Sharia law; the American Civil Liberties Union and the left generally impose secular law. The Taliban wiped out public vestiges of Buddhism in Afghanistan; the ACLU and its allies seek to wipe out public vestiges of Christianity in America...

Abortion Contraception

2012-02-13T06:00:00.135-05:00

From Rex Murphy at the National Post:

Obama’s war against Christianity: When the Church struck back

Great essay. Especially

"Few things are as precious to the progressive mind as their dogma concerning sexuality and birth control... All in all, the controversy has been an instructive one — as a glimpse into the smooth, untroubled complacencies of the caring and superior secular mind, it is without many parallels."

Murphy is right: contraception and abortion are secular sacraments, and we err in underestimating the importance of this dogma and these acts to the secular world-view. But I differ a bit though with Murphy's take that this was an unforced error on the part of the Obama administration.

It was no error. Obama's team is not stupid. They elected to the presidency a hard-left chronically unemployed cipher whose only discernible skill is reading a TelePrompTer. Obama's tacticians are very savvy political operators. They don't make unforced mistakes. I believe that the contraception insurance mandate serves several purposes:

1) Revs up the leftie base and leftie money, which Obama needs badly.

2) Attempts to split off some pro-contraception Catholics-- the majority of Catholics, sadly. Genuine pro-life Catholics won't vote for these guys anyway.

3) More importantly, it "defines deviancy down", in Daniel Patrick Moynihan's apt phrase. Every assault on Christianity lowers the bar for the next assault. By slamming the Church with an outrageous mandate-- a mandate that will will be withdrawn millimeter by millimeter until it is politically sustainable-- it makes the next assault easier for Christians to swallow. We've seen it with a host of assaults on school prayer and on civic religious expression. The initial lawsuits triggered nationwide outrage. Now most Christians take it in stride. There's a clever analogy about boiling a frog in water. If you turn the heat up to high immediately, the frog panics and escapes the pot. If you do it very gradually, the frog doesn't realize what's happening until it's too late.

4) Most importantly, it signals a shift in the strategy of the Culture of Death camp. The CoD folks have been losing massively on the issue of abortion. Abortion is a hard sell in the best of times-- any public relations firm will tell you that you've lost already when your opponents are called "pro-life". Every imaginable aspect of the abortion debate is going against the abortionists. The scientific fact that children in the womb are human beings is so obvious that it cannot be debated openly-- pro-deathers rely on circumlocution and evasion. Prenatal ultrasound is a catastrophe for abortionists, because it shows the mother the face of her child. Abortionists have been caught running criminal slaughterhouses and aiding and abetting child rape. Public opinion polls have shown a clear shift to the pro-life position. That's no surprise. The respondents of the polls no doubt are coming to realize that their very existence depended on their mother's pro-life decision. You can be pro-choice only if your mom was pro-life. That sinks in, after a while.

The pro-deathers understand that abortion is a lousy marquee for secularism. Apt, I might add, but lousy.

Contraception, on the other hand, is much more popular, even among otherwise conservative Christians. The deathers need to change the subject, and contraception, rather than abortion, will be the new subject. They will try to peel pro-contraception conservatives and independents off from the conservative religious base, and a Code of Omerta will settle over abortion. The abortion pill will be touted as just another form of contraception. Contraception will be marketed as The Most Effective Way to Reduce Abortions, despite a half-century of data showing lock-step increases in contraception and abortions. Contraceptive culture is promiscuous and inculcates a disrespect for the sanctity of life. Abortion is the culmination of contraceptive culture-- retroactive contraception for slackers, so to speak. But deathers will even be able to accuse pro-lifers of promoting abortion by opposing contraception. And of course, mandatory insurance coverage for contraception will swell the coffers of Planned Parenthood, which has always suffered under the Catch-22 that the people they want to contracept-- minorities and the poor-- are the people who can't afford contraception.

The lights have been on all night in the Ministry of Truth. Obama's contraception mandate is brilliant, and no mistake. Deathers have lost the abortion argument, and they know it.

The purpose of the mandate is to change the subject. ~~Abortion~~ Contraception.

There is precedent for this tactical shift. In the 1950's, after the Nazis did eugenics to its logical end, eugenicist Frederick Osborne-- "the respectable face of eugenic research in the post-war period"-- steered the eugenics movement from negative to positive eugenics. 'Eliminate the Unfit' became "Every Child a Wanted Child". Osborne insisted that people must be convinced to want eugenics for their own family. But it must not be called eugenics. Osborne had a name for the new tactic: "voluntary unconscious selection." Note the Darwinian attribution.

It was, and remains, extraordinarily effective. We are well on our way to eliminating entire classes of disabled people. Not curing them. Eliminating them.

~~Abortion~~ Contraception. It is brilliant, and it will set the pro-life movement back on our heels. We have two avenues of reply:

1) Use the Obama Administration's effort to stomp on the Church to motivate Christians to drive Obama and the deathers from office.

2) We have to be able to make a succinct compelling case against contraception. The Catholic Church has such a case, and it is compelling and even sublime, but it is not succinct.

Making the case in the Twitter Era will not be easy.

The tactics are shifting.

My Darwin Day challenge

2012-02-12T16:47:00.001-05:00

"I've got a bridge to sell you..."

Happy Darwin Day!

I've always believed in respecting other faiths, and few faiths are as fervent as Darwinism.

Here's my Darwin Day challenge to enlightened Egnorance readers:

Show me that random heritable variation and natural selection doesn't always reduce to "organisms change and survivors survive".

Darwinism is not a mechanism, nor is it an explanation of any sagacity. It's a banality and a tautology, dressed to look like science. As a philosophical scam, it's been damned effective. As science, it has contributed no explanation beyond banality.

Prove me wrong. I'll post intelligent replies, if there are any.

Chesterton: the Aristocrat

2012-02-12T06:00:00.002-05:00

G.K. Chesterton, from The Catholic Thing:

The Aristocrat

The Devil is a gentleman, and asks you down to stay

At his little place at What’sitsname (it isn’t far away).

They say the sport is splendid; there is always something new,

And fairy scenes, and fearful feats that none but he can do;

He can shoot the feathered cherubs if they fly on the estate,

Or fish for Father Neptune with the mermaids for a bait;

He scaled amid the staggering stars that precipice, the sky,

And blew his trumpet above heaven, and got by mastery

The starry crown of God Himself, and shoved it on the shelf;

But the Devil is a gentleman, and doesn’t brag himself.

O blind your eyes and break your heart and hack your hand away,

And lose your love and shave your head; but do not go to stay

At the little place in What’sitsname where folks are rich and clever;

The golden and the goodly house, where things grow worse for ever;

There are things you need not know of, though you live and die in vain,

There are souls more sick of pleasure than you are sick of pain;

There is a game of April Fool that’s played behind its door,

Where the fool remains for ever and the April comes no more,

Where the splendour of the daylight grows drearier than the dark,

And life droops like a vulture that once was such a lark:

And that is the Blue Devil that once was the Blue Bird;

For the Devil is a gentleman, and doesn’t keep his word.

"There are souls more sick of pleasure than you are sick of pain."

The lures of Satan are subtle, often, and he woos with pleasure. Sometimes suffering is healthier, as Christianity has always taught. Chesterton at his best.

"A religious woman upon waking up each morning..."

2012-02-11T06:00:00.005-05:00

From Great Clean Jokes:

A religious woman upon waking up each morning would open her front door stand on the porch and scream, “Praise the Lord.” This infuriated her atheist neighbor who would always make sure to counter back, “there is no Lord.” One morning the atheist neighbor overheard his neighbor praying for food, thinking it would be funny, he went and bought her all sorts of groceries and left them on her porch. The next morning the lady screamed, “praise the Lord, who gave me this food.” The neighbor laughing so hard he could barely get the words out screamed “it wasn’t the Lord, it was me.” The lady without missing a beat screamed “praise the Lord for not only giving me food but making the atheist pay for it!!”

Bishops just say No.

2012-02-10T06:00:00.002-05:00

Catholic bishops are defying the Obama administration's mandate that forces religious employers to pay for contraception and abortion pills. Archbishop Dolan of New York has spoken out courageously on this outrage:

Religious Freedom and Obamacare

Wall Street Journal Wednesday, January 25, 2012 - op ed.

By TIMOTHY M. DOLAN

Religious freedom is the lifeblood of the American people, the cornerstone of American government. When the Founding Fathers determined that the innate rights of men and women should be enshrined in our Constitution, they so esteemed religious liberty that they made it the first freedom in the Bill of Rights.

In particular, the Founding Fathers fiercely defended the right of conscience. George Washington himself declared: "The conscientious scruples of all men should be treated with great delicacy and tenderness; and it is my wish and desire, that the laws may always be extensively accommodated to them." James Madison, a key defender of religious freedom and author of the First Amendment, said: "Conscience is the most sacred of all property."

Scarcely two weeks ago, in its Hosanna-Tabor decision upholding the right of churches to make ministerial hiring decisions, the Supreme Court unanimously and enthusiastically reaffirmed these longstanding and foundational principles of religious freedom. The court made clear that they include the right of religious institutions to control their internal affairs.

Yet the Obama administration has veered in the opposite direction. It has refused to exempt religious institutions that serve the common good—including Catholic schools, charities and hospitals—from its sweeping new health-care mandate that requires employers to purchase contraception, including abortion-producing drugs, and sterilization coverage for their employees.

Last August, when the administration first proposed this nationwide mandate for contraception and sterilization coverage, it also proposed a "religious employer" exemption. But this was so narrow that it would apply only to religious organizations engaged primarily in serving people of the same religion. As Catholic Charities USA's president, the Rev. Larry Snyder, notes, even Jesus and His disciples would not qualify for the exemption in that case, because they were committed to serve those of other faiths.

Since then, hundreds of religious institutions, and hundreds of thousands of individual citizens, have raised their voices in principled opposition to this requirement that religious institutions and individuals violate their own basic moral teaching in their health plans. Certainly many of these good people and groups were Catholic, but many were Americans of other faiths, or no faith at all, who recognize that their beliefs could be next on the block. They also recognize that the cleverest way for the government to erode the broader principle of religious freedom is to target unpopular beliefs first.

Now we have learned that those loud and strong appeals were ignored. On Friday, the administration reaffirmed the mandate, and offered only a one-year delay in enforcement in some cases—as if we might suddenly be more willing to violate our consciences 12 months from now. As a result, all but a few employers will be forced to purchase coverage for contraception, abortion drugs and sterilization services even when they seriously object to them. All who share the cost of health plans that include such services will be forced to pay for them as well. Surely it violates freedom of religion to force religious ministries and citizens to buy health coverage to which they object as a matter of conscience and religious principle.

The rule forces insurance companies to provide these services without a co-pay, suggesting they are "free"—but it is naïve to believe that. There is no free lunch, and you can be sure there's no free abortion, sterilization or contraception. There will be a source of funding: you.

Coercing religious ministries and citizens to pay directly for actions that violate their teaching is an unprecedented incursion into freedom of conscience. Organizations fear that this unjust rule will force them to take one horn or the other of an unacceptable dilemma: Stop serving people of all faiths in their ministries—so that they will fall under the narrow exemption—or stop providing health-care coverage to their own employees.

The Catholic Church defends religious liberty, including freedom of conscience, for everyone. The Amish do not carry health insurance. The government respects their principles. Christian Scientists want to heal by prayer alone, and the new health-care reform law respects that. Quakers and others object to killing even in wartime, and the government respects that principle for conscientious objectors. By its decision, the Obama administration has failed to show the same respect for the consciences of Catholics and others who object to treating pregnancy as a disease.

This latest erosion of our first freedom should make all Americans pause. When the government tampers with a freedom so fundamental to the life of our nation, one shudders to think what lies ahead.

One can frame this quite credibly as a matter of the Constitutional right of Catholics to freely exercise our religion. Contraception and abortion are grave sins, and we will not participate in them. While there are situations in which there is a pressing government interest served by forcing religious people to violate the precepts of their faith, this is not one of them.

People can buy their own condoms. Hell, taxpayers already give Planned Parenthood a half-billion dollars a year to contracept us and kill our children. Do we really need to force the Catholic Church to chip in?

But there is a deeper issue here, that transcends esoteric debates about Constitutional law.

We are at war. We are at war with people who hate Christianity. There are people in this country who want to see Catholicism in particular, and Christianity in general, crushed. They are assaulting us continuously, in courtrooms, in the press, in regulatory offices with judicial censorship, calumny, and regulations that transgress the Constitution and transgress simple respect for conscience.

We need to understand what is happening, and we need to fight back.

You pray, you pay

2012-02-09T06:00:00.104-05:00

From the Huffington Post:

$173,000 In Fees Sought In Rhode Island Prayer Banner Case

'Nice little school ya got there. Shame if something happened to it'
Jessica's "volunteer attorneys" demand a nice payday-- $173,000-- to be coughed-up by the recently-prayer-liberated Cranston school kids. No bad for cut-n'-paste work the ACLU's been doing for half a century. The well-paid pro-bono attorneys have threatened the school with heavier fees if the school appeals the ruling.

01/31/12

PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- Lawyers for the 16-year-old Rhode Island atheist who sued over a prayer banner displayed at a public high school are asking a court to order the city of Cranston to pay $173,000 in attorneys' fees.

The request was filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Providence by lawyers retained by the Rhode Island chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union. The lawyers sued Cranston and its school committee on behalf of Jessica Ahlquist, a junior at Cranston High School West.

Earlier this month, a judge ordered the removal of the banner. The school committee has not decided whether to appeal the ruling.

The ACLU says Ahlquist is entitled to $25 in damages. The group also says the $173,000 request does not cover all the time spent on the case.

Of course, the plaintiff's legal team originally called themselves "volunteer attorneys" in their public statements. The ACLU is apparently as creative with the term "volunteer" as it is with the term "Free Exercise of Religion". They can pose as noble volunteers in the press, and still get a nice payday at the expense of the school kids when their censorship prevails. It's like Vegas, but better odds. And now the barristers are threatening the school with ruinous legal fees if the school appeals.

The school district and town will have to fork out the money-- taxes the parents of Cranston paid to educate their kids-- in addition to the money for the school's own legal bills.

But the kids, and their parents and neighbors, get a bit of an education as a bonus. They've learned the definition of "shakedown", and they get a nice warning not to try to stand up for freedom of religion.

Lesson one:

You pray, you pay.

The tutors for that lesson just sent the school a bill for $173,000. Actually, $173,033.60.

The court-ordered tarp covering the prayer mural
in the Cranston West High School auditorium.

Google-mapping "catacombs"

2012-02-08T06:00:00.102-05:00

An appeals court has ruled 2 to 1 that California's Prop. 8, which banned gay marriage, is unconstitutional:

Federal Appeals Court Rules Prop. 8 Ban On Same-Sex Marriage Unconstitutional

February 7, 2012 12:15 PM

SAN FRANCISCO (CBS SF) — A three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Tuesday that Proposition 8, California’s voter-approved ban on same-sex marriage, is unconstitutional because it violates the 14th Amendment guarantee of equal protection under the law.

But backers of the controversial, voter-approved law quickly signaled that they planned to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The court ruled 2-1 to uphold the decision of a lower court judge, U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker of San Francisco, who determined in Aug. 2010 that Prop. 8 was a violation of the civil rights of gays and lesbians. The panel also rejected claims that Walker, now retired, was biased in his ruling because he is gay and in a long-term relationship with another man.

Yea. The judge who issued the original ruling was gay and living with his boyfriend. No bias there.

“Although the Constitution permits communities to enact most laws they believe to be desirable, it requires that there be at least a legitimate reason for the passage of a law that treats different classes of people differently. There was no such reason that Proposition 8 could have been enacted,” the ruling stated.

The traditional (i.e. real) definition of marriage is 'voluntary legal union between one adult man and one adult woman'. That definition treats all groups equally. It makes no reference at all to sexual orientation.

"But", you say, "gay people should have the right to marry anyone they want, just like heterosexual people do."

"You're wrong", I'd say. No one-- gay or straight-- has the right to marry "anyone they want". No one can marry a child, or a blood relative, or ten people, or himself/herself, or an animal, or an inanimate object, etc.

More generally:

Defining marriage is not the same thing as unconstitutionally restricting marriage.

If Prop 8 had said:

"straight people may marry any adult they choose, but gay people may not marry any adult they choose"

... that would be a violation of the Equal Protection Clause. But defining marriage is not intrinsically a violation of equal protection. It is, in fact, a prerequisite for any meaningful legislation about marriage.

Any legal definition of marriage excludes someone. Heck, just defining marriage as "between two people" pisses off a few sheep farmers and half the State of Utah.

"But", you ask, "what about the Loving v Virginia case, which overturned anti-miscegenation laws? Isn't Prop. 8 analogous to anti-miscegenation laws, and thereby discriminatory and unconstitutional?"

"No", I'd reply. Anti-miscegenation laws were primarily about race, not about marriage. They were in fact the unconstitutional imposition of racial categories on the inherently color-blind tradition of marriage. In a sense, the imposition of gay marriage resembles anti-miscegenation laws, in that it imposes criteria on the legal definition of marriage that have nothing to do with marriage itself, which has always and everywhere meant the union of a man with a woman.

Both anti-miscegenation laws and gay marriage are the imposition of irrelevant ideologically-driven criteria-- racism and gay hegemony-- on the institution of marriage.

"Gay hegemony?", you ask?

I point out that gay marriage has already given rise to legal action against people who for reasons of conscience oppose gay marriage. Claims of privilege based on gay marriage have already compromised freedom of conscience, freedom of speech, and free exercise of religion. There are reasons for the fervent pursuit of legal recognition that only a tiny percentage of gays will actually request.

Gay marriage is less an end than a means.

