We all have heard of empathy and some of us actually have the capability of empathizing from time to time. I think some of you may want to take a look at the clip where you will see empathy on a level where many of us would never care to venture.
If you feel the need for another, this one touches on the tragedy of words that die, while others like gothtard, don’t.
After viewing the trailer for the upcoming documentary, Pregnant in America - A Nations Miscarriage, I found it odd that they chose childbirth as a means of the health-care industry raking in huge profits. Maybe its my own knee-jerk reaction attributed to my distrust of the current trend of documentaries that focus on controversial issues that is held so dearly by our dysfunctional culture, but this one stinks to high heaven. This film will not only exploit current fears, but also create fear of pregnancy and hospital based delivery.
Numbers and statistics mean absolutely nothing without being qualified in some manner. For example, the film states that the incidents of c-sections as a means of delivering a baby in the United States are currently at 33%. They cost more (which is why countries with socialized medicine don’t have a high rate of c-sections), which consequently increases the revenue of a hospital, that’s proof enough of a scandal, right? Not really, considering many of those c-sections are voluntary, at the request of the mother because she is a product of a culture that will do what it takes to avoid any pain of any kind. Try to find a celebrity who recently gave birth that didn’t have a c-section. It’s also a safety precaution some practitioners are forced to take to avoid being sued in our litigious society.
What about the mentioned infant and maternal death rate in U.S. hospitals compared to other industrialized countries? For one, you need to look no further than the statistical significant correlation between mortality and c-section procedures. As for the other variables, our country has a problem with poor pre-natal care which contribute to the mortality of children due to prematurity and low-birth weight. Some of these deaths can be attributed to social service ignorance and awareness, not by hospital neglect or needless “interventions”.
As a confirmation bonus, the director of the film shows his own child in an ICU crib after his birth, what’s one to deduce? Must be the result of a corporate scandal(ah, but this is not at all uncommon as a precaution for infants who have a low APGAR score, here they can be closely monitored until they are sure the baby is stable and healthy - law suits you know).
How about the shock by a European woman after she is informed that babies in the U.S. are not born at home? That my friends, can be referred to a mentality of someone who actively participates in maximizing the cost effectiveness of socialized medicine.
So what’s one to do to avoid hospitals? The only alternative to giving birth in the corrupt hospitals was a home birth by a midwife, but a physician warns that one should hopefully be within 15 minutes of the nearest hospital.
I’m not trying to justify what some hospitals may do in order to maximize profits, because some of them may (but not at the expense of a baby- law suits you know). At the same time, with the litigation associated with child birth and the demand for a perfect baby, physicians and hospitals are bound to take every pre-caution to avoid being sued (and that cost is passed on to the consumer). I absolutely hate the way I felt after watching the trailer, and I have my suspicions that this could be intended to raise the fears associated with pregnancies and child delivery. Either that, or it’s put together by the mid-wife union of America, or possibly a promotion for a socialized health-care system. Either way, it’s irresponsible journalism.
They’ll never get my 20 bucks.
But when I say theme park, do not think Alton Towers or Disneyland. Think, instead, illegal migrants. Because now you can pretend to be an illegal migrant at a theme park in Mexico.
Remember, this is for tourists.
Monsignor J. Terrence Fitzgerald, of the Catholic Diocese of Salt Lake City supports the monthly “gay” mass as an opportunity to extend Christian love and respect to those with same-sex attraction, with the hope of welcoming them into the Church. In a statement on the monthly Mass, the Monsignor acknowledged that the Church teaches that a homosexual inclination is not a sin, but believes pastors should also help gays and lesbians live healthy, chaste lives because of the objectively sinful nature of engaging in homosexual acts.
Unfortunately, Father Busen, the openly “it’s O.K. to be gay” priest believes in his heart that there is no conflict with Catholic teachings and the gay lifestyle. The Church, in all of her wisdom and compassion, understands the burden of the cross that some men with “deep-seated” homosexual tendencies must carry, and therefore affirm, they should not be ordained priests. Sadly, Father “B” himself, has a strong desire to feel a part of and belong to the normal community which, I believe, confirms the above mentioned Church’s criteria for priests, and also disqualifies him from ministering to those with same-sex attraction. Father “B”’s blog (internal link to previous post) is now password protected, so you will not have the opportunity to read some of his posts; some of which are beautifully done, while others illustrate how his battle with same-sex attraction has taken a toll on his heart and intellect.
