tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-61204130335559238522024-03-13T03:58:49.054-07:00Fortnight for Freedom CampaignAMERICA'S CITIZENS TAKE A STAND FOR RELIGIOUS LIBERTYChristina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.comBlogger331125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6120413033555923852.post-86353811861128943372013-05-17T05:27:00.001-07:002015-02-21T17:11:58.031-08:00Fight Against Legalized Abortion Continues in Ireland: An Insider's View<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEFRxjWHcAJiiPmFZJzMvH9mMyM1xCEabbgaXptic_7SnKZzfVQKNVfm_RkpbZd2GjgCWhMz3k0KMzzpWhKA60qPqVNQ4FuThPqEFuxwyLwQrpoVRfVMMa2W6Nru0A6nvjiGpZO0zCYcPo/s1600/Enda+demo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEFRxjWHcAJiiPmFZJzMvH9mMyM1xCEabbgaXptic_7SnKZzfVQKNVfm_RkpbZd2GjgCWhMz3k0KMzzpWhKA60qPqVNQ4FuThPqEFuxwyLwQrpoVRfVMMa2W6Nru0A6nvjiGpZO0zCYcPo/s1600/Enda+demo.jpg" height="220" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Irish women demonstrate outside the Parliament in Dublin against Prime Minister Enda Kenny's plan to legalize abortion in Ireland. </td></tr></tbody></table><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:OfficeDocumentSettings> <o:AllowPNG/> </o:OfficeDocumentSettings></xml><![endif]--> <div class="MsoNormal"><i> We offer this guest commentary from an advocate of the culture of life close to the ongoing fight for legalization of abortion in Ireland, one of the last two European nations, along with Malta, that protects unborn children under its laws.</i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">During the final stages of World War II in the Pacific, military aviators of the Empire of Japan<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>adopted their famous <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kamikaze </i>tactic<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">: </i>suicide missions in which Japanese pilots sacrificed themselves by crashing into Allied warships and other targets. The idea of engaging in a suicide mission by crashing and burning their planes was a tactic of desperation, when no better plan could be formulated to rescue Japan from its dire situation. Of course, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kamikaze</i> didn’t work. History records that over 4,000 young Japanese pilots sacrificed themselves, only 14 percent even reaching a target. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Kamikaze </i>is a good metaphor to describe the current flight plan of Fine Gael, under the leadership of <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Taosiech Mr. Enda Kenny. The <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kamikaze</i> missions between 1944 and the surrender of Japan were utterly destructive and failed as a strategy for Japanese victory during the crisis of the war. Today, Kenny seems intent on guiding the Fine Gael plane toward political demise, even if it destroys his government and his party to do so. Fine Gael under Kenny, is currently moving fast in a downward direction. For the first time since 2008, the opposition Fianna Fáil has managed to overtake Fine Gael, and the numbers could get worse. The <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Irish Times</i> states that Fianna Fáil’s support has “…almost doubled since last April.” Furthermore, the Taoiseach’s rating is at, “… its lowest...” since he became Prime Minister. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">And what is the Taosiech’s great big idea, at a time of unprecedented economic crisis in Ireland? Legalize abortion. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">There is a <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kamikaze</i>mission for you. Kenny explicitly promised Fine Gael’s supporters that he would not legislate for abortion, and voters remember electoral pledges. Fine Gael supporters are also one of the most prolife constituencies in Ireland. Kenny is not listening to his base on the issue of the sanctity of human life.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There is mounting evidence that he is not listening to their other concerns either. The Community Foundation for Ireland’s VitalSigns2012 Community Survey, open to all citizens on the World Wide Web,<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 13.5pt;"></span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>shows that─out of 119 issues─eight of the top ten addressed by respondents concern education in Ireland. The great majority of the public is clearly dissatisfied with employment, housing, and health issues. Interestingly enough religious and spiritual issues were found toward the bottom of the list. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">But what happens when ineffective government functionaries face economic crisis and have no plan for the needed recovery? They create a new and completely unnecessary crisis to distract from the real issues. What is Enda Kenny’s brilliant solution to the problems of Ireland? To ignite a new cultural and political war by throwing the abortion issue into the center of the public arena.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Legalizing abortion in Ireland may get Enda Kenny some points with the radical European elites, but as recent data shows, politics is local. This, simply put, is a political <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kamikaze</i> mission. Unless wiser heads such as Lucinda Creighton and others prevail, Kenny will be causing a completely unnecessary danger to members of his party.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">Yukoi Seki, the first commander of Japan’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kamikaze</i> pilots, stated what is surely the feeling of many Fine Gael parliamentarians today: “… I am going because I was ordered to.” Indeed, the training for the Japanese suicide missions required the leaders to crack the whip over those who were to carry them out. Intimidation and coercion were required to make sure the pilots did not step out of line. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Successful <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kamikaze</i> also entailed spiritual indoctrination: The pilots were trained to prepare psychologically to give their life for the Emperor by becoming <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kamikaze </i>(literally, “Divine wind”). Nonetheless, one Japanese commentator described it thus: “It’s a lie that they left filled with braveness and joy, crying. ‘Long live the emperor!’ They were sheep at a slaughter house. Everybody was looking down and tottering. Some were unable to stand up and were carried and pushed into the plane by maintenance soldiers.” </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">Let all of Fin Gael’s parliamentarian consider: Violating one’s conscience for a soon-to-be-replaced leader like Enda Kenny, is sure to be a disaster in the long run. If you allow it, this man, now virtually unknown, will take his place in world history as the father of abortion in Ireland. This will be his legacy. We will remember nothing else of this man. Poor Enda Kenny is being bullied by European radical elites, the Labour Party, and the abortion lobby. This pilot is not even in control of the plane.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">We say to all members of<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>political parties in Ireland who still have some humanity and solidarity with the unborn baby: Do not allow yourselves to be bullied by Enda Kenny. Get off the plane, before the crash. If enough refuse to cooperate, the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kamikaze </i>mission will fail.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">Dying for this clothes-less emperor is not worth your morals, your dignity as a politician, and your intellectual integrity. You were not elected to mindlessly follow Enda Kenny. You were elected carry out your duty to uphold the constitutional protection of the unborn child in Ireland. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">Voting to remove the protection of infants in the womb, preparing thus the road for the great evils of abortion to take hold of Ireland, is to embark on a suicidal mission. The evils abortion has unleashed medically, psychologically, morally, and spiritually upon hundreds of millions of women worldwide is scientifically verifiable. But as the tragedy of <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Japan’s young pilots should have taught us, a political <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kamikaze</i> mission requires those in the game to ignore facts, shun reality, close their eyes, and die for the emperor.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">It is an irony that the press, which should keep politicians honest, chooses to ignore the lies and false promises of Enda Kenny. 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table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman","serif";} </style><![endif]--> Christina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6120413033555923852.post-48613873293410599222013-05-17T05:27:00.000-07:002013-05-17T05:27:30.069-07:00Fight Against Legalized Abortion Continues in Ireland: An Insider's View<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEFRxjWHcAJiiPmFZJzMvH9mMyM1xCEabbgaXptic_7SnKZzfVQKNVfm_RkpbZd2GjgCWhMz3k0KMzzpWhKA60qPqVNQ4FuThPqEFuxwyLwQrpoVRfVMMa2W6Nru0A6nvjiGpZO0zCYcPo/s1600/Enda+demo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEFRxjWHcAJiiPmFZJzMvH9mMyM1xCEabbgaXptic_7SnKZzfVQKNVfm_RkpbZd2GjgCWhMz3k0KMzzpWhKA60qPqVNQ4FuThPqEFuxwyLwQrpoVRfVMMa2W6Nru0A6nvjiGpZO0zCYcPo/s1600/Enda+demo.jpg" height="220" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Irish women demonstrate outside the Parliament in Dublin against Prime Minister Enda Kenny's plan to legalize abortion in Ireland. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<i> We offer this guest commentary from an advocate of the culture of life close to the ongoing fight for legalization of abortion in Ireland, one of the last two European nations, along with Malta, that protects unborn children under its laws.</i></div>
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<br /></div>
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During the final stages of World War II in the Pacific,
military aviators of the Empire of Japan<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>adopted their famous <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kamikaze </i>tactic<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">: </i>suicide missions in which Japanese
pilots sacrificed themselves by crashing into Allied warships and other
targets. The idea of engaging in a suicide mission by crashing and burning their
planes was a tactic of desperation, when no better plan could be formulated to
rescue Japan from its dire situation. Of course, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kamikaze</i> didn’t work. History records that over 4,000 young
Japanese pilots sacrificed themselves, only 14 percent even reaching a target. </div>
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<br /></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Kamikaze </i>is a good
metaphor to describe the current flight plan of Fine Gael, under the leadership
of <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Taosiech Mr. Enda Kenny. The <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kamikaze</i> missions between 1944 and the
surrender of Japan were utterly destructive and failed as a strategy for
Japanese victory during the crisis of the war. Today, Kenny seems intent on
guiding the Fine Gael plane toward political demise, even if it destroys his government
and his party to do so. Fine Gael under Kenny, is currently moving fast in a
downward direction. For the first time since 2008, the opposition Fianna Fáil
has managed to overtake Fine Gael, and the numbers could get worse. The <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Irish Times</i> states that Fianna Fáil’s
support has “…almost doubled since last April.” Furthermore, the Taoiseach’s
rating is at, “… its lowest...” since he became Prime Minister. </div>
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<br /></div>
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And what is the Taosiech’s great big idea, at a time of
unprecedented economic crisis in Ireland? Legalize abortion. </div>
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<br /></div>
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There is a <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kamikaze</i>
mission for you. Kenny explicitly promised Fine Gael’s supporters that he would
not legislate for abortion, and voters remember electoral pledges. Fine Gael supporters
are also one of the most prolife constituencies in Ireland. Kenny is not
listening to his base on the issue of the sanctity of human life.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There is mounting
evidence that he is not listening to their other concerns either. The Community
Foundation for Ireland’s VitalSigns2012 Community Survey, open to all citizens
on the World Wide Web,<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 13.5pt;">
</span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>shows that─out of 119 issues─eight
of the top ten addressed by respondents concern education in Ireland. The great
majority of the public is clearly dissatisfied with employment, housing, and
health issues. Interestingly enough religious and spiritual issues were found
toward the bottom of the list. </div>
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<br /></div>
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But what happens when ineffective government functionaries face
economic crisis and have no plan for the needed recovery? They create a new and
completely unnecessary crisis to distract from the real issues. What is Enda
Kenny’s brilliant solution to the problems of Ireland? To ignite a new cultural
and political war by throwing the abortion issue into the center of the public
arena.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Legalizing abortion in Ireland
may get Enda Kenny some points with the radical European elites, but as recent
data shows, politics is local. This, simply put, is a political <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kamikaze</i> mission. Unless wiser heads
such as Lucinda Creighton and others prevail, Kenny will be causing a
completely unnecessary danger to members of his party.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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Yukoi Seki, the first commander of Japan’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kamikaze</i> pilots, stated what is surely
the feeling of many Fine Gael parliamentarians today: “… I am going because I
was ordered to.” Indeed, the training for the Japanese suicide missions
required the leaders to crack the whip over those who were to carry them out.
Intimidation and coercion were required to make sure the pilots did not step
out of line. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Successful <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kamikaze</i> also entailed spiritual
indoctrination: The pilots were trained to prepare psychologically to give
their life for the Emperor by becoming <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kamikaze
</i>(literally, “Divine wind”). Nonetheless, one Japanese commentator described
it thus: “It’s a lie that they left filled with braveness and joy, crying. ‘Long
live the emperor!’ They were sheep at a slaughter house. Everybody was looking
down and tottering. Some were unable to stand up and were carried and pushed
into the plane by maintenance soldiers.” </div>
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<br /></div>
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Let all of Fin Gael’s parliamentarian consider: Violating
one’s conscience for a soon-to-be-replaced leader like Enda Kenny, is sure to
be a disaster in the long run. If you allow it, this man, now virtually
unknown, will take his place in world history as the father of abortion in
Ireland. This will be his legacy. We will remember nothing else of this man.
Poor Enda Kenny is being bullied by European radical elites, the Labour Party, and
the abortion lobby. This pilot is not even in control of the plane.</div>
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<br /></div>
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We say to all members of<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>political parties in Ireland who still have some humanity and solidarity
with the unborn baby: Do not allow yourselves to be bullied by Enda Kenny. Get
off the plane, before the crash. If enough refuse to cooperate, the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kamikaze </i>mission will fail.</div>
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<br /></div>
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Dying for this clothes-less emperor is not worth your
morals, your dignity as a politician, and your intellectual integrity. You were
not elected to mindlessly follow Enda Kenny. You were elected carry out your
duty to uphold the constitutional protection of the unborn child in Ireland. </div>
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<br /></div>
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Voting to remove the protection of infants in the womb,
preparing thus the road for the great evils of abortion to take hold of Ireland,
is to embark on a suicidal mission. The evils abortion has unleashed medically,
psychologically, morally, and spiritually upon hundreds of millions of women
worldwide is scientifically verifiable. But as the tragedy of <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Japan’s young pilots should have taught us, a
political <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kamikaze</i> mission requires those
in the game to ignore facts, shun reality, close their eyes, and die for the
emperor.</div>
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<br /></div>
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It is an irony that the press, which should keep politicians
honest, chooses to ignore the lies and false promises of Enda Kenny. Instead,
Ireland’s press corps chooses to attack well-respected women politicians such
as Lucinda Creighton, who not only has had the courage to maintain her commitment
to the constitutional duty to protect the unborn, but also is a reminder to the
back benchers, that they are not expendable foot soldiers and that they should
refuse to go on these diversionary, yet lethal adventures with a man as weak as
Enda Kenny.</div>
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Christina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6120413033555923852.post-53426516815294981122013-05-17T04:47:00.001-07:002015-02-21T17:11:58.066-08:00UK Prelate Warns of Deeper Implications of Same-Sex Marriage Legislation<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuR3WHQ5sWdK0wVmy6iSO7SB0MyezwJJNYz-8ieaKGMMbd2OL4PmrSLGvBzJtaS_6Z9XGsp81gzzKapK3ScYwjnYRJB6KMvR2lcm77p1cAEfS6lP6LLKbSEgEWYHipGCdwrx4f8Oa0oTXx/s1600/Archbishio+Nichols.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuR3WHQ5sWdK0wVmy6iSO7SB0MyezwJJNYz-8ieaKGMMbd2OL4PmrSLGvBzJtaS_6Z9XGsp81gzzKapK3ScYwjnYRJB6KMvR2lcm77p1cAEfS6lP6LLKbSEgEWYHipGCdwrx4f8Oa0oTXx/s1600/Archbishio+Nichols.jpg" height="320" width="262" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Archbishop Vincent Nichols of Westminster </td></tr></tbody></table><br /><div> L<i>ONDON, May 16, 2013 (<a href="http://www.zenit.org/?utm_campaign=dailyhtml&utm_medium=email&utm_source=dispatch" style="color: #0000ee;" target="_blank">Zenit.org</a>) - Here is a statement from Archbishop Vincent Nichols of Westminster and Archbishop Peter Smith of Southwark regarding the same-sex "marriage" bill set to be debated next week in Parliament.</i><br /> <br /> We urge members of the House of Commons to think again about the long term consequences of the Marriage (same sex couples) Bill in deciding how to vote at the report stage and third reading debates next week (20-21 May).<br /> <br /> Many people within and beyond the faith communities deeply believe that the state should not seek to change the fundamental meaning of marriage. This proposed change in the law is far more profound than first appears. Marriage will become an institution in which openness to children, and with it the responsibility on fathers and mothers to remain together to care for children born into their family, is no longer central to society’s understanding of marriage. It is not too late for Parliament to think again and we urge MPs to do so.<br /> <br /> Furthermore, the Bill as currently drafted poses grave risks to freedom of speech and freedom of religion. If the Bill is to proceed through Parliament we urge members to ensure it is amended so that these fundamental freedoms we all cherish are clearly and demonstrably safeguarded. <br /><br />For more information on the same-sex "marriage" legislation in the UK:<br /> <a href="http://www.catholic-ew.org.uk/Home/Featured/Speak-Out-For-Marriage" style="color: #0000ee; text-decoration: underline;" target="_blank">http://www.catholic-ew.org.uk/Home/Featured/Speak-Out-For-Marriage</a><br /> </div>Christina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6120413033555923852.post-28384359916285116732013-05-17T04:47:00.000-07:002013-05-17T04:47:25.480-07:00UK Prelate Warns of Deeper Implications of Same-Sex Marriage Legislation<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuR3WHQ5sWdK0wVmy6iSO7SB0MyezwJJNYz-8ieaKGMMbd2OL4PmrSLGvBzJtaS_6Z9XGsp81gzzKapK3ScYwjnYRJB6KMvR2lcm77p1cAEfS6lP6LLKbSEgEWYHipGCdwrx4f8Oa0oTXx/s1600/Archbishio+Nichols.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuR3WHQ5sWdK0wVmy6iSO7SB0MyezwJJNYz-8ieaKGMMbd2OL4PmrSLGvBzJtaS_6Z9XGsp81gzzKapK3ScYwjnYRJB6KMvR2lcm77p1cAEfS6lP6LLKbSEgEWYHipGCdwrx4f8Oa0oTXx/s1600/Archbishio+Nichols.jpg" height="320" width="262" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Archbishop Vincent Nichols of Westminster </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br /><div>
L<i>ONDON, May 16, 2013 (<a href="http://www.zenit.org/?utm_campaign=dailyhtml&utm_medium=email&utm_source=dispatch" style="color: #0000ee;" target="_blank">Zenit.org</a>)
- Here is a statement from Archbishop Vincent Nichols of Westminster
and Archbishop Peter Smith of Southwark regarding the same-sex
"marriage" bill set to be debated next week in Parliament.</i><br />
<br />
We urge members of the House of Commons to think again about the long
term consequences of the Marriage (same sex couples) Bill in deciding
how to vote at the report stage and third reading debates next week
(20-21 May).<br /> <br /> Many people within and beyond the faith
communities deeply believe that the state should not seek to change the
fundamental meaning of marriage. This proposed change in the law is far
more profound than first appears. Marriage will become an institution in
which openness to children, and with it the responsibility on fathers
and mothers to remain together to care for children born into their
family, is no longer central to society’s understanding of marriage. It
is not too late for Parliament to think again and we urge MPs to do so.<br /> <br />
Furthermore, the Bill as currently drafted poses grave risks to freedom
of speech and freedom of religion. If the Bill is to proceed through
Parliament we urge members to ensure it is amended so that these
fundamental freedoms we all cherish are clearly and demonstrably
safeguarded. <br />
<br />
For more information on the same-sex "marriage" legislation in the UK:<br />
<a href="http://www.catholic-ew.org.uk/Home/Featured/Speak-Out-For-Marriage" style="color: #0000ee; text-decoration: underline;" target="_blank">http://www.catholic-ew.org.uk/Home/Featured/Speak-Out-For-Marriage</a><br />
</div>
Christina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6120413033555923852.post-20195885319331609792013-05-16T04:56:00.001-07:002015-02-21T17:11:58.086-08:00Asylum for Terrorists But Not For Christian Home-Schooling Family<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" class="article-img" src="http://www.lifesitenews.com/images/sized/images/news/RomeikeFamily-405px-240x160.jpg" height="266" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="400" /></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Uwe and Hannelore Romeike and their six children: Denied political asylum from a German government that wants to force their children into public school </td></tr></tbody></table><i>From Life Site News, we get the following chilling report on just how far the Obama Administration's attack on the family has moved ahead in the United States.</i><br /><br />PURCELLVILLE, VA., May 14, 2013 (<a href="http://www.lifesitenews.com/">LifeSiteNews.com</a>) - Today the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the Obama Administration's denial of asylum granted to Uwe and Hannelore Romeike and their six children. <br /><br />The Romeikes fled Germany in 2008 when they were subjected to criminal prosecution for homeschooling. In Bissingen, district of Ludwigsburg, Baden-Württemberg , they faced exorbitant fines, forcible removal of their children, and possible imprisonment all for homeschooling their children.<br /><br />The Supreme Court of Germany declared that the purpose of the German ban on homeschooling was to "counteract the development of religious and philosophically motivated parallel societies."<br /><br />For a moving video account of the Romeikes' fight to educate their children according to the dictates of their conscience,click here: <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=TTw8x4Uuf8Y">http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=TTw8x4Uuf8Y</a><br /><br />The family, currently residing in Tennessee, was granted asylum in 2010 by Immigration Judge Lawrence O. Burman, but that grant was overturned by the Board of Immigration Appeals in 2012.<br />A three-judge panel of the Sixth Circuit heard the Romeikes' appeal on April 23 in Cincinnati, and issued today's unanimous decision against the family. Uwe Romeike, a piano teacher, said that if the courts turned down their asylum completely, “it would mean they would send us back to Germany where we would face the same persecution as when we left.”<br /><br />"We believe the Sixth Circuit is wrong and we will appeal their decision," said Michael Farris, HSLDA Founder and Chairman. "America has room for this family and we will do everything we can to help them."<br />The court said that the Romeikes had not made a sufficient case and that the United States has not opened its doors to every victim of unfair treatment. Although the court acknowledged that the U.S. Constitution recognizes the rights of parents to direct the education and upbringing of their children, it refused to concede that the harsh treatment of religiously and philosophically motivated homeschoolers in Germany amounts to persecution within our laws on asylum.<br /><br />"Germany continues to persecute homeschoolers," said Mike Donnelly, HSLDA Director of International Affairs. "The court ignored mountains of evidence that homeschoolers are harshly fined and that custody of their children is gravely threatened -- something most people would call persecution. This is what the Romeikes will suffer if they are sent back to Germany.<br /><br />HSLDA will appeal the Sixth Circuit's ruling.<br /><br />A White House petition to stop deportation of the Romeikes currently has 123,229 signatures and can be accessed <a href="http://www.hslda.org/legal/cases/romeike/petition.asp">here</a>.Christina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6120413033555923852.post-53872087081534231682013-05-16T04:56:00.000-07:002013-05-17T04:41:55.114-07:00Asylum for Terrorists But Not For Christian Home-Schooling Family<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" class="article-img" src="http://www.lifesitenews.com/images/sized/images/news/RomeikeFamily-405px-240x160.jpg" height="266" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Uwe and Hannelore Romeike
and their six children: Denied political asylum from a German government that wants to force their children into public school </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<i>From Life Site News, we get the following chilling report on just how far the Obama Administration's attack on the family has moved ahead in the United States.</i><br />
<br />
PURCELLVILLE, VA., May 14, 2013 (<a href="http://www.lifesitenews.com/">LifeSiteNews.com</a>)
- Today the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the Obama
Administration's denial of asylum granted to Uwe and Hannelore Romeike
and their six children. <br />
<br />
The Romeikes fled Germany in 2008 when they were subjected to criminal
prosecution for homeschooling. In Bissingen, district of Ludwigsburg,
Baden-Württemberg , they faced exorbitant fines, forcible removal of
their children, and possible imprisonment all for homeschooling their
children.<br />
<br />
The Supreme Court of Germany declared that the purpose of the German
ban on homeschooling was to "counteract the development of religious and
philosophically motivated parallel societies."<br />
<br />
For a moving video account of the Romeikes' fight to educate their children according to the dictates of their conscience,click here: <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=TTw8x4Uuf8Y">http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=TTw8x4Uuf8Y</a><br />
<br />
The family, currently residing in Tennessee, was granted asylum in 2010
by Immigration Judge Lawrence O. Burman, but that grant was overturned
by the Board of Immigration Appeals in 2012.<br />
A three-judge panel of the Sixth Circuit heard the Romeikes' appeal on
April 23 in Cincinnati, and issued today's unanimous decision against
the family. Uwe Romeike, a piano teacher, said that if the courts turned
down their asylum completely, “it would mean they would send us back to
Germany where we would face the same persecution as when we left.”<br />
<br />
"We believe the Sixth Circuit is wrong and we will appeal their
decision," said Michael Farris, HSLDA Founder and Chairman. "America has
room for this family and we will do everything we can to help them."<br />
The court said that the Romeikes had not made a sufficient case and
that the United States has not opened its doors to every victim of
unfair treatment. Although the court acknowledged that the U.S.