Judge Stephen Reinhardt, the author of the majority opinion, went on to write: “Proposition 8 serves no purpose, and has no effect, other than to lessen the status and human dignity of gays and lesbians in California, and to officially reclassify their relationships and families as inferior to those of opposite-sex couples. The Constitution simply does not allow for laws of this sort.”

The Gay Marriage Clause of the Constitution is right there next to the Abortion Clause of the Constitution and the Separation of Church and State Clause of the Constitution. Those parts of the Constitution are difficult for ordinary Americans to find, even with diligent search of the venerable document. It's analogous to the difficulty that leftist judges have in finding the 2nd and 10th Amendments, which are actually there.

The Constitution was written by men who would have responded to the assertion that "by a vote of 2 to 1 a panel of judges ruled that the Constitution and its Amendments subsume habitual buggery with sacramental marriage-- thereby nullifying the direct vote of millions of American citizens--" by reminding us that certifiably insane judges shouldn't issue rulings when drunk.

Reihardt, who was appointed to the appeals court by President Jimmy Carter, was joined in the majority opinion by Judge Michael Hawkins, an appointee of President Bill Clinton.

Judge Randy Smith, who was appointed by President George W. Bush, dissented, saying he disagreed that Prop. 8 served no purpose other than to treat gays and lesbians as second-class citizens.

So if one of the majority judges had voted the other way, then the Constitution would have meant the opposite-- that Prop. 8 was Constitutional?

This isn't rule of law. It's a scene from Alice in Wonderland.

Tuesday’s ruling did not mean, however, that gay marriages would resume in California anytime soon as the decision of the three judges appeared to pave the way for a likely Supreme Court showdown over the issue.

“No court should presume to redefine marriage. No court should undercut the democratic process by taking the power to preserve marriage out of the hands of the people,” Brian Raum, one of the lawyers hired to defend Prop. 8, said in an e-mail sent to CBS San Francisco.

“We are not surprised that this Hollywood-orchestrated attack on marriage — tried in San Francisco — turned out this way. But we are confident that the expressed will of the American people in favor of marriage will be upheld at the Supreme Court,” Raum added.

Margaret Russell, a professor of constitutional law at Santa Clara University School of Law, told CBS San Francisco that the Supreme Court did not need a conflicting circuit-court decision in order to take up the case, but rather just four justices who deem it worthy of review.

Prop. 8 passed with 52 percent of the vote in 2008 and outlawed same-sex marriages just five months after they became legal in California. Two same-sex couples then brought a lawsuit in 2009 seeking to overturn the measure.

American Foundation for Equal Rights President Chad Griffin, who formed the legal team that waged the court battle on behalf of the two couples, called the three-judge panel’s ruling “a historic victory.”

More than 150 people who gathered outside the federal courthouse at Mission and Seventh streets in downtown San Francisco also greeted ruling with cheers. They held signs and waved rainbow flags.

California Attorney General Kamala Harris hailed the decision too. In a statement sent to CBS San Francisco, she called it “a victory for fairness, a victory for equality and a victory for justice.”

The Attorney General’s Office had declined to defend Prop. 8 in court, leaving it in the hands of proponents of the measure to mount a defense, after concluding that the law could not be defended on constitutional grounds.

By a single vote, two judges disenfranchised 13,402,566 Americans based on a batshit interpretation of the 14th Amendment-- the Amendment which was actually ratified to protect Americans (e.g. recently liberated slaves) from... wait for it... disenfranchisement.

The "living Constitution" is not without little sparkles of irony. But aside from the stunning betrayal of the Constitution and of democratic principles and the betrayal of simple logic, I don't think this ruling will matter much anyway. Neither will the Supreme Court ruling, sure to come. Gay marriage is gaining rapidly in public opinion polls, and the thugs will soon no longer need Alice-in-Wonderland court rulings to get their way.

I'm a pessimist here. Americans have been so dumbed-down by public education (how many high school seniors could tell you what the Fourteenth Amendment really says) and jaded by execrable popular culture (millions of Americans would only pay attention to a court ruling if it involved fornication, Lady Gaga, and a car-chase scene) that I think we've lost the culture.

Gramsci won. I'm google-mapping "catacombs".

Komen and Planned Parenthood

2012-02-07T06:00:00.142-05:00

The decision by the Susan G. Komen foundation to cut funding of Planned Parenthood has created quite a brouhaha. Komen may even have backed down, although there is debate over whether this is a genuine retreat or just a tactical maneuver.

Komen does wonderful work (my wife and I have a close friend who survived breast cancer, and we help with Komen's breast cancer walk in our community each June). They made a courageous decision to stop sending money to America's Abortion Mill. The amount was rather small-- $700,000-- probably what PP spends in coat hangers and little baggies in a week-- and the ostensible reason for the defunding was the fact that PP is currently under criminal investigation in several states. Komen also realized that PP does no mammograms and no real breast cancer screening that can't be done by genuine health care centers who don't specialize in industrial-scale killing.

I think the deeper issue is that Komen's leadership may have had the "revulsion moment" normal people experience when they look too closely at Planned Parenthood.

Why did PP make such a big deal about such small change? After all, Planned Parenthood is a billion-dollar-per year abortion mill, $500,000,000 of that paid for by you, dear taxpayer. Why would they give a damn about $700,000? Chump change.

There are three reasons, I think:

1) Complaining about it raises money-- PP got a big influx of donations-- several million bucks-- the past couple of days.

2) PP has big-time problems with enthusiasm. All rhetoric aside, it's hard to get people worked up in support of a nationwide charnel house for babies. Pretending to be the victim of an injustice-- 'they cut funding for womyn's choice!'-- gets the pro-abort lumpen-Truppen marching, for a couple of days.

3) PP knows that it must at all costs avoid a cascade of revulsion. Many other organizations might begin to ask themselves "why do we associate with these scum?". Can't let the idea catch on.

So kudos to Komen for standing up for life. Breast cancer is an horrendous killer of women, but even cancer pales in comparison to abortion's femicide-- 20 million baby girls in the U.S. since 1973, and counting. Planned Parenthood takes an idiosyncratic approach to breast cancer prevention. They kill 500 little girls in the womb each day. Not one aborted girl grows up to get breast cancer. It is, you might say, Planned Parenthood's final solution to the problem of cancer prevention.

Planned Parenthood kills 300,000 kids a year for profit, so don't expect them to hesitate to brutalize people who wear little pink ribbons and have a conscience.The blow-back from Komen's tiny bit of resistance will be intense. But Komen deserves praise for trying to dissociate themselves from America's abbatoir, and for doing all they can to save innocent lives of women and girls of all ages.

When will the Pope the Secretary of Education apologize to victims of abuse?

2012-02-06T06:00:00.175-05:00

I know this is hard to read on a Monday morning, or any morning. Sorry, but it's important.

Compare this...

From the New York Times:

Photos Led to Arrest in Abuse of Pupils

By IAN LOVETT and ADAM NAGOURNEY

Published: January 31, 2012

LOS ANGELES — A former elementary school teacher who taught in a South Los Angeles school for 30 years was arrested Monday on charges of inflicting bizarre abuse rituals on at least 23 young girls and boys, including blindfolding them, binding their mouths with masking tape, and placing cockroaches on their faces and mouths before photographing them.

A student at Miramonte Elementary, where Mark Berndt used to teach. He is accused of covering children's mouths with tape.

The man, Mark Berndt, 61, was arrested in his home in Torrance, Calif., by members of the Los Angeles County sheriff’s office, and charged with 23 counts of committing lewd acts upon a child. Bail was set at $2.3 million, but the authorities said they would seek to raise it to $23 million, or $1 million for each count.

The children were between the ages of 7 and 10 when the incidents took place between 2008 and 2010, the authorities said. Steve Whitmore, a spokesman for the sheriff’s office, said potential victims were being urged to come forward in an attempt to establish whether such behavior had been going on earlier in the teacher’s career. He said five other people had come forward.

The sheriff’s office said the investigation began about a year ago when a film processor, complying with California law, turned over 40 photographs of children in a classroom, their mouths and eyes covered with tape. Some of the pictures showed Mr. Berndt with his arms around the children, or covering their mouths with his hands. Others showed Madagascar hissing cockroaches crawling on their faces, the authorities said.

Mr. Berndt was removed from the classroom on Jan. 7, 2011, after school authorities were notified of the evidence, said John Deasy, the superintendent of the Los Angeles Unified School District. He was terminated by the Los Angeles Board of Education in February.

Mr. Deasy said that crisis counselors had been provided to victims and parents.

One student at the school said Mr. Berndt had collected bugs and larvae. School officials said there was nothing in Mr. Berndt’s 30-year personnel record to suggest this kind of behavior.

“This makes me afraid because the most important thing is to make sure my children are safe at school,” said Erendira Reyes, 38, who came to Miramonte Elementary School, where Mr. Berndt taught, upon hearing of the arrest. “When a person like that is at school and the administrators don’t know about it, I think that is a very serious problem.”

Jesse Lizzaraga, 30, also turned up to find out if this was the same man who was his second-grade teacher. It was. “He was actually kind of cool when I first met him,” Mr. Lizzaraga said. “I was shocked.”

Mr. Whitmore said that police closely monitored Mr. Berndt, who is unmarried and lives alone in a four-apartment complex in Torrance, to make certain that he had no contact with children. He said the length of time between the discovery of the photos and the filing of charges was a result of the complexity of the case, including efforts to identify the children in the pictures.

He said the final piece of evidence was finding a blue plastic spoon and a container in a wastebasket in Mr. Berndt’s classroom that contains traces of semen, which DNA testing established to be from Mr. Berndt. Some of the photographs depicted a similar spoon being held under the nose of blindfolded young girls.

The police searched Mr. Berndt’s home and uncovered an additional 100 photographs, and 250 more photographs were found at the film processing establishment. A total of 26 children have been identified in the photographs; 10 have not been identified.

...with this...

From the New York Times:

Vatican Declined to Defrock U.S. Priest Who Abused Boys

Top Vatican officials — including the future Pope Benedict XVI — did not defrock a priest who molested as many as 200 deaf boys, even though several American bishops repeatedly warned them that failure to act on the matter could embarrass the church, according to church files newly unearthed as part of a lawsuit.

Multimedia

Interactive Feature

Timeline: The Predator Priest Who Got Away

The Document Trail: Lawrence C. Murphy

The Takeaway With Laurie Goodstein

Abuse Scandal’s Ripples Spread Across Europe (March 25, 2010)

Room for Debate: Changing the Vatican's Response to Abuse(March 17, 2010)

Jeffrey Phelps for The New York Times

Arthur Budzinski, at a cemetery behind St. John's School for the Deaf, says he was first molested in 1960 when he went to Father Murphy for confession.

The internal correspondence from bishops in Wisconsin directly to Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the future pope, shows that while church officials tussled over whether the priest should be dismissed, their highest priority was protecting the church from scandal.

The documents emerge as Pope Benedict is facing other accusations that he and direct subordinates often did not alert civilian authorities or discipline priests involved in sexual abuse when he served as an archbishop in Germany and as the Vatican’s chief doctrinal enforcer.

The Wisconsin case involved an American priest, the Rev. Lawrence C. Murphy, who worked at a renowned school for deaf children from 1950 to 1974. But it is only one of thousands of cases forwarded over decades by bishops to the Vatican office called the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, led from 1981 to 2005 by Cardinal Ratzinger. It is still the office that decides whether accused priests should be given full canonical trials and defrocked.

In 1996, Cardinal Ratzinger failed to respond to two letters about the case from Rembert G. Weakland, Milwaukee’s archbishop at the time. After eight months, the second in command at the doctrinal office, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, now the Vatican’s secretary of state, instructed the Wisconsin bishops to begin a secret canonical trial that could lead to Father Murphy’s dismissal.

But Cardinal Bertone halted the process after Father Murphy personally wrote to Cardinal Ratzinger protesting that he should not be put on trial because he had already repented and was in poor health and that the case was beyond the church’s own statute of limitations.

“I simply want to live out the time that I have left in the dignity of my priesthood,” Father Murphy wrote near the end of his life to Cardinal Ratzinger. “I ask your kind assistance in this matter.” The files contain no response from Cardinal Ratzinger.

The New York Times obtained the documents, which the church fought to keep secret, from Jeff Anderson and Mike Finnegan, the lawyers for five men who have brought four lawsuits against the Archdiocese of Milwaukee. The documents include letters between bishops and the Vatican, victims’ affidavits, the handwritten notes of an expert on sexual disorders who interviewed Father Murphy and minutes of a final meeting on the case at the Vatican.

Father Murphy not only was never tried or disciplined by the church’s own justice system, but also got a pass from the police and prosecutors who ignored reports from his victims, according to the documents and interviews with victims. Three successive archbishops in Wisconsin were told that Father Murphy was sexually abusing children, the documents show, but never reported it to criminal or civil authorities.

Instead of being disciplined, Father Murphy was quietly moved by Archbishop William E. Cousins of Milwaukee to the Diocese of Superior in northern Wisconsin in 1974, where he spent his last 24 years working freely with children in parishes, schools and, as one lawsuit charges, a juvenile detention center. He died in 1998, still a priest.

Even as the pope himself in a recent letter to Irish Catholics has emphasized the need to cooperate with civil justice in abuse cases, the correspondence seems to indicate that the Vatican’s insistence on secrecy has often impeded such cooperation. At the same time, the officials’ reluctance to defrock a sex abuser shows that on a doctrinal level, the Vatican has tended to view the matter in terms of sin and repentance more than crime and punishment.

The Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, was shown the documents and was asked to respond to questions about the case. He provided a statement saying that Father Murphy had certainly violated “particularly vulnerable” children and the law, and that it was a “tragic case.” But he pointed out that the Vatican was not forwarded the case until 1996, years after civil authorities had investigated the case and dropped it.

Father Lombardi emphasized that neither the Code of Canon Law nor the Vatican norms issued in 1962, which instruct bishops to conduct canonical investigations and trials in secret, prohibited church officials from reporting child abuse to civil authorities. He did not address why that had never happened in this case.

As to why Father Murphy was never defrocked, he said that “the Code of Canon Law does not envision automatic penalties.” He said that Father Murphy’s poor health and the lack of more recent accusations against him were factors in the decision.

The Vatican’s inaction is not unusual. Only 20 percent of the 3,000 accused priests whose cases went to the church’s doctrinal office between 2001 and 2010 were given full church trials, and only some of those were defrocked, according to a recent interview in an Italian newspaper with Msgr. Charles J. Scicluna, the chief internal prosecutor at that office. An additional 10 percent were defrocked immediately. Ten percent left voluntarily. But a majority — 60 percent — faced other “administrative and disciplinary provisions,” Monsignor Scicluna said, like being prohibited from celebrating Mass.To many, Father Murphy appeared to be a saint: a hearing man gifted at communicating in American Sign Language and an effective fund-raiser for deaf causes. A priest of the Milwaukee Archdiocese, he started as a teacher at St. John’s School for the Deaf, in St. Francis, in 1950. He was promoted to run the school in 1963 even though students had disclosed to church officials in the 1950s that he was a predator.

Victims give similar accounts of Father Murphy’s pulling down their pants and touching them in his office, his car, his mother’s country house, on class excursions and fund-raising trips and in their dormitory beds at night. Arthur Budzinski said he was first molested when he went to Father Murphy for confession when he was about 12, in 1960.

“If he was a real mean guy, I would have stayed away,” said Mr. Budzinski, now 61, who worked for years as a journeyman printer. “But he was so friendly, and so nice and understanding. I knew he was wrong, but I couldn’t really believe it.”

Mr. Budzinski and a group of other deaf former students spent more than 30 years trying to raise the alarm, including passing out leaflets outside the Milwaukee cathedral. Mr. Budzinski’s friend Gary Smith said in an interview that Father Murphy molested him 50 or 60 times, starting at age 12. By the time he graduated from high school at St. John’s, Mr. Smith said, “I was a very, very angry man.”

In 1993, with complaints about Father Murphy landing on his desk, Archbishop Weakland hired a social worker specializing in treating sexual offenders to evaluate him. After four days of interviews, the social worker said that Father Murphy had admitted his acts, had probably molested about 200 boys and felt no remorse.

However, it was not until 1996 that Archbishop Weakland tried to have Father Murphy defrocked. The reason, he wrote to Cardinal Ratzinger, was to defuse the anger among the deaf and restore their trust in the church. He wrote that since he had become aware that “solicitation in the confessional might be part of the situation,” the case belonged at the doctrinal office.

With no response from Cardinal Ratzinger, Archbishop Weakland wrote a different Vatican office in March 1997 saying the matter was urgent because a lawyer was preparing to sue, the case could become public and “true scandal in the future seems very possible.”

Recently some bishops have argued that the 1962 norms dictating secret disciplinary procedures have long fallen out of use. But it is clear from these documents that in 1997, they were still in force.

But the effort to dismiss Father Murphy came to a sudden halt after the priest appealed to Cardinal Ratzinger for leniency.

In an interview, Archbishop Weakland said that he recalled a final meeting at the Vatican in May 1998 in which he failed to persuade Cardinal Bertone and other doctrinal officials to grant a canonical trial to defrock Father Murphy. (In 2002, Archbishop Weakland resigned after it became public that he had an affair with a man and used church money to pay him a settlement.)

Archbishop Weakland said this week in an interview, “The evidence was so complete, and so extensive that I thought he should be reduced to the lay state, and also that that would bring a certain amount of peace in the deaf community.”

Father Murphy died four months later at age 72 and was buried in his priestly vestments. Archbishop Weakland wrote a last letter to Cardinal Bertone explaining his regret that Father Murphy’s family had disobeyed the archbishop’s instructions that the funeral be small and private, and the coffin kept closed.