It’s my understanding that the Funeral Mass should never contain a eulogy of any kind, but apparently the church in Australia allows for words of remembrance from a family member or friend at the end of a funeral Mass. Cardinal George Pell should seriously consider following the General Instruction of the Roman Missal, given the trend of the laity turning the sacramental Mass into re-makes of comedic funeral services commonly found in Hollywood scripts.
“On NOT a few occasions, inappropriate remarks glossing over the deceased’s proclivities (drinking prowess, romantic conquests etc) or about the Church (attacking its moral teachings) have been made at funeral masses,” Pell’s new guidelines say.
Quoting Archbishop Pilarczyk of Cincinnati: “The funeral liturgy is a celebration of salvation and mercy, of grace and eternal life. It is not meant to be a commemoration of the person who has died. Extended remembering of the deceased often results in forgetting the Lord.”
With a Puerto Rican accent and his 666 tatoo, this guy swears he’s the second coming of Christ. Why do I have a feeling this story may not end has we would hope?
Here’s another video that gives a little more insight to the cult.
This is what happens when sex abuse victims with unresolved issues project their anger towards their own abuser unto others. Excuse me for using the tired, old expression of the inmates running the assylum, but that’s pretty much nails my general impression of SNAP’s vigilante style of justice, damaging innocent lives and reputations along the way.
“The repeated claims of Ms. Brown and SNAP (see post below this one) to the media that we had been unresponsive are untrue. SNAP and Ms. Brown received written replies to every communication they have sent — a total of five responses to date. Copies of these are available upon request. (A convenient oops moment, after the story was already run by the Associated Press.) We have been informed that Ms. Brown and SNAP have recently determined they were in error, and did, in fact, receive our correspondence. SNAP has issued an apology for making those claims.
The anti-catholic SNAP, which has accused Pope Benedict XVI of being a polarizing figure who prefers combativeness to compromise and compassion, continues to wage war against authority and orthodoxy. In the name of justice they have already stuffed their pockets with profits, publicly accused innocent priests of sex abuse (refusing to recant accusation), and winning millions against dead priests. In keeping with their prideful tradition of pillaging the Church, SNAP and it’s attorneys have now turned their attention to the next largest and a very socially conservative religious group in North America, the Southern Baptists.
$NAP presented a letter to the Southern Baptist Convention in Nashville, asking it to adopt a zero-tolerance policy on sex abuse. SNAP also asked the Southern Baptists to create an independent review board to investigate molestation reports.
Church leaders concede there have been some incidents of abuse in Southern Baptist congregations. But they say their hands are tied when it comes to investigating complaints.
Baptist leaders say unlike the Catholic Church, with its rigid hierarchy, Baptist churches are independent.
Christa Brown of SNAP says in the past six months the organization has received reports of about 40 cases of sexual abuse by Southern Baptist ministers.
What are the odds that those reports were unsolicited. In the case of the Southern Baptist Convention, I’m wondering how long it will take SNAP to unveil another acronym?
A “do as I say, not as I do” brought to us by The Nw/Mw Grandiflora:
Bono, talk about poverty, champion the poor but you could make it easier for me as a “rich citizen of the West†by not appearing so obnoxiously, obviously hypicritial.
President Gregg Dedrick of Yum foods has sent a letter to the Vatican asking for a papal blessing of the new KFC 99 cent fish snacker sandwich.
According to a news release, the Vatican has confirmed receipt of the letter, but as of yet, no blessing has been bestowed.
Who can think of a better time to bestow a fish sandwich blessing than on Ash Wednesday? I’ll keep a close eye on this one.