Constitution recognizes the rights of parents to direct the education
and upbringing of their children, it refused to concede that the harsh
treatment of religiously and philosophically motivated homeschoolers in
Germany amounts to persecution within our laws on asylum.<br />
<br />
"Germany continues to persecute homeschoolers," said Mike Donnelly,
HSLDA Director of International Affairs. "The court ignored mountains of
evidence that homeschoolers are harshly fined and that custody of their
children is gravely threatened -- something most people would call
persecution. This is what the Romeikes will suffer if they are sent back
to Germany.<br />
<br />
HSLDA will appeal the Sixth Circuit's ruling.<br />
<br />
A White House petition to stop deportation of the Romeikes currently has 123,229 signatures and can be accessed <a href="http://www.hslda.org/legal/cases/romeike/petition.asp">here</a>.Christina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6120413033555923852.post-318345499083969462013-05-15T05:32:00.001-07:002015-02-21T17:11:58.140-08:00Flashback to 2012 Fortnight for Freedom: Father Marcel Guarnizo on the Will of the State vs. Freedom of Conscience<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:OfficeDocumentSettings> <o:RelyOnVML/> <o:AllowPNG/> </o:OfficeDocumentSettings></xml><![endif]--><br /><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:TrackMoves/> <w:TrackFormatting/> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> 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Name="Bibliography"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" QFormat="true" Name="TOC Heading"/> </w:LatentStyles></xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 10]><style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:14.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} </style><![endif]--> <br /><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: small;"><i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; line-height: 150%;">Fr. Marcel Guarnizo,</span></i></span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: small;"> </span><span style="font-size: small;">a philosopher, theologian, and activist involved in economic and cultural issues in Europe and the United States, gave this address to the Fortnight for Freedom Campaign's June 30, 2012 seminar in Purcellville, Virginia.</span></i></div><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;"> </span></div><br /><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwoA0XQqYdbqA651U6-EkiQbYg7HenlJLs-RKedcG8OTTHHu6attQ0V2euMP9-O_OFThFuh_QkHkKtRPWofKXXPRpGEJ349Hr7jEmE1x4TiEbhn-EJqEu6tnN1wCzj0rpkTZC_yGyhhyTk/s1600/Father+CNA.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwoA0XQqYdbqA651U6-EkiQbYg7HenlJLs-RKedcG8OTTHHu6attQ0V2euMP9-O_OFThFuh_QkHkKtRPWofKXXPRpGEJ349Hr7jEmE1x4TiEbhn-EJqEu6tnN1wCzj0rpkTZC_yGyhhyTk/s1600/Father+CNA.jpg" height="253" width="320" /></a></div><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">This event during the Fortnight of Freedom seeks to be a response to the Holy Father’s call and the call of the bishops of the United States to cooperate, educate, and seek to defend our constitutional freedoms in our American democracy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In this effort we join not only Catholics but also other believers and people of good will who understand the danger the republic finds itself in.</span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">I will present a more theoretical understanding of the right to religious freedom in our post-modern world and the praxis or practice which has nearly completely superseded the theoretical analysis of this problem.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I think the new practical approach is a mistake, and I think so because good practice follows only from good theory.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I hope that what I have to say will convince all of us here that we must engage in an educational effort on the basis of good theory, for far too many Americans are being duped or not paying attention to the real threats of our time.</span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Jefferson once wrote that a democracy cannot remain both ignorant and free.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is something to think about:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It cannot remain both ignorant and free.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The events of last Thursday [the U.S. Supreme Court decision upholding ObamaCare], put a dramatic, urgent note on what we’re doing here. I will try to talk toward the end about practical things that can be done and some of the practical implications of where we find ourselves after the decision of the Supreme Court to uphold the Obama mandate and the healthcare law.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I think most Americans are starting to wake up and realize that they can no longer sit on the fence; that we must act and we must participate in the public square in the debate, for the result of this debate, I would argue, may alter or preserve the American democracy for future generations.</span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Earlier this year, <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>on January 19<sup>th</sup> during the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">ad lumina</i> visit of the American bishops to Rome, Pope Benedict XVI said the following regarding the problems of religious freedom in the United States:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“The seriousness of the challenges which the Church in America is called to confront in the near future cannot be underestimated. It is imperative that the entire Catholic community in the United States come to realize the grave threats to the Church’s public moral witness presented by the radical secularism which finds increasing expression in the political and cultural spheres.”</span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“The seriousness of this threat” he went on to say, “needs to be clearly appreciated at every level of ecclesial life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Of particular concern are certain attempts being made to limit that most cherished of American freedoms: The freedom of religion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Others [meaning the bishops] have spoken to me of a worrying tendency to reduce religious freedom to mere freedom of worship without guarantees of respect for freedom of conscience.”</span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">This excursus into the history of religious freedom is a complicated one particularly once we get to America and how the idea of religious freedom filtered down to the Constitution and then to the Bill of Rights.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m not going to revisit that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I think it’s a complicated problem and I think there are different interpretations of the problem.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But in the general, more macro level of the problem, religious freedom has always been a question and the struggle to preserve religious freedom is much more ancient, of course, than our own Constitution or the Bill of Rights.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The First Freedom</span></b></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">When Moses was asked by Yahweh to lead the people of Israel out of Egypt, it was a problem of religious freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A lot of people think that Yahweh was emancipating the slaves but that is not what Yahweh said.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is clear if you read Exodus, chapters 5-8. In Exodus 8:1 for instance, this is what Yahweh says: “Let my people go that they may serve me.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is important: <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the end of freedom: “that they may serve me.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Moses told the Pharaoh, “We will go three days’ journey into the wilderness and sacrifice to Yahweh our God as he shall command us.” Notice, he was asking for permission to go for three days and worship.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It wasn’t a request for emancipation or abolition of slavery.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">This is the first point: There are bigger, more important things than political freedom. Religious freedom and cultural freedom supersede, hierarchically, political freedom. This is true, although, as the Israelites would find out, political freedom is necessary in order to preserve religious freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s why they get emancipated―because they cannot continue to serve and worship God without political and economic freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pharaoh said, Exodus 8:28 “I will let you go that you may sacrifice to Yahweh, your God in the wilderness, only you shall not go very far away.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pray for me.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is completely a religious freedom issue.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Israelites are going to worship, God has commanded it, and they’re asking precisely for that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In fact, that’s all that Yahweh was asking for in the beginning.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Moses said, “Behold I go out from you and I will pray to Yahweh” but of course, as we know the story as it unfolds. Exodus 8: 32 “Pharaoh hardened his heart this time also and he didn’t let the people go.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pharaoh refuses to let them go, the plagues come, and political freedom comes as a consequence.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">From the beginning of the Judeo-Christian era we have faced this problem: Religious freedom is denied by the rulers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It tells us clearly though, as I just pointed out, that there are different hierarchies and the freedoms that need to be preserved in a democracy but also under every regime that exists; and they always exists together.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The notion of political freedom, economic freedom, and cultural freedom are interlocked.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They go up and down together. So, if you lose cultural freedom you will lose more political and economic freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you lose economic freedom you will lose political and cultural freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I could give many examples of this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But suffice it to see the experiments of the socialist revolution: The more economic power the regime gained, not respecting, for instance, the rights to private property, the more cultural freedom was denied to the people and the less religious freedom, freedom to worship, the populations had.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We now face the same problem even in our own nation. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As we lose cultural freedoms, we see that, more and more, inalienable rights cease to be respected.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It becomes less and less of a problem therefore for a government to take away economic freedom and political freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">1973: The Line in the Sand</span></b></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">I would argue that the big first loss of cultural freedom in this country was 1973. And of course I am referring to the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Roe vs. Wade</i>decision. The moment you allow the government to cross that line of the first inalienable right, the right to life, all other rights cannot be secured, theoretically speaking.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So it’s a question of time; it’s a question of political maneuvering, but that first right being conceded opens the floodgates to the loss of economic and political freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Cultural freedom is composed of two things in a democracy:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The religion of the political society that we’re speaking of, and in this case we’re speaking of Western civilization so therefore the religion of the West, the Catholic faith; and the philosophical presuppositions that underlie the notions of the institutions, laws, and ethics of that society.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Very generally, we talk about the three hills on which Europe and Western civilization were built—the combination of Roman law, Greek philosophy and the Judeo-Christian tradition.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There was a big debate in Europe concerning the preamble of the Constitution of the European Union: Should <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>it include Christianity as an historical element that impacted, influenced the creation and formation of Europe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Ultimately, it was decided to exclude all references to Christianity. This is a tragedy. And it is simply contrary to historical fact.</span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">What we knew as Europe at the time of Charlemagne―which was known as Christendom―was called “Christendom” for a reason. The historical argument is inescapable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But it’s important to realize that the Catholic Church was not just a midwife of Europe, influencing, impacting the birth of Europe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Catholic Church gave birth to Europe, is in fact “the mother of Europe.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At the time, the Golden Age of Greece had long disappeared.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Roman Empire had fallen. The Church actually held it all together to bring about what we now know as western civilization.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That would come to us, as Russell Kirk elaborated in his book <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Roots of the American Order,</i> via London and Philadelphia.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you read Kirk’s book, you will see how western civilization was brought historically to the United States.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Now the notion of religious freedom was present in two other historical documents which are very significant:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Charter of Liberties which precedes and was a precursor to the Magna Charta.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This document dates to the year 1100 after Christ. It was written by the English King<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Henry I and its 14 articles delineated certain rights to be enjoyed by the kingdom’s earls and barons, and in particular, the Church.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The first article guaranteed religious liberty. (It’s an interesting thing, that every time we hear about religious freedom it happens to be the first liberty enumerated.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You see the same thing in our Bill of Rights.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It reads: “I, Henry, by the grace of God having been crowned the King of England, shall not take or sell any property from a Church upon the death of a bishop or abbot, until a successor has been named to that Church property. I shall end all the oppressive practices which have been an evil presence in England.”</span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">So, already, the Church is claiming its rightful ownership of property but also its position in civil society.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Likewise, it’s important to say that the Charter of Liberties, when it was signed, was witnessed by three bishops.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>With the <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Magna Charta of 1215 you see the same thing:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When you read the preamble you will find all the people who were there, the signatories and those who were ratifying the document.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Among them, Stephen, Archbishop of Canterbury, primate of all England and Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church; Henry, Archbishop of Dublin; William of London and others; Benedict of Rochester, bishop; members of the household of our Lord the Pope. The Magna Carta again discusses and affirms the liberties of the Church.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The first article reads: “In the first place we have granted to God and by this our present charter, confirm for us and our heirs forever that the English Church shall be free.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s the first article!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It continues: “…and shall have her rights entire and liberties inviolate.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And we will that it be thus observed, which is apparent from this that the freedom of elections which is reckoned most important and very important to the English Church we of our pure and unconstrained will did grant and did by our charter confirm and did obtain the ratification of the same from our Lord, Pope Innocent III.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">So you see how important this is: Whenever our forebears thought of liberties, freedom of religion was the first.</span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;"><br /><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The View of the Founding Fathers</span></b></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">It is interesting that we’re at Patrick Henry College today. As you know, Patrick Henry was an anti-Federalist.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The anti-Federalists did not want to ratify the Constitution. Patrick Henry is now seen as the great champion of liberty, probably because of his famous line, “Give me liberty or give me death.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But he did not want to ratify the Constitution.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And one of the reasons the anti-Federalists did not want to ratify the Constitution was because they felt that it did not contain sufficient individual protections for the individual, that individual liberties were not being protected. So they argued for and obtained a Bill of Rights, the first ten amendments to the Constitution. The First Amendment of that Bill of Rights protects religious freedom. The Bill of Rights would be ratified in 1791, as you know.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Madison was originally not so keen on these amendments as you may know. Jefferson, in a letter, chastises Madison for not including a bill of rights in the Constitution. [Eventually, Madison campaigned for and drafted a Bill of Rights—ed.]. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s interesting to hear Madison’s original wording of the First Amendment. Wrote Madison: “The civil rights of none shall be abridged on account of religious belief or worship.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nor shall any national religion be established nor shall the full equal rights of conscience in any way, any matter, or any pretext be infringed.” This wording was published in the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Congressional Register</i> in 1789.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It did not end up like this, as the law of the land, as we all know, but Madison’s formulations help us understand the intent of the founders in including the First Amendment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I like it better than the one we have now.</span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Two things are important which are also present in the First Amendment today but may not be as clear: We are talking about civil rights that should not be abridged because of religious belief and worship.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s an important thing to say, that all human beings have these rights and they ought to be preserved by the constitutional protections in the United States.</span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The second thing is that no national religion shall be established.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This seems to me to be a clear refusal of a confessional state, <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>that is, the establishment of an official state religion, in the United States. It is not, however, as some interpret, the establishment of <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>a wall of separation between the state and the Church.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was denying the possibility of a confessional state. It was not denying the role of religion in civil society. </span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Now, why is this important?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s important because religious freedom can be preserved under many forms.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not having a confessional state is not a guarantee of religious freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A non-confessional state is one form that can be chosen if other guarantees are in place.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But there’s nothing intrinsically impossible about having a confessional state that respects religious freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A confessional state is not contradictory to religious freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I just want to make that point because some people think a confessional state would be contrary to religious freedom, and that is not the case. Malta is a confessional state.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The official religion of Malta is Catholicism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It doesn’t mean that you cannot have religious freedom just because you have a confessional state.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>People worship in Malta under different religions, yet their constitution guarantees a confessional state under Catholicism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s not the form that we in the United States chose, but I just want to point out it’s not the only one. </span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Jefferson observed when he wrote the Virginia Act<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>for Establishing Religious Freedom in 1786 that the religion of every man must be left to the conviction and conscience of every man.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And it is the right of every man to exercise it as these may dictate.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This right is in its nature an inalienable right, so the right to religious freedom inalienable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is the duty of every man to render the Creator such homage and such only as he believes acceptable to him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So we add one note here:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Jefferson is calling religious freedom an “inalienable right,” and I think this is the first thing to know.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If someone should ask, “What is religious freedom?” you should start there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Tell them it is an <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">inalienable right</i> and explain what that means.</span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Now I will deal with the First Amendment only vis-à-vis religious freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As you know, the First Amendment speaks about more things than religious freedom. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It states: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This respecting of an establishment of religion―because we have young people here―does not mean respect or disrespect.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It means regarding, regarding an establishment of religion―no confessional state.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It continues “…or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” the second clause.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And it goes on, “or abridging the freedom of speech or of the press or of the right of the people peaceably to assemble and to petition the government for redress of grievances.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Obviously, there is a relationship between religious freedom and the other two:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>freedom of speech and the right of the people to peaceably assemble. The right of assembly is here coupled with the right of the freedom of speech.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But what is the highest form of speech? The highest form of speech is worship.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s why it’s first.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But that’s why it’s connected to speech. If the highest form, the most demanding in a sense, but the one that perfects men’s nature the most is not guaranteed, all other rights to speech become irrelevant.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you do not have the right to pray, freedom of speech is not fulfilled.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Second, the right of association which we’re exercising here―we have a right to associate here―the highest right of association comes when people come together to worship.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s the point, that the first liberty guarantees. It is a foundation for other liberties that we have and that we need in a political society.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;"><br /><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">What Is Freedom of Religion?</span></b></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Now I will move on to problem we are now faced with as concerns our religious freedom </span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">We live in a society that does not understand terminology any more, and concepts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is due to a lot of bad post-modern philosophy in our day and age. So, the first concept we must understand is “religious.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s important to understand what religion is before we understand what religious freedom is.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The etymology of the word has several possibilities but I will stick to one from which the word religion is derived, which is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">religare</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">ligare</i> is to bind one’s self; to tie up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Religare</i>gives the notion to bind one’s self yet again.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Right?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“re” – repetition;<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">religare</i>―binding one’s self anew.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Of course, and the object of this binding, this tying of one’s self is to God, in mind and heart and in action.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The fact that there is an amendment on religious freedom, already illuminates one important dispute we’ve had with the modern world which is very important, that this action of binding oneself implies that man is free by nature.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Only free beings can do this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is very important.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You must be free to do this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Animals cannot bind themselves to anything.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To make that kind of moral commitment, spiritual commitment, it takes a free being. </span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">This concept is diametrically opposed to the modernist determinism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The moderns have taught for decades now, centuries, that we are genetically determined, biologically determined, economically determined (such as Marxism), psychologically determined―in short, that we are not free.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For all the talk about freedom in the modern world, the moderns have been the biggest enemies of man’s freedom and the biggest deniers that man is free.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Church has stood staunchly as a defender of man and his freedom, of the truth that freedom is a part of man’s nature―we are free beings.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We must be free, metaphysically speaking, in order to participate in religion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To perform the act of religion you must be free, and that’s a big, big philosophical, metaphysical statement from the outset.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Now the act itself of faith also requires us to be free in our actions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is to say, faith, if coerced, is no longer faith.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The act of faith itself by its nature requires a free act. So you can be forced to confess a faith in which you do not believe against your conscience, but it does not mean you have made an act of faith.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You must be free to make an act of faith.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The moment that you are not free the act of faith disappears; it is destroyed by coercion. This is why the act of religion cannot be coerced because you cannot possibly have faith if it’s coerced.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So you must be free to exercise the act of freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Now freedom of religion was always called, “the first freedom” and I want to give you two reasons why that is really important.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Notice, it is not the first “right,” so be careful.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The first right is the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">right to life</i>, because if you don’t exist you have no freedoms to exercise.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So the first right is the right to life―correctly so.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But the first freedom is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">freedom of religion</i>, and I will tell you why.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One reason is metaphysical, philosophical, it has to do with reality. That is to say, the relationship that immediately begins to exist from the moment that you exist, the moment of conception, between you and God, antecedes every other relation you will ever have.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s before the relation that you have with your parents, political relationships, friends, etc.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The relationship to God is antecedent and is not chosen.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is a relation that is supernatural because God is a supernatural being, but in a sense it is natural because it starts from the moment that we come to be.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s first before any other relation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, it antecedes all other relations.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In the portal of Patrick Henry College there is a quote from Colossians (Col. 1:17) which I think sums it up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It says, “You existed before all things and all things exist through You.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That sums it up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nothing is before God. Not just morally speaking, because God ought to be loved and worshiped.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No, metaphysically speaking, ontologically speaking, nothing is before God in our life. </span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Of course, this is not first to you in your mind.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is to say, you don’t realize immediately upon conception what the first relationship is.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is a subjective thing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You have to come to realize that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But that it is ontologically first is without question.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The first things that come to your mind are the things that exist in reality.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And from those and the causes you reach the effects, the cause, namely knowledge of God. But ontologically this is first.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is also first in another sense―hierarchically.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is the most important relation that we have.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So it is the first in the realm of being but it is also first in the moral order, hierarchically. It is the most important relationship that we have.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In fact it is the relationship to which all other relationships and actions of man as a moral agent are ordered to.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So it’s the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">end</i> of all other relationships and actions, and that is an important thing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Why Religious Freedom is Inalienable</span></b></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">That is why all other relationships, in a sense, are subordinate to the proper ordering of this relationship.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s why St. Thomas More said he wanted to serve the king <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">but God first</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This gives you an idea of why it is an inalienable right.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is “inalienable,” meaning it cannot be alienated from us; it cannot be taken away from us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In the realm of being, it’s impossible to be alienated from this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is possible through the positive law to obstruct the proper exercise of the first relationship or the first freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But in the moral realm it is inalienable and therefore outside the jurisdiction not just of the state but any other intermediary structure in society because the origin of the freedom does not derive from that instance ; it’s not derived from the state, it is not derived from the intermediary structures ; it is derived from a source <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">outside</i> of the temporal order.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In fact, the relationship is supernatural; it is beyond the temporal.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Therefore, the state has no jurisdiction over inalienable rights.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is not a grant of the government; it is not something the government can negotiate with.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is not something that you depend on the government to receive.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is given to you because you are the kind of being that you are.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The human nature that you possess gives you, as a free being created by God, this inalienable right.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So whenever it is obstructed, it will always be an injustice because the government is going outside of its own jurisdiction.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is violating rights that are prior to the constitution of any government.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Now, to the second part of the problem, the notion of freedom, which is really problematic and I will be brief on that, but I think it’s important.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We say, “freedom of religion,” but it is important to know precisely what we are saying.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The notion of religious freedom that the Second Vatican Council presented was highly objectionable to people like <span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Marcel Lefebvre</span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>because he thought when we say, “freedom of religion,” he felt that it was, in a sense, religious indifferentism; that everybody is free to believe whatever they want to believe; that there is no ordaining category; there is no true religion; everybody can follow whatever they wish; a sort of religious indifferentism or religious relativism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Marcel Lefebvre would eventually break away from the Church on this issue.</span></span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">So I want to show you how that it <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">not</i> the case, that everybody is free to believe whatever they want to believe, though in America religious freedom is understood like that, unfortunately.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We will not even talk about what actually constitutes a religion, but in America any belief is synonymous with religion, so I just highlight that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Belief is not a synonym of religion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We have <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">religious believers</i> and we have <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">believers</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But to be a <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">religious believer</i> you must meet certain requirements.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So Wicca, Christian Science, these things are not religion even though they’re treated like religion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It would be easy to show philosophically how they are <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">not</i> a religion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">In any case, the key here is that there are three types of freedom, or three orders of freedom, that you have to keep in mind to understand the problem.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The second clause of the first part of the First Amendment, that “…Congress shall not prohibit the free exercise thereof…” (meaning religion)―there is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">physical freedom</i>, the capacity not to be coerced, not to be constrained; the capacity to take action in the world and not be constrained―that is physical freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is clearly necessary for religious freedom, right?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you’re stuck in a dungeon being tortured, your physical freedom is being impeded.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Or if you’re being forced to go to worship or to a communist propaganda parade or something, you are coerced.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Second is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">psychological freedom</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In order to have religious freedom you must have psychological freedom as well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is the possibility for the intellect to pursue truth in accordance with its capacity or the knowledge that it has.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You cannot be brainwashed and say you’re exercising your religious freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These two must always be guaranteed:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Physical and psychological freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, you must be free to worship where you want, you must be psychologically free to choose to worship if you so choose in accordance with the dictates of your conscience.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is the problem of religious indifferentism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Some people will say the post-secular version of this is there is no truth that we can discern; no religion can be true, therefore everybody has a right to believe whatever they want to believe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, I want to correct that on the nature of the last form of freedom: moral freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">You are not morally free to believe whatever you want to believe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is where the accountability comes and religious relativism and indifferentism is stopped.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is not true that in the exercise of religious freedom, vis-à-vis God, whatever revelation you believe, whatever religion you believe, is completely equal and indifferent to God.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is not true.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You are not morally free <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">not</i> to pursue the truth that the intellect seeks at its highest level, namely the pursuit of religious freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is not true that you’re free to go against your conscience if God has called you or you have seen the revelation to be true.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Church affirms, of course, that there is no salvation outside of the Church (<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">ex ecclesia, nulla salus</i>).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It does not mean that only Catholics go to Heaven.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">does</i> mean that if by neglect, obstinacy, rebellion or sheer laziness of not knowing what you should have known vis-à-vis religion, you will be accountable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You are not morally free to just believe whatever you want to believe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You’re not accountable to the temporal powers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s the difference.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You’re not accountable to the state; you’re not accountable to an inquisition.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You’re accountable to God but you’re still not morally free and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">that</i> is what prevents religious indifferentism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There is one, true revelation and metaphysically speaking only one is possible because God neither changes his mind nor has opinions about matters.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So there’s only one Divine revelation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So yes, you’re not free morally to believe whatever you want to believe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>God will judge given the graces that you have received in your life, whether your choices were in accordance with conscience, and only God can judge that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But there is no religious indifferentism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Do you see that? </span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The pursuit of truth requires you to be intellectually free to pursue truth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You have to be free to explore, to seek the truth in religion freely.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Example:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A lot of post-modern parents don’t want to teach their children religion because they want to let them choose when they grow up, to be free to honor their dignity and they will choose.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Of course they end up without religion by the time they’re 15 and then they regret their choices.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The problem here is that their argument, completely theoretically flawed, is that education is coercive; that to educate somebody is to coerce them or to inhibit <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>their freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is why liberal arts existed because they free man from ignorance and the highest form of learning is religious.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But you must be free.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You cannot be indoctrinated. If you’re a child in a madrassa school and the teacher is indoctrinating you to commit suicide on behalf of God, this is contrary to psychological freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There may be a twelve year old child who commits a suicide bombing attempt thinking that he’s really obeying God. But I don’t think he’s psychologically free. So we have must have the freedom of the mind to pursue truth which is the highest objective.</span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The Question of Tolerance</span></b></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There is a lot of talk about the notion of tolerance; we must be tolerant.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A lot of Catholic die-hard conservatives don’t like the idea of tolerance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s like anathema or the liberal code word for “relativism.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But I love the notion of tolerance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ll tell you why.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Of course “tolerance” in our day has come to mean we must tolerate all opinions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They’re all of equal value because there is no truth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But that’s an improper definition of tolerance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Tolerance already denotes philosophically that something is true.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The reason you tolerate a departure from the truth is because something actually is objectively <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">true</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If everything were equally <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">false</i> you would need no tolerance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If everything were equally <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">true</i> you would need no tolerance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You have tolerance because there is an ordering principal and things are departing from the ordering principal in different degrees. So you <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">tolerate</i>the departure from truth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">So toleration immediately states that there is objective truth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Do you see that?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Put it this way:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Where you don’t have dogmatic truth you don’t need tolerance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If we were choosing the color of a car and one <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>of us preferred pink but another would choose black, there is no need for one of us to tolerate the other’s choice, per se, because there’s nothing intrinsically definitive about black over pink.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Toleration comes when you have something objectively true and you’re tolerating departures from the truth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We must be tolerant because that is an affirmation of the truth and it is the intellectual space required for others to seek to arrive at the truth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you’re not tolerant, you’re denying psychological freedom to other people to explore and seek the truth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Worship, Action, and Doctrine</span></b></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">So, the first phrase of the First Amendment is: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion,” meaning a confessional state or a religion that would be intolerant of the possibility of others to worship or have freedom of religion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The second part is, “or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” This is important, the positive first side of religious freedom, but the other side is the exercise of religious freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is the philosophical side.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But religious freedom, I would argue, is at least composed of three things. True religious freedom is composed of three things: worship, action, and doctrine.</span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">So part of religious freedom is a freedom to worship, but this is not even by a long stretch the fullness of what religious freedom means.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To be allowed to pray and only to pray, is not to have religious freedom guaranteed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is what the pope was saying in the first quote I read you.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Some bishops were telling him that religious freedom was being constrained to mean only freedom of worship.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you hear the Obama administration speak about religious freedom they will often say, “freedom of worship” because they mean it is to be confined to private religious services.</span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">In the post-modern world, the notion of religion was that we have to privatize religion; that religion has to be circumscribed to the sacristy, to worship, to religious events, to religious rituals which have no meaning except to those who are believers. Today’s most sophisticated atheists―Joseph<span style="color: red;"> </span>Sabia, Gianni Vattimo, Richard Rorty―all say that they do not object to religion as long as religion is privatized.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As long as you keep it to freedom of worship, they don’t care.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, they are among the post moderns.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Why?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because they are arguing theoretically that there is no truth in religion, that religion cannot derive any truth, it cannot determine what is true from what is false. Therefore, religious beliefs are emotional crutches, that people need in order to get by in life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So the Mormons believe this, the Catholics believe that, it’s like the opiate of the people.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Let them have their drug; let them have their crutch.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So we’ll let them have little religious ceremonies.