“In spite of these difficulties,” Archbishop Weakland wrote, “we are still hoping we can avoid undue publicity that would be negative toward the church.”

Notice the difference in the two stories.

The alleged molestation by the teacher is presented in isolation-- no discussion of the negligence or complicity of school authorities, despite the fact that the children appear to have been molested in the classroom, tied up with tape, covered with cockroaches, and fed semen on a spoon. It actually turns out that there were suspicions and even at least one allegation about this teacher going back to the 1990's.

Yet the school authorities are barely mentioned. The molestation is depicted as a la carte-- without context in the school system.

The alleged molestation by the priest is presented as an expose of the Catholic Church. The molestation is presented as crimes covered-up and even condoned at the highest levels of the Church. The article is focused on allegations of negligence and complicity by officials of the Catholic Church. The whole article is about context-- about the Catholic church.

The photo of the teacher (at the link) shows him isolated in a mug shot. The photo of the priest (at the link) shows him in a church conducting mass.

This double standard is evident in all mainstream press coverage of child abuse in schools and in the Church. When a teacher commits abuse, the abuse is generally reported in isolation (when it is reported at all). When a priest commits abuse, the abuse is almost always reported as a pattern of criminality sheltered and even condoned by the Catholic Church.

"Oh but", you say "teacher child molestation isn't covered up by schools like it is by the Church".

You'd be wrong, of course.

Hofstra Professor Carol Shakeshaft has observed that educator sexual abuse is at least 100 times more common than sexual abuse by clergy. She has noted that schools rarely report suspicions of abuse to the police. Sexual abuse in public schools is an epidemic, and protection of accused abusers by schools has been the rule, not the exception. Ten percent of public schools students are victims of sexual misconduct by educators or staff at some point in their school years. There are approximately 30,000 children abused annually in schools in the United States by educators or staff. In New York City alone, one child is sexually abused by an educator or staff each day.

Here is an excerpt from Shakeshaft's report prepared for the U.S. Department of Education:

Consequences for abusers. In an early study of 225 cases of educator sexual abuse in New York, all of the accused had admitted to sexual abuse of a student but none of the abusers was reported to authorities and only 1 percent lost their license to teach (Shakeshaft and Cohan, 1994). All of the accused had admitted to physical sexual abuse of a student but only 35 percent received a negative consequence for their actions: 15 percent were terminated or, if not tenured, they were not rehired; and 20 percent received a formal reprimand or suspension. Another 25 percent received no consequence or were reprimanded informally and off-the-record. Nearly 39 percent chose to leave the district, most with positive recommendations or even retirement packages intact.

Of those who left, superintendents reported that 16 percent were teaching in other schools and that they had no idea what the other 84 percent were doing. A recent report on sexual abuse in New York City indicates that 60 percent of employees who were accused of sexual abuse were transferred to desk jobs at offices inside schools and 40 percent of these teachers were repeat offenders (Campanile and Montero, 2001). In many instances, agreements are made to avoid legal battles with the alleged abuser (Shakeshaft and Cohan, 1994). .

Several investigative reports have publicized individual cases and the response by districts to allegations of educator sexual misconduct. For instance, O’Hagen and Willmsen report that of 159 Washington state coaches “who were reprimanded, warned, or let go in the past decade because of sexual misconduct . . . at least 98 of them continued coaching or teaching afterward.” (Dec. 15, 2003) Many school districts make confidential agreements with abusers, trading a positive recommendation for a resignation.

In the midst of this epidemic of sexual molestation by educators and staff in public schools, very few cases of child sexual abuse in schools are reported to police by school officials.

By comparison, the Catholic Church has radically reformed its practices regarding prevention of abuse-- the Church in the U.S. is now one of the the safest places for children, much safer than schools, the streets, and the home. In 2009, there were six credible cases of allegations of clerical child abuse in the entire United States. That's fewer than the number of credible allegations of educator/staff abuse in New York City public schools each week.

When the Pope travels, the news media incessantly reports sundry demands that he apologize to victims of abuse. Where are the calls for apologies from top school officials, who oversee organizations in which abuse is orders of magnitude more common than it is in the Church and who generally have much more direct responsibility-- statutory responsibility-- for organizational oversight than the Pope has?

Why aren't school superintendents and state education officials scrutinized and vilified in the press with the same ferocity with which bishops are scrutinized?

Why hasn't ~~the Pope~~ the Secretary of Education apologized to abuse victims?

Here's another taste of the double standard:

The federal report [Shakeshaft] said 422,000 California public-school students would be victims before graduation — a number that dwarfs the state’s entire Catholic-school enrollment of 143,000.

Yet, during the first half of 2002, the 61 largest newspapers in California ran nearly 2,000 stories about sexual abuse in Catholic institutions, mostly concerning past allegations. During the same period, those newspapers ran four stories about the federal government's discovery of the much larger — and ongoing — abuse scandal in public schools.

Please note that my argument here is not that most educators are child-molesters or that public schools are in some way intrinsically evil. That would be grossly unfair to the vast majority of public school educators and administrators who are decent people and who work very hard to do the right thing. It would be as unfair just as the widespread media coverage of priests and of the Catholic Church on this issue has been unfair.

My argument is much more simple. I assert that people in the media and elsewhere who focus on abuse in the Catholic Church, but neglect the much larger epidemic of abuse in public schools, are bigots.

Imagine if every crime committed by a black person was reported in the media as an example of the propensity of blacks to commit crimes and the complicity of black communities in such crimes, but when crimes were committed by whites, no mention of race was made. Imagine if every financial crime committed by a Jew was reported in the media as an example of the propensity of Jews to steal and defraud and the complicity of Jewish organizations in such crimes, but when financial crimes were committed by non-Jews, no mention of religion was made.

The double standard of the media coverage of child sexual abuse by priests and of the media coverage of child sexual abuse by educators and by people in other walks of life is disgusting. It is pure anti-Catholic bigotry-- a modern analogue to the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, directed against the Catholic Church.

It has a long history.

Chesterton on Mormonism

2012-02-05T06:00:00.066-05:00

From The Catholic Thing:

By G.K. Chesterton

I have not the space, even if I had the knowledge, to describe the fundamental theories of Mormonism about the universe. But they are extraordinarily interesting; and a proper understanding of them would certainly enable us to see daylight through the more perplexing or menacing customs of this community; and therefore to judge how far polygamy was in their scheme a permanent and self-renewing principle or (as is quite probably) a personal and unscrupulous accident. The basic Mormon belief is one that comes out of the morning of the earth, from the most primitive and even infantile attitude. Their chief dogma is that God is material, not that He was materialized once, as all Christians believe; nor that He is materialized specially, as all Catholics believe; but that He was materially embodied from all time; that He has a local habitation as well as a name. Under the influence of this barbaric but violently vivid conception, these people crossed a great desert with their guns and oxen, patiently, persistently, and courageously, as if they were following a vast and visible giant who was striding across the plains. In other words this strange sect, by soaking itself solely in the Hebrew Scriptures, had really managed to reproduce the atmosphere of those Scriptures as they are felt by Hebrews rather than by Christians. A number of dull, earnest, ignorant, black-coated men with chimney-pot hats, chin beards or mutton-chop whiskers, managed to reproduce in their own souls the richness and the peril of an ancient Oriental experience. An interesting insight into LDS theology. I have long been struck by the dichotomy between the obvious decency and thoughtfulness of most Mormons I know, and the bizarreness of Mormon theology. Chesterton's assertion that Mormonism is a resurrection of the ancient Hebrew understanding of God rings true. Perhaps the Mormons' desert wandering rekindled a primitive relation to God in the human heart. This is how people with no acquaintance with the substantive philosophy or theology of the past two millennia understand God.

The obvious instinct of primitive men is to anthromorphise God-- to make Him a fellow-wanderer in the desert. It is the basis for paganism. To make gods like us.

The sublimity of Christianity-- the breathtaking truth-- is that God did become one of us, but remained God. He drew us to Him. He deigned to be One of us and suffered for us. He showed us the one divine trait not imagined in the Hebrew understanding of Him: courage.

Christianity drew out the shred of truth in paganism-- that God walks with man-- and then demolished paganism.

I have no patience for Mormon theology. It's a boys' theology, utterly lacking the sublimity of any real understanding of God. Chesterton provides a very satisfying hypothesis about its genesis.

Yet I have a great deal of affection and respect for Mormons. We had Mormon neighbors years ago, and they were the most gracious friends we've had. I have over the years spent quite a bit of time in Salt Lake City (for scientific meetings), and I have always come away with great respect for Mormon people and culture and for their transparent decency.

Even a primitive Christian heresy retains enough of Christ-- just a touch of the hem of His cloak-- to ennoble it.

An atheist was walking through the woods one day...

2012-02-04T06:00:00.001-05:00

An atheist was walking through the woods one day in Alaska, admiring all that evolution had created. "What majestic trees! What a powerful river! What beautiful animals!" he said to himself. As he was walking alongside the river, he heard a rustling in the bushes behind him. Turning to look, he saw a 13-foot Kodiak brown bear beginning to charge towards him. He ran as fast as he could down the path. He looked over his shoulder and saw that the bear was rapidly closing on him. Somehow, he ran even faster, so scared that tears came to his eyes. He looked again and the bear was even closer. His heart pounding in his chest, he tried to run faster yet. But alas, he tripped and fell to the ground. As he rolled over to pick himself up, the bear was right over him, reaching for him with its left paw and raising its right paw to strike him.

"OH MY GOD! ..."

Time stopped.

The bear froze.

The forest was silent.

Even the river stopped moving ...

As a brilliant light shone upon the man, a thunderous voice came from all around...

"YOU DENY MY EXISTENCE FOR ALL THESE YEARS, TEACH OTHERS THAT I DON'T EXIST AND EVEN CREDIT CREATION TO SOME COSMIC ACCIDENT. DO YOU EXPECT ME TO HELP YOU OUT OF THIS PREDICAMENT? AM I TO COUNT YOU AS A BELIEVER?"

Difficult as it was, the atheist looked directly into the light and said, "It would be hypocritical to ask to be a Christian after all these years, but perhaps you could make the bear a Christian?"

"VERY WELL." Said God.

The light went out.

The river ran.

The sounds of the forest resumed.

... and the bear dropped down on his knees, brought both paws together, bowed his head and spoke: "Lord, thank you for this food which I am about to receive."

Why are atheists unanimous on denial of religious rights?

2012-02-03T06:00:00.120-05:00

Government-censored prayer mural hidden by tarp
in Rhode Island High School

A remarkable observation.

A group of Christians and other religious people gathered recently in Rhode Island to call for removal of the prayer mural in Cranston West High School.

Conspicuously absent is any gathering of atheists to support keeping the prayer mural in the high school.

Why is there pluralism among Christians, but no pluralism whatsoever on this issue among atheists?

In the furious debates about First Amendment rights-- the right to teach intelligent design in public schools, the right to voluntary organized school prayer-- Christians and other theists are divided to some extent, whereas atheists are essentially unanimous in opposition to these rights.

Court cases involving prayer in school attract many amicus briefs from theists (Jews, liberal Christians, etc) who oppose teaching intelligent design and oppose voluntary organized school prayer.

Why are there no amicus briefs filed by atheists (individually or collectively in organizations) supporting the teaching of ID or supporting prayer in school?

The atheist unanimity is astonishing, when viewed objectively. There is essential unanimity among at least 8 million Americans (4% of our adult population). Virtually every other demographic is pluralist on these issues. Atheists are unanimous.

Why?

It's worth noting that there is virtually nothing else among atheists that is unanimous. There are atheists who revere Ayn Rand, and atheists who revere Marx, and every political texture between. There are atheists who campaign for Obama, and atheists who campaign for Ron Paul. There are atheists for free trade, and there are atheists for protectionism. There are even pro-life atheists. But there are no atheists who speak up for the right to teach intelligent design or the right to organized prayer in school. Atheism is otherwise a cacophony of political and personal viewpoints. Except on rights brushing against religion.

It is an astonishing fact of our civil discourse.

"Of course", my atheist interlocutors will say: "atheists oppose these things because these things are wrong. They're right to oppose them".

But that would be to miss my point.

I am not arguing for the rightness or wrongness of a particular view on these issues. I am pointing out the bizarre unanimity of atheist viewpoint, at least viewpoint publicly expressed. It is a unanimity characteristic of virtually no other issue of public contention.

And of course my atheist interlocutors will argue that teaching ID and allowing school prayer are so obviously wrong that only Americans in the grip of religious delusion could support such things. Atheists will argue that support for teaching ID and for voluntary organized school prayer are so depraved that they are akin to support for torturing puppies.

But that is a hard argument to make. Reasonable theists are on both sides of this debate. There are many legal scholars and many jurists who agree with the majority of Americans that teaching ID and permitting voluntary organized school prayer are permitted by the Constitution and are perfectly legal.

A substantial majority of Americans support teaching intelligent design and support voluntary organized prayer in school. Of course it is understandable that most atheists would disagree. Yet a substantial minority of Christians, Jews and other theists oppose teaching intelligent design and oppose voluntary organized school prayer. Why wouldn't there be a corresponding substantial minority of atheists who break with their own consensus? Why isn't there a loyal opposition among atheists-- those atheists who support ID and school prayer?

Why are atheists, who are unanimous on virtually no other civic issue, unanimous on the rights (or lack thereof) of Christians?

The First Amendment, under a tarp

2012-02-02T06:00:00.130-05:00

A picture is worth a thousand words:

The prayer mural on the wall of the auditorium in Cranston West High School in Rhode Island.
The prayer is under the tarp, by federal court order.

The First Amendment guarantees all Americans the right to free exercise of religion and the right to freedom of speech.

The First Amendment prohibits an official national church.

Nowhere does it guarantee the right not to see other people's beliefs.

Nowhere does it guarantee atheists the right not to see religious expression.

Nowhere does it mandate civic atheism.

Nowhere does it prohibit prayer or religious expression in civic life.

The First Amendment is our charter of freedom. It explicitly prohibits government censorship of religious expression.

This wall in a school auditorium-- this prayer under a tarp-- is a metaphor for your rights under mandatory civic atheism.

It is court-ordered censorship of religious expression.

It's our First Amendment, under a tarp.

Church-of-What's-Happenin'-Now holds prayer vigil defending litigious atheist schoolgirl

2012-02-01T06:00:00.053-05:00

(Dissociated Press) A group of local Rhode Island ~~liberals~~ clergy held a public prayer vigil today to defend Cranston High School student Jessica Ahlquist, the sixteen year old atheist ~~used as bait by the ACLU to censor Christians~~ inexplicably embroiled in controversy over her lawsuit to remove a prayer mural in her school.

Rev. Ima Quisling, leader of a group of progressive clergy called 'Vicars of Vichy', opened the vigil by reminding the assembled reporters that "for progressive Christians, kneeling in submission is the most profitable response to worldly power". After several opening prayers, she lead the assembled reporters in the popular hymn "Barak of Ages" followed by a solemn acapella version of "Were You There, When They Fired Keith-Ol-ber-mann?"

Reverend Quisling then proceeded with a solemn homily on the Apostle's Creed entitled "Womynpriests and Choice-- the Legislative Outlook".

Ushers then passed around collection plates labeled "(Hope and) Change", as Reverend Quisling asked people to open their hearts and contribute "as much of other people's money as you can afford".

With the end of the liturgy of the Word, the liturgy of the eucharist began.

To prepare for the sacraments, the Reverend lit four incense-treated prayer murals.

In the soft light of the flickering flames, the parishoners lined up to recieve the sacrament. Reverend Quisling passed a plastic fetus to each, who in turn dumped it in the incinerator on the altar. "The bread of life(style)... ", she intoned, which each immolation.

At the conclusion of communion, Rev. Qusiling, winking at both of her wives in the front row, raised her arms in benediction: "Holy Mother, please protect little Jennifer-- um-- Justina-- umm--- Jessica from violations of her rights.

The Reverend walked through the congregation, shaking hands with all three parishoners and several hundred reporters.

On her way to her Prius, she warned of the Lord's wrath if Jessica is forced to look upon differing beliefs.

"North America has suffered annual cycles of warming and cooling, as well as almost daily fluctuations of light and dark, since the Republican victory in the 2010 mid-term elections", she has observed pointedly, "and by this summer portions of the Northern Hemisphere will be as much as fifty degrees warmer than now"

"Gaia is already angry about the Tea Party. Prayers on t-shirts will only inflame Her Righteous Fury".

"We cannot deny Her Holy Injunctions much longer" she warned, pointing out that a recent drought in Madagascar coincided with Rick Santorum's victory in the Iowa caucauses.

"Our Holy Mother will not be mocked. She led her people out of slavery. She will lead her people out of school auditoriums with prayer murals."

"We womyn and men and transgendered must protect innocent life. Jessica has already passed through the birth canal, so she too is a human being in God's eyes."

Reverend Quisling paused, her eyes welling with tears.

"Please defend little Justina from seeing things she doesn't like"

Morality Pills

2012-01-31T06:00:00.122-05:00

Peter Singer and Agata Sagan, from the New York Times, with my commentary:

Are We Ready for a ‘Morality Pill’?

By PETER SINGER and AGATA SAGAN

Last October, in Foshan, China, a 2-year-old girl was run over by a van. The driver did not stop. Over the next seven minutes, more than a dozen people walked or bicycled past the injured child. A second truck ran over her. Eventually, a woman pulled her to the side, and her mother arrived. The child died in a hospital. The entire scene was captured on video and caused an uproar when it was shown by a television station and posted online. A similar event occurred in London in 2004, as have others, far from the lens of a video camera.

There was widespread soul-searching in China about that incident.

Yet people can, and often do, behave in very different ways.