Today through Thursday, The Portland International Film Festival will be screening a film called Madeinusa (made-in-usa?)which was developed at the Sundance Screenwriters lab in Los Angeles and was the recipient of the best original script at the Havana film festival and has gone to win praise at numerous international festivals. Madeinusa takes place in a Peruvian village which is characterized by its fervor of the Catholic faith. After a virgin Mary beauty contest held during lent, the village maintains a tradition which has never been questioned or changed by the faithful. However, this changes with the arrival of a young geologist who is persecuted and jailed.
The tradition takes place from Good Friday at 3 pm (the time of our Lord’s crucifixion) until Easter Sunday, at which time the entire village is given permission to do whatever it desires. There is no fear or remorse of their actions because sin doesn’t exist when ,”God is dead“. Predictably, the diabolical plot descends further into hell when it’s village parishioners indulge themselves in sexual sin, including rape and incest.
You have to wonder if the unknown directors of the world are starting to figure out that the formula for instant success is the negative portrayal of the Catholic Church, especially when it includes sexual dysfunction.
This phrase came to mind as I was running out to help Tricia unload groceries from the car a little while ago. We had spent the morning, once again, shoveling snow (I even had to get out the pickaxe to take out a rather hefty mound of frozen effluence in the driveway left by the snow plows, but this is a double digression) so the walkway to the car was clear and smooth.
Well, I figur’d no need put’n on my boots, the slippers will do just fine. On the way back to the house as I was descending the steps, I quickly found out that sans snow, the sidewalk took on an invisible glaze of ice. As I picked myself up off at the bottom of the steps, Tricia was coming up behind me. I prepared myself for expressions of concern. That’s not what I got. Rather, Tricia opined “I guess that’s why they call them slippers.” Somehow the fall hurt much worse after that.
Expressions of love, or the lack thereof, have a significant influence on the way one experiences life’s ups and downs. Perhaps this recognition might be what is behind a rather pernicious error that affects all too many priests today. If you are listening to a homily on just about any Gospel reading in which Jesus is confronting the Pharisees, as soon as you hear the priest recite the number of laws the Pharisees formulated you can guess what is coming next. Usually, this is counter-posed with Jesus’ “reduction” of the law to “love”; that is, love of God and neighbor. This observation is quickly followed up with a comparison to the number of canons in current Canon Law. What one is then invited to draw from this that the Church has obviously missed Jesus’ message and we have devolved back into a bunch of Pharisees. After all, all we need is love.
These homilists miss the irony that they in fact suffer from the same juridicism that afflicted the Pharisees. Love is the foundation of law but I suppose that part of their problem is a mistaken notion of love. All too often for modern Pharisees, love is replaced with a false sentimentalism in which you are simply supposed to try to force yourself to have “good feelings” about others. If you can have these good feelings, then nothing else is required. We are left with an emotivist type of morality. However, these emotivist Pharisees inconsistently transition to a natural law morality when it suits them, usually when it has to do with someone’s “rights.” When it comes to “rights,” is seems obvious to them that everyone must be able to recognize that this is a God given law.
Legal positivists/jurdicists also have a mistaken notion of reality. Love is not an emotion, but an ontological reality. God is Love. Therefore, human love, which is a participation in Trinitarian love has a structure to it that one cannot change. Love is authentic only when it is grounded in truth. God has created the cosmos in accord with this truth. Thus, divine law and natural law are not postivist impositions of God’s arbitrary will; much less human created restrictions on human freedom. They are roadmaps to a happy, fulfilled life.
One cannot authentically love his neighbor while turning a blind eye to his sins or even worse, encouraging him to behave in self destructive and socially destructive ways. For example, embracing the sexual dysfunction of others because they claim it makes them happy may be a source of mutual good feelings, but it is not love.
Human love exists because of Trinitarian love. Human love reaches its fullness in disinterested self-gift. This means that we desire the other’s good for his own sake. While making him feel good about himself, and ourselves, is nice, “good feelings” is not an end. The other’s authentic happiness and personal fulfillment in holiness is the only authentic, ultimate end for anyone. In order to achieve this he needs to know the truth about God, about himself, and about how he must deal with various situations in order to authentically fulfill himself.