</span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">But the religion of the Israelites and Christianity does not limit itself to worship.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There is no dichotomy or schism between worship and action, or worship and doctrine.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is all one thing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Therefore, part of religious freedom is a right to profess one’s doctrine and actually to teach the doctrine to others.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So you have in Canada people trying to forbid homeschoolers from teaching and using the Bible to teach their kids.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s a violation of religious freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You have public schools which now claim that religion cannot be taught in public schools.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is completely contrary to the idea of the Founders.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s a violation of religious freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You have many who theoretically want to forbid the Church from participating in the public square. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The arguments of the Church are irrational because they depend on theological assumptions, they would argue.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You don’t have religious freedom if you cannot uphold the doctrine of that Church which you believe in or do what revelation asks of you.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">And finally action:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We are called by God in divine revelation to transform the culture in our world; to have institutions to promote man’s good, natural and supernatural.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To forbid that is also contrary to religious freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, to have us shut down orphanages in Washington, D.C.,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>because the Church objects to giving children to homosexual couples, for instance, is contrary to religious freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The possibility of shutting down hospitals on moral objections is contrary to religious freedom because this is part of what it means to have a religion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Religion does not just mean that we pray and that we are in our sacristies.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The First Amendment, Law, and Limited Government</span></b></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Now, so the first clause of the First Amendment guarantees no coercion, which is necessary as we saw to freedom of religion and the second clause guarantees, of course, the free exercise of religion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Now, I would say this: The First Amendment is really, really good law. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I would like to argue that even the philosophical and theological presuppositions that I’ve been speaking about really, really were comprehended in the drafting of the First Amendment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are a lot of interpretations of the First Amendment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The very radical Protestant interpretation makes the First Amendment almost like a dogma of religion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s like a providential, sacred thing by which the United States was founded.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The second, which is a secular interpretation, is that it was intended merely to be sort of a secular accommodation to prevent, as it were, fighting among a plurality of religions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I would disagree with both. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In his famous book, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">We Hold These Truths, </i>Father John Courtney Murray called the provisions of the First Amendment “articles of peace.” Basically his argument rested on the notion that, in the pursuit of the common good and peace, these articles were presented to assure peace in a pluralistic society.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I think that John Courtney Murray makes some pretty good arguments, but I disagree with that too.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Peace is a fruit of justice.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The reason the provisions of the First Amendment worked, and have enabled us to have political stability even in a plurality of religions, is because they were <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">true</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They were true to the nature of man and the philosophical assumptions behind them were true.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Peace is the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">fruit</i> of that truth and that justice, that proper freedoms were observed for all American citizens.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">I think it is good law for these reasons:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>First, it created a social environment protected by law in which men of different religions, faiths, might live together and flourish in peace.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s a big, big accomplishment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is to say, we proved that, without uniformity of religion, it is still possible to have a plurality that functions in a stable manner.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Before that, dating to the Augsburg Accords of 1555, the basic rule was, “We follow the religion of the king, everybody does.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But we’ve proven that it’s possible to have a different form, a plurality of religion, but still a stable, political environment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Second, there’s another very important thing that’s compatible with Catholic social doctrine.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The First Amendment keeps a clear distinction between the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">spiritual</i>order and the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">temporal</i> order.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It immediately delineates this, by stating that it is a right, inalienable in that sense, that the temporal order not have jurisdiction over the spiritual order.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, also, in preventing a confessional state that would supersede civil liberties―which was the historical experience of the Founders―the spiritual order cannot overrun the temporal order. The First Amendment asserts that the spiritual and the temporal are two different realms, with proper jurisdiction and authority that may intermingle, the spiritual being higher, but each existing in its own autonomy. Third, I think it fantastically upholds the theory of limited government. It immediately states that the government that we created, that we agreed to, is limited; that it cannot absorb the citizen and intermediary structures by its own fiat; that it is not omniscient; that it is not competent to judge in matters theological.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So it really created a vision of limits to the government.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And that’s really important.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you allow the government to transgress inalienable rights you will end up with no rights.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">And this was the big danger of 1973.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you’ve conceded the first basic right―the right to life―there’s no theoretical reason to hold that any other right is inalienable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You just gave up on the biggest one.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So it’s just a matter of time, just a matter of working out the politics of how less freedom is given to the citizens and more freedom is absorbed economically, politically, <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>and culturally by the state.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We’ve lived, “with the accommodation of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Roe v. Wade</i>” for over 40 years.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That was the line in the sand, and people like Von Mises used to say, “when the government crosses that line, you’re into unlimited government theory.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I would argue that the present administration believes in unlimited government theory.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Whatever you want to call it:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the welfare state, neo-socialism, socialism, whatever you want to call it―it’s the road toward loss of freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Why They Want the Mandate</span></b></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">And finally, I would argue, to the practical side of this problem.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Why is it so important that this famous mandate be passed and, lamentably, that it was upheld by Justice Roberts?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I myself was quite disappointed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No one knows why he did what he did.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I think he was completely mistaken and I agree with the commentary and with the dissenting opinion of the minority on what Roberts was doing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I don’t think it’s the law and the job of the Supreme Court to rewrite laws for the administration.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Clearly, even the majority agreed that, under the commerce clause, this was unconstitutional and it was over reaching by the administration.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, for whatever reason, this is the situation that we now have.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Why is it important?</span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">I would argue this:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In a democracy, in a modern democracy in any case,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>you always have three things.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You have the state, what you call the state and the organs of the state.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You also have what are called intermediary structures.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is to say churches, schools, private operations, etc., the private sector as it were.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And finally you have the private citizen.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The private sector—civil society—is the natural buffer zone between the government and the private citizen. If the aim of government is to increase the power of the state, the jurisdiction of the state, even beyond inalienable rights, swallowing inalienable rights as it would be, a case of life and now, the first freedom, freedom of religion, then you need to disappear, in order to get to the citizen, this natural buffer zone. You need to disappear intermediary structures in order to directly control the life of the citizen.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is why the anti-Federalists wanted a Bill of Rights to protect individual liberties.</span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Now, what stands as the most colossal intermediary structure right now in the health care debate?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s the Catholic Church.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you’re attempting to take over one-sixth of the economy, which is what the medical sector would be, but one out of six patients is under Catholic health care in some shape or form, you have a real problem, because you cannot have a total nationalization of health care, in practice, unless you deal with the Catholic Church.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So there are only two ways to get this done, obviously.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The first way is to disappear institutions that are run by that intermediary structure which is the buffer zone between the state and the citizen.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Shut down the orphanages, possibly shut down the hospitals, whatever may happen.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is a big practical problem, though.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are easier ways to make this happen. The first is to make the Catholic institutions subservient to the needs of the state and to the will of the state, to make them <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>comply with what the state demands without rearranging the entire practical structure which would be a big problem.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One out of six patients without health care, if we shut down Catholic institutions completely, would be a disaster.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So the other way is to coerce them to do what you would do if those institutions were yours.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So basically, to make private hospitals and institutions of the Catholic Church functionaries, organs of the state that would implement your policy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And here the mandate is very useful. </span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">This is like the book of Maccabees:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To eat of the forbidden food, to take a bite.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In that case, seven sons died because they would not eat impure food. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The HHS mandate says to the Catholic Church: We intend to make you participate in something that you have refused to eat for 40 years, so to speak, from “the fruit of the death culture.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We will force you to do it because clearly you are not going to do it on our own.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So now we will pass an edict, positive law, that obliges you to “take a bite” and you will be paying for it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As the pope says in his warning to the American bishops, participating in intrinsically evil practices, from contraception to abortifacients, if you do that as an institution you are no longer of the same nature <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">per se</i>, the same moral and spiritual tenure that you were. If you were to take but one step in that direction it doesn’t matter. Just one step in the participation in intrinsically evil practices—would transform Catholic institutions into state hospitals—the Church becomes a state church.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is where they’re going.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s why we’re here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The mandate is designed to deal with this intermediary structure somehow.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The second reason we’re here is not because of contraception.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is a ridiculous claim.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>All the people that are celebrating the continued victories of the Administration are the abortion groups and the abortion industry in the United States.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But their business is not contraception.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They will give you contraception for free because they know what really makes money, which is abortion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How do they do this?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They calculate that if they make the issue about contraception this is quite popular in our contemporary society because apparently many, many, many women and men use contraceptives.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Not 99%.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That was an absolutely absurd number.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s totally ridiculous.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That may be true.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So they are banking on the fact that this is a winning issue.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If we make it about contraception, people will vote for us, women will be scared, the “the war on women,” and they will vote for us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It will also divide the Catholic Church from other Christian churches, because most Christian churches have already collapsed on contraception but not on abortion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And you see when you go to these rallies (I know myself.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ve been to many), it’s very difficult to get a Protestant pastor to come out and speak against the mandate because they say, “Well, we are really not against contraception.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s a pretty good divisive issue to isolate the one intermediary structure which is a problem and which stands in the way of the state nationalizing the health system completely.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The third reason we are here relates to the HHS Secretary, Kathleen Sibelius, who I think is a nemesis to civilized life. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Sibelius is a longtime friend of the late term abortion industry and the abortion industry.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is no secret and I tell it everywhere.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One of her biggest supporters when she ran for Governor of Kansas was George Tiller, late-term abortionist.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He had a political action committee to support her and was one of her greatest contributors.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She, in turn, ran cover for him when he and LeRoy Carhart, who used to work with him, were being investigated.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The abortion industry wants to make money, not on contraception, but on abortion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A procedure, late-term abortion or any other abortion, can cost from $500 to $8,000, depending on the term, how late in the pregnancy the mother is.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But if you can pay with an insurance card for abortion, the abortion industry will be loving life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because to come up with $8,000 to do a procedure is not a small amount of money for a young woman who is pregnant or someone who is poor, etc.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But if you can just show an insurance card, that would be fantastic.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Now they cannot say that the mandate, (which I call totalitarian because it wants totality of American citizens to participate in it, so it’s totalitarian in that sense) is about abortion, because that is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">not</i> a good issue.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You can’t sell that before an election.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So they will say it’s about contraception, pass the mandate, uphold it (unfortunately it has been upheld by the Supreme Court) and then once you win the election, you will say, “…but abortion is already the law of the land since 1973, and it’s something that we consider health care.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So then you throw abortion in once you have the mandate and everyone is obliged to pay for it. Every American taxpayer will then be paying for abortions regularly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You throw it in after you get the mandate done because you already have <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Roe v. Wade</i>assuring you that abortion is legal and is the law of the land.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This should not be called the <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“contraception mandate.” It should be called the “anti-religious freedom mandate” or the “abortion mandate” and we should explain why.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I mean, this is really what Sibelius is after.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She’s after abortion, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">not</i> contraception.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">What Is to Be Done?</span></b></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">What is to be done? Our bishops have been calling for dissent. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ve heard and read many statements from, “This is the time of Henry VIII” to “We must do something.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The times of Henry VIII were very difficult.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As you know, John Fisher was the one, lone bishop that survived that sort of persecution (survive morally, to stick by the truth).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But I don’t think we need to use too much hyperbole.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No one is talking about getting beheaded, no one is talking about any of these things <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">right now</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I mean, to invoke Henry VIII in such things is not to take the question seriously.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They’ve talked about dissent and here we are talking about religious freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">I think we need an educational campaign because a democracy cannot remain both free and ignorant.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are far too many Americans who do not know what’s going on.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I think we should write letters to our bishops.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Dissent is not a strategy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was in the pro-life movement in the 90’s when we actually had civil disobedience and we had real dissent.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Dissent is not a strategy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“We would like to know,” you should write your bishops, “what does dissent mean <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">concretely</i>?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What are we talking about when we say, ‘dissent’?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">What are we going to do</i>?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Are we going to have a tax protest?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Are we going to tell Catholics not to buy insurance?”</span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">We need a real strategy because Obama could win the election and if he wins the election I don’t see how we will overturn this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, we need to clarify what we mean by dissent a.s.a.p.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s good that we’re speaking against the administration; it’s good that we’re speaking against this ObamaCare, but at this point we really need to figure out how we’re going to do this, in my opinion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One good way to dissent, I would say, which would save us the trouble, is for bishops to put pressure on the governors to say, “We will not implement ObamaCare.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, Bobby Jindal in Louisiana has already said he is not going to prepare the exchanges, shorthand for he will not implement ObamaCare.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He didn’t say until when.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He didn’t say it was just up until November and then after November he would have to.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But in any case, <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>we should write bishops and tell them to write the governors to say we are not going to implement it because if they don’t implement it we won’t have to dissent.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They will do the dissent and we will support them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They just say, “It doesn’t happen in Virginia.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>End of story.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They should go talk to their governors.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Bobby Jindal has said as much.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Bachmann and others are advocating and calling people.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Cantor is calling governors saying, “Do not implement it before November.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Exemption Is Not the Answer</span></b></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The problem is what happens in November if Obama wins, of course.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then you really have to make decisions if we’re really going to be paying for all of this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I would say there will be some theologians who will try to argue that this is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">material</i> cooperation but not <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">formal</i> cooperation and therefore it’s licit to cooperate. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I would argue that that is a complete ruse and remember that before this happened they were saying that was unacceptable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you later hear that it’s acceptable, morally acceptable, just go look at the articles when they said it was not acceptable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What is also not acceptable is an exemption for the Catholic Church.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Morally speaking you can only ask for an exemption (and I told this to one cardinal who will remain unnamed, I think he didn’t like it very much) exemptions are not possible as a moral claim if the law is intrinsically evil or unjust.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, I cannot ask as a Catholic Church to be exempt from slavery.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So you can enslave everybody else as long as we’re exempt.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You cannot ask if the Jewish people are made to wear the Star of David that we don’t say anything against that law as long as we’re exempt.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You can only ask for an exemption from a law that is just but that you have moral objections to, like war.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>War could be just but it is true, the Quakers and others may have some moral objection and so they have a conscientious objection.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But war itself is not intrinsically evil.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You cannot ask for an exemption for something that is intrinsically evil if that is what we teach, and that <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">is</i> what we teach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We have to <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">fight</i> something that is intrinsically evil.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not only will we not accept an exemption, we will fight it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And then we have to figure out how.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>An exemption is morally incorrect for Catholic bishops. (In the beginning they were looking for an exemption and now they are not.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I am glad to see they are not.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I hope they hold their ground.) It is incorrect, because a parish could get an exemption; the pastor could get an exemption on his three employees in the rectory.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What happens to the Catholic businessman who runs a corporation, an office―he’s a dentist, he’s a doctor?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They’re as much a part of the Church as we are.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But they cannot ask for an exemption and they have to participate in intrinsically evil practices.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We’re always talking about the lay people and how important the lay people are.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We stand with our people!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There’s no exemption for them, there’s no exemption from an intrinsically evil law, so there should be no exemption for us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s a non-starter as a moral argument.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Furthermore, there are people who are not Catholic because the things that we’re objecting to can be perceived by any person of good will to be contrary to right reason, that they are evil.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They must be exempted.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And that means that everybody would have an exemption and therefore there would be no law.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So there’s no other choice than to fight the law in its totality, as being unjust and intrinsically evil.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Evil and Sin: Definitions</span></b></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">It’s important to remember that this is not just a question of Catholics and religious believers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These things are contrary to the law of God because they’re also contrary to reason and God is the author of both reason and of Divine revelation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And I’ll close with this:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are two levels.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When my atheist acquaintance finds abortion, abortifacients, and the rest objectionable because he can reason his way to this, we say the action is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">evil</i>; these things are evil.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But if you also find them to be contrary to the Eternal law because you happen to be bound to God and God’s law as well, then you say that it’s a <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">sin</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So the violation of Eternal law is called a sin.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But the violation of the moral law and of right reason (natural law) is evil.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, at the level of the non-believer this is still evil or good.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We can still have the discussion and still have people who don’t believe on board.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is evil to violate our freedoms, it is evil to violate religious freedom, it is evil to do all of these different things that are objectionable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At the level of believers, we say it’s a sin because we recognize it as God’s law so breaking God’s law makes it a sin.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s the same evil.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So this is not just a religious question.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is a question of democracy and I argue that the present day notion of democracy cannot sustain the foundations and the principles upon which the United States was created because our citizenry no longer believes in the possibility of truth, metaphysical principles or theological truths.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And without truth you cannot sustain the consensus that was reached in our founding documents.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is impossible.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We as a people no longer uphold the reason why the United States was created in the way it was and this is why, frankly, the administration has no problem eroding or pretending that there is no national consensus on these issues.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>National consensus is not a moving relative target.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>National consensus was reached in the foundation of the United States.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What exists today is a lack of respect for the national consensus for which the United States stands.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So they’re trying to change the consensus:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Religious freedom is not that important; life is not that important because the postmodern believes in the national consensus that is always a moving target.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The national consensus for them is not what the Founding Fathers decided.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is what the democratic procedure can evolve into so it is a constant, moving target.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If we continue this way we will not just lose our religious freedom but other freedoms as well.</span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">From the Question and Answer Period</span></b></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Question:</span></b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Where and what should we teach?</span></div><div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Answer:</span></b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">I think you just do what you can and teach where it’s possible.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The bishops are the first teachers of the faith and they are in charge of the Catholic universities and the Catholic institutions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They have a responsibility before God and the common good to make sure these things don’t happen.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We have to try.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But I think unless we understand the problem philosophically, deeply what has happened… these things on freedom and abortion, are symptoms of the problem.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s not really the problem.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The problem is the whole philosophical culture of the west is vanishing, not just here, but all over Europe because we as a people no longer understand the philosophical, religious, metaphysical foundations of Western civilization.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So if you don’t understand that, you’re just getting different problems in different places at different times and so we have to really try to deeply teach, and I argue teach Catholics even, philosophy or metaphysics so they understand the problem.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is not just a doctrinal question. We’re not opposed to these things just because we have some weird revelation that says, “Abortion and contraception are wrong.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s important not to be isolated in that sense, like the Jehovah’s Witnesses would oppose blood transfusions on some kind of doctrinal issue, their religion that forbids blood transfusions, which is contrary to reason.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Our objection is not that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Our objection is that what they are doing is irrational, that is to say, contrary to right reason.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It violates the Eternal law because whenever you violate natural law, the law of reason, you’re also violating Eternal law.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s not because we have some weird revelation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s because these things are really evil and anybody who has reason could see them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So it’s not a question of, “Oh these believers who imagine these things to be wrong…”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They are <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">wrong</i> for <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">everybody</i> except that our faith <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">also</i> confirms us in the notion that reason gives us, that these things are <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">evil</i>. </span></div>Christina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6120413033555923852.post-63915475990219544072013-05-15T05:32:00.000-07:002013-05-17T14:18:34.040-07:00Flashback to 2012 Fortnight for Freedom: Father Marcel Guarnizo on the Will of the State vs. Freedom of Conscience<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; line-height: 150%;">Fr. Marcel Guarnizo,</span></i></span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: small;"> </span><span style="font-size: small;">a philosopher,
theologian, and activist involved in economic and cultural issues in Europe and
the United States, gave this address to the Fortnight for Freedom Campaign's June 30, 2012 seminar in Purcellville, Virginia.</span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">This event during the
Fortnight of Freedom seeks to be a response to the Holy Father’s call and the call
of the bishops of the United States to cooperate, educate, and seek to defend our
constitutional freedoms in our American democracy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In this effort we join not only Catholics but
also other believers and people of good will who understand the danger the
republic finds itself in.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">I will present a more
theoretical understanding of the right to religious freedom in our post-modern
world and the praxis or practice which has nearly completely superseded the
theoretical analysis of this problem.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I
think the new practical approach is a mistake, and I think so because good
practice follows only from good theory.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I
hope that what I have to say will convince all of us here that we must engage
in an educational effort on the basis of good theory, for far too many Americans
are being duped or not paying attention to the real threats of our time.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Jefferson once wrote
that a democracy cannot remain both ignorant and free.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is something to think about:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It cannot remain both ignorant and free.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The events of last Thursday [the U.S. Supreme
Court decision upholding ObamaCare], put a dramatic, urgent note on what we’re
doing here. I will try to talk toward the end about practical things that can
be done and some of the practical implications of where we find ourselves after
the decision of the Supreme Court to uphold the Obama mandate and the
healthcare law.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I think most Americans
are starting to wake up and realize that they can no longer sit on the fence;
that we must act and we must participate in the public square in the debate, for
the result of this debate, I would argue, may alter or preserve the American
democracy for future generations.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Earlier this year, <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>on January 19<sup>th</sup> during the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">ad lumina</i> visit of the American bishops to
Rome, Pope Benedict XVI said the following regarding the problems of religious
freedom in the United States:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“The
seriousness of the challenges which the Church in America is called to confront
in the near future cannot be underestimated. It is imperative that the entire
Catholic community in the United States come to realize the grave threats to
the Church’s public moral witness presented by the radical secularism which
finds increasing expression in the political and cultural spheres.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“The seriousness of this threat” he went on to
say, “needs to be clearly appreciated at every level of ecclesial life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Of particular concern are certain attempts
being made to limit that most cherished of American freedoms: The freedom of
religion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Others [meaning the bishops] have
spoken to me of a worrying tendency to reduce religious freedom to mere freedom
of worship without guarantees of respect for freedom of conscience.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">This excursus into the
history of religious freedom is a complicated one particularly once we get to
America and how the idea of religious freedom filtered down to the Constitution
and then to the Bill of Rights.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m not
going to revisit that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I think it’s a
complicated problem and I think there are different interpretations of the
problem.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But in the general, more macro level
of the problem, religious freedom has always been a question and the struggle
to preserve religious freedom is much more ancient, of course, than our own Constitution
or the Bill of Rights.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The First Freedom</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">When Moses was asked by
Yahweh to lead the people of Israel out of Egypt, it was a problem of religious
freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A lot of people think that Yahweh
was emancipating the slaves but that is not what Yahweh said.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is clear if you read Exodus, chapters 5-8.
In Exodus 8:1 for instance, this is what Yahweh says: “Let my people go that
they may serve me.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is important: <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the end of freedom: “that they may serve me.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Moses told the Pharaoh, “We will go three
days’ journey into the wilderness and sacrifice to Yahweh our God as he shall
command us.” Notice, he was asking for permission to go for three days and
worship.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It wasn’t a request for
emancipation or abolition of slavery.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">This is the first
point: There are bigger, more important things than political freedom. Religious
freedom and cultural freedom supersede, hierarchically, political freedom. This
is true, although, as the Israelites would find out, political freedom is
necessary in order to preserve religious freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s why they get emancipated―because they
cannot continue to serve and worship God without political and economic
freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pharaoh said, Exodus 8:28 “I
will let you go that you may sacrifice to Yahweh, your God in the wilderness,
only you shall not go very far away.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Pray for me.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is completely
a religious freedom issue.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
Israelites are going to worship, God has commanded it, and they’re asking
precisely for that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In fact, that’s all
that Yahweh was asking for in the beginning.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Moses said, “Behold I go out from you and I will pray to Yahweh” but of
course, as we know the story as it unfolds. Exodus 8: 32 “Pharaoh hardened his
heart this time also and he didn’t let the people go.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pharaoh refuses to let them go, the plagues
come, and political freedom comes as a consequence.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">From the beginning of
the Judeo-Christian era we have faced this problem: Religious freedom is denied
by the rulers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It tells us clearly
though, as I just pointed out, that there are different hierarchies and the
freedoms that need to be preserved in a democracy but also under every regime
that exists; and they always exists together.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The notion of political freedom, economic freedom, and cultural freedom
are interlocked.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They go up and down
together. So, if you lose cultural freedom you will lose more political and
economic freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you lose economic
freedom you will lose political and cultural freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I could give many examples of this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But suffice it to see the experiments of the
socialist revolution: The more economic power the regime gained, not
respecting, for instance, the rights to private property, the more cultural
freedom was denied to the people and the less religious freedom, freedom to
worship, the populations had.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We now
face the same problem even in our own nation. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As we lose cultural freedoms, we see that, more
and more, inalienable rights cease to be respected.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It becomes less and less of a problem
therefore for a government to take away economic freedom and political
freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">1973: The Line in the Sand</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">I would argue that the
big first loss of cultural freedom in this country was 1973. And of course I am
referring to the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Roe vs. Wade</i>
decision. The moment you allow the government to cross that line of the first
inalienable right, the right to life, all other rights cannot be secured, theoretically
speaking.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So it’s a question of time;
it’s a question of political maneuvering, but that first right being conceded
opens the floodgates to the loss of economic and political freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Cultural freedom is
composed of two things in a democracy:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
religion of the political society that we’re speaking of, and in this case
we’re speaking of Western civilization so therefore the religion of the West,
the Catholic faith; and the philosophical presuppositions that underlie the notions
of the institutions, laws, and ethics of that society.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Very generally, we talk about the three hills
on which Europe and Western civilization were built—the combination of Roman
law, Greek philosophy and the Judeo-Christian tradition.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There was a big debate in Europe concerning the
preamble of the Constitution of the European Union: Should <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>it include Christianity as an historical element
that impacted, influenced the creation and formation of Europe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Ultimately, it was decided to exclude all
references to Christianity. This is a tragedy. And it is simply contrary to
historical fact.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">What we knew as Europe
at the time of Charlemagne―which was known as Christendom―was called
“Christendom” for a reason. The historical argument is inescapable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But it’s important to realize that the
Catholic Church was not just a midwife of Europe, influencing, impacting the
birth of Europe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Catholic Church gave birth to Europe, is in
fact “the mother of Europe.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At the time,
the Golden Age of Greece had long disappeared.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The Roman Empire had fallen. The Church actually held it all together to
bring about what we now know as western civilization.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That would come to us, as Russell Kirk
elaborated in his book <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Roots of the
American Order,</i> via London and Philadelphia.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you read Kirk’s book, you will see how western
civilization was brought historically to the United States.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Now the notion of
religious freedom was present in two other historical documents which are very
significant:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Charter of Liberties
which precedes and was a precursor to the Magna Charta.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This document dates to the year 1100 after
Christ. It was written by the English King<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Henry I and its 14 articles delineated certain rights to be enjoyed by
the kingdom’s earls and barons, and in particular, the Church.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The first article guaranteed religious
liberty. (It’s an interesting thing, that every time we hear about religious
freedom it happens to be the first liberty enumerated.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You see the same thing in our Bill of Rights.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It reads: “I, Henry, by the grace of God
having been crowned the King of England, shall not take or sell any property
from a Church upon the death of a bishop or abbot, until a successor has been
named to that Church property. I shall end all the oppressive practices which
have been an evil presence in England.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">So, already, the Church
is claiming its rightful ownership of property but also its position in civil
society.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Likewise, it’s important to say
that the Charter of Liberties, when it was signed, was witnessed by three
bishops.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>With the <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Magna Charta of 1215 you see the same
thing:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When you read the preamble you
will find all the people who were there, the signatories and those who were
ratifying the document.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Among them,
Stephen, Archbishop of Canterbury, primate of all England and Cardinal of the
Holy Roman Church; Henry, Archbishop of Dublin; William of London and others;
Benedict of Rochester, bishop; members of the household of our Lord the Pope.
