It Could Happen to Anyone
Here’s something light for your Friday. We all knew what sort of guy French president Nicholas Sarkozy is, but few realized that our own president has similar aesthetic sensibilities.
Some are loudly mocking Obama for this. I’d say give the guy a break.
The king is but a man, as I am: the violet smells to him as it doth to me: the element shows to him as it doth to me; all his senses have but human conditions:
Presidents are a lower species than kings, but the principle applies. And we must recall that the wisdom of the American people has given us a president who hasn’t yet had years of practice in checking out passing babes without allowing it to be obvious to the camera. Give it some time and when his senses kick in with human conditions as the element shows to him, he’ll gaze upon it with the same cool aplomb as Sarkozy.
Optimism and the Star Spangled Banner
Hattip to Paul Zummo, the Cranky Conservative. The event in the video above occurred two years ago on Disability Awareness Day at Fenway Park. The way in which the crowd joined in to help the young man gives me optimism as to the basic decency of much of the human race. I have heard many renditions of the Star-Spangled Banner, but as the father of an autistic son I have never heard one which moved me more.
Marg Bar Diktator!
Hattitp to Ed Morrissey at Hot Air. In spite of the Iranian regime cutting off text messaging and cell phone service throughout the country, thousands of demonstrators took to the streets of Tehran on Thursday chanting “Marg bar Diktator!” , Death to the Dictator! First rate coverage of today’s developments here at Gateway Pundit. Great coverage here at Atlas Shrugs. Continue reading
The Petrine Ministry And Christian Ecumenism
Orientalium Ecclesiarum (Decree on the Eastern Catholic Churches) truly deserves more attention, as it remains vital to the self-understanding of the Catholic Church and for the prospect of Christian ecumenism in general.
Eastern Catholics are non-Latin Rite Christians who, at some point in the last thousand years, entered into communion with Bishop of Rome—though technically, some like the Italo-Albanian and Maronite churches, may have never left that communion. These Christians of the East are many, part of several churches, in communion with the Roman church. It is often forgotten that the Catholic Church, founded on the See of Peter, is a communion of twenty-two churches.
These Eastern-rite churches are significant to any real ecclesiology because their Catholic reality—their theological tradition, liturgy, spirituality, discipline, and customs—does not derive from Western influence. As a matter of fact, their Catholicism has its own apostolic foundations as old as, or even older than, those of Rome itself. Therefore, the way the Roman church understands its relationship to Eastern churches and the way in which it lives out that understanding is a clear marker to the shape a reunified Church will take in the future. Continue reading
Obama's World Apology Tour
This gave me a chuckle as our President Obama continues to blame America for every ill in the world.
Conservatism is Alive and Well
It has become popular to sound the death-knell of Conservatism. I believe the evidence indicates otherwise.
The latest polls indicate that Conservatism is in great shape. A plurality of Americans consider themselves conservative.
http://www.gallup.com/poll/120857/Conservatives-Single-Largest-Ideological-Group.aspx
At 40% self-identified conservatives are almost twice as numerous as self-identified liberals at 21%.
Great Jesuits 1: The Ark and The Dove
As readers of this blog know I have a series of posts, Jesuitical, in which I have highlighted follies of some modern day Jesuits. This series will put the spotlight on great Jesuits of the past and present. First up is Father Andrew White, SJ.
California R.I.P.
As California continues on a course that may well end in bankruptcy, the indispensable Iowahawk decides to give us a sneak peek of the future California funeral here. Any relation between California’s funeral and the funeral of a pop singer this week is purely intentional. After all, they both died broke!
Common Good, Common Sense Economics
Given that the Church offers no exacting technical program for getting the job of the common good accomplished in any given state or global community. But does offer a blueprint of values and insights into the necessity of applying the Gospel to our social conditions- to include economics- I offer this past guest column I wrote shortly after my run for Florida state house. It addresses some conditions particular to the state of Florida, but it contains an outline of general responsibilities that could be applied at any level of governance.
A Plan For Palin, A New Contract With America?
[Updates at the bottom of his post]
Governor Sarah Palin recently announced her resignation as governor of the great state of Alaska and there has been a flurry of analysis of her motives, her character, and her future plans. Some of this analysis were sincere, others were borderline antagonistic.