Love is also an act of the will. It is possible because we have the freedom to choose…to choose excellence that is, not the freedom to choose indifferently. That is why Jesus told us that only those who do the Father’s will authentically love Him.
Therefore, in order to achieve authentic happiness and fulfillment, we require more than an easily mistaken, general phrase for our guidance. This necessary, more detailed guidance is what the Catholic Church provides us. We are given true freedom to live as God calls us to live because the Church unhesitatingly teaches us what is in accord with authentic love and what is not, in the various situations of life which we face. Canon law and the moral teachings form part of this teaching.
In the end, it is true that all you need is love but one must recognize what love really is and all that comes with it.
Bryan (The Tomfoolery of a Seminarian) passed on some information on Planned Parenthood’s duplicitous downplaying of Sexually Transmitted Diseases as being only infections.
♣ Planned Parenthood states they are among the organizations that prefer to think of STD’s as infections (STIs).
♣ All Plants and animals that reproduce develop STIs.
♣ 75% of sexually active people eventually get STIs.
♣ Testimony of an anonymous 34 year-old woman: Except for a case of crabs two years ago, I haven’t had a sexually transmitted infection in 10 years. I can tell you from experience — safer sex works.”
One theory I have behind this agenda is a simple business plan which exploits the most vulnerable. It’s no secret to Planned Parenthood that one of the most compelling reasons for teen abstinence is a fear of contracting STDs. If STDs are only infections that most sexually active get, than whats the big deal?(in fact, being part of the crowd may hold a significant value to the teen). More of teen abstinence means less of Planned Parenthood. As long as they break down the barriers to teen abstinence by providing a false sense of security and cheap condoms (as rated by Consumer Reports: Look at the very bottom - with the black dots), they will continue to maintain their viable, multi-million dollar business. The conflict of interest in this case could be compared to a dentist encouraging his patients to eat sweets, or a pulmonologist giving away free cigarettes at the office.
A clinical study conducted in Rome suggests that religious faith may help people recover more effectly from strokes and suggests spirituality can reduce the emotional stress which may impair in the recovery process, according to a report Thursday in the medical journal Stroke.
“The analysis showed higher scores on the anxiety and depression scale correlated significantly with lower scores on the religious and spirituality questionnaire,” said the American Heart Association, which publishes Stroke. “The association remained significant after adjusting for other factors that could influence a stroke patient’s degree of emotional distress (such as mental and physical functioning, living conditions and marital status),” it said in a statement.
Here is a cute video that shows quadruplets responding to their father’s funny faces . . . four “choices” giving such great joy to their parents:
Just days after being elected Bulgaria’s youngest Orthodox bishop, Nikolay saw it upon himself to call the Pope a heretic while being interviewed on television. His asinine comment was largely criticized by his fellow clerics.
“Plovdiv will see scandals on a monthly basis with this newly-hatched bishop,” Hristo Matanov, a former chief of the state’s Department of Ecclesiastical Matters said. “If he wants to play Jesus, than he should throw his silk cassock and give up all contemporary commodities and roam the Earth barefoot preaching.”
There was no single event that marked the schism between Rome and the Eastern Church, but a movement into and out of schism during a period of several centuries, with periods of reconciliations. The East’s final break with Rome did not come until the 1450s, with pressure from Muslims, most of the Eastern churches repudiated their union with Rome, and this is the split that continues upto our current day.
We were watching TV yesterday morning, trying to learn more about the snow storm making its way across the east central states, and I came to recall why I avoid, as much as possible, watching the popular media. The program was NBC’s Today Show and the issue was the “tragic” situation of couples continuing to live together after the “love” has “disappeared” from the marriage. This is the plug line from their website:
NBC’s Janet Shamlian takes a look at married couples who choose to live separate lives under the same roof instead of getting a legal divorce. Then, TODAY’s Al Roker talks with Dr. Gail Saltz about the new trend.
Shamlain’s portion (which is not on-line) provided the “sage” advice, that one’s concern for the children ought not be an inhibitor to going through with a divorce. The parents just need to explain to their children that their “journey together has now come to an end.” Roker’s interview with Dr. Saltz, a psychiatrist, was just as illuminating.