The Magna Carta again discusses and affirms the liberties of the Church.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The first article reads: “In the first place
we have granted to God and by this our present charter, confirm for us and our
heirs forever that the English Church shall be free.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s the first article!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It continues: “…and shall have her rights
entire and liberties inviolate.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And we
will that it be thus observed, which is apparent from this that the freedom of
elections which is reckoned most important and very important to the English
Church we of our pure and unconstrained will did grant and did by our charter
confirm and did obtain the ratification of the same from our Lord, Pope
Innocent III.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">So you see how
important this is: Whenever our forebears thought of liberties, freedom of
religion was the first.</span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The View of the Founding Fathers</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">It is interesting that
we’re at Patrick Henry College today. As you know, Patrick Henry was an anti-Federalist.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The anti-Federalists did not want to ratify
the Constitution. Patrick Henry is now seen as the great champion of liberty,
probably because of his famous line, “Give me liberty or give me death.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But he did not want to ratify the Constitution.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And one of the reasons the anti-Federalists
did not want to ratify the Constitution was because they felt that it did not
contain sufficient individual protections for the individual, that individual
liberties were not being protected. So they argued for and obtained a Bill of Rights,
the first ten amendments to the Constitution. The First Amendment of that Bill
of Rights protects religious freedom. The Bill of Rights would be ratified in
1791, as you know.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Madison was originally
not so keen on these amendments as you may know. Jefferson, in a letter,
chastises Madison for not including a bill of rights in the Constitution. [Eventually,
Madison campaigned for and drafted a Bill of Rights—ed.]. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s interesting to hear Madison’s original
wording of the First Amendment. Wrote Madison: “The civil rights of none shall
be abridged on account of religious belief or worship.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nor shall any national religion be
established nor shall the full equal rights of conscience in any way, any
matter, or any pretext be infringed.” This wording was published in the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Congressional Register</i> in 1789.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It did not end up like this, as the law of
the land, as we all know, but Madison’s formulations help us understand the
intent of the founders in including the First Amendment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I like it better than the one we have now.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Two things are
important which are also present in the First Amendment today but may not be as
clear: We are talking about civil rights that should not be abridged because of
religious belief and worship.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s an
important thing to say, that all human beings have these rights and they ought
to be preserved by the constitutional protections in the United States.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The second thing is that no national religion shall
be established.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This seems to me to be a
clear refusal of a confessional state, <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>that is, the establishment of an official
state religion, in the United States. It is not, however, as some interpret, the
establishment of <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>a wall of separation
between the state and the Church.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was
denying the possibility of a confessional state. It was not denying the role of
religion in civil society. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Now, why is this
important?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s important because religious
freedom can be preserved under many forms.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Not having a confessional state is not a guarantee of religious
freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A non-confessional state is one
form that can be chosen if other guarantees are in place.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But there’s nothing intrinsically impossible
about having a confessional state that respects religious freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A confessional state is not contradictory to
religious freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I just want to make
that point because some people think a confessional state would be contrary to
religious freedom, and that is not the case. Malta is a confessional
state.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The official religion of Malta is
Catholicism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It doesn’t mean that you cannot
have religious freedom just because you have a confessional state.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>People worship in Malta under different
religions, yet their constitution guarantees a confessional state under
Catholicism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s not the form that we
in the United States chose, but I just want to point out it’s not the only one.
</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Jefferson observed when
he wrote the Virginia Act<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>for
Establishing Religious Freedom in 1786 that the religion of every man must be
left to the conviction and conscience of every man.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And it is the right of every man to exercise
it as these may dictate.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This right is
in its nature an inalienable right, so the right to religious freedom
inalienable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is the duty of every man
to render the Creator such homage and such only as he believes acceptable to
him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So we add one note here:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Jefferson is calling religious freedom an “inalienable
right,” and I think this is the first thing to know.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If someone should ask, “What is religious
freedom?” you should start there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Tell
them it is an <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">inalienable right</i> and
explain what that means.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Now I will deal with
the First Amendment only vis-à-vis religious freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As you know, the First Amendment speaks about
more things than religious freedom. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It
states: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of
religion.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This respecting of an
establishment of religion―because we have young people here―does not mean
respect or disrespect.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It means
regarding, regarding an establishment of religion―no confessional state.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It continues “…or prohibiting the free
exercise thereof,” the second clause.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And it goes on, “or abridging the freedom of speech or of the press or
of the right of the people peaceably to assemble and to petition the government
for redress of grievances.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Obviously, there is a
relationship between religious freedom and the other two:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>freedom of speech and the right of the people
to peaceably assemble. The right of assembly is here coupled with the right of
the freedom of speech.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But what is the
highest form of speech? The highest form of speech is worship.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s why it’s first.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But that’s why it’s connected to speech. If the
highest form, the most demanding in a sense, but the one that perfects men’s
nature the most is not guaranteed, all other rights to speech become
irrelevant.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you do not have the right
to pray, freedom of speech is not fulfilled.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Second, the right of association which we’re exercising here―we have a
right to associate here―the highest right of association comes when people come
together to worship.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s the point,
that the first liberty guarantees. It is a foundation for other liberties that
we have and that we need in a political society.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<br />
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">What Is Freedom of Religion?</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Now I will move on to
problem we are now faced with as concerns our religious freedom </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">We live in a society
that does not understand terminology any more, and concepts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is due to a lot of bad post-modern
philosophy in our day and age. So, the first concept we must understand is “religious.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s important to understand what religion is
before we understand what religious freedom is.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The etymology of the word has several possibilities but I will stick to
one from which the word religion is derived, which is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">religare</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">ligare</i> is to bind one’s self; to tie
up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Religare</i>
gives the notion to bind one’s self yet again.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>(Right?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“re” – repetition;<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">religare</i>―binding
one’s self anew.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Of course, and the
object of this binding, this tying of one’s self is to God, in mind and heart
and in action.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The fact that there is
an amendment on religious freedom, already illuminates one important dispute
we’ve had with the modern world which is very important, that this action of
binding oneself implies that man is free by nature.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Only free beings can do this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is very important.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You must be free to do this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Animals cannot bind themselves to
anything.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To make that kind of moral
commitment, spiritual commitment, it takes a free being. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">This concept is
diametrically opposed to the modernist determinism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The moderns have taught for decades now,
centuries, that we are genetically determined, biologically determined,
economically determined (such as Marxism), psychologically determined―in short,
that we are not free.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For all the talk
about freedom in the modern world, the moderns have been the biggest enemies of
man’s freedom and the biggest deniers that man is free.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Church has stood staunchly as a defender
of man and his freedom, of the truth that freedom is a part of man’s nature―we
are free beings.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We must be free,
metaphysically speaking, in order to participate in religion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To perform the act of religion you must be
free, and that’s a big, big philosophical, metaphysical statement from the
outset.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Now the act itself of
faith also requires us to be free in our actions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is to say, faith, if coerced, is no
longer faith.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The act of faith itself by
its nature requires a free act. So you can be forced to confess a faith in which
you do not believe against your conscience, but it does not mean you have made
an act of faith.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You must be free to
make an act of faith.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The moment that you
are not free the act of faith disappears; it is destroyed by coercion. This is
why the act of religion cannot be coerced because you cannot possibly have
faith if it’s coerced.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So you must be
free to exercise the act of freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Now freedom of religion
was always called, “the first freedom” and I want to give you two reasons why
that is really important.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Notice, it is
not the first “right,” so be careful.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The first right is the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">right to
life</i>, because if you don’t exist you have no freedoms to exercise.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So the first right is the right to life―correctly
so.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But the first freedom is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">freedom of religion</i>, and I will tell you
why.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One reason is metaphysical,
philosophical, it has to do with reality. That is to say, the relationship that
immediately begins to exist from the moment that you exist, the moment of
conception, between you and God, antecedes every other relation you will ever
have.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s before the relation that you
have with your parents, political relationships, friends, etc.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The relationship to God is antecedent and is not
chosen.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is a relation that is
supernatural because God is a supernatural being, but in a sense it is natural
because it starts from the moment that we come to be.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s first before any other relation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, it antecedes all other relations.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In the portal of Patrick Henry College there
is a quote from Colossians (Col. 1:17) which I think sums it up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It says, “You existed before all things and
all things exist through You.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That sums
it up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nothing is before God. Not just
morally speaking, because God ought to be loved and worshiped.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No, metaphysically speaking, ontologically
speaking, nothing is before God in our life. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Of course, this is not
first to you in your mind.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is to
say, you don’t realize immediately upon conception what the first relationship
is.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is a subjective thing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You have to come to realize that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But that it is ontologically first is without
question.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The first things that come to
your mind are the things that exist in reality.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And from those and the causes you reach the effects, the cause, namely
knowledge of God. But ontologically this is first.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is also first in another sense―hierarchically.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is the most important relation that we
have.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So it is the first in the realm of
being but it is also first in the moral order, hierarchically. It is the most
important relationship that we have.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In
fact it is the relationship to which all other relationships and actions of man
as a moral agent are ordered to.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So it’s
the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">end</i> of all other relationships
and actions, and that is an important thing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span></span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Why Religious Freedom is
Inalienable</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">That is why all other
relationships, in a sense, are subordinate to the proper ordering of this
relationship.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s why St. Thomas More
said he wanted to serve the king <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">but God
first</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This gives you an idea of why
it is an inalienable right.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is “inalienable,”
meaning it cannot be alienated from us; it cannot be taken away from us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In the realm of being, it’s impossible to be
alienated from this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is possible
through the positive law to obstruct the proper exercise of the first
relationship or the first freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But
in the moral realm it is inalienable and therefore outside the jurisdiction not
just of the state but any other intermediary structure in society because the
origin of the freedom does not derive from that instance ; it’s not derived
from the state, it is not derived from the intermediary structures ; it is
derived from a source <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">outside</i> of the
temporal order.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In fact, the
relationship is supernatural; it is beyond the temporal.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Therefore, the state has no jurisdiction over
inalienable rights.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is not a grant of
the government; it is not something the government can negotiate with.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is not something that you depend on the
government to receive.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is given to
you because you are the kind of being that you are.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The human nature that you possess gives you,
as a free being created by God, this inalienable right.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So whenever it is obstructed, it will always
be an injustice because the government is going outside of its own jurisdiction.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is violating rights that are prior to the
constitution of any government.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Now, to the second part
of the problem, the notion of freedom, which is really problematic and I will
be brief on that, but I think it’s important.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>We say, “freedom of religion,” but it is important to know precisely
what we are saying.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The notion of religious
freedom that the Second Vatican Council presented was highly objectionable to
people like <span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Marcel Lefebvre</span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>because he thought when we say, “freedom of
religion,” he felt that it was, in a sense, religious indifferentism; that
everybody is free to believe whatever they want to believe; that there is no
ordaining category; there is no true religion; everybody can follow whatever
they wish; a sort of religious indifferentism or religious relativism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Marcel
Lefebvre would eventually break away from the Church on this issue.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">So I want to show you
how that it <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">not</i> the case, that
everybody is free to believe whatever they want to believe, though in America
religious freedom is understood like that, unfortunately.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We will not even talk about what actually constitutes
a religion, but in America any belief is synonymous with religion, so I just
highlight that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Belief is not a synonym
of religion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We have <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">religious believers</i> and we have <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">believers</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But to be a <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">religious believer</i> you must meet certain requirements.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So Wicca, Christian Science, these things are
not religion even though they’re treated like religion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It would be easy to show philosophically how they
are <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">not</i> a religion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">In any case, the key
here is that there are three types of freedom, or three orders of freedom, that
you have to keep in mind to understand the problem.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The second clause of the first part of the First
Amendment, that “…Congress shall not prohibit the free exercise thereof…” (meaning
religion)―there is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">physical freedom</i>,
the capacity not to be coerced, not to be constrained; the capacity to take
action in the world and not be constrained―that is physical freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is clearly necessary for religious
freedom, right?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you’re stuck in a
dungeon being tortured, your physical freedom is being impeded.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Or if you’re being forced to go to worship or
to a communist propaganda parade or something, you are coerced.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Second is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">psychological freedom</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In order to have religious freedom you must
have psychological freedom as well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This
is the possibility for the intellect to pursue truth in accordance with its
capacity or the knowledge that it has.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>You cannot be brainwashed and say you’re exercising your religious
freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These two must always be guaranteed:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Physical and psychological freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, you must be free to worship where you
want, you must be psychologically free to choose to worship if you so choose in
accordance with the dictates of your conscience.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is the problem of religious
indifferentism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Some people will say the
post-secular version of this is there is no truth that we can discern; no religion
can be true, therefore everybody has a right to believe whatever they want to
believe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, I want to correct that on
the nature of the last form of freedom: moral freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">You are not morally
free to believe whatever you want to believe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>This is where the accountability comes and religious relativism and
indifferentism is stopped.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is not
true that in the exercise of religious freedom, vis-à-vis God, whatever revelation
you believe, whatever religion you believe, is completely equal and indifferent
to God.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is not true.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You are not morally free <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">not</i> to pursue the truth that the intellect seeks at its highest
level, namely the pursuit of religious freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It is not true that you’re free to go against your conscience if God has
called you or you have seen the revelation to be true.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Church affirms, of course, that there is
no salvation outside of the Church (<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">ex
ecclesia, nulla salus</i>).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It does not
mean that only Catholics go to Heaven.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">does</i> mean that if by
neglect, obstinacy, rebellion or sheer laziness of not knowing what you should
have known vis-à-vis religion, you will be accountable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You are not morally free to just believe
whatever you want to believe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You’re not
accountable to the temporal powers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>That’s the difference.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You’re not
accountable to the state; you’re not accountable to an inquisition.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You’re accountable to God but you’re still
not morally free and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">that</i> is what
prevents religious indifferentism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There
is one, true revelation and metaphysically speaking only one is possible
because God neither changes his mind nor has opinions about matters.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So there’s only one Divine revelation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So yes, you’re not free morally to believe
whatever you want to believe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>God will
judge given the graces that you have received in your life, whether your
choices were in accordance with conscience, and only God can judge that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But there is no religious
indifferentism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Do you see that? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The pursuit of truth
requires you to be intellectually free to pursue truth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You have to be free to explore, to seek the
truth in religion freely.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Example:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A lot of post-modern parents don’t want to
teach their children religion because they want to let them choose when they
grow up, to be free to honor their dignity and they will choose.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Of course they end up without religion by the
time they’re 15 and then they regret their choices.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The problem here is that their argument,
completely theoretically flawed, is that education is coercive; that to educate
somebody is to coerce them or to inhibit <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>their freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>This is why liberal arts existed because they free man from ignorance
and the highest form of learning is religious.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>But you must be free.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You cannot
be indoctrinated. If you’re a child in a madrassa school and the teacher is
indoctrinating you to commit suicide on behalf of God, this is contrary to
psychological freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There may be a twelve
year old child who commits a suicide bombing attempt thinking that he’s really
obeying God. But I don’t think he’s psychologically free. So we have must have
the freedom of the mind to pursue truth which is the highest objective.</span></div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The Question of Tolerance</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There is a lot of talk about the notion of
tolerance; we must be tolerant.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A lot of
Catholic die-hard conservatives don’t like the idea of tolerance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s like anathema or the liberal code word for
“relativism.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But I love the notion of
tolerance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ll tell you why.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Of course “tolerance” in our day has come to
mean we must tolerate all opinions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>They’re all of equal value because there is no truth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But that’s an improper definition of
tolerance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Tolerance already denotes
philosophically that something is true.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The reason you tolerate a departure from the truth is because something
actually is objectively <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">true</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If everything were equally <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">false</i> you would need no tolerance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If everything were equally <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">true</i> you would need no tolerance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You have tolerance because there is an
ordering principal and things are departing from the ordering principal in
different degrees. So you <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">tolerate</i>
the departure from truth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">So toleration
immediately states that there is objective truth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Do you see that?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Put it this way:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Where you don’t have dogmatic truth you don’t
need tolerance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If we were choosing the
color of a car and one <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>of us preferred
pink but another would choose black, there is no need for one of us to tolerate
the other’s choice, per se, because there’s nothing intrinsically definitive
about black over pink.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Toleration comes
when you have something objectively true and you’re tolerating departures from
the truth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We must be tolerant because
that is an affirmation of the truth and it is the intellectual space required
for others to seek to arrive at the truth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>If you’re not tolerant, you’re denying psychological freedom to other
people to explore and seek the truth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Worship, Action, and Doctrine</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">So, the first phrase of
the First Amendment is: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment
of religion,” meaning a confessional state or a religion that would be
intolerant of the possibility of others to worship or have freedom of
religion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The second part is, “or prohibiting
the free exercise thereof.” This is important, the positive first side of
religious freedom, but the other side is the exercise of religious freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is the philosophical side.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But religious freedom, I would argue, is at
least composed of three things. True religious freedom is composed of three
things: worship, action, and doctrine.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">So part of religious
freedom is a freedom to worship, but this is not even by a long stretch the fullness
of what religious freedom means.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To be
allowed to pray and only to pray, is not to have religious freedom
guaranteed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is what the pope was
saying in the first quote I read you.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Some bishops were telling him that religious freedom was being
constrained to mean only freedom of worship.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>If you hear the Obama administration speak about religious freedom they
will often say, “freedom of worship” because they mean it is to be confined to
private religious services.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">In the post-modern
world, the notion of religion was that we have to privatize religion; that
religion has to be circumscribed to the sacristy, to worship, to religious
events, to religious rituals which have no meaning except to those who are
believers. Today’s most sophisticated atheists―Joseph<span style="color: red;"> </span>Sabia,
Gianni Vattimo, Richard Rorty―all say that they do not object to religion as
long as religion is privatized.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As long
as you keep it to freedom of worship, they don’t care.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, they are among the post moderns.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Why?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because
they are arguing theoretically that there is no truth in religion, that
religion cannot derive any truth, it cannot determine what is true from what is
false. Therefore, religious beliefs are emotional crutches, that people need in
order to get by in life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So the Mormons
believe this, the Catholics believe that, it’s like the opiate of the
people.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Let them have their drug; let
them have their crutch.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So we’ll let them have little religious
ceremonies.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">But the religion of the
Israelites and Christianity does not limit itself to worship.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There is no dichotomy or schism between worship
and action, or worship and doctrine.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It
is all one thing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Therefore, part of religious
freedom is a right to profess one’s doctrine and actually to teach the doctrine
to others.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So you have in Canada people
trying to forbid homeschoolers from teaching and using the Bible to teach their
kids.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s a violation of religious
freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You have public schools which
now claim that religion cannot be taught in public schools.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is completely contrary to the idea of
the Founders.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s a violation of
religious freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You have many who
theoretically want to forbid the Church from participating in the public square.
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The arguments of the Church are
irrational because they depend on theological assumptions, they would
argue.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You don’t have religious freedom
if you cannot uphold the doctrine of that Church which you believe in or do what
revelation asks of you.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">And finally action:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We are called by God in divine revelation to
transform the culture in our world; to have institutions to promote man’s good,
natural and supernatural.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To forbid that
is also contrary to religious freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>So, to have us shut down orphanages in Washington, D.C.,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>because the Church objects to giving children
to homosexual couples, for instance, is contrary to religious freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The possibility of shutting down hospitals on
moral objections is contrary to religious freedom because this is part of what
it means to have a religion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Religion
does not just mean that we pray and that we are in our sacristies.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The First Amendment, Law, and
Limited Government</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Now, so the first
clause of the First Amendment guarantees no coercion, which is necessary as we
saw to freedom of religion and the second clause guarantees, of course, the
free exercise of religion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Now, I would
say this: The First Amendment is really, really good law. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I would like to argue that even the
philosophical and theological presuppositions that I’ve been speaking about
really, really were comprehended in the drafting of the First Amendment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are a lot of interpretations of the
First Amendment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The very radical Protestant
interpretation makes the First Amendment almost like a dogma of religion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s like a providential, sacred thing by
which the United States was founded.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
second, which is a secular interpretation, is that it was intended merely to be
sort of a secular accommodation to prevent, as it were, fighting among a
plurality of religions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I would disagree
with both. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In his famous book, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">We Hold These Truths, </i>Father John
Courtney Murray called the provisions of the First Amendment “articles of peace.”
Basically his argument rested on the notion that, in the pursuit of the common
good and peace, these articles were presented to assure peace in a pluralistic
society.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I think that John Courtney
Murray makes some pretty good arguments, but I disagree with that too.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Peace is a fruit of
justice.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The reason the provisions of
the First Amendment worked, and have enabled us to have political stability
even in a plurality of religions, is because they were <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">true</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They were true to the
nature of man and the philosophical assumptions behind them were true.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Peace is the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">fruit</i> of that truth and that justice, that proper freedoms were
observed for all American citizens.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">I think it is good law
for these reasons:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>First, it created a
social environment protected by law in which men of different religions, faiths,
might live together and flourish in peace.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>That’s a big, big accomplishment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>That is to say, we proved that, without uniformity of religion, it is
still possible to have a plurality that functions in a stable manner.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Before that, dating to the Augsburg Accords
of 1555, the basic rule was, “We follow the religion of the king, everybody
does.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But we’ve proven that it’s
possible to have a different form, a plurality of religion, but still a stable,
political environment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Second, there’s
another very important thing that’s compatible with Catholic social
doctrine.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The First Amendment keeps a
clear distinction between the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">spiritual</i>
order and the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">temporal</i> order.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It immediately delineates this, by stating
that it is a right, inalienable in that sense, that the temporal order not have
jurisdiction over the spiritual order.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>But, also, in preventing a confessional state that would supersede civil
liberties―which was the historical experience of the Founders―the spiritual
order cannot overrun the temporal order. The First Amendment asserts that the
spiritual and the temporal are two different realms, with proper jurisdiction
and authority that may intermingle, the spiritual being higher, but each
existing in its own autonomy. Third, I think it fantastically upholds the
theory of limited government. It immediately states that the government that we
created, that we agreed to, is limited; that it cannot absorb the citizen and
intermediary structures by its own fiat; that it is not omniscient; that it is
not competent to judge in matters theological.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>So it really created a vision of limits to the government.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And that’s really important.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you allow the government to transgress
inalienable rights you will end up with no rights.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">And this was the big
danger of 1973.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you’ve conceded the
first basic right―the right to life―there’s no theoretical reason to hold that
any other right is inalienable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You just
gave up on the biggest one.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So it’s just
a matter of time, just a matter of working out the politics of how less freedom
is given to the citizens and more freedom is absorbed economically, politically,
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>and culturally by the state.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We’ve lived, “with the accommodation of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Roe v. Wade</i>” for over 40 years.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That was the line in the sand, and people
like Von Mises used to say, “when the government crosses that line, you’re into
unlimited government theory.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I would
argue that the present administration believes in unlimited government
theory.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Whatever you want to call
it:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the welfare state, neo-socialism, socialism,
whatever you want to call it―it’s the road toward loss of freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Why They Want the Mandate</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">And finally, I would
argue, to the practical side of this problem.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Why is it so important that this famous mandate be passed and,
lamentably, that it was upheld by Justice Roberts?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I myself was quite disappointed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No one knows why he did what he did.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I think he was completely mistaken and I
agree with the commentary and with the dissenting opinion of the minority on
what Roberts was doing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I don’t think
it’s the law and the job of the Supreme Court to rewrite laws for the
administration.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Clearly, even the
majority agreed that, under the commerce clause, this was unconstitutional and
it was over reaching by the administration.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>But, for whatever reason, this is the situation that we now have.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Why is it important?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">I would argue
this:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In a democracy, in a modern
democracy in any case,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>you always have
three things.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You have the state, what
you call the state and the organs of the state.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>You also have what are called intermediary structures.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is to say churches, schools, private
operations, etc., the private sector as it were.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And finally you have the private
citizen.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The private sector—civil
society—is the natural buffer zone between the government and the private
citizen. If the aim of government is to increase the power of the state, the
jurisdiction of the state, even beyond inalienable rights, swallowing
inalienable rights as it would be, a case of life and now, the first freedom,
freedom of religion, then you need to disappear, in order to get to the
citizen, this natural buffer zone. You need to disappear intermediary
structures in order to directly control the life of the citizen.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is why the anti-Federalists wanted a Bill
of Rights to protect individual liberties.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Now, what stands as the
most colossal intermediary structure right now in the health care debate?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s the Catholic Church.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you’re attempting to take over one-sixth
of the economy, which is what the medical sector would be, but one out of six
patients is under Catholic health care in some shape or form, you have a real
problem, because you cannot have a total nationalization of health care, in
practice, unless you deal with the Catholic Church.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So there are only two ways to get this done,
obviously.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The first way is to disappear
institutions that are run by that intermediary structure which is the buffer
zone between the state and the citizen.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Shut down the orphanages, possibly shut down the hospitals, whatever may
happen.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is a big practical problem,
though.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are easier ways to make
this happen. The first is to make the Catholic institutions subservient to the
needs of the state and to the will of the state, to make them <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>comply with what the state demands without
rearranging the entire practical structure which would be a big problem.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One out of six patients without health care,
if we shut down Catholic institutions completely, would be a disaster.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So the other way is to coerce them to do what
you would do if those institutions were yours.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>So basically, to make private hospitals and institutions of the Catholic
Church functionaries, organs of the state that would implement your
policy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And here the mandate is very
useful. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">This is like the book
of Maccabees:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To eat of the forbidden
food, to take a bite.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In that case,
seven sons died because they would not eat impure food. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The HHS mandate says to the Catholic Church:
We intend to make you participate in something that you have refused to eat for
40 years, so to speak, from “the fruit of the death culture.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We will force you to do it because clearly you
are not going to do it on our own.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So
now we will pass an edict, positive law, that obliges you to “take a bite” and
you will be paying for it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As the pope
says in his warning to the American bishops, participating in intrinsically
evil practices, from contraception to abortifacients, if you do that as an
institution you are no longer of the same nature <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">per se</i>, the same moral and spiritual tenure that you were. If you
were to take but one step in that direction it doesn’t matter. Just one step in
the participation in intrinsically evil practices—would transform Catholic
institutions into state hospitals—the Church becomes a state church.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is where they’re going.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s why we’re here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The mandate is designed to deal with this
intermediary structure somehow.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The second reason we’re
here is not because of contraception.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>That is a ridiculous claim.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>All
the people that are celebrating the continued victories of the Administration
are the abortion groups and the abortion industry in the United States.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But their business is not contraception.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They will give you contraception for free
because they know what really makes money, which is abortion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How do they do this?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They calculate that if they make the issue
about contraception this is quite popular in our contemporary society because
apparently many, many, many women and men use contraceptives.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Not 99%.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>That was an absolutely absurd number.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It’s totally ridiculous.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That
may be true.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So they are banking on the
fact that this is a winning issue.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If we
make it about contraception, people will vote for us, women will be scared, the
“the war on women,” and they will vote for us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It will also divide the Catholic Church from other Christian churches,
because most Christian churches have already collapsed on contraception but not
on abortion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And you see when you go to
these rallies (I know myself.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ve been
to many), it’s very difficult to get a Protestant pastor to come out and speak
against the mandate because they say, “Well, we are really not against
contraception.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s a pretty good
divisive issue to isolate the one intermediary structure which is a problem and
which stands in the way of the state nationalizing the health system
completely.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The third reason we are
here relates to the HHS Secretary, Kathleen Sibelius, who I think is a nemesis
to civilized life. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Sibelius is a longtime
friend of the late term abortion industry and the abortion industry.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is no secret and I tell it
everywhere.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One of her biggest
supporters when she ran for Governor of Kansas was George Tiller, late-term
abortionist.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He had a political action
committee to support her and was one of her greatest contributors.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She, in turn, ran cover for him when he and
LeRoy Carhart, who used to work with him, were being investigated.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The abortion industry wants to make money,
not on contraception, but on abortion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A
procedure, late-term abortion or any other abortion, can cost from $500 to
$8,000, depending on the term, how late in the pregnancy the mother is.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But if you can pay with an insurance card for
abortion, the abortion industry will be loving life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because to come up with $8,000 to do a
procedure is not a small amount of money for a young woman who is pregnant or
someone who is poor, etc.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But if you can
just show an insurance card, that would be fantastic.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Now they cannot say that the mandate, (which
I call totalitarian because it wants totality of American citizens to
participate in it, so it’s totalitarian in that sense) is about abortion,
because that is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">not</i> a good
issue.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You can’t sell that before an
election.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So they will say it’s about
contraception, pass the mandate, uphold it (unfortunately it has been upheld by
the Supreme Court) and then once you win the election, you will say, “…but
abortion is already the law of the land since 1973, and it’s something that we
consider health care.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So then you throw
abortion in once you have the mandate and everyone is obliged to pay for it.