A news search for the words “hero saves” will routinely turn up stories of bystanders braving oncoming trains, swift currents and raging fires to save strangers from harm. Acts of extreme kindness, responsibility and compassion are, like their opposites, nearly universal.

Why are some people prepared to risk their lives to help a stranger when others won’t even stop to dial an emergency number?

Scientists have been exploring questions like this for decades.

Scientists are very late to the conversation. Philosophers and theologians and playwrights and poets and people in every imaginable walk of life have been exploring that question for millennia.

Scientists just began to wonder about it a few decades ago.

In the 1960s and early ’70s, famous experiments by Stanley Milgram and Philip Zimbardo suggested that most of us would, under specific circumstances, voluntarily do great harm to innocent people.

Military commanders have known that since pre-history. Control of armies among civilian populations and vanquished enemies has always been a difficult problem. Atrocities, rape, and pillage are often the fruits of hard-fought victories, even among otherwise well-disciplined soldiers.

The same situational depravity has been noted during plagues and famines since antiquity.

Milgram showed us nothing new about human nature, but he reminded us of what we, in our modern conceit, had forgotten.

Singer needs to read more widely.

During the same period, John Darley and C. Daniel Batson showed that even some seminary students on their way to give a lecture about the parable of the Good Samaritan would, if told that they were running late, walk past a stranger lying moaning beside the path. More recent research has told us a lot about what happens in the brain when people make moral decisions.

"What happens in the brain" when people make moral decisions? Interesting, but not the crux of the matter. 'What happens in the soul' seems to me a more important question.

But are we getting any closer to understanding what drives our moral behavior?

Closer to understanding morality with science? I doubt it.

Here’s what much of the discussion of all these experiments missed: Some people did the right thing.

Most people who knew about the experiments didn't "miss it". The fact that some people acted morally, and some did not, was the published conclusion of the studies. That fact has been widely discussed.

Singer seems to have missed it.

A recent experiment (about which we have some ethical reservations) at the University of Chicago seems to shed new light on why.

Singer mentions no ethical reservations about the human subjects in Milgram's experiments, who were probably emotionally devastated knowing afterward that they cooperated with torture. Would you want to live with the knowledge that you were someone who has been cited for decades as a classic example of human depravity?

Singer's concern is, however, for the rats.

Researchers there took two rats who shared a cage and trapped one of them in a tube that could be opened only from the outside. The free rat usually tried to open the door, eventually succeeding. Even when the free rats could eat up all of a quantity of chocolate before freeing the trapped rat, they mostly preferred to free their cage-mate. The experimenters interpret their findings as demonstrating empathy in rats. But if that is the case, they have also demonstrated that individual rats vary, for only 23 of 30 rats freed their trapped companions.

I'm not acquainted with the details of the study. It would seem to me that there could be all sorts of reasons for one rat opening the cage of another (a desire for warmth or sex, an instinct to form a colony, etc), and "moral" considerations are only applicable to a few of them.

For an act to be moral, it must be, in classical terms, an act of the intellect. It must involve abstracting the universal aspects of a sense-datum-- it must involve some kind of abstract thinking. "It is sad to be stuck behind a door" (an act of the intellect) is a different mental act than the perception of a door (a sense-datum) and wanting to open the door (an act of the appetite-- which is the animal analogue of the human will).

The notion that an animal's mental act of sensation and appetite sheds light on the human mental act of the intellect and the will is dubious. Singer makes no mention of this limitation, and shows no awareness of it.

The causes of the difference in their behavior must lie in the rats themselves.

Of course. Where else would it lie?

It seems plausible that humans, like rats, are spread along a continuum of readiness to help others.

Some people are by nature helpful to others. Others not. This is news to Singer.

There has been considerable research on abnormal people, like psychopaths, but we need to know more about relatively stable differences (perhaps rooted in our genes) in the great majority of people as well.

Has Singer ever heard of psychology, sociology, theology, ethics, literature, and history? Much of human inquiry since the dawn of civilization has concerned itself with understanding the spectrum of normal human behavior.

Undoubtedly, situational factors can make a huge difference, and perhaps moral beliefs do as well, but if humans are just different in their predispositions to act morally, we also need to know more about these differences.

It's been studied since the dawn of man.

Only then will we gain a proper understanding of our moral behavior, including why it varies so much from person to person and whether there is anything we can do about it.

There is much to learn, but probably not from rats.

If continuing brain research does in fact show biochemical differences between the brains of those who help others and the brains of those who do not, could this lead to a “morality pill” — a drug that makes us more likely to help? Given the many other studies linking biochemical conditions to mood and behavior, and the proliferation of drugs to modify them that have followed, the idea is not far-fetched.

All sorts of things we ingest and perceive influence our mood and likely influence our moral acts. I'm certainly more disposed to courtesy when I'm well fed, haven't had too much coffee, haven't read Pharyngula recently, etc.

If so, would people choose to take it?

It seems immoral not to take the pill. If it were immoral not to take it, then the moral decision to take the morality pill could be influenced by a proto-morality pill. If the decision to take the proto-morality pill were a moral decision, then then the moral decision to take the proto-morality pill could be influenced by a proto-proto-morality pill. If... you see where this is going.

At some point you still have to make the moral decision, cold turkey, unless they put the pill in your drinking water.

But if they put the pill in your drinking water, then the decision to put the pill in your drinking water would be influenced by a pill...

It's morality pills, all the way down.

Could criminals be given the option, as an alternative to prison, of a drug-releasing implant that would make them less likely to harm others?

That's already done with chemical castration for sex offenders.

Might governments begin screening people to discover those most likely to commit crimes? Those who are at much greater risk of committing a crime might be offered the morality pill; if they refused, they might be required to wear a tracking device that would show where they had been at any given time, so that they would know that if they did commit a crime, they would be detected.

See where materialism leads us? If we accept the inference that we're evolved rats, we implicitly ask to be treated like rats.

Fifty years ago, Anthony Burgess wrote “A Clockwork Orange,” a futuristic novel about a vicious gang leader who undergoes a procedure that makes him incapable of violence.

Quadriplegia can do that, as can amputation of hands and feet. Capital punishment tends to reduce recidivism as well.

The effectiveness of such measures is not debatable. The morality of such measures is of course debatable. But before we decide on the morality, we all have to take our morality pill. Not to do so would be immoral, which would mean that we should take our proto-morality pill first...

Stanley Kubrick’s 1971 movie version sparked a discussion in which many argued that we could never be justified in depriving someone of his free will, no matter how gruesome the violence that would thereby be prevented. No doubt any proposal to develop a morality pill would encounter the same objection.

The morality of morality pills would be influenced by ingestion of morality pills...

But if our brain’s chemistry does affect our moral behavior, the question of whether that balance is set in a natural way or by medical intervention will make no difference in how freely we act.

Is Singer seriously asserting that whether an act is influenced by our nature, or is influenced by a pill we are forced to take, has no impact on the free nature of the act that results? Acts born of nature and acts born of slavery are equally free? Diligently harvesting cotton on your own farm and diligently harvesting cotton on your slave-master's plantation are equally free acts?

If Singer made this assertion without understanding it, he'd be a fool. But Singer is no fool. He understands. What we see in such sophistry is an effort to degrade man to the ethical status of a rat in a cage. Pure evil.

You've been introduced to Peter Singer.

If there are already biochemical differences between us that can be used to predict how ethically we will act, then either such differences are compatible with free will, or they are evidence that at least as far as some of our ethical actions are concerned, none of us have ever had free will anyway.

Of course we have free will. The assertion that "we don't have free will" has no truth value if it is not made with some degree of freedom. The mere assertion of a proposition presupposes free will. Chemical processes alone can't be true or false, and thus can't be propositions.

In any case, whether or not we have free will, we may soon face new choices about the ways in which we are willing to influence behavior for the better.

The ethics does get sticky, but primarily because we accept implicitly Singer's odious materialistic view of man.

Human beings are composites of matter, soul, and spirit and are created by God in His image. We have free will, because He has free will.

Our free will is tainted by our propensity to sin and by our nature as composite creatures. We are not meat and we are not rats, but we are influenced by chemistry, because we are in one aspect material. Yet we are more than matter. We are soul and spirit as well. We can choose.

Moral culpability for our choices is complex question. We are influenced by material and immaterial things, and the influence can be very strong. Our acts are the outcome of a material and spiritual tug-of-war that each of knows intimately. To what extent are we morally culpable for a particular act? We can speculate, but we are not our own judges. Our moral culpability is finally a judgement that will be made by Another. He understands us, in part because He created us and He is one of us and He knows what we face.

In the final analysis, mere chemical analysis of human neurotransmitters has little more to teach us about human moral decisions than chemical analysis of the ink on a page of a Shakespearian play has to teach us about Hamlet. We are not meat. We are not rats. We are embodied spiritual creatures.

Science predicated on the fallacy that we are rats and meat is pseudoscience, no less. The 21st century has its own phrenology, more technological but no less foolish than the phrenology of the 19th century.

But that is not to say that there are no morality pills. One pill in particular has proven quite effective, when taken regularly. It is venerable, and has shaped civilizations. It has powers that transcend morality. Powers that seem miraculous. For millions of people it has transformed whiskey into furniture, and opiates into children's clothing, and promiscuity into fidelity. It's very expensive, but it's free for you. It was paid for already.

And you don't need a prescription, just a desire.

"Lawyer (n): one skilled in circumventing the law". -- Ambrose Bierce

2012-01-30T06:00:00.079-05:00

Anonymous, who claims to be an attorney who practices Constitutional law (and I believe him), defends the judge's ruling on the Rhode Island prayer mural case:

... the case law, which is an interpretation of the Constitution... holds that endorsement of religion is a violation of the Constitution.

No it doesn't.

The test applied from case law is the Lemon Test, from Lemon v. Kurtzman. The relevant part of the Lemon test is the second prong, which reads:

2) The government's action must not have the primary effect of either advancing or inhibiting religion;

The test of a government action is "the primary effect of advancing" religion, not endorsing it. An endorsement that does not advance religion is not, according to the Lemon Test, unconstitutional. Even if a government does advance religion, it is only unconstitutional if it's primary effect is the advancement of religion.

So by the second prong of the Lemon Test the prayer mural would only be unconstitutional if it advanced religion as its primary effect. Obviously, the mural does not in any meaningful sense advance religion (it does not compel or advertise religious observance or assent), and religion is its secondary effect anyway. Only six of its eighty words say anything about religion. The other seventy-six words encourage students to be good citizens. It is primarily an exhortation to good citizenship.

By the plain language of the Lemon Test, the prayer mural is constitutional.

On the other hand, Judge Lagueux's opinion can also be analyzed using the Lemon Test. Judge Laugueux 's opinion meets three criteria:

1) It is a government action (a federal court ruling).

2) It inhibits religion (it explicitly censors a prayer mural because it contains religious language).

3) The inhibition of religion is the primary effect of the ruling. It's the whole point of the ruling.

Thus, by the Lemon Test, Judge Laugueux's ruling is unconstitutional.

Justice Scalia has noted that for the Lemon Test to be applied at all it must be applied inconsistently and incoherently. He cites the example of the application of the Lemon Test to the First Amendment:

The Free Exercise clause singles out religion for place of privilege in our First Amendment rights, prior to the right to freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom of assembly.

By doing so, the Free Exercise clause explicitly advances religion. So the Lemon Test's criterion for the compliance of a government act with the First Amendment is violated by... the Free Exercise clause of the First Amendment.

Justice Scalia points out that by the Lemon Test, the First Amendment violates the First Amendment.

Constitutional lawyer Anonymous:

And since the incorporation doctrine holds that the rights enumerated in the Constitution apply not just to the states, but to their instrumentalities, like a school, the actions of the school to endorse a religion are prohibited.

No.

The Establishment clause cannot, by logic, be subject to incorporation by the Fourteenth Amendment.

From Nebraska Law Professor Robert Duncan:

Justice Thomas [has] observed that the best scholarship on the original understanding of the Establishment Clause supports the conclusion that it is “best understood as a federalism provision—[which] protects state establishments from federal interference..."

Thus, incorporation of the Establishment Clause against the states is incoherent, because it “prohibit[s] precisely what the Establishment Clause was intended to protect—state establishments of religion.” In other words, incorporation of the Establishment Clause has perverted the purpose of the Clause, because as Justice Stewart once said: “a constitutional provision . . . designed to leave the States free to go their own way . . . [has] become a restriction upon their autonomy.”

The purpose of the Establishment clause was to preclude incorporation of federal religious constraints-- such as would eminate from an established national church-- on the states. Therefore, the Establishment clause is not subject to incorporation by the Fourteenth Amendment, because its overt purpose is to prohibit incorporation.

Lawyers like Anonymous who hawk state censorship of religious expression aren't invoking genuine legal scholarship. They are merely applying their skills, as Ambrose Bierce quipped, to the circumvention of the law. They misrepresent the law to make a cudgel to extinguish civic religious expression. Sophistry, not scholarship, is their method.

We ordinary citizens-- We the People-- and honest legal scholars and jurists who respect the Constitution, need to call these dissembling bigots out.

Chesterton: the paradox of Islam

2012-01-29T06:00:00.028-05:00

From The Catholic Thing:

The paradox of Islam

By G.K. Chesterton

There is in Islam a paradox which is perhaps a permanent menace. The great creed born in the desert creates a kind of ecstasy out of the very emptiness of its own land, and even, one may say, out of the emptiness of its own theology. It affirms, with no little sublimity, something that is not merely the singleness but rather the solitude of God. There is the same extreme simplification in the solitary figure of the Prophet; and yet this isolation perpetually reacts into its own opposite. A void is made in the heart of Islam which has to be filled up again and again by a mere repetition of the revolution that founded it. There are no sacraments; the only thing that can happen is a sort of apocalypse, as unique as the end of the world; so the apocalypse can only be repeated and the world end again and again.

A fascinating observation. Islam lacks sacraments. Yet the violence that is so much a part of Islam-- embedded in its theology and its reality-- is a kind of sacrament, a physical manifestation of Allah's will on earth.

In Catholicism, Christ's sacrifice of Himself is repeated at each Eucharist. In my view, Islam's egregious violence in the name of jihad is a satanic bastardization of the Lord's sacrifice. In both, innocents suffer. But the Lord's suffering in the Christian sacrament is redemptive, an act of ultimate self-sacrifice, an act of love. The suffering of innocents butchered by Islamic terrorists is an act of power, an act of the sacrifice of innocent others, an act of hate.

There is a difference between Christianity and Islam. A difference as wide as love and hate. Christ's sacrifice is God's renunciation of all manner of violence, a renunciation of all jihad.

Rene Girard explained it.

"I'm not a good singer, but I just like it"

2012-01-28T06:00:00.000-05:00

This is a video of 21 year old Choi Sungbong in his first performance on Korea's Got Talent. He was abandoned in an orphanage at the age of three, and escaped because of abuse at the age of five and lived by himself on the street selling gum and newspapers for ten years. He was helped to get an education by a woman who ran a food cart who saw him living on the street. As he got older, he worked as a day laborer to support himself and to pay for a modicum of musical training. His story seems genuine.

His fortunes have changed at bit. He's a remarkably humble young man. When he was asked by a judge on the show if he was a good singer, he replied "I'm not a good singer, but I just like it". I'm fascinated by the response of the people in the Korean audience and of the judges. A warm and tearful response, with a beautiful sense of dignity and respect.

Listen to him sing.

Is the First Amendment unconstitutional?

2012-01-27T06:00:00.009-05:00

In the wonderland of what passes for First Amendment jurisprudence, oddities abound. The second "prong" of the Lemon test-- a fabricated test of unconstitutional religion-entanglement with no basis whatsoever in the Constitution and not much more basis in logic-- condemns as unconstitutional any government entanglement that advances religion as its primary effect:

2) The government's action must not have the primary effect of either advancing or inhibiting religion;

Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, who sours on the Lemon Test, notes wryly:

...What a strange notion, that a Constitution which itself gives “religion in general” preferential treatment (I refer to the Free Exercise Clause) forbids endorsement of religion in general...

That was not the view of those who adopted our Constitution, who believed that the public virtues inculcated by religion are a public good. It suffices to point out that during the summer of 1789, when it was in the process of drafting the First Amendment, Congress enacted the famous Northwest Territory Ordinance of 1789, Article III of which provides, “Religion, morality, and knowledge, being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged.”

Unsurprisingly, then, indifference to “religion in general” is not what our cases, both old and recent, demand.

The mind reels. The template by which the First Amendment is enforced by the courts-- the Lemon Test's requirement that a government action not have the primary effect of advancing religion-- implicitly rules unconstitutional the First Amendment, which is a government action whose Free Exercise clause has the primary effect of advancing religion.

If the First Amendment prohibits government advancement of religion, then the First Amendment prohibits itself, in which case it doesn't prohibit advancement of religion, in which case it doesn't prohibit itself, in which case it does, in which case... .

The reality is that down inside our juricidal rabbit hole the First Amendment means anything secularists want it to mean, as long as censors can silence what they don't like, logic being no obstacle.

A schoolgirl as a human shield...

2012-01-26T06:00:00.027-05:00

Atheists employ a panopoly of strategies to suppress dissent-- gulags and firing squads where they actually run things, and professional destruction, fake invocations of "consensus", insistence that critics 'just follow instructions', and lawsuits to shut people up when they lack the levers of absolute power.

In the Cranston High School lawsuit, atheists use a schoolgirl as a human shield.

To wit, from commentor 23cal:

You mock Mr. Eberhard for realizing that the situation has nuances.

I didn't mean to mock him. I meant to say that he is a totalitarian thug.

As he noted "The students sued, the school won." He said, "When I was told about the possibility of students all wearing these shirts on the same day I initially said there was nothing wrong with it......I still don’t care if the students wear the shirts individually, but I’ve changed my mind about how the administration should react to a mass event like that. They should stop it."