Saltz says that the reason for people living in this situation is fear. The fear arises from economics including the cost of divorce and the loss of income, the fear of being alone, and the fear about the impacts on children (Saltz admits that we now know about the long term negative effects on children of divorce but that short remark exhausts their treatment this concern). Roker offered that these fears did not legitimize living with someone whom you no longer loved. Saltz agreed. She warns that the problem is that people need intimacy, love, and sex (emphasis her’s).
Saltz says that what couples need to do is to seek counseling. Why, pray tell? Of course, counseling is needed in order to prepare the couples for a “healthy” divorce (whatever that may be). As an after thought, it seems, she offered that perhaps there might even be something left in the marriage that could allow it to be salvaged. But the over riding emphasis of Saltz’s discussion is on getting on with a “healthy” divorce.
Now here we have a “professional” psychiatrist who seems to suffer from emotivism. Emotivism is the defective view that moral judgments simply express our feelings. With emotivism, emotions like love are reduced to feelings and so if this “feeling” has “mysteriously” disappeared then it would seem that there is nothing one can do to restore it. There is no right or wrong about divorce, simply the need to ensure that the couples have the “intimacy, love, and sex” that they need; the welfare of the children be damned.
Classical philosophy shows us that love is an act of the will; it is not an emotion. Emotions ought to correspond to the rational faculties (which include the intellect and will) but they do not always do so immediately. However, emotions can and must be trained to submit themselves to reason, as they are created to do. Bad philosophy has negative consequences for society at large. Psychiatry has swallowed the philosophical errors of modernism and post-modernism and have called them science and medicine. It is time that they recognize that there is such a thing as human nature and that human nature entails more than simply biology. Modern medicine is in sore need of an adequate philosophical system in order to recover an authentic anthropology. Without this, they do not have a snow ball’s chance of actually helping their patients.
When the focus of marriage counseling is providing “healthy divorces” and saving a marriage is an afterthought that is viewed in terms of assessing whether there is anything there worth salvaging, we seem to have little chance of turning around the “free fall” of the family ( the state it has been in since the 1960s). I am not defending the non-divorce, divorce. Rather, I am saying that we need to recognize the truth about the human person if we are going to provide helpful advice and treatment to troubled marriages. Promoting the modern reductive understanding of the human person and erroneous ideas about personal needs will continue to damage marriages, families, children, and society. Heaven help us.
The Versace Clerical garb line - who’s designer was inspired by the personal secretary to Pope Benedict XVI, Father Georg Gänswein - won unanimous praise yesterday at the Men’s Fashion Week in Milan. According to designer Miss Versace, Father Gänswein represents, “a triumph of more brain and less muscle”.
“I was certainly inspired by him,” she said. “I find his austerity very elegant. It is the right moment to show an ethical and spiritual man, free from all those pointless details. I also like Gregorian garb.” She said her ideal man has biceps but “looks for his inside quality and trains it up, the muscles of the soul.”
Rumor has it that Pope Benedict offered a majority of the Vatican staff and employees his poor impression of the Versace personal secretary collection.
In a separate matter, Prada announced this morning that they will be working on an upgrade to their Papal Spring line for early 2008.
National Catholic Register has an excellent commentary on-line this week. It is written by a lady, Melinda Selmys, who suffers from same sex attraction disorder. She writes from her perspective as one who was presented with the Good News in a way that prepared her for the difficult conversion from her former way of life. This is the second in a series she is writing for the Register. Some snippets from Melinda’s article:
[snip]
What is most important, though, is that we realize that the reasons underlying homosexual behavior are genuine emotional and psychological needs or fears. People who experience these desires are people whose sexuality, and possibly the ability to identify with their own gender, has been wounded in some way.
It is, therefore, not enough to convince them that homosexual activity is wrong. There are plenty of people practicing homosexuality who believe in the immorality of their actions, but feel unable to stop because they don’t know of any other way to fulfill their fundamental, underlying needs.