Every American taxpayer will then be paying for abortions regularly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You throw it in after you get the mandate
done because you already have <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Roe v. Wade</i>
assuring you that abortion is legal and is the law of the land.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This should not be called the <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“contraception mandate.” It should be called
the “anti-religious freedom mandate” or the “abortion mandate” and we should explain
why.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I mean, this is really what Sibelius
is after.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She’s after abortion, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">not</i> contraception.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">What Is to Be Done?</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">What is to be done? Our
bishops have been calling for dissent. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ve heard and read many statements from, “This
is the time of Henry VIII” to “We must do something.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The times of Henry VIII were very
difficult.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As you know, John Fisher was
the one, lone bishop that survived that sort of persecution (survive morally,
to stick by the truth).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But I don’t
think we need to use too much hyperbole.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>No one is talking about getting beheaded, no one is talking about any of
these things <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">right now</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I mean, to invoke Henry VIII in such things
is not to take the question seriously.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>They’ve talked about dissent and here we are talking about religious
freedom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">I think we need an educational
campaign because a democracy cannot remain both free and ignorant.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are far too many Americans who do not
know what’s going on.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I think we should
write letters to our bishops.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Dissent is
not a strategy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was in the pro-life
movement in the 90’s when we actually had civil disobedience and we had real dissent.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Dissent is not a strategy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“We would like to know,” you should write
your bishops, “what does dissent mean <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">concretely</i>?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What are we talking about when we say, ‘dissent’?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">What
are we going to do</i>?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Are we going to
have a tax protest?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Are we going to tell
Catholics not to buy insurance?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">We need a real strategy
because Obama could win the election and if he wins the election I don’t see
how we will overturn this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, we need
to clarify what we mean by dissent a.s.a.p.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It’s good that we’re speaking against the administration; it’s good that
we’re speaking against this ObamaCare, but at this point we really need to
figure out how we’re going to do this, in my opinion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One good way to dissent, I would say, which
would save us the trouble, is for bishops to put pressure on the governors to
say, “We will not implement ObamaCare.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>So, Bobby Jindal in Louisiana has already said he is not going to
prepare the exchanges, shorthand for he will not implement ObamaCare.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He didn’t say until when.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He didn’t say it was just up until November
and then after November he would have to.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>But in any case, <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>we should write
bishops and tell them to write the governors to say we are not going to implement
it because if they don’t implement it we won’t have to dissent.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They will do the dissent and we will support
them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They just say, “It doesn’t happen
in Virginia.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>End of story.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They should go talk to their governors.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Bobby Jindal has said as much.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Bachmann and others are advocating and
calling people.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Cantor is calling
governors saying, “Do not implement it before November.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Exemption Is Not the Answer</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">The problem is what
happens in November if Obama wins, of course.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Then you really have to make decisions if we’re really going to be
paying for all of this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I would say
there will be some theologians who will try to argue that this is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">material</i> cooperation but not <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">formal</i> cooperation and therefore it’s
licit to cooperate. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I would argue that
that is a complete ruse and remember that before this happened they were saying
that was unacceptable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you later hear
that it’s acceptable, morally acceptable, just go look at the articles when
they said it was not acceptable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What is
also not acceptable is an exemption for the Catholic Church.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Morally speaking you can only ask for an
exemption (and I told this to one cardinal who will remain unnamed, I think he
didn’t like it very much) exemptions are not possible as a moral claim if the
law is intrinsically evil or unjust.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So,
I cannot ask as a Catholic Church to be exempt from slavery.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So you can enslave everybody else as long as
we’re exempt.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You cannot ask if the
Jewish people are made to wear the Star of David that we don’t say anything
against that law as long as we’re exempt.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>You can only ask for an exemption from a law that is just but that you
have moral objections to, like war.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>War
could be just but it is true, the Quakers and others may have some moral
objection and so they have a conscientious objection.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But war itself is not intrinsically
evil.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You cannot ask for an exemption
for something that is intrinsically evil if that is what we teach, and that <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">is</i> what we teach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We have to <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">fight</i> something that is intrinsically evil.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not only will we not accept an exemption, we
will fight it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And then we have to
figure out how.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>An exemption is morally
incorrect for Catholic bishops. (In the beginning they were looking for an
exemption and now they are not.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I am
glad to see they are not.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I hope they
hold their ground.) It is incorrect, because a parish could get an exemption; the
pastor could get an exemption on his three employees in the rectory.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What happens to the Catholic businessman who
runs a corporation, an office―he’s a dentist, he’s a doctor?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They’re as much a part of the Church as we
are.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But they cannot ask for an
exemption and they have to participate in intrinsically evil practices.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We’re always talking about the lay people and
how important the lay people are.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We stand with our people!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There’s no exemption for them, there’s no
exemption from an intrinsically evil law, so there should be no exemption for
us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s a non-starter as a moral
argument.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Furthermore, there are people
who are not Catholic because the things that we’re objecting to can be
perceived by any person of good will to be contrary to right reason, that they
are evil.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They must be exempted.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And that means that everybody would have an
exemption and therefore there would be no law.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>So there’s no other choice than to fight the law in its totality, as
being unjust and intrinsically evil.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Evil and Sin: Definitions</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">It’s important to
remember that this is not just a question of Catholics and religious
believers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These things are contrary to
the law of God because they’re also contrary to reason and God is the author of
both reason and of Divine revelation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And
I’ll close with this:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are two
levels.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When my atheist acquaintance
finds abortion, abortifacients, and the rest objectionable because he can
reason his way to this, we say the action is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">evil</i>; these things are evil.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>But if you also find them to be contrary to the Eternal law because you
happen to be bound to God and God’s law as well, then you say that it’s a <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">sin</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>So the violation of Eternal law is called a sin.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But the violation of the moral law and of
right reason (natural law) is evil.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So,
at the level of the non-believer this is still evil or good.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We can still have the discussion and still have
people who don’t believe on board.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is
evil to violate our freedoms, it is evil to violate religious freedom, it is
evil to do all of these different things that are objectionable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At the level of believers, we say it’s a sin
because we recognize it as God’s law so breaking God’s law makes it a sin.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s the same evil.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So this is not just a religious
question.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is a question of
democracy and I argue that the present day notion of democracy cannot sustain
the foundations and the principles upon which the United States was created because
our citizenry no longer believes in the possibility of truth, metaphysical
principles or theological truths.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And without
truth you cannot sustain the consensus that was reached in our founding
documents.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is impossible.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We as a people no longer uphold the reason
why the United States was created in the way it was and this is why, frankly,
the administration has no problem eroding or pretending that there is no
national consensus on these issues.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>National consensus is not a moving relative target.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>National consensus was reached in the
foundation of the United States.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What
exists today is a lack of respect for the national consensus for which the
United States stands.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So they’re trying
to change the consensus:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Religious
freedom is not that important; life is not that important because the postmodern
believes in the national consensus that is always a moving target.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The national consensus for them is not what
the Founding Fathers decided.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is what
the democratic procedure can evolve into so it is a constant, moving
target.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If we continue this way we will
not just lose our religious freedom but other freedoms as well.</span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">From the Question and Answer Period</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Question:</span></b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">
Where and what should we teach?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="line-height: 150%;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">Answer:</span></b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 150%;">
I think you just do what you can and teach where it’s possible.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The bishops are the first teachers of the
faith and they are in charge of the Catholic universities and the Catholic
institutions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They have a responsibility
before God and the common good to make sure these things don’t happen.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We have to try.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But I think unless we understand the problem
philosophically, deeply what has happened… these things on freedom and
abortion, are symptoms of the problem.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It’s not really the problem.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
problem is the whole philosophical culture of the west is vanishing, not just
here, but all over Europe because we as a people no longer understand the philosophical,
religious, metaphysical foundations of Western civilization.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So if you don’t understand that, you’re just
getting different problems in different places at different times and so we
have to really try to deeply teach, and I argue teach Catholics even,
philosophy or metaphysics so they understand the problem.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is not just a doctrinal question. We’re
not opposed to these things just because we have some weird revelation that
says, “Abortion and contraception are wrong.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It’s important not to be isolated in that sense, like the Jehovah’s
Witnesses would oppose blood transfusions on some kind of doctrinal issue,
their religion that forbids blood transfusions, which is contrary to
reason.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Our objection is not that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Our objection is that what they are doing is
irrational, that is to say, contrary to right reason.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It violates the Eternal law because whenever
you violate natural law, the law of reason, you’re also violating Eternal
law.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s not because we have some weird
revelation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s because these things are
really evil and anybody who has reason could see them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So it’s not a question of, “Oh these
believers who imagine these things to be wrong…”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>They are <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">wrong</i> for <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">everybody</i> except that our faith <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">also</i> confirms us in the notion that
reason gives us, that these things are <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">evil</i>.
</span></div>
Christina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6120413033555923852.post-54994990612374702422013-05-15T05:24:00.002-07:002015-02-21T17:11:58.171-08:00Bishops Announce Second Fortnight for Freedom<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7tiamJiOyuOStMrcqimMSGThuTzLst9lHAgD-gS4yTlqG0KHgovnHadaH-A4IAsc8YgQW1XfI7GVVf8B3E26GOZCyw67KPKPLNEBAk7n1KGZUT8i_ahsSrTAG8arQNVY9oZ6tkUJvtnzg/s1600/fortnight-freedom-2012-topeka-rally-montage.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a></div><br /> <br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHVu7u4TQsEvXer6F0DPqM3PQEk4boQbwXcG1L-SMw29dWUJ0R1Ra0jvjYTyyD0txkSqqu4p0vnXQn484BKKwRJOoJ_xp9i9HADQ8QVv_LxcAE1GIOUXmustCbPImK_B9jgLQgmEsTqN_A/s1600/fortnight-freedom-2012-rosary-ride-motorcycles-montage.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHVu7u4TQsEvXer6F0DPqM3PQEk4boQbwXcG1L-SMw29dWUJ0R1Ra0jvjYTyyD0txkSqqu4p0vnXQn484BKKwRJOoJ_xp9i9HADQ8QVv_LxcAE1GIOUXmustCbPImK_B9jgLQgmEsTqN_A/s1600/fortnight-freedom-2012-rosary-ride-motorcycles-montage.jpg" height="296" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Rosary Ride in Colorado Springs during Fortnight for Freedom 2012</td></tr></tbody></table>The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has formally announced the second annual Fortnight for Freedom effort to defend religious liberty in the United States. The Fortnight for Freedom will take place from June 21--the eve of the feast day martyr Thomas More, patron saint of politicians--to Independence Day on July 4. <br /><br />Both the spiritual success and political impact of this year's Fortnight for Freedom depend on the laity. Last year's Fortnight activities, despite the participation of many faithful in the parishes and the support of many Christian and other religious organizations, failed to stop or slow the Obama administration's insistent campaign to remove religion from the public square and force believers to participate in intrinsically evil policies, such as universal insurance coverage for abortion, sterilization, and birth control. Contact your parish and the office of your diocesan bishop to ask about 2013 Fortnight for Freedom activities, and to propose methods of participation <br /> <div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b> What the Bishops Have Planned</b></div><div> Archbishop William Lori of Baltimore, chairman of the US bishops' Ad Hoc Committee for Religious Liberty, will open the 2013 Fortnight for Freedom by celebrating Mass at Baltimore's National Shrine of the Assumption.<br /><br /> Cardinal Donald Wuerl of Washington will celebrate the closing Mass at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington on July 4, American Independence Day.<br /> "The need for prayer, education, and action in defense of religious liberty has never been greater," explained Archbishop Lori. "The Fortnight for Freedom exists to meet that need. This year's Fortnight occurs just weeks before August 1, when the administration's mandate coercing us to violate our deeply-held beliefs will be enforced against most religious non-profits. During the Fortnight the Supreme Court's decisions on the definition of marriage will likely be handed down as well. Those decisions could have a profound impact on religious freedom for generations to come."<br /><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9KabRvLTd1tVT4SMNhy68uaxNQptVYnrHp7sDvKr0K44gPQB_Y9WlbL9AekUnk1_F6OiHg-IFvXuRn51IL3mrtENrJR7pKA0QOwmCGWc6HnTL0wJ981b2CtLpAgBYd2zoO9Y0nn-995mi/s1600/franciscan-waving-flag-montage.jpg" height="237" width="320" /></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A Franciscan friar unfrults the American flag at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception, Fort Wayne, Indiana, during the 2012 Fortnight for Freedom.</td></tr></tbody></table> Resources for the Fortnight are at <a href="http://www.fortnight4freedom.org/" style="color: #0000ee; text-decoration: underline;" target="_blank">www.Fortnight4Freedom.org</a>. The site has items such as one-page fact sheets outlining current threats to religious freedom both in the United States and abroad; frequently asked questions about religious liberty, including quotes from the Founding Fathers, the Second Vatican Council and Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI; and a study guide on <i>Dignitatis Humanae</i>, Vatican II's document on religious liberty.<br /><br /> The Web site also lists sample activities already planned in several dioceses, an image gallery of photos from last year's Fortnight celebrations, as well as resources and recommendations for other local efforts, such as prayers for use in special liturgies.<br /></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7tiamJiOyuOStMrcqimMSGThuTzLst9lHAgD-gS4yTlqG0KHgovnHadaH-A4IAsc8YgQW1XfI7GVVf8B3E26GOZCyw67KPKPLNEBAk7n1KGZUT8i_ahsSrTAG8arQNVY9oZ6tkUJvtnzg/s1600/fortnight-freedom-2012-topeka-rally-montage.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7tiamJiOyuOStMrcqimMSGThuTzLst9lHAgD-gS4yTlqG0KHgovnHadaH-A4IAsc8YgQW1XfI7GVVf8B3E26GOZCyw67KPKPLNEBAk7n1KGZUT8i_ahsSrTAG8arQNVY9oZ6tkUJvtnzg/s1600/fortnight-freedom-2012-topeka-rally-montage.jpg" height="237" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Four thousand gather to hear the Archbishop in Topeka, Kansas for Fortnight for Freedom 2012. </td></tr></tbody></table><br />Christina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6120413033555923852.post-28184569151078542842013-05-15T05:24:00.001-07:002013-05-15T05:24:57.657-07:00Bishops Announce Second Fortnight for Freedom<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7tiamJiOyuOStMrcqimMSGThuTzLst9lHAgD-gS4yTlqG0KHgovnHadaH-A4IAsc8YgQW1XfI7GVVf8B3E26GOZCyw67KPKPLNEBAk7n1KGZUT8i_ahsSrTAG8arQNVY9oZ6tkUJvtnzg/s1600/fortnight-freedom-2012-topeka-rally-montage.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a></div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHVu7u4TQsEvXer6F0DPqM3PQEk4boQbwXcG1L-SMw29dWUJ0R1Ra0jvjYTyyD0txkSqqu4p0vnXQn484BKKwRJOoJ_xp9i9HADQ8QVv_LxcAE1GIOUXmustCbPImK_B9jgLQgmEsTqN_A/s1600/fortnight-freedom-2012-rosary-ride-motorcycles-montage.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHVu7u4TQsEvXer6F0DPqM3PQEk4boQbwXcG1L-SMw29dWUJ0R1Ra0jvjYTyyD0txkSqqu4p0vnXQn484BKKwRJOoJ_xp9i9HADQ8QVv_LxcAE1GIOUXmustCbPImK_B9jgLQgmEsTqN_A/s1600/fortnight-freedom-2012-rosary-ride-motorcycles-montage.jpg" height="296" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Rosary Ride in Colorado Springs during Fortnight for Freedom 2012</td></tr>
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The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has formally announced the second annual Fortnight for Freedom effort to defend religious liberty in the United States. The Fortnight for Freedom will take place from June 21--the eve of the feast day martyr Thomas More, patron saint of politicians--to Independence Day on July 4. <br />
<br />
Both the spiritual success and political impact of this year's
Fortnight for Freedom depend on the laity. Last year's Fortnight activities, despite the participation of many faithful in the parishes and the support of many Christian and other religious organizations, failed to stop or slow the Obama administration's insistent campaign to remove religion from the public square and force believers to participate in intrinsically evil policies, such as universal insurance coverage for abortion, sterilization, and birth control. Contact your parish and the
office of your diocesan bishop to ask about 2013 Fortnight for Freedom
activities, and to propose methods of participation <br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<b> What the Bishops Have Planned</b></div>
<div>
Archbishop
William Lori of Baltimore, chairman of the US bishops' Ad Hoc Committee
for Religious Liberty, will open the 2013 Fortnight for Freedom by
celebrating Mass at Baltimore's National Shrine of the Assumption.<br />
<br />
Cardinal Donald Wuerl of Washington will celebrate the closing Mass
at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in
Washington on July 4, American Independence Day.<br />
"The need for prayer, education, and action in defense of religious
liberty has never been greater," explained Archbishop Lori. "The
Fortnight for Freedom exists to meet that need. This year's Fortnight
occurs just weeks before August 1, when the administration's mandate
coercing us to violate our deeply-held beliefs will be enforced against
most religious non-profits. During the Fortnight the Supreme Court's
decisions on the definition of marriage will likely be handed down as
well. Those decisions could have a profound impact on religious freedom
for generations to come."<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9KabRvLTd1tVT4SMNhy68uaxNQptVYnrHp7sDvKr0K44gPQB_Y9WlbL9AekUnk1_F6OiHg-IFvXuRn51IL3mrtENrJR7pKA0QOwmCGWc6HnTL0wJ981b2CtLpAgBYd2zoO9Y0nn-995mi/s1600/franciscan-waving-flag-montage.jpg" height="237" width="320" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A Franciscan friar unfrults the American flag at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception, Fort Wayne, Indiana, during the 2012 Fortnight for Freedom.</td></tr>
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Resources for the Fortnight are at <a href="http://www.fortnight4freedom.org/" style="color: #0000ee; text-decoration: underline;" target="_blank">www.Fortnight4Freedom.org</a>. The site has items such as one-page fact sheets outlining current
threats to religious freedom both in the United States and abroad;
frequently asked questions about religious liberty, including quotes
from the Founding Fathers, the Second Vatican Council and Popes John
Paul II and Benedict XVI; and a study guide on <i>Dignitatis Humanae</i>,
Vatican II's document on religious liberty.<br />
<br />
The Web site also lists sample activities already planned in several
dioceses, an image gallery of photos from last year's Fortnight
celebrations, as well as resources and recommendations for other local
efforts, such as prayers for use in special liturgies.<br />
</div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7tiamJiOyuOStMrcqimMSGThuTzLst9lHAgD-gS4yTlqG0KHgovnHadaH-A4IAsc8YgQW1XfI7GVVf8B3E26GOZCyw67KPKPLNEBAk7n1KGZUT8i_ahsSrTAG8arQNVY9oZ6tkUJvtnzg/s1600/fortnight-freedom-2012-topeka-rally-montage.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7tiamJiOyuOStMrcqimMSGThuTzLst9lHAgD-gS4yTlqG0KHgovnHadaH-A4IAsc8YgQW1XfI7GVVf8B3E26GOZCyw67KPKPLNEBAk7n1KGZUT8i_ahsSrTAG8arQNVY9oZ6tkUJvtnzg/s1600/fortnight-freedom-2012-topeka-rally-montage.jpg" height="237" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Four thousand gather to hear the Archbishop in Topeka, Kansas for Fortnight for Freedom 2012. </td></tr>
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<br />Christina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6120413033555923852.post-80934405235586346252013-05-14T15:54:00.001-07:002015-02-21T17:11:58.225-08:00What Americans Can Learn From France<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:OfficeDocumentSettings> <o:RelyOnVML/> <o:AllowPNG/> </o:OfficeDocumentSettings></xml><![endif]--><br /><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:TrackMoves/> <w:TrackFormatting/> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:DoNotPromoteQF/> <w:LidThemeOther>EN-US</w:LidThemeOther> <w:LidThemeAsian>JA</w:LidThemeAsian> <w:LidThemeComplexScript>X-NONE</w:LidThemeComplexScript> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> <w:DontGrowAutofit/> <w:SplitPgBreakAndParaMark/> <w:EnableOpenTypeKerning/> <w:DontFlipMirrorIndents/> <w:OverrideTableStyleHps/> <w:UseFELayout/> </w:Compatibility> </w:LatentStyles></xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 10]><style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:16.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia; mso-fareast-language:JA;} </style><![endif]--> <br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">The week before last, the Socialist government of French Prime Minister Fran<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">ç</span>ois Hollande completed its plan to shove through national legislation giving individuals with non-normative sexual tendencies the same status under French law as married men and women, including the right to adopt children. Shortly thereafter, Hollande’s “partner”, Valerie Trierweiler, announced that she would attend the first official “wedding” arranged under the new law. </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">This is nothing new. Hollande’s legislation makes France the world’s 14<sup>th</sup> nation to enshrine the non-normative sexual preferences of a tiny percentage of its population in the laws of its land.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">What is news is that the French population is saying no. Better yet, the French people are saying no for the right reasons, and they have refused to back away from their resistance—despite the intervention of federal anti-riot police who have covered their demonstrations with tear gas and knocked down and dragged children by their necks from crowds, and despite the usual left-leaning coverage from the mainstream media that seeks to obfuscate the fundamental issues at stake in Hollande’s policy. With a level of political and physical determination that is shaking the Fifth Republic to its fundament, hundreds of thousands are demonstrating that they understand the future of their society and their children hinges on the truth concerning family and marriage. </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">Americans who are considering what is at stake in the current Supreme Court cases regarding marriage and the family, take note: A majority of French citizens oppose legalization in law of the unions of individuals with non-normative sexual tendencies and an even larger majority opposes adoption of children into the households they establish. They know why they oppose these arrangements, and they have decided that it is necessary to put themselves in harm’s way to oppose the enshrining of these policies in the law of their land.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"> <img height="328" id="irc_mi" src="https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQ_MrJ2JRXNQ1F0oacTwQXSu1rMCQL_KFX8TYY37YwUMyYC1O74jg" style="margin-top: 117px;" width="493" /><br /><br />For more than a month, buses and trainloads full of families and children have converged on Paris to demonstrate in what European newspapers are calling "without a doubt the largest public mvements in French history (Spectator of London, April 25). Their lead organization is La Manif Pour Tous, (Demonstrating for Everyone). Their slogans include "One Mother, One Father," "Two mothers, no father: That's not equal rights," "A Baby without a Father--That Can't Be Done," and "Justice for Children."</div><pre><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Georgia; mso-fareast-font-family: "MS Mincho"; mso-fareast-language: JA; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Georgia; mso-fareast-font-family: "MS Mincho"; mso-fareast-language: JA; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast;"></span></pre><pre><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Georgia; mso-fareast-font-family: "MS Mincho"; mso-fareast-language: JA; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast;"> </span></pre><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">Across France, 14,900 mayors of municipalities have signed a public pledge of non-cooperation: They will perform marriage ceremonies only for men and women—that is, one of each—and will participate in no official actions to legally bind together two individuals with non-normative sexual tendencies. </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">The very existence of this French resistance movement reveals some fundamental truths on serious issues of law and justice—truths about marriage, family, and the rights of children under the law.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">Americans should pay attention to what is happening in France. And Americans should understand the truth that has brought their French brother and sisters into the streets. </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">The truth is that:</div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">1.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Same-sex attraction is not a normative inclination in the human individual. Precisely because it is non-normative, its existence constitutes a faulty ground to establish a norm for society as a whole.</span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">2.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">To legislate to enshrine non-normative inclinations in the laws of our society, threatens—in fact, guarantees—injustice under the law for all of those involved.<span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">If we continue down the path that Hollande has paved in France, and that the U.S. Supreme Court is considering, there will be no end, except the end of what we now know as the rule of law. It is unreasonable to legislate on constitutional order in this fashion.</span><br /><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">3. There is no justice for the adults in a relationship centered on non-normative same-sex attraction. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Truth #1: Same-Sex Attraction Is Not Normative</span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Note that there is no ethical implication in this claim. No one is saying that people with same-sex tendencies are undesirable or evil. The affirmation is a simple statement of fact. Same-sex tendencies are present in men and women in a percentage fluctuating between 2% and 4%. To make the point clear, if you, the reader, show up late for work two times out of a hundred, it would be false for your manager to report up the line to your employer that you are normally late. You show up on time (98 out of 100 times), and your occasional tardiness is outside the norm.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Likewise, normally, men and women have a sexual tendency oriented towards the opposite gender. It is outside of the norm to have tendencies toward the same sex. This is simply a fact. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Non-normative tendencies are not limited to sexuality. Anorexia—a<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>non-normative tendency as regards food—is found in about 1-2% of the population, Bulimia in women—another non-normative tendency in relationship to food—is found in about 1-3% of all women. We say that these tendencies vis-à-vis food, are non-normative, because the universal tendency toward food normally does not incline in either manner. Anorexia and bulimia are outside the norm, not on account of a conventional social belief regarding whether anorexia is an acceptable tendency to be embraced and promoted, or a bad tendency to be despised. No, these tendencies in relationship to food are simply non-normative as a sociological and empirical fact. In the sexual realm, non-normative tendencies appear not only toward adults of the same gender. Some women have sexual tendencies that are heterosexual yet non-normative (nymphomania), or heterosexual, non-normative, and oriented towards minors (pedophilia), and so forth. Some sexual tendencies can be oriented towards both sexes (bisexuality). Other such non-normative examples abound. Same-sex attraction is merely one of many non-normative tendencies. </span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;"><br /></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Men and women with non-normative tendencies are not therefore a special case or class or group which requires new laws and institutions. They are, like all of us, men and women dealing with the complexities of human desires and the passion for such ends. The sexual tendency is indeed a fluid and fragile thing. Non-normative tendencies are real and possible in many ways for all of us. But they are not matters for legislation. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">The problem here is that if non-normative tendencies become the criteria for constitutional or state law, law itself will become biographical. The atomization of the law culminates in the inability for us to have fundamental rights, as <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">human beings</i>. Things are institutionalized after centuries in law and custom, because they are recognized as normative, and, in the case of marriage, as a good for society. The legal institution of marriage is the normalization of that which is de facto normative in man. </span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;"><br /></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">The French protestors correctly point out that, as the law is atomized in this process, another process accelerates: The precious genealogy of families, towns, cities, and the nation itself, is lost. As </span>Cardinal Philippe Barbarin, the Archbishop of Lyon, told the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Times of London</i><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“[The French] Parliament has decided to change the meaning of the word ‘marriage.’ For the people, it is a very violent thing to do.”<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;"></span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;"><br /></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">If we continue down that path, there will be no end, except the end of what we now know as the rule of law. It is unreasonable to legislate on constitutional order in this fashion.</span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;"><br /></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Truth Number 2: Legislating for Same-Sex Unions and Adoption Is Unjust to Children </span></b></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;"><br /></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">The protesters in France, typified by the La Manif Pour Tous (Demonstrating for Everyone) organization leading the Paris resistance, has pushed hardest on the issue of justice for the children. The cultural DNA of this historically Roman Catholic<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>nation is showing:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>French men and women of all ages are in the streets rejecting the right to adopt children for individuals with non-normative sexual tendencies. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Here is what is at stake:</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Children have an <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">ius </i>(debt in justice) from us all: a mother and a father. The need for two parents, one of each gender, is an unwritten need of the child, and one which, in justice, society cannot ignore. The same legal system that has condoned abortion now contemplates denying those that are allowed to be born a father and a mother. Having eliminated the first fundamental right, the right to life, in positive law, the legal system continues down that path, logically consistent and undeterred.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Our society is absolutely ignoring the right of each child to a father and a mother. Most can see the moral, social, and economic consequences of fathers and mothers abandoning the home. No one likes this. The family is breaking up and we are reaping the bitter fruit of these breakdowns in society. To now legislate for the institutionalized denial of a father and mother from birth, is to enshrine in law, that which from the outset is prejudicial, gravely disadvantageous, and unjust to children. To deny a father and a mother to some children by law, would be to institutionalize a situation, which in fact we are trying to, or should be trying to, <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>correct in our society. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Not to foresee the consequences of denying a child a father and mother is obtuse. One spark for the massive demonstrations now going on in France is the move by Hollande’s government, in a colossal display of just such obtuseness, to strip the very categories of “mother” and “father” from French law, legislating to replace these words in all official documents (birth certificates, school records, the laws themselves, and so forth) with the word “parent.” It is not a question of having two adults in a family; it is a question of having a father (male) and a mother (female). To not see the difference is to deny that gender per se exists, since the implicit claim is that gender makes no difference. Indeed, good nuns can raise children, but as even Mother Teresa always stated, their love and care cannot replace the father and the mother. Why would we normalize in law, something that is so hindering child development in our society--namely the absence of a father or a mother? To set in law the possibility for this to be the fate of a child from birth is clearly a violation of justice against that child. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Truth #3: There is No Justice for the Adults </span></b><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;"></span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Now, when human behavior is outside of the norm, we seek causes. We ask: Why is this non-normative behavior taking place? We don’t start making laws for an entire population based on the non-normative tendencies of a tiny segment of the population.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">We have a duty to ask: Why? Why is this taking place? What experiences are triggering and augmenting the non-normative behavior? </span></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;"><br /></div><div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Unfortunately, the powerful lobby that claims to speak for American men and women with non-normative sexual tendencies is trying to keep anyone from asking or answering these questions. In California, for example, it is against the law for a private counselor or psychiatrist to counsel patients on the root cause of their non-normative sexual behaviors. This is contrary to simple justice. It ignores the fact that real suffering lurks in the background of most of these cases. To seek to impose normality and silence on the issue is an injustice, first and foremost against many who are experiencing non-normative sexual tendencies and who wish to speak and exercise their right to have adults and professionals listen to them.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Compassion obliges us to lend an ear, and many of us have found, while doing so, that much pain, tragedy, and sadness exists and is shared when these conversations take place. This used to be unanimously admitted among psychologists until this powerful lobby intimidated the profession. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Teenagers and adults, when free to speak regarding their same-sex non-normative tendencies, often reveal that they have experienced sexual trauma, sexual abuse, sexual violence, dysfunctional homes, improper relations with one or more of their parents and/or other trauma that were clearly major contributing factors to their non-normative behavior. Many live with other effects and behaviors which they themselves attribute to the non-normative behavior: depression, suicidal thoughts on a regular basis, hatred of self, drug and alcohol abuse, and so forth.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If a woman is abused by a man or men at certain stages of her life, this experience is strong enough to affect her normative sexual inclination toward men. The causes may be varied. However, to deny them and pretend all is well—and not just well but institutionalize and solidify it as normative for all—is at best unreasonable. To teach in faculties of psychology that there is no issue here and that what is non-normative is to be ignored by all, is a tremendous injustice, and a method easily verifiable as false by anyone in the field of serving and counseling men, women, and especially teenagers. To sweep it all under the rug, pretend that there is no real human suffering in these cases is cowardly and bad counsel. Courts may “bless” it, <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>and push the normalization, but that does not take away the pain and real suffering of these men and women, who in many cases are being told to ignore that they have been victims of great moral and human abuse.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">To direct society to decline to listen and discover the many cases in which these and other tragedies of the human condition are leading factors in the development of non-normative sexual tendencies, is an injustice to precisely the men and women that the powerful lobby keeping them from being helped claims falsely to be advocating for. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Parents should never offer their children the mantra “just embrace it.” They should ask <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">why</i>? Often parents do not know what their children have gone through in school and elsewhere. They should realize same-sex tendencies are non-normative and should inquire into the matter. This is not a hateful but a sensible approach. Asking <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">why?</i>often reveals great human tragedy.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Many in France are taking a stand, at great personal risk, to defend these truths about marriage and the family, and to challenge the socialist government of French President Francois Hollande for the injustice<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>it has and will cause by turning away from these truths. Here in the United States, our nation is on the verge of the same great error: Enshrining into law the non-normative behavior of the same-sex attraction tendency in an attempt to make perfectly normative without scientific or psychological basis something that is verifiably a source of suffering for so many. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoListParagraph" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;"><br /></div>Christina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6120413033555923852.post-82417320866628715532013-05-14T15:54:00.000-07:002013-05-14T15:54:07.876-07:00What Americans Can Learn From France<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
The week before last, the Socialist government of French Prime
Minister Fran<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">ç</span>ois
Hollande completed its plan to shove through national legislation giving
individuals with non-normative sexual tendencies the same status under French
law as married men and women, including the right to adopt children. Shortly
thereafter, Hollande’s “partner”, Valerie Trierweiler, announced that she would attend the first official “wedding”
arranged under the new law. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
This is nothing new. Hollande’s legislation makes
France the world’s 14<sup>th</sup> nation to enshrine the non-normative sexual
preferences of a tiny percentage of its population in the laws of its land.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
What is news is that the French population is saying
no. Better yet, the French people are saying no for the right reasons, and they
have refused to back away from their resistance—despite the intervention of federal
anti-riot police who have covered their demonstrations with tear gas and
knocked down and dragged children by their necks from crowds, and despite the
usual left-leaning coverage from the mainstream media that seeks to obfuscate
the fundamental issues at stake in Hollande’s policy. With a level of political
and physical determination that is shaking the Fifth Republic to its fundament,
hundreds of thousands are demonstrating that they understand the future of
their society and their children hinges on the truth concerning family and
marriage. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
Americans who are considering what is at stake in the
current Supreme Court cases regarding marriage and the family, take note: A
majority of French citizens oppose legalization in law of the unions of
individuals with non-normative sexual tendencies and an even larger majority
opposes adoption of children into the households they establish. They know why
they oppose these arrangements, and they have decided that it is necessary to
put themselves in harm’s way to oppose the enshrining of these policies in the
law of their land.</div>
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<img height="328" id="irc_mi" src="https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQ_MrJ2JRXNQ1F0oacTwQXSu1rMCQL_KFX8TYY37YwUMyYC1O74jg" style="margin-top: 117px;" width="493" /><br />
<br />
For more than a month, buses and trainloads full of families and children have converged on Paris to demonstrate in what European newspapers are calling "without a doubt the largest public mvements in French history (Spectator of London, April 25). Their lead organization is La Manif Pour Tous, (Demonstrating for Everyone). Their slogans include "One Mother, One Father," "Two mothers, no father: That's not equal rights," "A Baby without a Father--That Can't Be Done," and "Justice for Children."</div>
<pre><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Georgia; mso-fareast-font-family: "MS Mincho"; mso-fareast-language: JA; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Georgia; mso-fareast-font-family: "MS Mincho"; mso-fareast-language: JA; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast;"></span></pre>
<pre><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Georgia; mso-fareast-font-family: "MS Mincho"; mso-fareast-language: JA; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast;"> </span></pre>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
Across France, 14,900 mayors of municipalities have
signed a public pledge of non-cooperation: They will perform marriage
ceremonies only for men and women—that is, one of each—and will participate in
no official actions to legally bind together two individuals with non-normative
sexual tendencies. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
The very existence of this French resistance movement
reveals some fundamental truths on serious issues of law and justice—truths
about marriage, family, and the rights of children under the law.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
Americans should pay attention to what is happening
in France. And Americans should understand the truth that has brought their
French brother and sisters into the streets. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 16.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
The truth is that:</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">1.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Same-sex
attraction is not a normative inclination in the human individual. Precisely
because it is non-normative, its existence constitutes a faulty ground to establish
a norm for society as a whole.</span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">2.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">To
legislate to enshrine non-normative inclinations in the laws of our society,
threatens—in fact, guarantees—injustice under the law for all of those
involved.<span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">If
we continue down the path that Hollande has paved in France, and that the U.S.
Supreme Court is considering, there will be no end, except the end of what we
now know as the rule of law. It is unreasonable to legislate on constitutional
order in this fashion.</span><br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">3. There is no justice for the adults in a relationship centered on non-normative same-sex attraction. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Truth #1: Same-Sex Attraction Is
Not Normative</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Note that there
is no ethical implication in this claim. No one is saying that people with same-sex
tendencies are undesirable or evil. The affirmation is a simple statement of
fact. Same-sex tendencies are present in men and women in a percentage
fluctuating between 2% and 4%. To make the point clear, if you, the reader,
show up late for work two times out of a hundred, it would be false for your
manager to report up the line to your employer that you are normally late. You
show up on time (98 out of 100 times), and your occasional tardiness is outside
the norm.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Likewise, normally, men and
women have a sexual tendency oriented towards the opposite gender. It is
outside of the norm to have tendencies toward the same sex. This is simply a
fact. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Non-normative
tendencies are not limited to sexuality. Anorexia—a<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>non-normative tendency as regards food—is
found in about 1-2% of the population, Bulimia in women—another non-normative
tendency in relationship to food—is found in about 1-3% of all women. We say
that these tendencies vis-à-vis food, are non-normative, because the universal
tendency toward food normally does not incline in either manner. Anorexia and
bulimia are outside the norm, not on account of a conventional social belief
regarding whether anorexia is an acceptable tendency to be embraced and
promoted, or a bad tendency to be despised. No, these tendencies in
relationship to food are simply non-normative as a sociological and empirical
fact. In the sexual realm, non-normative tendencies appear not only toward
adults of the same gender. Some women have sexual tendencies that are
heterosexual yet non-normative (nymphomania), or heterosexual, non-normative,
and oriented towards minors (pedophilia), and so forth. Some sexual tendencies
can be oriented towards both sexes (bisexuality). Other such non-normative
examples abound. Same-sex attraction is merely one of many non-normative
tendencies. </span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Men and women with non-normative
tendencies are not therefore a special case or class or group which requires
new laws and institutions. They are, like all of us, men and women dealing with
the complexities of human desires and the passion for such ends. The sexual
tendency is indeed a fluid and fragile thing. Non-normative tendencies are real
and possible in many ways for all of us. But they are not matters for
legislation. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">The problem
here is that if non-normative tendencies become the criteria for constitutional
or state law, law itself will become biographical. The atomization of the law
culminates in the inability for us to have fundamental rights, as <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">human beings</i>. Things are
institutionalized after centuries in law and custom, because they are
recognized as normative, and, in the case of marriage, as a good for society.
The legal institution of marriage is the normalization of that which is de
facto normative in man. </span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">The French protestors correctly point
out that, as the law is atomized in this process, another process accelerates:
The precious genealogy of families, towns, cities, and the nation itself, is
lost. As </span>Cardinal Philippe Barbarin, the Archbishop of Lyon, told the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Times of London</i><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“[The French] Parliament has decided to
change the meaning of the word ‘marriage.’ For the people, it is a very violent
thing to do.”<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;"></span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">If we continue down that path, there
will be no end, except the end of what we now know as the rule of law. It is
unreasonable to legislate on constitutional order in this fashion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Truth Number 2: Legislating for Same-Sex Unions and Adoption Is Unjust to Children </span></b></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">The protesters in France, typified by
the La Manif Pour Tous (Demonstrating for Everyone) organization leading the
Paris resistance, has pushed hardest on the issue of justice for the children.
The cultural DNA of this historically Roman Catholic<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>nation is showing:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>French men and women of all ages are in the
streets rejecting the right to adopt children for individuals with non-normative
sexual tendencies. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Here is what is
at stake:</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Children have an
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">ius </i>(debt in justice) from us all: a
mother and a father. The need for two parents, one of each gender, is an
unwritten need of the child, and one which, in justice, society cannot ignore.
The same legal system that has condoned abortion now contemplates denying those
that are allowed to be born a father and a mother. Having eliminated the first
fundamental right, the right to life, in positive law, the legal system
continues down that path, logically consistent and undeterred.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Our society is
absolutely ignoring the right of each child to a father and a mother. Most can
see the moral, social, and economic consequences of fathers and mothers
abandoning the home. No one likes this. The family is breaking up and we are
reaping the bitter fruit of these breakdowns in society. To now legislate for
the institutionalized denial of a father and mother from birth, is to enshrine
in law, that which from the outset is prejudicial, gravely disadvantageous, and
unjust to children. To deny a father and a mother to some children by law,
would be to institutionalize a situation, which in fact we are trying to, or
should be trying to, <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>correct in our
society. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Not to foresee
the consequences of denying a child a father and mother is obtuse. One spark
for the massive demonstrations now going on in France is the move by Hollande’s
government, in a colossal display of just such obtuseness, to strip the very
categories of “mother” and “father” from French law, legislating to replace
these words in all official documents (birth certificates, school records, the
laws themselves, and so forth) with the word “parent.” It is not a question of
having two adults in a family; it is a question of having a father (male) and a
mother (female). To not see the difference is to deny that gender per se exists,
since the implicit claim is that gender makes no difference. Indeed, good nuns can
raise children, but as even Mother Teresa always stated, their love and care
cannot replace the father and the mother. Why would we normalize in law, something
that is so hindering child development in our society--namely the absence of a
father or a mother? To set in law the possibility for this to be the fate of a
child from birth is clearly a violation of justice against that child. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Truth #3: There is No Justice for the
Adults </span></b><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;"></span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Now, when human behavior is outside of
the norm, we seek causes. We ask: Why is this non-normative behavior taking
place? We don’t start making laws for an entire population based on the
non-normative tendencies of a tiny segment of the population.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">We have a duty to ask: Why? Why is this
taking place? What experiences are triggering and augmenting the non-normative behavior?
</span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="margin-left: 0in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Unfortunately, the powerful lobby that
claims to speak for American men and women with non-normative sexual tendencies
is trying to keep anyone from asking or answering these questions. In
California, for example, it is against the law for a private counselor or
psychiatrist to counsel patients on the root cause of their non-normative
sexual behaviors. This is contrary to simple justice. It ignores the fact that
real suffering lurks in the background of most of these cases. To seek to
impose normality and silence on the issue is an injustice, first and foremost
against many who are experiencing non-normative sexual tendencies and who wish
to speak and exercise their right to have adults and professionals listen to
them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Compassion
obliges us to lend an ear, and many of us have found, while doing so, that much
pain, tragedy, and sadness exists and is shared when these conversations take
place. This used to be unanimously admitted among psychologists until this
powerful lobby intimidated the profession. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Teenagers and
adults, when free to speak regarding their same-sex non-normative tendencies, often
reveal that they have experienced sexual trauma, sexual abuse, sexual violence,
dysfunctional homes, improper relations with one or more of their parents
and/or other trauma that were clearly major contributing factors to their
non-normative behavior. Many live with other effects and behaviors which they
themselves attribute to the non-normative behavior: depression, suicidal
thoughts on a regular basis, hatred of self, drug and alcohol abuse, and so
forth.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If a woman is abused by a man or men at
certain stages of her life, this experience is strong enough to affect her normative
sexual inclination toward men. The causes may be varied. However, to deny them
and pretend all is well—and not just well but institutionalize and solidify it
as normative for all—is at best unreasonable. To teach in faculties of
psychology that there is no issue here and that what is non-normative is to be
ignored by all, is a tremendous injustice, and a method easily verifiable as
false by anyone in the field of serving and counseling men, women, and
especially teenagers. To sweep it all under the rug, pretend that there is no
real human suffering in these cases is cowardly and bad counsel. Courts may
“bless” it, <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>and push the normalization,
but that does not take away the pain and real suffering of these men and women,
who in many cases are being told to ignore that they have been victims of great
moral and human abuse.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">To direct
society to decline to listen and discover the many cases in which these and
other tragedies of the human condition are leading factors in the development
of non-normative sexual tendencies, is an injustice to precisely the men and
women that the powerful lobby keeping them from being helped claims falsely to
be advocating for. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Parents should
never offer their children the mantra “just embrace it.” They should ask <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">why</i>? Often parents do not know what
their children have gone through in school and elsewhere. They should realize same-sex
tendencies are non-normative and should inquire into the matter. This is not a
hateful but a sensible approach. Asking <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">why?</i>
often reveals great human tragedy.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Many in France
are taking a stand, at great personal risk, to defend these truths about
marriage and the family, and to challenge the socialist government of French
President Francois Hollande for the injustice<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>it has and will cause by turning away from these truths. Here in the
United States, our nation is on the verge of the same great error: Enshrining
into law the non-normative behavior of the same-sex attraction tendency in an
attempt to make perfectly normative without scientific or psychological basis
something that is verifiably a source of suffering for so many. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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Christina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6120413033555923852.post-2742880912777502732013-05-14T14:49:00.002-07:002015-02-21T17:11:58.244-08:00An Open Letter to Congressman Paul Ryan<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:TrackMoves/> <w:TrackFormatting/> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:DoNotPromoteQF/> <w:LidThemeOther>EN-US</w:LidThemeOther> <w:LidThemeAsian>X-NONE</w:LidThemeAsian> <w:LidThemeComplexScript>X-NONE</w:LidThemeComplexScript> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> <w:DontGrowAutofit/> <w:SplitPgBreakAndParaMark/> <w:EnableOpenTypeKerning/> <w:DontFlipMirrorIndents/> <w:OverrideTableStyleHps/> <w:UseFELayout/> </w:Compatibility> <m:mathPr> <m:mathFont m:val="Cambria Math"/> <m:brkBin m:val="before"/> <m:brkBinSub m:val="--"/> <m:smallFrac m:val="off"/> <m:dispDef/> <m:lMargin m:val="0"/> <m:rMargin m:val="0"/> <m:defJc m:val="centerGroup"/> <m:wrapIndent m:val="1440"/> <m:intLim m:val="subSup"/> <m:naryLim m:val="undOvr"/> </m:mathPr></w:WordDocument></xml><![endif]--> <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTbb5eY4ETkt8zBIuCYIPqgq156N81vbbbn-DcBTqg8pQkHNMjQGfhBB81V_73vS-8-5DQten7PeLzUu6jX7h0ssWT_lKYqWPUwcYTZPa3b1AkbUBrE0meDzKCd-5K0J-iO-3S0fRuesGK/s1600/Ryan.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTbb5eY4ETkt8zBIuCYIPqgq156N81vbbbn-DcBTqg8pQkHNMjQGfhBB81V_73vS-8-5DQten7PeLzUu6jX7h0ssWT_lKYqWPUwcYTZPa3b1AkbUBrE0meDzKCd-5K0J-iO-3S0fRuesGK/s1600/Ryan.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ryan: Position on homosexual adoptions has changed for the worse.</td></tr></tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Dear Congressman Paul Ryan,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">In the days following the Republican Party’s defeat last November,</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">many good Americans took solace in the notion that, with a large cohort of patriotic and well educated young leaders coming up through its ranks, the GOP remained advantageously equipped to secure the Senate and House of Representatives in 2014, and to provide a 2016 presidential candidate to lead America in binding up the economic and social wounds visited upon the nation by eight years of the Democratic Party’s culture of death.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Your recent endorsement of adoption of children by couples in homosexual relationships is a shock to those among us who had entertained such hopes. It reveals a deep and fundamental lack of understanding of the principles upon which the Founding Fathers established our republic. It also betrays a blindness to the dangers facing the United States of America from the powerful lobby that has set out to “fundamentally transform” our nation. America is at a tipping point, and you have rested your hand on the wrong side of the balance. As a former vice-presidential candidate, your comments on homosexual adoption at the April 30 Town Hall Meeting in Janesville, Wisconsin speak loudly to the nation about the state of the Republican Party and its leadership, and you should act quickly to retract them.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Here is why.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">First of all, from the standpoint of first principles, which you should understand on the basis of your training not only as a Roman Catholic, but also as a statesman, it is never legitimate to tolerate a lesser moral evil to prevent a greater one. This is at bottom what your proposal to place parentless children into the households of couples with non-normative same-sex attraction <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>amounts to. As Pope Paul VI put it very clearly in Humanae Vitae (On Human Life): “ </span>“although it is true that it is at times lawful to tolerate a lesser moral evil in order to avoid a greater<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">… it is never lawful, even for the greatest of reasons, to do evil that good may come of it… even though the intention is to promote the welfare of an individual, of a family or of a society in general” </b>(emphasis added)<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"> </b>(<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Humanae Vitae</i>, no. 14).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is, what is intrinsically evil cannot be the direct object of the will.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">It is intrinsically evil to place children into homosexual households because it is unjust for the children, and it is unjust for the following reasons.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are some things which no government may legislate, or pronounce from the judicial bench, and no political leader or group of leaders may decide from executive office. Nor, in legitimate democracy, may these things be subject to change by a vote.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These things are the unalienable rights of man under natural law, as so beautifully expressed in our nation’s founding documents. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">For example, whether some classes of people should live or die is not the proper subject of deliberation by any court of justice. After World War II, as civilization united in promising “Never Again,” the Tribunal at Nuremberg made this principal of law abundantly clear as it condemned the justices of Hitler’s People’s Court for "judicial murder" and other atrocities. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Likewise, referenda on whether unalienable rights are to be preserved or eliminated are not only morally illicit, but are profoundly anti-democratic. It should be firmly locked in our thinking that no human being has any jurisdiction assigned by democracy to vote on issues concerning the inalienable rights of man, such as which classes of human beings shall live and who shall die. The right to life is not something that is in our jurisdiction as citizens, legislators, judges, or leaders, to deny to any member of the human species, regardless of race, color, religion, gender, size, or stage of development. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Unalienable rights are beyond the legitimate jurisdiction of voters. Courts lose legitimacy when they claim jurisdiction on these issues. Legislators harm and even destroy national institutions of deliberation such as state assemblies and the U.S. Congress when they illicitly take upon themselves the power to legislate against the natural rights of man.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Considering the policy of the legislating to pronounce that it is lawful to place children into homes headed by individuals with non-normative same-sex attractions, therefore, involves the question: Is it morally licit for the state to make this decision for the child, that is, does the policy violate the fundamental rights of the child under natural law? </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">The answer is that it is a violation of the rights of the child for the state to place any child in a household consisting of individuals with the non-normative sexual orientation of same-sex attraction. Individuals with non-normative same-sex attraction cannot provide children with a household in which there is a father and a mother.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The need for two parents, one of each gender, is an absolute need of the child under natural law, one which is unwritten but one which, in justice, cannot be ignored. Therefore, it is a violation of the fundamental rights of the child to be placed by the state into such households. Children have an <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">ius </i>(debt in justice) from us all: a mother and a father.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">America</span><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;"> already faces a crisis of family breakdown, one which the political class has, foolishly, largely ignored. The statistics on the moral, social, and economic consequences of fathers and mothers abandoning the home are staggering. The family is breaking up and we are reaping the bitter fruit of these breakdowns in society. To now legislate for the institutionalized denial of a father and mother from birth, is to enshrine in law, that which from the outset is prejudicial and gravely disadvantageous to children. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">To deny a father and a mother to some children by law, would be to institutionalize a situation, which in fact we should be more vigorously trying to correct in our society. That it happens today is something we regard as one of the leading causes of poverty and many related problems. For our legal system to positively make this situation into an institution is to deliver an unjust verdict on the fate of many children, from the get go. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Not to foresee the consequences of denying a child a father and mother is obtuse. It is not a question of having two adults in a family; it is a question of having a father (male) and a mother (female). To not see the difference is to deny that gender per se exists, since the implicit claim is that gender makes no difference. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Indeed, good nuns can raise children, but as even Mother Teresa always stated, their love and care cannot replace the father and the mother. Why would you normalize in law, something that so hinders child development in our society--namely the absence of a father and a mother? Nothing in our empirical data or experience should lead anyone to believe that this absence will be a good for the child. To set in law the possibility for this to be the fate of a child from birth is clearly a violation of justice against that child. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">For the former vice presidential candidate of the Republican Party to carelessly endorse such an injustice is a sad witness to the degraded state of our understanding of the principles on which our nation was founded. This carelessness does further damage to our governing institutions, and weakens our republic. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Our current trajectory to deny the child his right to a father and a mother should come as no surprise. For more than 40 years, America has denied the child in the womb his right to protection against bodily harm (caused by abortion), owed to him as a scientifically verifiable member of the human species. The same legal system that has condoned the killing of nearly 60 million American babies—some in conditions recently revealed to be as<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>barbaric as the Nazi death camps—now contemplates denying those that are allowed to be born a father and a mother. Having eliminated the first fundamental right, through abortion, in positive law, our legislators, courts, and voters continue down that path, logically consistent and undeterred.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Where are the American leaders who will stand up to these horrific injustices? Congressman Ryan, are you one of them? Will you retract your endorsement of adoptions of children by homosexuals?</span></div><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:LatentStyles DefLockedState="false" DefUnhideWhenUsed="true" DefSemiHidden="true" DefQFormat="false" DefPriority="99" LatentStyleCount="267"> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="0" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" QFormat="true" Name="Normal"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="9" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" QFormat="true" Name="heading 1"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="9" QFormat="true" Name="heading 2"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="9" QFormat="true" Name="heading 3"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="9" QFormat="true" Name="heading 4"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="9" QFormat="true" Name="heading 5"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="9" QFormat="true" Name="heading 6"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="9" QFormat="true" Name="heading 7"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" 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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTbb5eY4ETkt8zBIuCYIPqgq156N81vbbbn-DcBTqg8pQkHNMjQGfhBB81V_73vS-8-5DQten7PeLzUu6jX7h0ssWT_lKYqWPUwcYTZPa3b1AkbUBrE0meDzKCd-5K0J-iO-3S0fRuesGK/s1600/Ryan.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTbb5eY4ETkt8zBIuCYIPqgq156N81vbbbn-DcBTqg8pQkHNMjQGfhBB81V_73vS-8-5DQten7PeLzUu6jX7h0ssWT_lKYqWPUwcYTZPa3b1AkbUBrE0meDzKCd-5K0J-iO-3S0fRuesGK/s1600/Ryan.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ryan: Position on homosexual adoptions has changed for the worse.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Dear Congressman Paul Ryan,</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">In the days following the Republican Party’s defeat last November,</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">many good Americans took solace in the notion that, with a large cohort
of patriotic and well educated young leaders coming up through its ranks, the
GOP remained advantageously equipped to secure the Senate and House of
Representatives in 2014, and to provide a 2016 presidential candidate to lead
America in binding up the economic and social wounds visited upon the nation by
eight years of the Democratic Party’s culture of death.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Your recent endorsement of adoption of children by couples in
homosexual relationships is a shock to those among us who had entertained such
hopes. It reveals a deep and fundamental lack of understanding of the
principles upon which the Founding Fathers established our republic. It also
betrays a blindness to the dangers facing the United States of America from the
powerful lobby that has set out to “fundamentally transform” our nation. America
is at a tipping point, and you have rested your hand on the wrong side of the
balance. As a former vice-presidential candidate, your comments on homosexual
adoption at the April 30 Town Hall Meeting in Janesville, Wisconsin
speak loudly to the nation about the state of the Republican Party and its
leadership, and you should act quickly to retract them.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Here is why.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">First of all, from the standpoint of first principles, which you should
understand on the basis of your training not only as a Roman Catholic, but also
as a statesman, it is never legitimate to tolerate a lesser moral evil to
prevent a greater one. This is at bottom what your proposal to place parentless
children into the households of couples with non-normative same-sex attraction <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>amounts to. As Pope Paul VI put it very
clearly in Humanae Vitae (On Human Life): “ </span>“although it is true that it
is at times lawful to tolerate a lesser moral evil in order to avoid a greater<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">… it is never lawful, even for the greatest
of reasons, to do evil that good may come of it… even though the intention is
to promote the welfare of an individual, of a family or of a society in
general” </b>(emphasis added)<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"> </b>(<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Humanae Vitae</i>, no. 14).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is, what is intrinsically evil cannot be
the direct object of the will.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">It is intrinsically evil to place children into homosexual households because
it is unjust for the children, and it is unjust for the following reasons.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are some things which no
government may legislate, or pronounce from the judicial bench, and no
political leader or group of leaders may decide from executive office. Nor, in
legitimate democracy, may these things be subject to change by a vote.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These things are the unalienable rights of
man under natural law, as so beautifully expressed in our nation’s founding
documents. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">For example, whether some classes of people should live or die is not
the proper subject of deliberation by any court of justice. After World War II,
as civilization united in promising “Never Again,” the Tribunal at Nuremberg made this principal
of law abundantly clear as it condemned the justices of Hitler’s People’s Court
for "judicial murder" and other atrocities. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Likewise, referenda on whether unalienable rights are to be preserved
or eliminated are not only morally illicit, but are profoundly anti-democratic.