Totalitarian thug.

In spite of his initial "free speech" reaction, Mr. Eberhard apparently realized there is both a legal and a safety factor involved.....as the court decision pointed out.

Why put free speech in scare quotes?

Atheists' initial reaction to free speech is to endorse it generally.

Atheists' final reaction to free speech is to deny it specifically. "We believe in free speech, but..."

Regulating speech is indispensable to atheists' agenda. Musn't have too much dissent. Everywhere that atheism has ascended to state power, freedom of speech is the first right under the atheist boot. The prayer mural case and the emerging move to censor the students' t-shirts is a microcosm of a century of atheist politics.

"Free speech", except...

He obviously isn't as cavalier about the safety of kids as yourself.

I wouldn't use a teen-aged girl as blow-back-bait in a lawsuit.

Of course, for you, displaying some atheist hate and harassment is leagues more important than a little student safety, especially if the student whose safety is in question doesn't subscribe to your preferred religion.

Atheist concern for Jessica's safety begins oddly after the court ruling.

The godless were delighted to use the little tool to litigate the hell out of the citizens of Cranston, cynically shoving the 16 year old into the midst of a highly charged federal lawsuit, luring the teen with flattery and fame and press conferences and awards and a scholarship fund.

When the innocent citizens on the receiving end of the lawsuit got pissed, atheists howled "student safety!". Can't you see she's an innocent child? How dare you question our motives and tactics? Don't you dare say anything that will upset her. Are you threatening her? Brutes!

In one appeal case, the decision included, “the district judge will be required to strike a careful balance between the limited constitutional right of a high-school student to campaign inside the school..... and the school’s interest in maintaining an atmosphere in which students are not distracted from their studies by wrenching debates over issues of personal identity.”

The only person distracted by the prayer was Jessica. So perhaps she can find it within herself to ignore the t-shirts, unable as she was to ignore the mural.

The Constitutional rights of the students and citizens in Cranston apparently depend on just what Jessica is capable of ignoring. Such a responsibility for her to bear...

"...the courts are struggling to define just where the expression of hostile views becomes harassment. And so far, even when they have allowed ... speech, the courts have shown some sympathy to the needs of.... students to be protected against harassment."

"Free speech", except... . Now you're beginning to see why atheists use the scare quotes. Free speech is ok, unless atheists start to feel harassed.

In your "burn them at the stake" attitude, there is no recognition of "the needs of atheist students to be protected against harassment." As a matter of fact, you clearly do not want them protected at all.

Protected from prayers on t-shirts?

Your uncaring and short-sighted statement, "When I was a kid, bullying meant that someone beat you up" illustrates this very well.

I never grasped the "prayer" kind of bullying. And I was an atheist when I was a kid. I thought prayers were boring, but I never got chased home from school by one.

Under your definition, stealing your lunch money through intimidation or being pushed around in a circle of kids isn't bullying, because you weren't actually beaten up. The concept is absurd.

Stealing and pushing are theft and assault. Both are crimes.

Is wearing a prayer on a t-shirt a crime?

The courts have used whether "wearing the shirts would cause “substantial disruption” in ruling about mass wearing of T-shirts.

Jessica again gets to decide on the rights of others. If she is 'substantially disrupted' by the sight of t-shirt prayers, the feds move in. If she manages the stress with equanimity, students get to keep their First Amendment rights. Let's hope she's in a good mood.

You are welcome to your opinion on this, but you refuse to recognize that others, such as Mr. Eberhard, are also welcome to their opinion.

I welcome Mr. Eberhard's opinion, unless he writes it on a mural or on a t-shirt, or makes me feel bad, in which case I'll sue.

To label his position of "for safety, for legal precedent, against disruption" as being against free speech, is a gross misrepresentation, especially when he says in the quote of his that you provided that he considered both and felt one outweighed the other.

"Free speech", except...

I happen to agree that it is acceptable for the students to wear T-shirts bearing the prayer en masse;

That's big of you. We Christians will consult you again next time we want to speak.

however, I also recognize the POTENTIAL for disruption and harassment to which you turn a blind eye.

"Free speech", except.. except... except...

When you consider the existing bullying, harassment, ostracism, threats of assault, rape, and death from a number of these very same students who no doubt will be in the vanguard of those wearing these T-shirts, anyone but a fool can see the very real POTENTIAL for disruption, harassment, and violence.

Bullying and threats of assault, rape and death are crimes, proscribed in statutory law.

Jessica dragged a prayer into court, so the punctilious little gumshoe will certainly bring her putative assailants and rapists and murderers to justice. Please let me know when she files charges with the police and starts formal legal proceedings.

In the unlikely event that the teen prayer prosecutor shows less interest in prosecuting threats to her person and life than she did to prosecuting prayer, it might lead a cynic to wonder if the "bullying and threats of assault, rape..." is a rhetorical ploy, not a credible allegation that would withstand legal scrutiny. 'How dare you Christians assert your First Amendment rights! Just look at what those monsters are doing to Jessica!' 'At long last have you Christians no sense of decency!'

Although I agree it is acceptable to have a mass wearing of the shirts, it is incumbent upon the administration to closely monitor the situation and to send home students if safety and disruption become issues.

The school could install video camera surveillance for prayer crimes.

I do not agree with Mr. Eberhard's revised opinion, but am fair enough to see it has an important and valid base.

Quite base. Hiding behind a teenaged girl in order to secure a legal imprimatur on your anti-Christian bigotry is about as base as it gets.

Too bad your ravening lust to go after atheists blinds you to the danger to an innocent 16 year old girl.

"Lust" isn't the world I'd use for going after atheists. It's a grim job really.

Your callous disregard for the safety of kids in order to push your preferred ideology puts you in a poor light, Sir.

I've never used a kid as a human shield. I don't hide behind schoolgirls. Throwing this kid into a concocted public maelstrom in order to secure a judicial imprimatur on anti-Christian hate is a tactic ladled from the moral cesspool that is atheism.

What kind of people hate and censor their friends and neighbors, and send out kids to take the flack?

First they came for my prayer mural. Then they came for my T-shirt...

2012-01-25T06:00:00.022-05:00

JT Eberhard at freethought blogs exalted at the censorship of the Cranston High School prayer mural. But silencing prayers on school auditorium walls isn't enough, it seems. Now he wants to silence prayers on your back.

Eberhard wants to censor your T-shirt, actually, if you're a kid in Cranston High.

Eberhard, with my commentary:

Tshirts And Mass Bullying

January 18, 2012 at 4:00 pm JT Eberhard

Someone has made tshirts bearing the Cranston prayer and is selling them to raise money to preserve the banner. To the creator’s credit, he has said…

The effort and responsibility of the page is to raise funds through donations to pay for the preservation of the “Prayer Banner.” All monies raised will be spent for this purpose only. They will not be spent on legal fees, or expenses, related to the pending lawsuit and/or appeal if the School Committee takes this route.

Ok fine. I have no problem with that. Preserve the prayer. Hang it in your house, wear it as a bathrobe, I could honestly give less than a shit so long as it’s not being hung in a government building. Of course, there’s no disdain for the bullies or threats, but at least they’re not actively trying to subvert the Constitution.

According to Eberhard, people who challenge censorship in court are "actively trying to subvert the Constitution".

There is a fun poll on the facebook page he created though. They want people’s opinions. I read that and I think to myself, “I know some people!”

When Eberhard sees a poll he doesn't like, he wants to rig the poll. When Eberhard sees a prayer he doesn't like, he wants a judge to censor it.

Respect for the opinions of others isn't a priority for atheists, in case you hadn't noticed.

Anyway, here’s why I mention it.

[From a news article] Ahlquist said she was aware of rumors circulating that some students were planning to wear T-shirts emblazoned with the school prayer designed by a school alumnus. Others, she said, have threatened to harass or beat her up when she returns.

I have no problem with students wearing those shirts.

Whew!... . Eberhard sees no reason to call the police, yet...

It’s their right, they are not agents of the government.

Eberhard has no problem using agents of the government (i.e. federal judges, federal marshals) to enforce censorship. As long as they don't wear T-shirts he doesn't agree with...

I just hope they don’t think for a second it’s going to make their school breaking the law ok or that it will result in a holiday TV special ending where a judge says, “Damn, look at all those shirts…you know, the Constitution is just a piece of paper anyway…”

"Go ahead and wear those Xtian tees, you imbecilic devotees of that slave religion. Resistance is futile..."

However, the issue comes if they all elect to wear them on the same day.

Oh. Freedom of speech is one thing. Conspiracy to speak freely is another matter...

Last year at a Northern California high school, a large group of the students banded together and decided to wear shirts with American flags as a dig on the Hispanic students/immigrants. The administration sent all participating students home. The students sued, the school won. The school won for a very simple reason: that kind of thing constitutes bullying, and schools should oppose bullying.

When I was a kid, bullying meant that someone beat you up. I didn't realize that people who wore Tshirts I didn't like were bullying me.

When I was told about the possibility of students all wearing these shirts on the same day I initially said there was nothing wrong with it.

Then JT remembered: 'Wait, I'm an atheist. How can I possibly defend free speech...'

After all, nobody wants to stop anybody from praying...

Ooohhh nooo. Who would ever accuse atheists who demand court orders to stop people from praying of wanting to... stop people from praying?

(we may criticize them for holding foolish beliefs)

Foolish belief: "I believe in the First Amendment ."

or from expressing themselves individually –

That's right. The Constitution only applies to individuals, not to "We the People".

we care about the government endorsing religion, which is illegal...

... unlike government mandating civic atheism, which is legal.

I still don’t care if the students wear the shirts individually, but I’ve changed my mind about how the administration should react to a mass event like that. They should stop it.

The new motto for Cranston West High School is "We're not Allowed to do Anything that Might Offend Atheists".

This travesty hardly needs comment. Nothing in the First Amendment really matters to atheists-- not the actual meaning of the Establishment Clause, not the rights guaranteed by the Free Exercise Clause, not Freedom of Speech, not even the Right of the People Peaceably to Assemble and to Petition the Government for a Redress of Grievances.

Not even the right to wear a T-shirt with a prayer on it.

Atheists' First Amendment:

"We take offense, you obey."

Atheists aren't even trying not to look like totalitarians anymore.

Ed Brayton: "...first class jerk Michael Egnor... [the] dolt... impose[s] his religion on others..."

2012-01-24T06:00:00.183-05:00

Ed Brayton has his panties in a bunch about my defense of religious freedom.

Ed, with my replies:

Egnor Loves Palumbo

January 18, 2012 at 11:59 am Ed Brayton

Leave it to ID advocate and first class jerk Michael Egnor to...

"First class jerk" is not easy to get. I started in "Coach Jerk", but I've accumulated enough blogger miles to be upgraded to First Class.

... actually support Rep. Peter Palumbo for calling Jessica Ahlquist an “evil little thing.”

An atheist Mini-Me.

JT has the details. Egnor, who is as clueless about constitutional law as he is about biology,

Yea. I've got this singular delusion that the First Amendment is the charter of our freedom, and that freedom includes freedom of civic expression. I still can't find the Censorship Clause that atheists keep invoking.

actually thinks it is our side that is trying to deny religious freedom:

The prayer mural has been ripped down by federal court order, with federal marshals posed to shred it if the defendants-- now convicted in court-- hesitate to obey the court order.

Ed finds it odd that I would interpret that as a denial of freedom.

[Egnor: "]I strongly support your statement, and I share your dismay at the unconstitutional denial of the right to free exercise of religion inherent in the judge’s decision.["]

No, you dolt. This has nothing to do with free exercise of religion.

Censorship has nothing to do with freedom? Say again, Ed?

Having the right to exercise your religion does not include the right to have the government endorse and display your religious beliefs.

Endorsement and display of religious beliefs on public property by government agents occur everywhere and always. The Constitution prohibits an established national church. It protects endorsement and display, which is not establishment; the Constitution guarantees Free Exercise of religion and makes no distinction whatsoever between private and civic free exercise. It places no constraints whatsoever on what government agents may say. It restricts legislation they may pass ("Congress shall make no law..." not "Congressmen shall make no endorsement and display...".

The First Amendment restricts the use of government force in religion. It does not restrict expression, civic or private. In fact, it protects expression, explicitly, for all citizens. A prayer mural on a wall in a school is expression, not force. A judge ordering the mural removed is force, not expression. The First Amendment protects the former, and prohibits the latter.

At the time of the ratification of the Bill of Rights, there were countless civic displays and endorsements of religion, and countless displays and endorsements remain today. They all were and are Constitutional, and in fact are protected by the Constitution. Presidents invoke God in speeches, crosses and Stars of David grace graves in Arlington, national monuments are slathered with references to God (have you ever stood in the Lincoln Memorial and read the stuff on the walls, Ed?)

Excerpt from Lincoln's Second Inaugural, Lincoln Memorial

Wanna rip this down too, Ed? It's a display of religion a whole lot more egregious than the Cranston High prayer mural. You'll need a sandblaster, or some black paint or a chisel, and you'll need to get past the National Park Service police. Tell 'em you're an atheist and it's demanded by the Constitution, Ed. See how far you get.

Well, maybe you can make the Cranston High School kids wear blindfolds when they visit the Lincoln Memorial on their Senior Class Trip?

How about this unconstitutional establishment of religion:

Declaration of Independence

Is display of this old document in Cranston High School unconstitutional, Ed? Do the kids have to scratch out the "... all men are Created equal, and are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights...".

Does that illegal "Creator" talk make you feel 'excluded and ostracized', Ed?

How about this old document, Ed? The one that contains the phrase "wall of separation between church and state"... oh... wait.... it doesn't say anything about separation. Not a word.

Bill of Rights

Actually, Ed, what it does say is that free exercise of religion has a protected place in our nation's law. It gives place of primacy to protection of religion, even before freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom of assembly.

Of course Ed, that violates the Lemon Test (second prong), which requires that

2) The government's action must not have the primary effect of either advancing or inhibiting religion...

The First Amendment explicitly has the primary effect of advancing religion, by guaranteeing free exercise of religion.

In your batshit world, Ed, the First Amendment is unconstitutional.

Ed:

... And I guarantee you that Egnor himself would suddenly discover that I am right the moment someone tried to put up a mural of a Muslim prayer in a public school.

You're the censor, Ed. Not me. I'd be fine with a Muslim prayer, or a Jewish prayer, or a Buddhist prayer, or a secular humanist pra... whatever. Free expression is guaranteed by the Constitution. I love the First Amendment, and I hate censorship. I want kids to see a variety of viewpoints, different beliefs and lack of beliefs. I want them to know what Muslims believe, and what Jews believe, and what atheists believe, and what Christians believe. I want religious beliefs of a variety of faiths displayed and discussed in school, and everywhere. I have nothing to fear from the expression of beliefs with which I disagree.

I have never sued anyone for expressing beliefs, neither in a civic forum nor in a private forum. I find the idea of calling the police when you see a belief expressed that you don't agree with to be abhorrent.

I repeat: You're the censor, Ed. Not me. Don't dare compare me to you.

Suddenly all that flowery talk of the free exercise of religion would go flying out the window and he would be ranting about the evils of this religious establishment.

Our respective positions on freedom of expression are publicly expressed and crystal clear. You're the censor, Ed. Not me.

Because “freedom of religion” for him really only means the authority to impose his religion on others.

The Cranston High School prayer mural didn't "impose" any religion on anyone. Note the irony: atheists call the police and get a judge to silence others who disagree, and then accuse the people they've silenced by force with "imposing" their beliefs. It's like a rapist accusing his victim of sexual assault.

There's a deeper contradiction, here, worth some discussion.

Why is Ed so... so... angry? He won, after all. Why would censors be angry with a victory for censorship? The prayer mural was chucked into the judicial fire. The judge ruled that the First Amendment demands censorship. A real victory for atheists.

So why is Ed-- along with other godless gendarmes-- spitting pea soup?

Atheists fear that their book-burnings are pyrrhic victories. They don't just want enforcement of civic atheism. They need us to like it, to comply. Not to ask questions. They need us not to look at the plain text of the Constitution, and not to point out what it actually says. State atheism brooks no questions, and certainly brooks no defiance. Their job is to tell us what our Constitution says. Our job is to comply.

Atheists understand the danger that their censorship poses to their larger agenda. A tiny faction risks a lot by telling the majority that their rights-- rights plainly enumerated in our nations founding document-- aren't really rights at all. Transparent lies are dangerous, to the liars, and are potentially lethal to the atheist agenda.

Atheists need to hide behind sophistry, behind euphemisms ("separation of church and state...") that are nowhere in the Constitution, even hide behind schoolgirls, because plain talk about what the Constitution says and what our rights actually are is catastrophic to their agenda. Honest discussion of our First Amendment rights is the last thing atheists want us talking about.

Censorship is risky business, and atheists understand the risk. The American public has largely taken this assault on their freedom with equanimity. But we need to stand up and defy the censors-- we need to tell the truth. It won't be an easy fight-- the censors are ruthless-- but we the people are soverign in this nation, and we need to take it back.

Without God we have no rights, because without God there is no such thing as rights. There is merely applied secular power. So we need to demand our First Amendment rights, particularly the right to acknowledge in our civic life that God is the source of our rights , because respect for the right of free expression-- civic and private-- is the basis for our nation, and the Christian understanding of man is the rational basis for that respect, and God is the only Source of our rights.

Finally! Atheists Make Schools Obey Constitution during Washington D.C. Class Trips.

2012-01-23T06:00:00.191-05:00

Rhode Island Public High School Students arrive on National Mall in Washington.

(Dissociated Press) Atheist organizations are hailing their success in forcing public schools to protect students from violations of the Constitution during class trips to our nation's capitol.