Many have gone through years of guilt and shame before finally deciding that any God who demands such an impossible sacrifice is cruel, and any church that rejects their sexual actions is unjust. It is important, therefore, to seek to bring the healing power of God into their lives so that, rather than simply telling them to live chastely, we give them the emotional and psychological means by which to do so.
This work requires a one-on-one approach — it cannot be done through the mass media — and it cannot be achieved from the pulpit. Most people who have had any success in ministering to persons with same-sex attractions agree that you can’t get anywhere unless you first form a personal relationship.
This is one of the reasons why fear, hatred or disgust directed towards those who are attracted to their own sex is so crippling when it is found within the Christian community. It repels those who have embraced the “gay†lifestyle, and alienates those who are struggling to remain faithful in spite of their same-sex attractions.
[snip]
First, while it is important to be conscious of the psychological problems that may underlie a homosexual orientation, it is equally important not to openly psychoanalyze. People hate being told that their feelings and attitudes are the result of an Oedipus complex, even if it happens to be true. If it becomes appropriate to help them realize, at some point in a long-term relationship, that their feelings stem from a lack of comfort with identifying with their own gender, that’s fine, but you have to make sure that this conclusion is something that they are coming to realize themselves, not merely something that you are trying to tell them as a supposed expert.
Secondly, it is usually not a good idea to go into a deep discussion of the moral theology of sex unless they absolutely insist on doing so. Of course, you must never give the impression that you approve of what they are doing, but it is usually sufficient to say that, yes, as a Catholic, you support the Church’s teachings on homosexuality and believe that homosexual behaviors are morally wrong — but that those teachings don’t in any way interfere with your personal feelings of love or affection for them as a person.
One of the people who was most instrumental in my conversion to Catholicism took precisely this approach. I always knew that he didn’t approve of my sexual choices, but it was never one of the central concerns of our relationship. For the most part, it was something that didn’t even come up. Once you’ve established a relationship, it is tremendously important that you seek to undermine their identification of self with sexual preference.
This can be difficult, because our sexuality does form an important and integral part of our personality, and since those who experience same-sex attractions usually suffer from a wounded sense of sexual identity, it is easy to see why they would think that their “sexual orientation†was tied to something more profound and fundamental than the mere sex act itself.
Thus, if you tell someone suffering from same-sex attractions that their sexuality is objectively disordered and their behaviors are immoral, but that you love them in spite of their sexuality, they are going to call you a hypocrite. This sentiment is baffling to many Catholics because we tend to see same-sex attractions primarily in terms of homosexual intercourse. We need to bear in mind that many people in the homosexual community feel that they have only ever really been personally accepted by that community — not just because the outside world condemns homosexuality, but because some significant part of the outside world failed to accept their personality even before they had any sort of homosexual feelings.
As a result of this, their genuine personality traits — aspects of themselves that actually are part of the way God made them — are psychologically bound up with their homosexuality. The things that made society (or Daddy or whoever) reject them are a part of their “gayness,†and to reject their homosexuality is, in their eyes, to reject all of those aspects of their personality, as well.
What is necessary, therefore, is to show them that someone can love them, and love all of the things that they erroneously associate with homosexuality, without actually loving their sin. Only when this becomes a practical reality, rather than a theoretical tagline, will they actually believe that it is possible, and understand that they have an identity and a personality with which their sexual desires are not integrally connected.
Since we can’t bring people who identify themselves as “gay†into the Church simply by demonstrating that their actions are contrary to natural law, we need to use another approach.
The one that is most appropriate is, in fact, surprisingly simple: Make the faith appealing. Show them a God who is patient, merciful and loving, a God who brings healing to a world broken by sin. Talk to them about your faith, your experience of God’s healing power and of his forgiveness. Show them that God will meet, perfectly, all of the psychological needs that they have been trying to fulfill through homosexuality.
When I finally decided to join the Church, and to abandon my homosexual lifestyle, it was not because I had been rationally persuaded that homosexual acts were unnatural, it was because I had developed a relationship with God, and he asked it of me.
Go read the entire article.
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Theology of the Body Resources
Since their stint over at the Edwards blog didn’t work out, the girls over at