This is all occurring in the midst of an Obama presidency steering both Democratic controlled chambers of Congress that have substantially increased spending and enlarged the government to the detriment of our freedoms. Couple this with the lack of a clear Republican plan to challenge all of this, the American people are in need of a leader to guide us out of this wilderness.
I believe Governor Palin can and should play this important role. She stated in her final address as governor of Alaska that she wants to do what’s best for her state. If she is a person of principle and a patriot then it is logical to presume that she wants what’s best for America. And what’s best for America right now is to have a strong and vigorous counterweight to the liberal agenda of President Obama and his enablers in the Congress.
The plan that Governor Palin should pursue is to proactively lead Americans to take back Congress as part of the pact with America. She should do what then House Leader Newt Gingrich did in 1994 with the Republican Party’s Contract with America that gave the Republicans control of the House of Representatives for the first time in 40 years.
Bullet Points on Caritas
A helpful post courtesy of Father Z here on the major points of Caritas gleaned from L’Osservatore Romano. I found this very useful.
Here's to You Mr. Jefferson
With apologies to Simon & Garfunkel. Hattip to Smitty at the other McCain. A parody song dreamed up by Mike Church. If the Founding Fathers could see the fix we are in today with government spending, I am sure it would anger them but it would certainly not surprise them.
My Take on Caritas in Veritate
(I was going to wait until later to do this, but I just couldn’t 
)
After many months of waiting and speculation, Pope Benedict’s third encyclical Caritas in Veritate (Truth in Charity, CV for short) was released to the public today. As I read it this morning, I was grateful that we have been blessed with a Pontiff whose intellectual command of the social and cultural issues of our day is so wide-ranging, dynamic and insightful.
The reaction, thus far, has been more or less what I expected: people of various ideological persuasions attempting to take away what they can from it. I will have more to say about that below. For now, though, I want to highlight what I thought were the most important themes.
First, the Pope reminds us that Catholic social teaching cannot be arbitrarily divided into different categories. Of the Church’s social doctrine, Benedict says: “there is a single teaching, consistent and at the same time ever new” (12). Nothing in this encyclical, then, will fundamentally alter or revise anything that has been said before since the publication of Rerum Novarum in 1891.
An Encyclical Prediction
Thus far I’ve only had the chance to read the first couple pages of Caritas in Veritate, however seeing the first rounds of blog and media reaction rolling forth from both sides of the Catholic political spectrum I would like to indulge in revisitting a prediction from the beginning of the year:
9. The much discussed social encyclical will finally be issued — and all sides of the Catholic political spectrum will within several days claim that it supports the positions they already held.
Regardless of one’s political position, if the main thing one gets from reading the encyclical is, “I am right, and my opponents are all fools or villains” then you probably aren’t reading very carefully. Hopefully most Catholics taking the time to discuss Caritas in Veritate will take the time to read at a deeper level than that.
Guest Post: The Church, Advertising and the Junk We Don't Need
As a result of previous discussion on this blog, I invited one of our regular commentors, Anthony Chelette, who works as an advertising agency art director, to read the Pontifical Council on Social Communications document Ethics In Advertising and write his thoughts on it as a person working in the field. He was kind enough to do so, and thus results the following guest post.
I’d like to thank Anthony for taking the time to read the document and write this response over the last several weeks. I hope this will lead to fruitful discussion and greater understanding of the field and this response to it.
–Brendan Hodge (DarwinCatholic)
Certain ideas are intrinsically a part of being American. Liberty. Individualism. Capitalism. But often another ‘ism’— consumerism— is associated with the American experience. Catholics appropriately abhor what consumerism is — an insatiable search for happiness through material gratification— and some point a finger at advertising as a pusher for ‘unneeded’ products of questionable value. Such opinion holds advertisers partially responsible for behavior that distracts from moral progress and discourages the ordering of economies.
The Church has always had a keen eye on how the desire for material satisfaction erects walls between the human person and his true destiny in Heaven. Jesus himself recognized that love for possessions easily make men willing slaves. Suddenly, man is more obedient to besting his Guitar Hero score than Christ’s teachings.
Caritas in Veritate Is Here
Link here. As with all of Benedict’s encyclicals, I am sure there will be much to reflect upon. Let the discussions begin!
Iran: The Revolutionary Guards In Charge
Hattip to Ed Morrissey at Hot Air. No doubt in part a response to the declaration on Saturday of the prestigious Association of Researchers and Teachers of Qum that the election was illegitimate, spokesmen of the Revolutionary Guards, formally known as the Army of the Guardians of the Islamic Revolution, announced on Sunday that the Guards had taken charge of all security in Iran and that no further debate over the Presidential election would be tolerated.