Richard Stifle, president of The Freedom from Religion and Anything Atheists Don't Like Foundation, announced that his organization and a coalition of atheist public-interest lawyers have reached a pre-trial settlement with the nation's 98,817 public schools to avert a multi-trillion dollar lawsuit over the exposure of students to illegal violations of the First Amendment during school trips to Washington, D.C.

Beginning January 1, 2012, students visiting the National Mall and other historic locations in Washington D.C. will be required by federal court order to wear blindfolds.

However, Stifle cautioned against calling the mandatory eyeware "blindfolds".

"Oh, we... don't call the mandatory opaque student optical apparel "blindfolds". We atheists call them "First Amendment Spectacles"-- they help kids see the atheist version of their First Amendment rights and help to protect kids from violations of their right to separation of church and state."

Why are schoolkids required by the Constitution to wear blindfolds in our nation's capital, this reporter asked?

"The National Mall is a crime scene", Stifle said. "Everywhere there are references to God and Christianity on government buildings. The National Mall is one big prayer mural. We have a Constitutional responsibility to protect students."

Stifle noted that many major government buildings in the heart of the capital are slathered with God-talk, which is obviously a violation of the First Amendment, which explicitly demands separation of church and state and prohibits all civic reference to God everywhere forever.

"We protect our kids from seeing even a whiff of religious speech in school, but who protects them when they're on class trips?" Stifle implored. "The danger to students is real. Some may feel ostracized and excluded if they realize that our nation's most important institutions and monuments are covered with illegal references to God. "

"Child safety doesn't end when kids leave school property."Stifle warned. "Prayer predators are everywhere, waiting to violate your child's right to Constitutional separation of church and state".

Stifle provided The Dissociated Press with several crime scene photos:

Display of Ten Commandments on frieze of Supreme Court, which has outlawed display of Ten Commandments on the friezes of court buildings.

Display of Ten Commandments on door of Supreme Court chamber, where the Supreme Court has outlawed display of Ten Commandments on doors of court chambers.

Display of Ten Commandments over Supreme Court benches, where Supreme Court Justices sit and outlaw display of Ten Commandments over court benches.

Display of Ten Commandments on floor of entrance to National Archives, which contains the Constitution that outlaws display of Ten Commandments on floors of entrances to government archives.

Lincoln Memorial: Outrageous display of a violation of separation of church and state by our 16th President, with actual Bible quotations!

Thousands of violations of separation of church and state at Arlington National Cemetery!

Notorious violations of separation of church and state at National Archives: "All men are created equal and are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights..."

Jefferson Memorial: Violation of wall of separation between church and state in quote from Virginia Act for Establishing Religious Freedom written by author of term "wall of separation between church and state".

"We need to protect our children from seeing violations of the Constitutional separation of church and state", noted Stifle, solemnly, "even when they're not actually on school property.' "We are teaching children how to spot violation of separation of church and state crimes that put their freedom in danger on all government property. We are putting lessons in schools to educate students".

Here's one lesson that warns of the dangers:

Attention Kids!
Danger to your freedom!
Anodyne fifty-year old prayer mural

And here's another lesson that shows how to spot friendly adults who don't put your freedom in danger:

Attention Kids!
No danger to your freedom!
Judge ordering people to shut up.

Stifle beamed: "We've even started a public education campaign for school kids to help them appreciate the atheist interpretation of the First Amendment. We are putting up posters in all public schools around the country, in place of where the illegal prayers used to be."

"We call it the 'Freedom is Blind' Campaign."

"Freedom is Blind"
The Constitution protects you from seeing things atheists don't like!

"Finally", Stifle intoned, smiling, "we're going to teach kids what separation of church and state really means."

Thomas Merton on St. John of the Cross

2012-01-22T06:00:00.017-05:00

Fr. Thomas Merton, O.S.C.O.

Two of my favorite contemplatives. Merton is a must-read for Christians (and anyone interested in mysticism and prayer)-- his Seven Storey Mountain is a classic and one of the best stories of coming to Christ.

St. John of the Cross is of course one of the most influential mystics. His Spiritual Canticle and Dark Night of the Soul are essential works for Christian mysticism.

Merton comments on the dark night of the soul, encountered on the journey to God:

This total self-denial, which St. John of the Cross pursues into the inmost depths of the human spirit, reduces our interior landscape to a wasteland without special features of any kind whatever. We do not even have the consolation of beholding a personal disaster. A cataclysm of the spirit, if terrible, is also interesting. But the soul of the contemplative is happy to be reduced to a state of complete loneliness and dereliction in which the most significant renouncement is that of self-complacency. Many men are attracted to a solitude in which they believe they will have the leisure and the opportunity to contemplate themselves. Not so St. John of the Cross:

(St. John) These times of aridity cause the soul to journey in all purity in the love of God, since it is no longer influenced in its actions by the pleasure and sweetness of the actions themselves, . . . but only by a desire to please God. It becomes neither presumptuous nor self-satisfied, as perchance it was wont to become in the time of its prosperity, but fearful and timid with regard to itself, find ing in itself no satisfaction whatsoever; and herein consists that holy fear which preserves and increases the virtues. . . . Save for the pleasure indeed which at certain times God infuses into it, it is a wonder if it find pleasure and consolation of sense, through its own diligence, in any spiritual exercise or action. . . . There grows within souls that experience this arid night (of the senses) care for God and yearnings to serve him, for in proportion as the breasts of sensuality, wherewith it sustained and nourished the desires that it pursued, are drying up, there remains nothing in that aridity and detachment save the yearning to serve God, which is a thing very pleasing to God. (The Dark Night of the Soul, i, 13. Peers, op. cit., vol. I, p. 393.)

The joy of this emptiness, this weird neutrality of spirit which leaves the soul detached from the things of the earth and not yet in possession of those of heaven, suddenly blossoms out into a pure paradise of liberty, of which the saint sings in his Spiritual Canticle: it is a solitude full of wild birds and strange trees, rocks, rivers, and desert islands, lions, and leaping does. These creatures are images of the joys of the spirit, aspects of interior solitude, fires that flash in the abyss of the pure heart whose loneliness becomes alive with the deep lightnings of God.

I have not travelled far enough in my prayer life to encounter such beauty. I had a discussion with one of our parish priests a while back about such mystical experience. He is a gentle and preternaturally happy man, always full of joy-- I suspected that he was a man of deep Christian mysticism-- and I asked him about mystical experiences.

He commented, as if he knew intimately, that even a momentary direct experience of God-- the quest of all mystics-- transforms you forever.

A guy joins a strict monastery...

2012-01-21T06:00:00.006-05:00

From Catholic jokes:

A guy joins a strict monastery. During the three-year novitiate, they are permitted to say only two words a year. At the end of the first year he meets with the novice master and says, “Food bad.” At the end of the second year, he meets with the novice master and says, “Bed hard.” At the end of the third year, he meets with the novice master and says, “I quit.” The novice master says… “I’m not surprised. You’ve been complaining since you got here!”

"... marks you as an idiot. A hayseed even"

2012-01-20T06:00:00.010-05:00

Commentor anonymous, on my bucolic insistence that the text of the Constitution has meaning:

Explain what the Establishment clause means using only the "actual text of the U.S. Constitution". Insisting on strict textual interpretation of the Constitution marks you as an idiot. A hayseed even.

I did grow up in a rural area, where "hayseed" was not necessarily derogatory. We countryfolk believe that words have meanings, and that the meanings matter in the way in which words are understood.

"Establishment of religion" means a government church-- a formally recognized and legislated national religion-- such as the Church of England or the Lutheran Church in Sweden or Islam in Saudi Arabia.

"Establishment" doesn' t mean religious speech by someone employed by the government. Presidents don't Establish a national religion when they mention God in speeches. Congress doesn't Establish a national religion when they put those speeches on national monuments. Groundskeepers don't Establish a national religion when they put crosses and Stars of David on graves at Arlington National Cemetary. Teachers don't Establish a national religion when they put up a prayer mural in an auditorium wall.

So text of the Constitution matters, and not just to us countryfolk. But anonymous is partially right-- the text certainly has to be interpreted in context.

Anonymous won't, however, like the context. The context of our manifestly Christian nation is that our civic contract derives from Christian ideas-- "Created equal... endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights..."-- all that stuff. Our Rights make no sense if they have no Source.

Here's a nice comment on anonymous' context argument, by Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, who hails from the more rural parts of Washington D.C.:

In holding that the Establishment Clause prohibits invocations and benedictions at public-school graduation ceremonies, the Court—with nary a mention that it is doing so—lays waste a tradition that is as old as public-school graduation ceremonies themselves, and that is a component of an even more longstanding American tradition of nonsectarian prayer to God at public celebrations generally. As its instrument of destruction, the bulldozer of its social engineering, the Court invents a boundless, and boundlessly manipulable, test of psychological coercion, which promises to do for the Establishment Clause what the Durham rule did for the insanity defense. See Durham v. United States, 94 U.S.App.D.C. 228, 214 F.2d 862 (1954). Today’s opinion shows more forcefully than volumes of argumentation why our Nation’s protection, that fortress which is our Constitution, cannot possibly rest upon the changeable philosophical predilections of the Justices of this Court, but must have deep foundations in the historic practices of our people. (Robert E. LEE, Individually and as Principal of Nathan Bishop Middle School, et al., Petitioners, 1992)

Justice Scalia understands that the word Establishment has a meaning, and that it must be understood in the deep historical principles of our people, not on the "philosophical predilections" of Christianity's pharisaical despisers.

Unfortunately for atheists like anonymous, Americans are largely hayseeds. We regularfolk think God gave us our Rights, and our Constitution must be interpreted in light of that.

That's how it works, in these here parts.

Fr. Miguel Pro and the century of Christian martyrs

2012-01-19T06:00:00.002-05:00

The Twentieth Century is the century of Christian martyrs. Upwards of 30 million Christians have been murdered for their faith in the past century, most at the hands of atheists of one brand or another. Above is a photograph of Blessed Father Miguel Pro, a Jesuit priest in Mexico who was murdered by firing squad by the Mexican government on November 23, 1927. Fr. Pro was murdered for defying the virtual ban on Catholic worship in Mexico under the atheist-socialist government of Plutarco Elias Calles, an anti-Catholic bigot who rigorously enforced the provisions of the 1917 Mexican constitution to essentially outlaw Catholic worship. Fr. Pro was falsely accused of complicity in an assassination attempt on a former Mexican president, and he was shot without trial. The government circulated photographs of the execution in the hope of scaring other priests and faithful as well as Cristero rebels who were trying to defend religious freedom in Mexico. The photos had the opposite effect, enraging the populace and highlighting the atrocities by the atheists who had seized power. As Fr. Pro was shot, he extended his arms as if he were on a cross, and shouted "Vivo Christo Rey"!

To get a sense of the fervor of the atheists in Mexico for the annihilation of Catholicism and the imposition of a strict atheist civic life, an anecdote about Garrido Canabal, Mexican minister of agriculture at the time and former Governor of Tabasco who was particularly fervent about the eradication of Christianity in Mexico, is revealing: Canabal, an atheist intent on leaving no doubt as to where his sympathies lay, named his three sons Lenin, Lucifer, and Satan.

It's worth keeping in mind that the atheist program to eradicate Christianity from American public life has antecedents. "Separation of church and state" and its variants has been a rallying cry from anti-Christian and anti-Catholic bigots from Jacobians in 1792 to Bolsheviks in 1917 to the Mexican National Revolutionary Party in 1927 to the Ku Klux Klan in 1933 to the Freedom from Religion Foundation in 2011. Some atheists use state violence, some use terror, some use legal blackmail and coercion. The aim is the same. The tactics are situational.

We in America are merely in a small skirmish in a much larger and bloodier onslaught against Christian faith.

My challenge to JT Eberhard on the Rhode Island prayer case

2012-01-18T06:00:00.223-05:00

JT Eberhard of the ~~Atheist~~ Secular Student Alliance has a meandering philippic defending the Rhode Island federal judge's censorship of a school prayer mural encouraging students to be better citizens.

I ask Eberhard these questions:

In what way was Jessica Ahlquist harmed by the prayer mural?

Is feeling "excluded and ostracized" by a prayer on a wall the reaction of a reasonable person? During the 50 years the mural was on the wall, how many other people reported experiencing the same harm?

In what way is Ms. Ahlquist now benefitted by removing the prayer?

Would it be of benefit to Ms. Ahlquist to learn to tolerate displays of the beliefs of others?

Do atheists have a Constitutional right not to see religious expression with which they disagree?

If atheists don't have that right, what standing did Ahlquist have to bring the suit?

What part of the First Amendment did the prayer mural violate? Be specific.

Is the prayer mural a "law" made by Congress ("Congress shall make no law...")?

Is the place of privilege given to free exercise of religion in the First Amendment-- which is a government document-- a violation of the Establishment clause, which according to Judge Lageuex prohibits advancement of religion by government?

Is the prayer mural an Establishment of religion, which means an official instutional federal church, like the Church of England?

Is reading the prayer, giving assent to the prayer, or believing the prayer mandatory for students? Could a student ignore the prayer mural?

Where in the text does the Constitution forbid the display of a religious statement that citizens are free to ignore?

Can the mere display of a prayer, without compulsion of any sort, constitute an Establishment of religion-- an institutional federal church?

Many prayers and religious statements are displayed on National Monuments (Lincoln Memorial, Supreme Court, Jefferson Memorial, etc). Do these artifacts Establish a federal church? Are they unconstitutional?

If the prayer mural is an establishment of religion, which religion is it? Anglican? Baptist? Unitarian? Please be specific about the denomination.

Is display of the Declaration of Independence-- which is more explicitly religious than the prayer mural-- unconstitutional?

Does the president of the United States violate the Constitution when he says "God Bless America"?

Are crosses and Stars of David on the graves of soldiers at Arlington National Cemetery unconstitutional? Should the courts order that they be removed? If not, why are thousands of crosses in a federal cemetery Constitutional, but a single prayer in a local school unconstitutional? Why the double standard?

Are military chaplains unconstitutional? Should soldiers be denied government-sponsored chaplains, Bibles, and religious artifacts during war? If a mere prayer mural is unconstitutional in a school, why aren't government-sponsored religious services for American soldiers in combat unconstitutional?

Should the First Amendment, which guarantees freedom of speech and free exercise of religion, be used to censor religious speech?

Is mandatory civic atheism-- the court-ordered erasure of religious expression from civic life-- effectively an Establishment of atheism? If not, what would constitute an Establishment of atheism? Give examples. Be specific, please.

Can there be an atheist Establishment of religion, in which civic atheism is enforced by law? What article and section of the Constitution cedes to the judiciary the authority to mandate civic atheism?

When government-sponsored artists or museums display work that is insulting to Christianity (e.g. Andres Serrano's Piss Christ or Chris Ofili's dung-covered vulva-festooned Virgin Mary), does that violate the First Amendment's prohibition on government entanglement with religion?

According to the second "prong" of the Lemon test, government may not act in a way that primarily advances or inhibits religion. Can you name one lawsuit filed by an atheist or an atheist organization that objects to government support of speech or artifacts that insult-- i.e. that inhibit-- Christianity?

If government support of speech or artifacts insulting to Christianity isn't unconstitutional, why is government support of speech or artifacts that approve of Christianity unconstitutional?

Can you refer me to one blog post that you've written in which you object to government support of speech or art that depicts Christianity in a derogatory fashion? Why the double standard?

I'm curious whether Eberhard's support for censorship of the prayer mural is a consequence of his personal anti-Christian bigotry, or whether his endorsement is based on careful reasoning and an impartial respect for the Constitution.

His answers should be interesting, if he answers.

Thomas Woods on how the Catholic Church built Western civilization: part 2

2012-01-17T06:00:00.005-05:00

Historian Thomas Woods, author of How the Catholic Church Built Western Civilization, has a great essay on the central role the Catholic church played in building Western civilization. This is a continuation my post from last week on Wood's essay.

Woods:

The early church also institutionalized the care of widows, orphans, the sick and the poor in ways unseen in classical Greece or Rome. Even her harshest critics, from the fourth-century emperor Julian the Apostate all the way to Martin Luther and Voltaire, conceded the church's enormous contributions to the relief of human misery.

The spirit of Catholic charity — that we help those in need not out of any expectation of reciprocity, but as a pure gift, and that we even help those who might not like us — finds no analogue in classical Greece and Rome, but it is this idea of charity that we continue to embrace today.

The university was an utterly new phenomenon in European history. Nothing like it had existed in ancient Greece or Rome. The institution that we recognize today, with its faculties, courses of study, examinations and degrees, as well as the familiar distinction between undergraduate and graduate study, come to us directly from the medieval world.

By the time of the Reformation, no secular government had chartered more universities than the church. Edward Grant, who has written on medieval science for Cambridge University Press, points out that intellectual life was robust and debate was vigorous at these universities — the very opposite of the popular presumption.

It is no surprise that the church should have done so much to foster and protect the nascent university system, since the church, according to historian Lowrie Daly, "was the only institution in Europe that showed consistent interest in the preservation and cultivation of knowledge."

Until the mid-20th century, the history of economic thought started, more or less, with the 18th century and Adam Smith. But beginning with Joseph Schumpeter, the great economist and historian of his field, scholars have begun to point instead to the 16th-century Catholic theologians at Spain's University of Salamanca as the originators of modern economics.

And the list goes on.

I can already hear the complaint: What about these awful things the church did that I heard about in school? For one thing, isn't it a little odd that we never heard any of the material I've presented here in school? Doesn't that seem a trifle unfair?

But although an episode like the medieval Inquisition has been dramatically scaled back in scope and cruelty by recent scholarship — the University of California at Berkeley, not exactly a bastion of traditional Catholicism, published a book substantially revising popular view — it is not my subject here. My aim is to point out, as I do in my book "How the Catholic Church Built Western Civilization," how indebted we are, without realizing it, to an institution popular culture teaches us to despise.