It should be firmly locked in our thinking that no human being has any
jurisdiction assigned by democracy to vote on issues concerning the inalienable
rights of man, such as which classes of human beings shall live and who shall
die. The right to life is not something that is in our jurisdiction as
citizens, legislators, judges, or leaders, to deny to any member of the human
species, regardless of race, color, religion, gender, size, or stage of
development. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Unalienable rights are beyond the legitimate jurisdiction of voters.
Courts lose legitimacy when they claim jurisdiction on these issues.
Legislators harm and even destroy national institutions of deliberation such as
state assemblies and the U.S. Congress when they illicitly take upon themselves
the power to legislate against the natural rights of man.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Considering the policy of the legislating to pronounce that it is
lawful to place children into homes headed by individuals with non-normative
same-sex attractions, therefore, involves the question: Is it morally licit for
the state to make this decision for the child, that is, does the policy violate
the fundamental rights of the child under natural law? </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">The answer is
that it is a violation of the rights of the child for the state to place any
child in a household consisting of individuals with the non-normative sexual
orientation of same-sex attraction. Individuals with non-normative same-sex
attraction cannot provide children with a household in which there is a father
and a mother.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The need for two parents,
one of each gender, is an absolute need of the child under natural law, one
which is unwritten but one which, in justice, cannot be ignored. Therefore, it
is a violation of the fundamental rights of the child to be placed by the state
into such households. Children have an <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">ius
</i>(debt in justice) from us all: a mother and a father.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">America</span><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;"> already faces a crisis of family
breakdown, one which the political class has, foolishly, largely ignored. The
statistics on the moral, social, and economic consequences of fathers and
mothers abandoning the home are staggering. The family is breaking up and we
are reaping the bitter fruit of these breakdowns in society. To now legislate
for the institutionalized denial of a father and mother from birth, is to enshrine
in law, that which from the outset is prejudicial and gravely disadvantageous
to children. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">To deny a
father and a mother to some children by law, would be to institutionalize a
situation, which in fact we should be more vigorously trying to correct in our
society. That it happens today is something we regard as one of the leading
causes of poverty and many related problems. For our legal system to positively
make this situation into an institution is to deliver an unjust verdict on the
fate of many children, from the get go. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Not to foresee
the consequences of denying a child a father and mother is obtuse. It is not a
question of having two adults in a family; it is a question of having a father
(male) and a mother (female). To not see the difference is to deny that gender
per se exists, since the implicit claim is that gender makes no difference. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Indeed, good
nuns can raise children, but as even Mother Teresa always stated, their love
and care cannot replace the father and the mother. Why would you normalize in
law, something that so hinders child development in our society--namely the
absence of a father and a mother? Nothing in our empirical data or experience
should lead anyone to believe that this absence will be a good for the child.
To set in law the possibility for this to be the fate of a child from birth is
clearly a violation of justice against that child. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">For the former
vice presidential candidate of the Republican Party to carelessly endorse such
an injustice is a sad witness to the degraded state of our understanding of the
principles on which our nation was founded. This carelessness does further
damage to our governing institutions, and weakens our republic. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Our current
trajectory to deny the child his right to a father and a mother should come as
no surprise. For more than 40 years, America has denied the child in the
womb his right to protection against bodily harm (caused by abortion), owed to
him as a scientifically verifiable member of the human species. The same legal
system that has condoned the killing of nearly 60 million American babies—some
in conditions recently revealed to be as<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>barbaric as the Nazi death camps—now contemplates denying those that are
allowed to be born a father and a mother. Having eliminated the first
fundamental right, through abortion, in positive law, our legislators, courts,
and voters continue down that path, logically consistent and undeterred.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Helvetica;">Where are the
American leaders who will stand up to these horrific injustices? Congressman
Ryan, are you one of them? Will you retract your endorsement of adoptions of
children by homosexuals?</span></div>
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Name="Bibliography"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" QFormat="true" Name="TOC Heading"/> </w:LatentStyles></xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 10]><style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:16.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family:Georgia; mso-fareast-language:JA;} </style><![endif]--> <br /><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> A guest commentary from Rev. Marcel Guarnizo, a philosopher, theologian, and activist involved in economic and cultural issues in Europe and the United States.</span></b></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="tab-stops: 85.5pt 166.5pt;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="tab-stops: 85.5pt 166.5pt;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">“Who among us has any conception of the dimensions of shame that will befall us and our children when one day the veil has fallen from our eyes and the most horrible of crimes─crimes that infinitely outdistance every human measure─reach the light of day.” (Sophie Scholl of the White Rose-German dissident, decapitated by the Nazis, February 22, 1943).</i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">It would serve us well, as more and more of the <a href="http://spectator.org/archives/2013/04/17/gosnells-chop-shop">unspeakable crimes of late-term abortionist Kermit Gosnell</a> come to light, to recall the thesis of Hannah Arendt in her 1963 book,<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil.</i> </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Arendt's thesis was that people who carry out unspeakable crimes, such as those committed by Adolf Eichmann, who implemented<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the final solution of the Nazi death camps, were not all psychotic and crazed individuals. They are, rather, exactly what a person becomes when he or she has accepted the logic and practice of a state and a society that has determined that it is licit to exterminate some members of the human species for the convenience of others. Gosnell is not unique, not an aberrant case, not a “lone shooter.” He is a horrifying microcosm of what has been taking place in America for four decades. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjm2IH_rpK0rwdfLb9evMvoq_L-fZY6TJvn23eA51LJkcuupIqMnVGS5rpRS5dcZ2He-v9rcQkOOAzF19OSEr2MHepSn6W-7uaZBbHleanzZWlnF1PAV2LvcLgTDkDD2t2ARwbBcEc5gWu3/s1600/Gosnell.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjm2IH_rpK0rwdfLb9evMvoq_L-fZY6TJvn23eA51LJkcuupIqMnVGS5rpRS5dcZ2He-v9rcQkOOAzF19OSEr2MHepSn6W-7uaZBbHleanzZWlnF1PAV2LvcLgTDkDD2t2ARwbBcEc5gWu3/s1600/Gosnell.jpg" /></a></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-no-proof: yes;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Kermit Gosnell. Courtesy of Brietbart.com</span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Gosnell is not alone. Planned Parenthood is the iconic example of crimes against the unborn on a massive scale. Late term abortionist Leroy Carhart in Germantown, Maryland, is substantially no different than Gosnell. Todd Stave and Nancy Samuels from </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Potomac, Maryland—owners of Carhart’s abortion center, who sponsor and profit from Carhart’s killing—are all part of what was appropriately called by John Paul II, “the culture of death,” in America.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBXYkE8xkb-09mniHOjXVASQdLrOux586JeRbIvOt0SOljFVdqTyJRcky6j4OOiYi67auxFCmOQJGTG2kddj8rg1wOROihvRwp-Oq3y_Bc96ZvZKmyGIYxj5hWHjq7CIXKvAlNnjgk2I9V/s1600/Stave.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBXYkE8xkb-09mniHOjXVASQdLrOux586JeRbIvOt0SOljFVdqTyJRcky6j4OOiYi67auxFCmOQJGTG2kddj8rg1wOROihvRwp-Oq3y_Bc96ZvZKmyGIYxj5hWHjq7CIXKvAlNnjgk2I9V/s1600/Stave.jpg" /></a></div><br /><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-no-proof: yes;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"></span></div><div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Todd Stave, abortion clinic owner</span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Lila Rose and </span><a href="http://www.liveaction.org/"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Live Action</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"> have more than sufficiently documented Planned Parenthood’s mass murder. Their videos and documentation will remain as a shocking testimonial for future generations of what America was willing to tolerate in our age. Live Action’s most recent expose on the abortion industry has shown that infanticide is anything but rare in America.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">It is high time that we realize that the crisis of our times is first and foremost a moral and cultural crisis of enormous proportions. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">The crimes of abortion are made possible by a broad network of complicity. Kermit Gosnell and Leroy Carhart are but telling reflections of the neglect of authorities at many levels and a population that has become so dormant and lethargic, that it has trouble recognizing murder when it is staring them right in the face. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Our response to the massive abuse against life is so disproportional to the crimes being committed that it has allowed in our society the growth of what John Paul II called veritable “structures of sin.” Our silence and inaction amounts to complicity in this matter. We allow these killing centers in our neighborhoods, near our churches, and next door to our schools, as if they were part of the forces of civilization. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Abortion is not medical care and abortionists are not doctors. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">They are rather what the corruption of the science of medicine looks like. The crimes of Gosnell, too horrible for most to behold without crying aloud, stand in abject contrast to the deafening silence of American culture in this regard. Abortion is creating an enormous democratic deficit that is delegitimizing the state and the courts that are part of the legal and political structure that keeps abortion functioning in America. Until we theoretically grasp the illegitimacy of laws that support abortion and the verdicts that decriminalize it, we will fail to have a robust and foundational understanding of democracy. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">In legitimate democracy, not all things are subject to a political debate, vote, or deliberation. Whether some should live or die is not the proper subject of a democratic referendum or deliberation by any court of justice. Referenda on whether unalienable rights are to be preserved or eliminated are not only morally illicit, but are profoundly anti-democratic. It should be firmly locked in our thinking that no human being has any jurisdiction assigned by democracy to vote on who shall live and who shall die. The right to life is not something that is in our jurisdiction as citizens to deny to any member of the human species, regardless of race, color, religion, gender, size, or stage of development. Unalienable rights are beyond the legitimate jurisdiction of voters. Courts lose legitimacy when they claim authority over things beyond their legitimate reach. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">When did our Presidents and their cohorts, or the court of the Nine, become accepted as the Caesars of old? When did we come to believe that they have the right to signal thumbs up or thumbs down on whether an innocent human being in the womb should live or be executed? What legitimacy remains in a court without an antecedent rectification in positive law of the previous abuses committed by their decisions vis-à-vis the unborn? </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">It is astonishing that, as of late, “the political strategists” think nothing of speaking on national television, about how we must rid ourselves of those “pesky social issues” in order to win elections. These “pseudo philosophers” of our age, must be forcefully rebuked. Their “bean counting skills” to win elections are of no use in this crisis. Their crafty counsel and carefully chosen words, leave—always—the stench of death in the room.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">That we have a President who promotes the death culture at home and internationally is one of the explanations for the present extraordinary push worldwide against the unborn, marriage, and the family. Think what we have become, when the President of the United States agrees to be the keynote speaker at a gala for Planned Parenthood—Planned Parenthood, an institution that has single-handedly killed more innocent human beings perhaps than any other institution in the history of mankind. The fact that the tax payers of America, still have their hard earned money paying for these murders, should really cause us to think whether our reaction to the death culture is proportionate to the crimes being committed. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">It is no surprise that President Obama remains mute on the Gosnell trial. As an Illinois state senator he voted twice for infanticide. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Planned Parenthood is nothing more than a criminal organization, which systematically and brutally takes the lives of the unborn and profits from the desperation and fear of women. Planned Parenthood’s “crocodile tears” over the Gosnell atrocities are simply a means to diffuse attention from the fact that they are guilty of the same crimes—the extermination of a whole class of innocent human beings. Planned Parenthood’s singular “complaint” against Gosnell is not that he kills babies for a living, but rather his lack of greater “professionalism” when murdering the innocent. Why can he not kill in a more sanitized manner? Why must he cause such a bloody mess every time he butchers a baby? Why must he draw attention to our lethal “business practices”? </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">As the mass media is finally forced to cover Gosnell’s horrible murders, the Holocaust image of abortion is finally becoming a reality in the American imagination. Gosnell is the case making the news, but there is no difference among Gosnell, Germantown late-term abortion doctor Leroy Carhart, and Todd Stave and Nancy Samuels, the owners of Carhart’s abortion clinic. Each is a part of the callous, calculating, money-hungry machine, prepared to kill unborn children or make possible the death of the unborn. It is this that should be the foundational thing that horrifies us about Gosnell. Otherwise, we will still not have learned the lesson.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Have we forgotten, already? Not even two months have gone by since Carhart was implicated in the death of one of his abortion clients, Jennifer Morbelli, 29, thirty-three weeks pregnant. While Jennifer and her baby girl died in Shady Grove Hospital, Carhart’s sponsors, Todd Stave and Nancy Samuels, continued to live the life of the innocent and blameless in neighboring Potomac, Maryland. Their children continued to go to school, just as the children of Nazi SS camp commander Adolf Höss lived and grew up in the midst of the mass extermination in Auschwitz. When I told Todd Stave that Carhart had just been involved in the death of another woman, his two-word response was: “stuff happens.”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">The banality of evil lives on in America. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">The banality of evil is celebrated in America. Imagine, Carhart and fellow late-term abortionists </span>Warren Hern, who performs late-term abortions in Boulder, Colorado, Shelley Sella and Susan Robinson who do their killing in Albuquerque, New Mexico, <span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">are the </span><a href="http://www.cnsnews.com/blog/rev-marcel-guarnizo/heroes-sundance"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">heroes of Sundance</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">, celebrated in </span><a href="http://www.cnsnews.com/blog/rev-marcel-guarnizo/heroes-sundance"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">lionized film</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"> celebrated at Hollywood’s Sundance Festival. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Until the Gosnell scandal, Leroy Carhart was perhaps America’s most notorious late term abortionist. I charged Leroy Carhart, early on, with being the “Butcher of Germantown” and the name has stuck. The Holocaust image is no hyperbole. The appellation was historically based and was meant to illustrate the reality of who Carhart is. The infamous Nazi criminal Klaus Barbie was known as the “Butcher of Lyon” and it has been estimated he was responsible for the murder of over 14,000 people. The “Butcher of Germantown,” Leroy Carhart, by his own count, has killed with his own hands over 20,000 babies. He is a circuit rider, as he spends his week shuttling among three states, in order to maximize his killing. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Even technically, the abortion industry emulates the horrific crimes of the not-so-distant past—for instance, the use of lethal poison to destroy its victims. “The Butcher of Germantown,” even encountered some of the same technical difficulties Auschwitz Commandant Adolf Höss experienced and testified about at the Nuremberg Tribunal. </span><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“Technically it wasn't so hard—it would not have been hard to exterminate even greater numbers.... The killing itself took the least time. You could dispose of 2,000 head in half an hour,” H</span><span style="font-family: "Times","serif";">ö</span><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">ss wrote in his affidavit to the Nuremberg Tribunal in 1946. “But it was the burning that took all the time.”</span><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"> </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">As I have related before, Leroy Carhart had to install his own personal incinerator at his abortion mill to burn the cadavers of his victims. This, after a journalist took a picture of a dog consuming the body of one of the aborted babies in the public incinerator (where Carhart previously disposed of the infants’ corpses).</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">This should be the image that comes to mind when we think of Planned Parenthood—not fancy dinners and flowing glasses of champagne with President Obama. No, rather a ravenous beast consuming our children.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">We have an equally vivid image of Gosnell dealing with the same “problems.” In Gosnell’s house of horrors, babies were stuffed down the toilet, put in shoe boxes, decapitated, and dismembered. There were body parts, blood, and death everywhere. What else do we need, to recognize that abortion is but the whole-scale massacre of an unprotected group of Americans (for they are born on our soil)?</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">Someday, future generations will gaze in amazement at pictures which will be shown publicly for the record, of bishops and cardinals gleefully socializing with politicians engaged in keeping the abortion industry alive and well in America. The complete silence of so many, the open door policies of our churches to those who openly call “good evil and evil good,” the easy distribution of Holy Communion to such people, and the hollow rationalizations, will all come back to haunt us, some day. Future generations will then ask of us, “What were you thinking? What were you doing after 1973?” These are precisely the same questions that haunted so many Germans when their children and grandchildren asked, “What were you doing during the war?”</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">Unfortunately, those who have fought valiantly for the abolition of abortion, may not be remembered so easily. And so much of the complicity of the media and their political cohorts, will one day be left bare for all to see how systematic was the effort to keep a nation in darkness and ignorant of the real horrors of abortion. </div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">The prolife forces have indeed become the new Abolitionist forces in America. And they should know, study, and understand the great movements of civil disobedience which historically achieved so much to reverse discrimination in our travailed human history.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">Civil disobedience was aided by prayer, but prayer was the means to strengthen the soul of the Abolitionists. Prayer was the means to prepare them to be willing to pay the price, to atone at great financial and personal risk, for the terrible evils that were afflicting humanity. We are called to pray but perhaps so that we may muster the courage that grace gives, to say in action, “No more. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Never again</i>.”</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">Gosnell, Carhart, Todd Stave, Nancy Samuels and the thousands of others involved in this wicked industry should cause us to examine, whether our souls have become so desensitized that we are being lulled to sleep and ultimately consumed by the banality of evil.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><br />Christina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6120413033555923852.post-46823049048868654382013-05-03T06:25:00.000-07:002013-05-03T06:26:03.275-07:00Kermit Gosnell and the Banality of Evil<!--[if !mso]>
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<br />
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<b><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> A guest commentary from Rev. Marcel Guarnizo,
a philosopher, theologian, and activist involved in economic and cultural
issues in Europe and the United States.</span></b></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="tab-stops: 85.5pt 166.5pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="tab-stops: 85.5pt 166.5pt;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">“Who among us has any conception of the dimensions of shame that will
befall us and our children when one day the veil has fallen from our eyes and
the most horrible of crimes─crimes that infinitely outdistance every human
measure─reach the light of day.” (Sophie Scholl of the White Rose-German dissident,
decapitated by the Nazis, February 22, 1943).</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It would serve us well, as more and more of the <a href="http://spectator.org/archives/2013/04/17/gosnells-chop-shop">unspeakable
crimes of late-term abortionist Kermit Gosnell</a> come to light, to recall the
thesis of Hannah Arendt in her 1963 book,<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">
Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil.</i> </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Arendt's thesis was that people who carry out unspeakable crimes, such
as those committed by Adolf Eichmann, who implemented<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the final solution of the Nazi death camps,
were not all psychotic and crazed individuals. They are, rather, exactly what a
person becomes when he or she has accepted the logic and practice of a state
and a society that has determined that it is licit to exterminate some members
of the human species for the convenience of others. Gosnell is not unique, not an
aberrant case, not a “lone shooter.” He is a horrifying microcosm of what has
been taking place in America for four decades. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjm2IH_rpK0rwdfLb9evMvoq_L-fZY6TJvn23eA51LJkcuupIqMnVGS5rpRS5dcZ2He-v9rcQkOOAzF19OSEr2MHepSn6W-7uaZBbHleanzZWlnF1PAV2LvcLgTDkDD2t2ARwbBcEc5gWu3/s1600/Gosnell.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjm2IH_rpK0rwdfLb9evMvoq_L-fZY6TJvn23eA51LJkcuupIqMnVGS5rpRS5dcZ2He-v9rcQkOOAzF19OSEr2MHepSn6W-7uaZBbHleanzZWlnF1PAV2LvcLgTDkDD2t2ARwbBcEc5gWu3/s1600/Gosnell.jpg" /></a></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-no-proof: yes;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Kermit Gosnell. Courtesy of Brietbart.com</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Gosnell is not alone. Planned Parenthood is the iconic example of crimes
against the unborn on a massive scale. Late term abortionist Leroy Carhart in
Germantown, Maryland, is substantially no different than Gosnell. Todd Stave
and Nancy Samuels from </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Potomac, Maryland—owners of Carhart’s abortion center, who sponsor and
profit from Carhart’s killing—are all part of what was appropriately called by John
Paul II, “the culture of death,” in America.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBXYkE8xkb-09mniHOjXVASQdLrOux586JeRbIvOt0SOljFVdqTyJRcky6j4OOiYi67auxFCmOQJGTG2kddj8rg1wOROihvRwp-Oq3y_Bc96ZvZKmyGIYxj5hWHjq7CIXKvAlNnjgk2I9V/s1600/Stave.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBXYkE8xkb-09mniHOjXVASQdLrOux586JeRbIvOt0SOljFVdqTyJRcky6j4OOiYi67auxFCmOQJGTG2kddj8rg1wOROihvRwp-Oq3y_Bc96ZvZKmyGIYxj5hWHjq7CIXKvAlNnjgk2I9V/s1600/Stave.jpg" /></a></div>
<br />
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<span style="mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-no-proof: yes;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Todd Stave, abortion clinic owner</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Lila Rose and </span><a href="http://www.liveaction.org/"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Live Action</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"> have more than sufficiently
documented Planned Parenthood’s mass murder. Their videos and documentation will
remain as a shocking testimonial for future generations of what America was
willing to tolerate in our age. Live Action’s most recent expose on the
abortion industry has shown that infanticide is anything but rare in America.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">It is high time that we realize that the crisis of our times is first
and foremost a moral and cultural crisis of enormous proportions. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">The crimes of abortion are made possible by a broad network of
complicity. Kermit Gosnell and Leroy Carhart are but telling reflections of the
neglect of authorities at many levels and a population that has become so
dormant and lethargic, that it has trouble recognizing murder when it is
staring them right in the face. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Our response to the massive abuse against life is so disproportional to
the crimes being committed that it has allowed in our society the growth of what
John Paul II called veritable “structures of sin.” Our silence and inaction amounts
to complicity in this matter. We allow these killing centers in our
neighborhoods, near our churches, and next door to our schools, as if they were
part of the forces of civilization. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Abortion is not medical care and abortionists are not doctors. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">They are rather what the corruption of the science of medicine looks
like. The crimes of Gosnell, too horrible for most to behold without crying
aloud, stand in abject contrast to the deafening silence of American culture in
this regard. Abortion is creating an enormous democratic deficit that is
delegitimizing the state and the courts that are part of the legal and
political structure that keeps abortion functioning in America. Until we
theoretically grasp the illegitimacy of laws that support abortion and the verdicts
that decriminalize it, we will fail to have a robust and foundational
understanding of democracy. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">In legitimate democracy, not all things are subject to a political
debate, vote, or deliberation. Whether some should live or die is not the proper
subject of a democratic referendum or deliberation by any court of justice. Referenda
on whether unalienable rights are to be preserved or eliminated are not only
morally illicit, but are profoundly anti-democratic. It should be firmly locked
in our thinking that no human being has any jurisdiction assigned by democracy
to vote on who shall live and who shall die. The right to life is not something
that is in our jurisdiction as citizens to deny to any member of the human
species, regardless of race, color, religion, gender, size, or stage of
development. Unalienable rights are beyond the legitimate jurisdiction of
voters. Courts lose legitimacy when they claim authority over things beyond
their legitimate reach. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">When did our Presidents and their cohorts, or the court of the Nine,
become accepted as the Caesars of old? When did we come to believe that they
have the right to signal thumbs up or thumbs down on whether an innocent human
being in the womb should live or be executed? What legitimacy remains in a
court without an antecedent rectification in positive law of the previous abuses
committed by their decisions vis-à-vis the unborn? </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">It is astonishing that, as of late, “the political strategists” think
nothing of speaking on national television, about how we must rid ourselves of
those “pesky social issues” in order to win elections. These “pseudo philosophers”
of our age, must be forcefully rebuked. Their “bean counting skills” to win
elections are of no use in this crisis. Their crafty counsel and carefully
chosen words, leave—always—the stench of death in the room.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">That we have a President who promotes the death culture at home and
internationally is one of the explanations for the present extraordinary push
worldwide against the unborn, marriage, and the family. Think what we have
become, when the President of the United States agrees to be the keynote
speaker at a gala for Planned Parenthood—Planned Parenthood, an institution
that has single-handedly killed more innocent human beings perhaps than any
other institution in the history of mankind. The fact that the tax payers of
America, still have their hard earned money paying for these murders, should
really cause us to think whether our reaction to the death culture is
proportionate to the crimes being committed. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">It is no surprise that President Obama remains mute on the Gosnell
trial. As an Illinois state senator he voted twice for infanticide. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Planned Parenthood is nothing more than a criminal organization, which systematically
and brutally takes the lives of the unborn and profits from the desperation and
fear of women. Planned Parenthood’s “crocodile tears” over the Gosnell atrocities
are simply a means to diffuse attention from the fact that they are guilty of
the same crimes—the extermination of a whole class of innocent human beings. Planned
Parenthood’s singular “complaint” against Gosnell is not that he kills babies
for a living, but rather his lack of greater “professionalism” when murdering
the innocent. Why can he not kill in a more sanitized manner? Why must he cause
such a bloody mess every time he butchers a baby? Why must he draw attention to
our lethal “business practices”? </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">As the mass media is finally forced to cover Gosnell’s horrible
murders, the Holocaust image of abortion is finally becoming a reality in the
American imagination. Gosnell is the case making the news, but there is no
difference among Gosnell, Germantown late-term abortion doctor Leroy Carhart, and
Todd Stave and Nancy Samuels, the owners of Carhart’s abortion clinic. Each is
a part of the callous, calculating, money-hungry machine, prepared to kill
unborn children or make possible the death of the unborn. It is this that
should be the foundational thing that horrifies us about Gosnell. Otherwise, we
will still not have learned the lesson.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Have we forgotten, already? Not
even two months have gone by since Carhart was implicated in the death of one
of his abortion clients, Jennifer Morbelli, 29, thirty-three weeks pregnant. While
Jennifer and her baby girl died in Shady Grove Hospital, Carhart’s sponsors,
Todd Stave and Nancy Samuels, continued to live the life of the innocent and
blameless in neighboring Potomac, Maryland. Their children continued to go to
school, just as the children of Nazi SS camp commander Adolf Höss lived and
grew up in the midst of the mass extermination in Auschwitz. When I told Todd
Stave that Carhart had just been involved in the death of another woman, his two-word
response was: “stuff happens.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">The banality of evil lives on in America. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">The banality of evil is celebrated in America. Imagine, Carhart and
fellow late-term abortionists </span>Warren Hern, who performs late-term
abortions in Boulder, Colorado, Shelley Sella and Susan Robinson who do their
killing in Albuquerque, New Mexico, <span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">are the </span><a href="http://www.cnsnews.com/blog/rev-marcel-guarnizo/heroes-sundance"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">heroes of
Sundance</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">, celebrated in </span><a href="http://www.cnsnews.com/blog/rev-marcel-guarnizo/heroes-sundance"><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">lionized film</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"> celebrated at
Hollywood’s Sundance Festival. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Until the Gosnell scandal, Leroy Carhart was perhaps America’s most
notorious late term abortionist. I charged Leroy Carhart, early on, with being the
“Butcher of Germantown” and the name has stuck. The Holocaust image is no
hyperbole. The appellation was historically based and was meant to illustrate
the reality of who Carhart is. The infamous Nazi criminal Klaus Barbie was
known as the “Butcher of Lyon” and it has been estimated he was responsible for
the murder of over 14,000 people. The “Butcher of Germantown,” Leroy Carhart, by
his own count, has killed with his own hands over 20,000 babies. He is a
circuit rider, as he spends his week shuttling among three states, in order to
maximize his killing. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Even technically, the abortion industry emulates the horrific crimes of
the not-so-distant past—for instance, the use of lethal poison to destroy its
victims. “The Butcher of Germantown,” even encountered some of the same
technical difficulties Auschwitz Commandant Adolf Höss experienced and
testified about at the Nuremberg Tribunal. </span><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“Technically it wasn't so hard—it would not have been hard
to exterminate even greater numbers.... The killing itself took the least time.