The Shia revolution of 1979 was based on the idea that a government controlled by the mullahs, motivated by pure Islam, would provide the best form of government in Iran. Now each day brings more news of mullahs speaking out against the current regime in control of Iran.
“Over the weekend, Grand Ayatollah Assadolah Bayat Zanjani launched a broadside against the mass arrest of reformist activists and protesters.”
The walls are closing in on Ahmadinejad, a former Revolutionary Guards member, and his puppet masters. Mullahs speaking out have destroyed any remaining illusion that this regime is blessed by God. The Revolutionary Guards is the last remaining support that this government has, and, if the Guards falter, Ahmadinejad, Supreme Leader Khamenei and their cronies better have their bags packed and a plane warming up. This could all happen quite swiftly. The Resistance has called for mass rallies on Thursday. If the dissident mullahs join them, the Iranians could witness mullahs being beaten by Revolutionary Guards. Once that happens, I think armed revolt will not be far off.
Rhetoric, Abortion and Abraham Lincoln
Regular readers of this blog know that I am a big fan of Father Z at What Does The Prayer Really Say. Today he has a post on calls to tone down the rhetoric of those who oppose abortion. He eloquently explains here why he probably will not heed these calls. Let me associate myself with Father Z’s remarks. I have a great many interests and a great many opinions on a lot of issues, but for me abortion will always be THE ISSUE. I am never going to stop speaking out against the obscenity of abortion. I will never stop making abortion THE ISSUE on which I vote. Sometimes in life you simply have to call a spade a spade, and to call abortion the deliberate taking of innocent human life.
A Just War
Based on the just war doctrine first enunciated by Saint Augustine, the American Revolution was a just war.
Major Development in Iran
Yesterday the most important group of clerics in Iran, the Association of Researchers and Teachers of Qum, called the Presidential election in Iran illegitimate. It is now impossible for the Iranian regime to claim the Iranian Resistance is restricted to a handful of malcontents or foreign agents. This is the grimmest news yet since the election for the Iranian regime, and the best news that the Resistance has received. Good analysis here at Hot Air by Ed Morrissey. Now the Iranian regime has to decide if they are going to arrest and hang these clerics who have been the mainstay of the regime as they have been hanging protesters. The clerics speaking out indicates clearing that there is a strong division among the ruling elites in Iran as to whether Ahmadinejad and his puppet masters can stay in power. This coming week could be decisive in Iran.
Run Away From the Border!
From the only reliable news source on the net, the Onion. Fess up. Haven’t you sort of suspected this as you’ve been choking down a soft taco at Taco Bell?
Evangelical Catholicism
After a few years of dormancy, the blog Evangelical Catholicism has been revived and is back in business.
From the “About” section:
[T]he content of this blog will range from the theological and, at times, the academic, to the level of devotion and ministry inside and outside Catholic circles, as well as to socio-political life. We hold that doctrine is hollow without spirituality and prayer that continually seek the face of God. We also hold that faith is dead without the outward expression of ministry to, and solidarity with, the least of Christ’s brethren. We understand the Catholic faith to be the indissoluble union of doctrine, praxis, and spirituality. This is the ideal.
I will be a regular contributor there, so I hope my friends here at American Catholic will come by and see how we are doing. It may come as no small surprise that I write for blogs with seemingly different approaches to our faith because I truly believe that there are great and valuable insights and wisdom to be gained from more than one perspective. Catholics my age that I have the good fortune of meeting through Church groups, social networking sites, and other venues are less comfortable being burdened with an ideological label, and more comfortable discovering what in the different perspectives shaping our world are compatible with Catholicism.
Charles Carroll: Our Catholic Founding Father
Charles Carroll of Carrollton was a delegate to the Continental Congress and later United States Senator for Maryland. He was also the only Catholic to have signed the The Declaration of Independence. One of the wealthiest men in the colonies, it is reported that — upon fixing his signature,
a member standing near observed, “There go a few millions,” and all admitted that few risked as much, in a material sense, than the wealthy Marylander.
(The Life of Charles Carroll of Carrollton, 1737-1832, by Kate Mason Rowland).
A new biography, American Cicero: The Life of Charles Carroll (Lives of the Founders)
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