The Church, beginning with the Roman world devastated by the barbarian invasions and the fall of the great Empire, rebuilt the West, drawing on the best of Greek and Roman philosophy and law and culture, and uniting it to a spiritual revolution unprecedented in man's history. The Church melded Athens and Rome with Jerusalem. The result of the Christian revolution was the Western cannon of law, magnificent art and music and architecture, philosophical advances building on and exceeding even that of the classical pagan masters, a system of care for the poor and sick that heralded modern hospitals and social service programs, and a breath-taking explosion of scientific knowledge.

As Woods points out, it is a lie to assert that the Church was the enemy of learning and culture and science. The Church was the source of the astonishing achievements of the West.

Western civilization was, and is, Christian civilization. Those who would destroy Christianity-- and there are innumerable cultured and uncultured despisers-- would destroy the West as well.

What shall replace it?

Please stand up for Rep. Peter G. Palumbo

2012-01-16T19:23:00.000-05:00

Rhode Island State Rep. Peter G. Palumbo has a great take on the outrageous judicial censorship of the prayer mural in Cranston High School West in Rhode Island. Listen to the whole podcast. He's right on target.

He describes the outrage of the citizens of Rhode Island about this unconstitutional decision. Americans are getting fed up with anti-Christian bigotry.

Atheist thugs of course are targeting Rep. Palumbo for his willingness to speak out and defend our Constitutional rights.

Please email and/or phone Rep. Palumbo's office, express your support for him and for his cause, and ask him to fight on against atheist bigots.

We need to take back our rights.

rep-palumbo@rilin.state.ri.us

(401)785-2882

In Rhode Island, anti-Christian kristallnacht continues

2012-01-16T06:00:00.173-05:00

Mandatory Civic Atheism took another step forward last week.

Rhode Island U.S. District Court Judge Ronald Lagueux ruled in favor of plaintiff Jessica Ahlquist in her demand that a 50 year-old prayer asking students to be good neighbors and citizens be removed from the auditorium wall in her high school. Lagueux' ruling is here. Read it, if you have the stomach for it.

The ruling is as clear an example of anti-Christian bigotry guised in legal sophistry as you could ask for. The absurdities are obvious. Lagueux claims that Ahlquist suffered tangible harm from the presence of the prayer-- an anodyne prayer with minimal reference to "Our Heavenly Father" that exhorts students to good civic behavior-- something for which Ms. Ahlquist certainly needs a bit of after-class help. If Ms. Ahlquist actually suffered emotional harm from the mere sight of a banal prayer mural, she needs psychiatric, not legal, help.

Lagueux bases much of his decision on the Lemon Test. The Lemon Test is a controversial doctrine fabricated in a Supreme Court ruling several decades ago. It has no basis in the text of the Constitution. The "test" has three prongs:

The government's action must have a secular legislative purpose;

The government's action must not have the primary effect of either advancing or inhibiting religion;

The government's action must not result in an "excessive government entanglement" with religion.

The prayer mural is not an act of legislation, and it has a clear secular purpose (encouraging good citizenship) with a minor religious component. The only religious reference is that it is phrased as a prayer- "Our Heavenly Father... Amen". The salient content is entirely secular-- "to be kind and honest to our classmates and teachers... to bring credit to Cranston High School West."

The mural is much less religious than, say, Lincoln's Second Inaugural or Washington's Thanksgiving Day Proclamation or Bill Clinton's Second Inaugural Address, among countless other public prayers by government officials.

The mural obviously does not have the primary effect of advancing religion. Its self-evident purpose is exhortation to good citizenship, merely phrased in the form of a prayer.

Ironically, Ahlquist's and Lagueux' censorship does have an obvious primary purpose to inhibit the public expression of religion. Ahlquist is a Christianity-hating atheist, and the judge's ruling itself-- a government action that inhibits religion in civic life-- violates the Lemon Test.

And it is obvious that the ruling excessively entangles government-- the federal courts-- with religion, by micromanaging a high school's wall murals based on the anti-religious bigotry of a single student.

Our government and civic life is saturated with references to God (in presidential speeches, on national monuments, in our founding documents) that would consign such expression to the fire if federal ~~censors~~ judges had the balls to censor them with the same frenzy they censor the (in reality) Constitutionally protected expression of ordinary Americans.

Rhode Island's show trial is another example, as if you needed another example, of the incessant war that atheist thugs and judges with brown shirts under black robes are waging against Christian faith and its Constitutionally protected public expression. The only government-sponsored Christian artifacts the judiciary routinely protects are crucifixes soaked in urine and paintings of the Blessed Virgin smeared in feces and adorned with close-ups of female genitalia cut from pornographic magazines.

Now consider Lagueux' critique of the school prayer mural:

... it is still maintained and located in a place of honor to the right of the stage... the School Committee endorsed the position of those who believe that it is acceptable to use Christian prayer to instill values in public schoolchildren...In between, the Prayer espouses values of honesty, kindness, friendship and sportsmanship. While these goals are commendable, the reliance on God’s intervention as the way to achieve those goals is not consistent with a secular purpose.

It was the fact that the prayer was honored and commendable that Judge Lagueux used to ground his order to remove it. The crux of Lagueux' decision against the mural is not that it was a government-sponsored Christian artifact that was displayed publicly. No court has ever ruled that a government-sponsored Christian artifact smeared in urine or feces and adorned with pornographic images is an unconstitutional entanglement of government with religion. You'll notice that courts never demand removal of government-supported artifacts that insult Christianity.

The objection to the prayer mural-- made explicit by Lagueux in his opinion-- is that it was a Christian artifact that was displayed respectfully.

The New Mass

2012-01-15T06:00:00.001-05:00

The new Mass is in my view quite beautiful. It is a more faithful translation of the Latin, which was simplified somewhat after Vatican II for Mass in the vernacular.

The new Mass is spiritual and profound, with a renewed solemnity. I think that it is well received by the faithful. I love it.

I'm grateful for this gift, one of many.

Gooo... Brady Tebow!

2012-01-14T06:00:00.017-05:00

Tonight's Broncos-Patriots playoff game should be great. It pits two fascinating quaterbacks-- Tom Brady and Tim Tebow-- against each other.

Brady is perhaps the best quaterback to ever play the game. I'm a tremendous fan of his. He has posted accomplishments-- wins, Superbowl victories, touchdown passes, completion percentages, rarity of interceptions-- that are almost hard to believe. He has an elegant passing style. I always root for him even when he's playing my hometown teams-- the Jets and Giants. My kids won't talk to me on game day. Rooting for the Patriots in a New York family is serious misconduct. I don't care. Brady is great.

Tim Tebow has one of Brady's skills-- he wins, consistently. His passing style may not be much, but he has incredible guts and leadership, and it's hard to root against him.

His quite public Christianity has been mocked, and he has been the target of astonishing vituperation. He responds with humility and humor (kind of like... let me think... hmmm... what blogger consistently shows similar modesty and meekness... ).

In Christ's body, Tebow's the throwing arm. I'm... the spleen, perhaps. Some would surely assign me a different body part.

But I love Tebow. It's probably gauche to root for a fellow Christian the way one roots for a football team. But I'll make an exception for Tebow. He's such an obviously decent guy, and I deeply admire his very public acknowledgement of Christ. I'll be rooting for him, despite my admiration for Brady.

God bless Tim Tebow. We need good men and real heroes.

Finally! LGBT-Z rights!

2012-01-13T06:00:00.003-05:00

It seems that we can finally add zoophilia to the growing list of alternatesex rights emerging in our culture. And in the military, no less. LGBT-Z Rights!

From Timothy Whiteman of the Wilmington Political Buzz Examiner:

Senate legalizes bestiality in the Armed Forces

Timothy Whiteman, Wilmington Political Buzz Examiner

December 4, 2011

The Associated Press (via the Boston Globe) is reporting that the Democratic-controlled US Senate has passed the $662 billion 2012 NDAA (National Defense Authorization Act).

The NDAA covers everything from jet strike fighters to housing for military families.

It also de-criminalizes both sodomy and bestiality.

In a press release from the US Senate Committee on the Armed Services (Chairman - Sen. Carl Levin, D-MI) from June 17, 2011, under the Military Personnel Policy section (page 9), it clearly states that the Committee has added to the Fiscal Year 2012 NDAA the following;

Also repeals Article 125 of the UCMJ, relating to the offense of sodomy.

The Library of Congress has recorded and saved for posterity every letter and number associated Senate bill, S. 1867. Specifically;

S.1867National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012

Sec. 920c. Art. 120c. Other sexual misconduct

(d) Repeal of Sodomy Article- Section 925 of such title (article 125 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice) is repealed.

On an official US Air Force website, Article 125 of the UCMJ (Uniform Code of Military Justice) formerly prohibited both sodomy and bestiality.

(a) Any person subject to this chapter who engages in unnatural carnal copulation with another person of the same or opposite sex or with an animal is guilty of sodomy. Penetration , however slight, is sufficient to complete the offense.

(b) Any person found guilty of sodomy shall be punished as a court-martial may direct.

The official website for the US Senate has listed by name the 93-7 vote in favor of the NDAA.

Gay activists will no doubt explain that this expansion of "rights" has nothing whatsoever to do with traditionalist arguments that legalizing gay marriage will open the doors to all manner of legal sexual unions.

Just because the military has permitted soldiers to have sex with animals doesn't mean that these soldiers and their pet-amours will ultimately be permitted to sanctify their love with legal recognition as marriage.

Unlike gay marriage, interspecies marriage would be to place a legal imprimatur on an unnatural union.

Welcome to pagan wonderland.

Pope Benedict feels the burdens of age and duty

2012-01-13T06:00:00.002-05:00

The Holy Father will be 85 years old soon, and many close observers have noticed the toll that the years and the crushing responsibilities are taking on him.

I was thrilled when he was elected pope, following the passing of Blessed John Paul II. Benedict is one of the great theologians of the 20th century. He is a brilliant man, with a genius for subtle and salient explication of theology, Biblical texts, and culture. His Introduction to Christianity is one of the best overviews of the rational and spiritual basis for the faith, and as pope he has written a beautiful series of theological commentaries ordered on Jesus' life and ministry. His Salt of the Earth, which is an interview with a journalist, is one of the best commentaries on modern culture and the Church's role that I've read. The only difficulty I've had with his books is that I've marked so many pages that the bookmarks are useless. Every page has one.

His service to the Church has been exemplary. For decades he did an extraordinary job as Prefect for the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith. He is a superb administrator, and he is directly responsible for the very effective measures the Church has taken to prevent sexual abuse. The Catholic Church is now the safest institution for children in America. The secular world should learn from his example.

The Church has been blessed by the succession of Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVII. John Paul strengthened and sanctified the Church with his charisma and his courage. Benedict has consolidated John Paul's achievements with his intellect and his administrative skills.

Please pray that the Holy Father's health will sustain him in the great tasks that remain before him.

God, gays, and K'd up circuit boys

2012-01-12T06:00:00.026-05:00

Jay Michaelson's essay in Religion Dispatches, with my commentary:

Why Rick Santorum Can't Just Say: God Doesn't Want You To Be Gay

Gay rights and the collapse of pseudo-secularism

By JAY MICHAELSON

It’s been widely observed that religious foes of LGBT equality...

There are very few actual foes of LGBT equality, religious or otherwise, the Westboro Baptist Church notwithstanding.

The vast majority of people-- Christians included-- strongly support full rights for gays. The right to free exercise of religion, the right to freedom of speech, the right to keep and bear arms, the right to trial by jury, etc.

Gay marriage has nothing to do with "rights", because marrying anyone you want isn't a "right".

There have always been constraints on marriage. Constraints on who may legally marry is a matter of statutory law, decided by the mechanisms of representative democracy. There are no "rights" involved in defining marriage, as long as the definition applies to all and thereby satisfies the Equal Protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

Denying marriage to people who want to marry a sibling isn't denying the rights of the incestuous. Denying marriage to more than two people isn't denying the rights of polygamists. Denying marriage to people who want to marry themselves isn't denying the rights of narcissists. Denying marriage to people who want to marry children isn't denying the rights of pederasts. Denying marriage to people who want to marry the dead isn't denying the rights of necrophiliacs.

Denying marriage to gays isn't denying the rights of gays. It's simply defining marriage in accordance with the majority view, which is how a democracy works.

Gays and others who want to change the legal definition of marriage are entitled to do so, through the legislative process. Those who want to maintain the traditional definition are entitled to do so, through the legislative process. The only "right" involved is the right to access to and participation in the legislative process.

...frequently make arguments of convenience. These arguments are usually guised in the language of rhetorics other than that of religion. Thus homosexuality is pathological (medical), destructive of society (sociological), narcissistic (psychological)—anything, really, as long as it’s bad, which is what opponents of equality really mean.

There are religious reasons to oppose gay marriage and homosexual conduct (it's sinful), and there are secular reasons (it's not marriage as traditionally understood, it's unhealthy, pathological, destructive of society... ). Those are all perfectly defensible viewpoints.

Aware, however, that pure rhetorics of sin and God’s will are of limited public efficacy—mostly for cultural reasons, though also for legal/political ones—the more candid statements are rarely spoken publicly.

There are many millions of religious people who are quite willing to state simply that homosexual conduct is sinful. I think it is, and that's my primary reason for opposition to it. Many religious people carry the debate to secular issues, for which strong arguments can be made as well, that others who don't share their faith may agree on.

As Mark Jordan has recently described in great detail, this instrumental use of non-religious rhetoric has led to a discursive slipperiness, leaving the keen observer wondering: What, exactly, is wrong with homosexuality?

It's sinful. Also, it's unhealthy, for the person engaging in it and for the society that facilitates it.

Opponents of equality often seem unable to respond consistently, instead attempting to marshal a variety of non-religious arguments to bolster what is at heart a religious condition. Chosen, as they typically are, for efficacy rather than for accuracy, these arguments often turn out to be wrong.

Homosexual conduct is associated with astonishingly high rates of disease. It is a profound public health issue, about which there is no honest debate.

Last week, for example, Rick Santorum argued that same-sex marriage would be a slippery slope, because “in terms of pleasure,” polygamous marriages offered as much pleasure as gay marriages do. This strange new line of thinking pre-supposes that the only reason for same-sex marriage is pleasure, just as the only reason for a homosexual “lifestyle” is pleasure, lust, and so on.

The connection between gay marriage and polygamy is obvious. If marriage to someone of the same sex is permitted, by what logic can marriage to more than one person be denied?

This is, of course, absurd. Gay couples get married for the same reasons that straight couples do, with pleasure being pretty far down the list, behind, say, love, companionship, taking care of one another, societal recognition, raising children, and so on. Santorum’s ignorant comment (one of many, of course) assumes, incorrectly, that homosexuality is a (changeable, optional) predilection of the gonads, rather than an orientation of the heart. Lust, not love.

Gay couples certainly have a range of motives and desires, just as straight couples do.

Likewise, Alan Chambers, President of Exodus International, recently gave an interview on Christian Radio wherein he described the “homosexual lifestyle” again in terms of selfishness and pleasure. The radio host, in turn, stated that LGBT activists (it was interesting to hear her say the acronym—I think its foreignness and length helped her case) simply don’t understand how a person changes when they are born again in Christ. Because LGBT activists are irreligious, they just don’t get how religiously-inspired change is possible.

This, too, is factually wrong. As readers of this publication know, a great many LGBT activists (this one included) are religious.

Indeed yes. I think that they are mistaken about God's law regarding homosexual conduct, but it is certainly true that there are many quite religious people who are gay and are gay activists.

Many others are formerly religious. We know quite well what it is to live in the light of God, Christ, dharma, et cetera. And many of us have experienced that doing so while not lying and repressing oneself is actually more religiously spacious than the alternative.

Relation to God is about truth, not "spaciousness".

And, to state the obvious, any queer person in a committed relationship with a partner or with a circle of friends and companions knows that selfishness is as pathetic in a queer life as it is in a straight one. Apparently Chambers has forgotten that during the AIDS plague, queers were highly unselfish in their taking care of one another (including, let’s mention out loud, lesbians taking care of gay men).

That's true, and deeply admirable. I've seen it myself in my medical practice, and I have great respect for the selfless men and women who care for their friends and partners.

But we must not forget the maniacal promiscuity and recklessness that spreads AIDS and myriad other diseases in the gay community.

There has been much courage and love, and much depravity.

It’s a pity that Chambers’ experience of the gay community (apparently extremely brief, according to this report) was limited to its most vapid representatives. But even K’d-up circuit boys take care of one another.

"K'd up circuit boys"?

Does "K'd up" refer to ketamine, K-Y jelly, or Kaposi's?

In making these bogus arguments, Santorum and Chambers inevitably run afoul of the facts, because the facts are not what really interest them. If we assume that Santorum is being sincere in his bigotry rather than purely opportunistic, what he’s really interested in is religion, not social policy.

"K'd up circuit boys..."?

If it were social policy that motivated him, he’d read the studies of same-sex couples in Massachusetts and in other countries, which show that they raise children as well as opposite-sex couples, form stable families, and the rest.

"K'd up circuit boys..."?

But what Santorum is motivated by is actually religion: a fear of sexuality and of women souped-up by a misreading of Leviticus, Romans, and Corinthians.

It's odd to hear a gay guy accuse Santorum, who has seven kids and a beloved wife of twenty years, of having a fear of sexuality and of women.

But he can’t really say that on television. If he were honest, he’d just come out and say something like: “I’m sorry, but God just cannot abide any homosexual behavior.” But he isn’t.

He'd be right to do so. But he's trying to point out that there are solid non-religious reasons to critique homosexual behavior. Why Michaelson finds the effort to appeal to common values objectionable is unclear.

Now, in no way am I claiming that the Bible prohibits same-sex intimacy.

It condemns same-sex sex. Intimacy is another matter, and can mean very different things.

I have written abook showing the exact opposite: that Biblical values demand us to affirm it. Rick Santorum’s views are not dictated by St. Paul, but he believes that they are, and that’s enough.

The Bible is quite clear on the sinfulness of homosexual acts. It is also clear on the blessing of love and care for each other. Relationships of all sorts can involve a composite of good and bad.

Let me take one further step. Santorum and other homophobes...

I really don't like the word "homophobe". Very few people are afraid of homosexuals, and even fewer are afraid to the point of diagnosable mental illness, which is what "phobia" means.

Many people hold the opinion that homosexual acts are sinful. That's an opinion, not a phobia.

Heterophobes like Michaelson should know the difference.

... cannot speak frankly because their real motivations are private, emotional, and incoherent.

The Catholic view to which Santorum (and I) subscribe is quite coherent-- homosexual desire is not sinful. Homosexual acts are. People who have homosexual desire and/or commit homosexual acts are God's beloved sons and daughters, just like each of us. We are all sinners, loved always and redeemed, if we accept redemption. Part of accepting redemption is acting, as best we can, in accordance with God's will.

It’s not as though Santorum dispassionately selected Catholicism from a menu of religious ideologies. He believes because he feels.

And feels because he believes.

Even before his wife’s miscarriage (in 1996), before his political career, some concatenation of circumstances installed what some have called religious “software” in his brain.

Huh? I'll have to ask my neurosurgical colleagues in Pennsylvania who operated on him...

Things are good when religion is dominant, bad when it is not. This is the truth of his experience.

What?

I’m reminded of a story told by Tim LaHaye, notorious author of the apocalyptic “Left Behind” series. LaHaye was ten years old when his father died, and obviously devastated by the loss. As LaHaye tells it, it was during a pastor’s eulogy for his father that he truly came to believe. The pastor explained how his father was now in heaven with Jesus, and the young LaHaye knew this to be true, felt it to be true. Indeed, he must have wished it to be true as well. Of course he did; what ten-year-old boy wouldn’t?

That, not evolution or homosexuality or any other point of dogma, is the real issue for people like LaHaye, Santorum, and Chambers: the fundamental comfort that religion provides.

Ketamine, amyl nitrite, and promiscuity provide comfort.

A relationship to God provides truth, which is comforting and terrifying in turns. Fear and trembling.

If people evolved from apes, according to this logic, Timmy LaHaye’s father is not in heaven with Jesus and Rick Santorum’s son died for no reason.

Evolution and the Catholic understanding of man are quite consistent, if one accepts that man's physical nature evolved and his spirit/soul were independently created.

And this is why we cannot argue with people who subscribe to this framework: there is simply too much at stake for them.

We believe what we say.

They have wedded their fundamental sense of okay-ness to the truthfulness of a set of doctrines.

We believe what we say.

Not only is sociology not at issue for Rick Santorum, Romans isn’t either. What is at stake is his very sense that the world is a good place, that things are basically okay, and that he himself is okay as a result. That may be expressed in a theological framework, but it is a psychological reality.

Santorum is figuratively on Dr. Michaelson's couch, getting psychoanalyzed. For free, no less.

If I marry my partner, therefore, Rick Santorum is not okay.

Right. The only reason one could oppose gay marriage is if one has a psychiatric condition. All sane people agree with Jay Michaelson and K'd up circuit boys.

The rest is window dressing. The fake sociology, the religious doctrines of sin and salvation, all of it.

Reluctance to bestow a legal imprimatur on a sexual culture synonymous with promiscuity and contagion is "fake sociology"?

Santorum and Chambers have had powerful religious experiences, and they avail themselves of such doctrines to articulate the inexpressible.

This is expressible: gay marriage isn't marriage.

The fake secularism, the fake science, the bogus constructions of homosexuality—

All based on publicly available data and obvious inferences...

all of these are so transparently false because they are mere props. As one after another of them collapse,

Here's "fake science": gay lifestyle is associated with astronomical rates of promiscuity, mental illness, violence, alcoholism, drug abuse, AIDS, syphilis, gonorrhea, chlamydia, HPV, herpes, anal cancer ... . The life expectancy of an active urban homosexual man is equal to the life expectancy of men in Canada in 1871.

anti-gays will eventually be left only with their convictions, and the reasons why they have them. Perhaps only then, echoing Portnoy’s therapist, might we say “Now vee may perhaps to begin.”

In my view, the most shameful aspect of contemporary homosexual culture is not the sex itself. The most shameful aspect is the willful lying by "activists" like Michaelson about the real world consequences of gay sex, especially among men. Male homosexuality is deadly, more deadly than drunk driving, I.V. drug abuse, and Russian roulette. The leading killer of gay men is gay men.

Condoms aren't the answer. They haven't been the answer. The answer is continence and chastity, and a respect for God, for others and for oneself, which is the Catholic understanding and Rick Santorum's understanding.

It is Michaelson, not Santorum, who is devaluing the lives of gay men.

My reply to Doug Indeap on the constitutional "separation of church and state"; Part 3

2012-01-11T06:00:00.193-05:00

Doug Indeap has replied to my recent post on the Establishment clause and the relationship between church and state.

I should note that I appreciate Doug's detailed comments. My replies are a bit snarky, partly because this is a blog and that's what is done on blogs, and partly because Doug, however thoughtful and polite, is trying to censor me and several hundred million of my fellow Americans. That angers me. I employ sarcasm to make my point. Doug employs police and attorneys to force you to comply with his point.

Doug:

... your post is largely premised on a fundamental misunderstanding of the nature of constitutional law. The Constitution places certain matters beyond the purview of the normal electoral and legislative processes. Our individual rights, for instance, are not up for majority vote, as you seem to suppose.

I understand the premise of constitutional law as well as you do, Doug. We agree that the Constitution places certain rights beyond the legislative purview (the right to free expression of religion and the right to keep and bear arms, for example). We differ on what the Constitution places beyond the legislative purview.

I believe that the Constitution prohibits the establishment of a national church. In every other manifestation of religion it protects free exercise. It's the plain reading of the Establishment and Free Exercise clauses.

You believe that the Constitution empowers unelected judges to expunge religious expression from civic life, thereby establishing de facto atheism as our civic religion. You believe that the Constitution empowers judges to micromanage vast aspects of our religious life, including what our children are taught in schools and can say and see in schools, and what we citizens can put on our public property and what opinions that we citizens can express via our elected officials.

I see the Establishment clause as prohibiting a national religious establishment. You see the Establishment clause as a license for tenured judges and irreligious litigants to use the power of the state to suppress civic religious expression by American citizens.

I see the First Amendment as a charter for free expression. You see it as a cudgel to suppress religious expression that you hate.

Your post is premised as well on other fundamental misunderstandings. You seem not to appreciate the distinctions between (1) We the People, (2) the government, and (3) individuals.

I understand the distinction.

For instance, you proclaim that "We the People (i.e. the government)" have the right to say we trust in God.

Yep.

"We the People" and "the government" are not one and the same.

Right. We the People are sovereign, and we elect the government to express our will, with the constraints of the Bill of Rights.

"We the People," acting through a constitutional convention, created "the government" and, in the process, gave it certain powers, refrained from giving it other powers, and expressly limited some of its powers.

Indeed. Could you cite for me the section of the Constitution that empowers federal judges to censor students' prayers at high school graduations? Was that the Establishment clause, the Free Exercise clause, or the Freedom of Speech clause?

"We the People" could amend the Constitution and thereby change the government's powers; the government itself, though, cannot do that.

What hypocrisy, Doug. "Living Constitution" judges change the Constitution regularly, without formally amending it. Every day some batshit federal judge discovers a new right that nobody can seem to find in the Bill of Rights. The right to kill a child in the womb. The right of the government to take private property from citizens to increase municipal tax revenue. The right of atheists not to hear things they don't like. So you're finally admitting that when the Supreme Court or some loon federal judge discovers some "right" that's not in the Constitution and that no one else had noticed for two hundred years, they're acting unconstitutionally? I knew that you and I agreed on some things.

The government must act within the constraints established by "We the People" in the Constitution, including the separation of church and state.

Oh. What was that "separation of church and state" clause in the Constitution, again? Section and article, please. No fair using the KKK initiation oath as a reference.

Your disbelief that the Constitution might bar the government from saying anything that 312,529,476 Americans don't all agree reflects yet another fundamental misunderstanding--because it indeed does just that in certain respects.

Actually, the Constitution doesn't restrict what the government says. It restricts what the government does. "Congress shall make no law...", not "High school valedictorians shall say nothing about..."

The whole point of the government in a representative democracy is to express what the voters have elected it to express. The government represents the people. Elections aren't unanimous, so not everyone will agree with what government says. That's ok. Our elections are decided by majority vote. President Obama won the last presidential election, although I didn't vote for him. President Obama's speeches about the deficit don't violate my freedom of speech. I don't have a heckler's veto over what the president says.

You don't have a heckler's veto either. A high school valedictorian's speech about God doesn't violate your right to free exercise of religion, any more than the President's speech violates my right to freedom of speech. If you don't like the valedictorian's speech, don't listen. Bring your IPod to the ceremony, or hum a tune to yourself. Don't call the police. You've got to learn to suppress your totalitarian instincts.

Speech doesn't violate rights. The use of government force ("Congress shall make no law...") violates rights. You're the one who uses force, Doug.

The Constitution prohibits the Establishment of religion, which is the act of recognizing a national church. It does not prohibit any government official from saying something about religion.

The Constitution prohibits the government from making certain kinds of laws-- from using force. It does not prohibit government officials from saying things, like prayers. In fact, the Constitution is quite emphatic about protecting freedom of speech and free expression of religion.

That is what the constitutional guarantees of individual rights and constitutional limits on government power are all about. The government is constrained to act according to the Constitution REGARDLESS of whether those on one or the other side of an issue amount to millions or dozens or one.

You make my point. The government is constrained to act according to the Constitution. Where in the Constitution are judges empowered to censor civic religious expression? Why do you continuously use the constitutional constraints on government power to invoke government power? Why do you call the police when someone at a school graduation prays? Why do you incessantly use the First Amendment-- the charter of free expression-- to shut people up?

You and I appear to agree on one thing: The courts' explanation that the references to God in the Pledge of Allegiance and the National Motto are more about acknowledging tradition than promoting religion is "bull." As you say, when most Americans recite these references they "mean it."

Damn right.

If the courts acknowledged that and dealt with it forthrightly, they would then have to recognize that such governmental pronouncements are indeed unconstitutional. The courts, though, dodge that conclusion by the "bull" that it is all about tradition and not about religion.

The reason that the courts invoke tradition to insulate some religious expression from censorship is that "separation of church and state" is junk jurisprudence, not any part of Constitutional law, and has created a garbage heap of incoherent and unconstitutional judicial censorship. The transparent purpose of "separation of church and state" is to extinguish civic religious speech-- speech that is explicitly protected in the Free Exercise clause of the First Amendment, which makes no distinction whatsoever between private and civic free expression.

A teacher is no more prohibited by the First Amendment from stating a religious opinion than she is prohibited by the First Amendment from stating a political opinion.

If courts were to enforce your 'mandatory censorship' interpretations of the First Amendment consistently, federal marshals would storm the podium during the State of the Union Address and arrest the President for violating the Constitution when he implores God to bless America. The FBI would arrest the employees at the U.S. Mint for printing prohibited religious speech on our money, and the U.S. Army would dismantle countless national monuments that are slathered with invocations of God. No religion on public property! Klaverns of the godless would go to Arlington Cemetery and tear up those crosses and stars of David on the graves. Ecrasez l'Infame!

Censorship of civic religious expression is not prohibited by the Constitution-- the Constitution guarantees free exercise and makes no distinction between civic and private speech, but, heck, atheist ideologues with a totalitarian itch tell us what the Constitution really means. Who needs to read the document itself?

The reason that judges invoke "tradition" to protect some religious expression is that if they followed your junk logic consistently, they'd be arresting everyone from the President on down, and the whole "separation of church and state" scam would be exposed for the totalitarian project that it is.

You guys just hate Christianity, and you do what you can get away with, and call it law.

Thomas Woods on the contributions of the Catholic Church to Western civilization

2012-01-10T06:00:00.000-05:00

Historian Thomas Woods has a wonderful new book-- How the Catholic Church Built Western Civilization-- and for readers who want to know the truth about the origins of modern science, law, commerce and art, the book is a must. Woods lays out the facts about the central role the Church played in creating the modern world and the unique scientific and cultural triumphs of the West.

Woods has penned a fine essay summing up his observations about the Church and the civilization it built:

Commentary: History shows contributions of Catholic Church to Western civilization

Published: Wednesday, Dec. 28, 2011 5:00 a.m. MST

By Thomas E. Woods, The Free Lance-Star (Fredericksburg, Va.)

TOPEKA, Kan. — About the least fashionable thing one can do these days is utter a kind word about the Catholic Church. The idea that the church has been an obstacle to human progress has been elevated to the level of something everybody thinks he knows. But to the contrary, it is to the Catholic Church more than to any other institution that we owe so many of the treasures of Western civilization. Knowingly or not, scholars operated for two centuries under an Enlightenment prejudice that assumes all progress to come from religious skeptics, and that whatever the church touches is backward, superstitious, even barbaric.

Since the mid-20th century, this unscholarly prejudice has thankfully begun to melt away, and professors of a variety of religious backgrounds, or none at all, increasingly acknowledge the church's contributions.

Nowhere has the revision of what we thought we knew been more dramatic than in the study of the history of science. We all remember what we learned in fourth grade: While scientists were bravely trying to uncover truths about the universe and improve our quality of life, stupid churchmen who hated reason and simply wanted the faithful to shut up and obey placed a ceaseless stream of obstacles in their path.

That was where the conventional wisdom stood just over a century ago, with the publication of Andrew Dickson White's book, "A History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom," in 1896. And that's where most Americans (and Europeans, for that matter) believe it still stands.

But there is scarcely a historian of science in America who would endorse this comic-book version of events today. To the contrary, modern historians of science freely acknowledge the church's contributions — both theoretical and material — to the Scientific Revolution. It was the church's worldview that insisted the universe was orderly and operated according to certain fixed laws. Only buoyed with that confidence would it have made sense to bother investigating the physical world in the first place, or even to develop the scientific method (which can work only in an orderly world). It's likewise a little tricky to claim the church has been an implacable foe of the sciences when so many priests were accomplished scientists.

The first person to measure the rate of acceleration of a freely falling body was Father Giambattista Riccioli. The man who has been called the father of Egyptology was Father Athanasius Kircher. Father Roger Boscovich, who has been described as "the greatest genius that Yugoslavia ever produced," has often been called the father of modern atomic theory. In the sciences it was the Jesuits in particular who distinguished themselves; some 35 craters on the moon, in fact, are named after Jesuit scientists and mathematicians.

By the 18th century, writes historian Jonathan Wright, the Jesuits "had contributed to the development of pendulum clocks, pantographs, barometers, reflecting telescopes, and microscopes, to scientific fields as various as magnetism, optics, and electricity. They observed, in some cases before anyone else, the colored bands on Jupiter's surface, the Andromeda nebula, and Saturn's rings. They theorized about the circulation of the blood (independently of Harvey), the theoretical possibility of flight, the way the moon affected the tides, and the wave-like nature of light."

Their achievements likewise included "star maps of the southern hemisphere, symbolic logic, flood-control measures on the Po and Adige rivers, introducing plus and minus signs into Italian mathematics."

These were the great opponents of human progress?

Seismology, the study of earthquakes, has been so dominated by Jesuits that it has become known as "the Jesuit science." It was a Jesuit, Father J.B. Macelwane, who wrote the first seismology textbook in America in 1936. To this day, the American Geophysical Union, which Macelwane once headed, gives an annual medal named after this brilliant priest to a promising young geophysicist.

The Jesuits were also the first to introduce Western science into such far-off places as China and India. In 17th-century China in particular, Jesuits introduced a substantial body of scientific knowledge and a vast array of mental tools for understanding the physical universe, including the Euclidean geometry that made planetary motion comprehensible.

Jesuits made important contributions to the scientific knowledge and infrastructure of other less developed nations not only in Asia but also in Africa and Central and South America. Beginning in the 19th century, these continents saw the opening of Jesuit observatories that studied such fields as astronomy, geomagnetism, meteorology, seismology and solar physics. Such observatories provided these places with accurate time keeping, weather forecasts (particularly important in the cases of hurricanes and typhoons), earthquake risk assessments and cartography.

The centrality of the Catholic Church specifically and Christianity generally in the astonishing accomplishments of Western civilization is a fact of history. A brute fact. To ignore it, which is routine in modern education, is negligence. To deny it, which is de rigueur in godless circles, is a lie, born of bigotry and hate.

Those who hate the Church-- and they are many-- would do well to understand the scientific, cultural, political, economic, legal, and artistic revolution the Church wrought, if only to understand the miracle and to try to replicate it under other metaphysical systems. It's worth noting that many godless modernist systems-- Marxism for example-- try to do just that. Marxism has been called, with reason, a Christian heresy, an attempt at salvation of mankind with mortal saviors.

The history of the West since the fall of Rome is the history of the Church, applied. Most of it has been magnificent, some tawdry. As the influence of the Church in the West recedes (it is, thank God, growing in the East and the South), we will get to know again much of the evil that the Church vanquished centuries ago.

I suspect that even the Church's most impassioned enemies will pause when they begin to see what de-Christianization really means. The 20th century in Europe was a prelude.