You could dispose of 2,000 head in half an hour,” H</span><span style="font-family: "Times","serif";">ö</span><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">ss wrote in his affidavit to the Nuremberg Tribunal in 1946.
“But it was the burning that took all the time.”</span><span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">As I have related before, Leroy Carhart had to install his own personal
incinerator at his abortion mill to burn the cadavers of his victims. This, after
a journalist took a picture of a dog consuming the body of one of the aborted
babies in the public incinerator (where Carhart previously disposed of the
infants’ corpses).</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">This should be the image that comes to mind when we think of Planned
Parenthood—not fancy dinners and flowing glasses of champagne with President
Obama. No, rather a ravenous beast consuming our children.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Times","serif"; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">We have an equally vivid image of Gosnell dealing with the same “problems.”
In Gosnell’s house of horrors, babies were stuffed down the toilet, put in shoe
boxes, decapitated, and dismembered. There were body parts, blood, and death
everywhere. What else do we need, to recognize that abortion is but the whole-scale
massacre of an unprotected group of Americans (for they are born on our soil)?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Someday, future generations will gaze in amazement at pictures
which will be shown publicly for the record, of bishops and cardinals gleefully
socializing with politicians engaged in keeping the abortion industry alive and
well in America. The complete silence of so many, the open door policies of our
churches to those who openly call “good evil and evil good,” the easy
distribution of Holy Communion to such people, and the hollow rationalizations,
will all come back to haunt us, some day. Future generations will then ask of
us, “What were you thinking? What were you doing after 1973?” These are
precisely the same questions that haunted so many Germans when their children
and grandchildren asked, “What were you doing during the war?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Unfortunately, those who have fought valiantly for the
abolition of abortion, may not be remembered so easily. And so much of the complicity
of the media and their political cohorts, will one day be left bare for all to
see how systematic was the effort to keep a nation in darkness and ignorant of
the real horrors of abortion. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The prolife forces have indeed become the new Abolitionist
forces in America. And they should know, study, and understand the great
movements of civil disobedience which historically achieved so much to reverse
discrimination in our travailed human history.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Civil disobedience was aided by prayer, but prayer was the
means to strengthen the soul of the Abolitionists. Prayer was the means to
prepare them to be willing to pay the price, to atone at great financial and
personal risk, for the terrible evils that were afflicting humanity. We are
called to pray but perhaps so that we may muster the courage that grace gives,
to say in action, “No more. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Never again</i>.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Gosnell, Carhart, Todd Stave, Nancy Samuels and the
thousands of others involved in this wicked industry should cause us to examine,
whether our souls have become so desensitized that we are being lulled to sleep
and ultimately consumed by the banality of evil.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<br />Christina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6120413033555923852.post-67218068221301729512012-11-23T12:24:00.001-08:002015-02-21T17:11:58.327-08:00Cardinal Calls Israelis "Baby Killers"--Does this Promote Peace in the Holy Land? <br /><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-233478" src="http://thegatewaypundit.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/Gianfranco-Ravasi.jpg" height="294" title="Gianfranco Ravasi" width="400" /></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi: Vatican must clarify his statement</td></tr></tbody></table><span style="color: black;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gianfranco_Ravasi">Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi</a><u>,</u></span> President of the Vatican Council for Culture, called Israel <b>baby-killers during an interview this week.</b><br /><br /><a href="http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/162368#.UK8YG2chx8F">Israel National News</a> reported, via <a href="http://israelmatzav.blogspot.com/2012/11/vatican-calls-israel-baby-killers.html">Israel Matsav</a>:<br />"Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, President of the Vatican Council for Culture, commenting on the war between Israel and Hamas, delivered a severe attack on the Jewish people: “I think of the ‘massacre of the innocents’. Children are dying in Gaza, their mothers’ shouts is a perennial cry, a universal cry.”<br /><br />"The Catholic Church high official equated Israel’s operation in Gaza against terror groups with the New Testament story of Herod’s slaughter of Jewish babies in his effort to kill Jesus.<br /><br />"Ravasi, who is one of the most popular Catholic cardinals and the director of the Church’s policy on culture, called Israelis baby-killers in a shameless form of anti-Semitism which subtly accuses the Jewish State of trying to murder the new Jesus, symbolized by the Palestinian people."<br /><br />Poorly worded condemnation of parties on either side of the Israeli-Hamas conflict could contribute to a catastrophic devolution of the Middle East into unstoppable violence. Clarification of Ravasi's statement, which could wipe out the gains of Pope Benedict's recent peace-making trip to Lebanon, should be forthcoming from the Vatican without delay.Christina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6120413033555923852.post-284867256136138642012-11-23T12:24:00.000-08:002012-11-23T12:24:09.651-08:00Cardinal Calls Israelis "Baby Killers"--Does this Promote Peace in the Holy Land? <br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-233478" src="http://thegatewaypundit.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/Gianfranco-Ravasi.jpg" height="294" title="Gianfranco Ravasi" width="400" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi: Vatican must clarify his statement</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="color: black;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gianfranco_Ravasi">Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi</a><u>,</u></span> President of the Vatican Council for Culture, called Israel <b>baby-killers during an interview this week.</b><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/162368#.UK8YG2chx8F">Israel National News</a> reported, via <a href="http://israelmatzav.blogspot.com/2012/11/vatican-calls-israel-baby-killers.html">Israel Matsav</a>:<br />
"Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, President of the Vatican
Council for Culture, commenting on the war between Israel and Hamas,
delivered a severe attack on the Jewish people: “I think of the
‘massacre of the innocents’. Children are dying in Gaza, their mothers’
shouts is a perennial cry, a universal cry.”<br />
<br />
"The Catholic Church high official equated Israel’s operation in Gaza
against terror groups with the New Testament story of Herod’s slaughter
of Jewish babies in his effort to kill Jesus.<br />
<br />
"Ravasi, who is one of the most popular Catholic cardinals and the
director of the Church’s policy on culture, called Israelis baby-killers
in a shameless form of anti-Semitism which subtly accuses the Jewish
State of trying to murder the new Jesus, symbolized by the Palestinian
people."<br />
<br />
Poorly worded condemnation of parties on either side of the Israeli-Hamas conflict could contribute to a catastrophic devolution of the Middle East into unstoppable violence. Clarification of Ravasi's statement, which could wipe out the gains of Pope Benedict's recent peace-making trip to Lebanon, should be forthcoming from the Vatican without delay.Christina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6120413033555923852.post-32424766723984079272012-11-17T07:10:00.001-08:002015-02-21T17:11:58.392-08:00Cardinal Dolan: Bishops Will Get Back to Work Dealing with Obama Attacks on Religious Freedom<br /><br /><iframe width="580" height="280" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/_Ypc58CXKHQ?feature=player_embedded" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe><br /><br />America's Catholic bishops took a "bit of a breather" during the last weeks of the 2012 election campaign, hoping that a defeat of Obama would end the administration's assault on Catholic hospitals and charitable institutions, said Conference of Bishops President Timothy Dolan on Thursday. But now it's time for the bishops to get back to work in defense of principles that cannot and will not be compromised.<br /><br /> Life Site News reported: Video has surfaced of Cardinal Timothy Dolan, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, who said the Catholic Church will not obey the pro-abortion HHS mandate the Obama administration put forward. “The only thing we’re certainly prepared to do is not give in — not violate our consciences and not obey what we consider to be something immoral,” Dolan said Tuesday, as LifeNews reported. “That we’re committed on.” “We took a bit of a breather as we waited for Election Day because the results of Election Day could have changed the playing field. It didn’t. So now I think the bishops have taken a deep breath and said, we better to get back to work and decide just what we are going to do,” he said. Saying he remains open to the Obama administration working out an acceptable compromise, he added, “I would say no door is closed, except the door to capitulation.”<br /><br /><div style="text-align: left;"> Catholic leaders have promised a 100 percent chance civil disobedience if Obama pursues the HHS mandate.</div>Christina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6120413033555923852.post-47626070002816561982012-11-17T07:10:00.000-08:002012-11-17T07:10:37.002-08:00Cardinal Dolan: Bishops Will Get Back to Work Dealing with Obama Attacks on Religious Freedom<br />
<br /><iframe width="580" height="280" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/_Ypc58CXKHQ?feature=player_embedded" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
<br />
<br />
America's Catholic bishops took a "bit of a breather" during the last weeks of the 2012 election campaign, hoping that a defeat of Obama would end the administration's assault on Catholic hospitals and charitable institutions, said Conference of Bishops President Timothy Dolan on Thursday. But now it's time for the bishops to get back to work in defense of principles that cannot and will not be compromised.<br />
<br />
Life Site News reported:
Video has surfaced of Cardinal Timothy Dolan, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, who said the Catholic Church will not obey the pro-abortion HHS mandate the Obama administration put forward.
“The only thing we’re certainly prepared to do is not give in — not violate our consciences and not obey what we consider to be something immoral,” Dolan said Tuesday, as LifeNews reported. “That we’re committed on.”
“We took a bit of a breather as we waited for Election Day because the results of Election Day could have changed the playing field. It didn’t. So now I think the bishops have taken a deep breath and said, we better to get back to work and decide just what we are going to do,” he said. Saying he remains open to the Obama administration working out an acceptable compromise, he added, “I would say no door is closed, except the door to capitulation.”<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: left;">
Catholic leaders have promised a 100 percent chance civil disobedience if Obama pursues the HHS mandate.</div>
Christina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6120413033555923852.post-81250515443201536702012-11-13T05:37:00.002-08:002015-02-21T17:11:58.446-08:00Archbishop Chaput: Catholics, Prepare for Civil Disobedience If Obama Pursues HHS Mandate<iframe allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" frameborder="0" height="280" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/DaL176Wd70k?feature=player_embedded" width="520"></iframe> Catholic leaders have promised a 100 percent chance civil disobedience if Obama pursues the HHS mandate. Philadelphia's Archbishop Charles Chaput, in the video here, explains why.<br /><br />Catholic.org reported:<br /><br /> Martin Luther King’s “Letter from the Birmingham Jail” (April 16, 1963) is one of our nation’s elegant testimonies to the political implications of our Declaration of Independence: “One may want to ask: ‘How can you advocate breaking some laws and obeying others?’ The answer lies in the fact that <i>there are two types of laws: just and unjust</i>. I would be the first to advocate obeying just laws. One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I would agree with St. Augustine that ‘an unjust law is no law at all.’”<br /><br />Indeed, there may be more theological letters written from the confines of jail cells in the near future, as the Catholic bishops quickly approach the end of a one-year deadline given to them by the Obama administration to obey the HHS mandate or face the consequences.<br /><br />Not a single bishop has signaled any other intention than to embrace the consequences with the joy of serving Christ.<br /><br />Was Archbishop Chaput predicting the future in the interview when he concluded, “This has been the story of the martyrs through the centuries”?<br /><br />We know it has crossed his mind: At Chester Springs, he said, but only half-jokingly, “I don’t want to go to jail.”<br /><br /> As Chaput points out in the video, if Americans had resisted the culture of death in the decades following <i>Roe vs. Wade</i>, many lives could have been saved. Now, Obama's imperious mandate has pushed the Church beyond the point of accommodation. Christina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6120413033555923852.post-36706359087297580242012-11-13T05:37:00.001-08:002012-11-13T05:37:24.877-08:00Archbishop Chaput: Catholics, Prepare for Civil Disobedience If Obama Pursues HHS Mandate<iframe allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" frameborder="0" height="280" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/DaL176Wd70k?feature=player_embedded" width="520"></iframe>
Catholic leaders have promised a 100 percent chance civil disobedience if Obama pursues the HHS mandate. Philadelphia's Archbishop Charles Chaput, in the video here, explains why.<br />
<br />
Catholic.org reported:<br />
<br />
Martin Luther King’s “Letter from the Birmingham Jail” (April 16, 1963) is one of our nation’s elegant testimonies to the political implications of our Declaration of Independence:
“One may want to ask: ‘How can you advocate breaking some laws and obeying others?’ The answer lies in the fact that <i>there are two types of laws: just and unjust</i>. I would be the first to advocate obeying just laws. One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I would agree with St. Augustine that ‘an unjust law is no law at all.’”<br />
<br />
Indeed, there may be more theological letters written from the confines of jail cells in the near future, as the Catholic bishops quickly approach the end of a one-year deadline given to them by the Obama administration to obey the HHS mandate or face the consequences.<br />
<br />
Not a single bishop has signaled any other intention than to embrace the consequences with the joy of serving Christ.<br />
<br />
Was Archbishop Chaput predicting the future in the interview when he concluded, “This has been the story of the martyrs through the centuries”?<br />
<br />
We know it has crossed his mind: At Chester Springs, he said, but only half-jokingly, “I don’t want to go to jail.”<br />
<br />
As Chaput points out in the video, if Americans had resisted the culture of death in the decades following <i>Roe vs. Wade</i>, many lives could have been saved. Now, Obama's imperious mandate has pushed the Church beyond the point of accommodation. Christina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6120413033555923852.post-76851293704580317912012-11-07T05:58:00.001-08:002015-02-21T17:11:58.461-08:00Key to Romney's Defeat: Collapse of the Family<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwadlDHuigIIkXiQQDcq0iuVxA0VML5tJ3eT7bKavPNPov1fEz0MHndUIh0GbSKuVyXygJP4FkKoC_zfztIhrl5GRfBRvS0xSlc42UpPMCyyN2g5SmpQUaC0dtL8_kXKoF2Vp2_XWwW4L4/s1600/fatherless.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="286" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwadlDHuigIIkXiQQDcq0iuVxA0VML5tJ3eT7bKavPNPov1fEz0MHndUIh0GbSKuVyXygJP4FkKoC_zfztIhrl5GRfBRvS0xSlc42UpPMCyyN2g5SmpQUaC0dtL8_kXKoF2Vp2_XWwW4L4/s1600/fatherless.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="color: black; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"></span><br /><div><span style="color: black; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="color: #333399;"><span style="font-family: georgia,serif;"> Even more impo<span style="font-size: x-small;">rtant than <span style="font-size: x-small;">the election night <span style="font-size: x-small;">commentary about the <span style="font-size: x-small;">supposed racial divide in American poli<span style="font-size: x-small;">tics <span style="font-size: x-small;">are the facts on the changing demographics of our nation: The United States of America is no longer a society of <span style="font-size: x-small;">families, in which mothers <span style="font-size: x-small;">and father<span style="font-size: x-small;">s rear and educate children for the futu<span style="font-size: x-small;">re. It is now a society in which half o<span style="font-size: x-small;">f the children are born out of wedloc<span style="font-size: x-small;">k<span style="font-size: x-small;">, including</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span> 40% of Hispanic children and 70% of black children. Most of these children never know a stable two-parent family, even if one of the parents is a step parent. </div><div></div><div><span style="color: #333399;"><span style="font-family: georgia,serif;">This is the demographic Presid<span style="font-size: x-small;">ent </span>Obama <span style="font-size: x-small;">appealed to <span style="font-size: x-small;">in <span style="font-size: x-small;">his infamous </span></span></span> "Julia" ads, which followed the life of a single mother from government-assisted Head Sta<span style="font-size: x-small;">rt programs through ObamaCare and into <span style="font-size: x-small;">government-funded ret<span style="font-size: x-small;">irement </span></span></span>. The decline in family life leaves only the government as a safety net for an increasingly impoverished population and culture. This is the demo<span style="font-size: x-small;">graphic that put Big Government back into the <span style="font-size: x-small;">White House, from where he<span style="font-size: x-small;"> now w<span style="font-size: x-small;">ields <span style="font-size: x-small;">extraordinary powers to disarm America and continue his attack on the institutions of our civil society</span></span></span>. Once again, culture has <span style="font-size: x-small;">asserted <span style="font-size: x-small;">itself as t<span style="font-size: x-small;">he driver of hman history<span style="font-size: x-small;">.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div></div><br /><span style="color: black; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"> </span><br /><div><span style="color: black; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="color: #333399; font-family: Georgia;">Underlying this is a deeper cultural problem. Romney won among married women. But most women and most mothers today are not married. In addition, i<i><span style="color: black;">n 1950, 22 percent of American adults were single. </span></i><span style="color: black;">Now that number is almost 50 percent. One in seven adults lives alone. Half of all Manhattan residences are one-person dwellings. The Democratic Party is the party of single people, not famil<span style="font-size: x-small;">ies and nation-builders. </span></span></span></span></div><div></div><div><span style="color: black; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="color: #333399; font-family: Georgia;"><span style="color: black;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">For more details on this demo<span style="font-size: x-small;">graphic analysis, <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2103235/Most-children-U-S-born-wedlock.html">see the recent report in the UK's Daily Mail</a>. The newspaper reported on a stud<span style="font-size: x-small;">y by Child Trends, a Washin<span style="font-size: x-small;">g<span style="font-size: x-small;">ton, D.C. research group <span style="font-size: x-small;">that analysed U<span style="font-size: x-small;">.S. govern<span style="font-size: x-small;">ment <span style="font-size: x-small;">data. The study reported that most college graduates marry before they have children, suggesting that family structure id becoming a new class divide in an already splintering U.S. culture.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div><div></div><br /><br /><i><br /></i><span style="color: black; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"> </span><br /><div></div><span style="color: black; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"> </span><br /><div><span style="color: black; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="color: #333399;"><span style="font-family: georgia,serif;"><a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2103235/Most-children-U-S-born-wedlock.html" target="_blank">h</a></span></span></span></div><span style="color: black; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"></span>Christina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6120413033555923852.post-48128280225319651682012-11-07T05:58:00.000-08:002012-11-13T17:40:56.851-08:00Key to Romney's Defeat: Collapse of the Family<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="color: black; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="color: #333399;"><span style="font-family: georgia,serif;"> Even more impo<span style="font-size: x-small;">rtant than <span style="font-size: x-small;">the election night <span style="font-size: x-small;">commentary about the <span style="font-size: x-small;">supposed racial divide in American poli<span style="font-size: x-small;">tics <span style="font-size: x-small;">are the facts on the changing demographics of our nation: The United States of America is no longer a society of <span style="font-size: x-small;">families, in which mothers <span style="font-size: x-small;">and father<span style="font-size: x-small;">s rear and educate children for the futu<span style="font-size: x-small;">re. It is now a society in which half o<span style="font-size: x-small;">f the children are born out of wedloc<span style="font-size: x-small;">k<span style="font-size: x-small;">, including</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span> 40% of Hispanic children and 70% of black children. Most of these
children never know a stable two-parent family, even if one of the
parents is a step parent. </div>
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<span style="color: #333399;"><span style="font-family: georgia,serif;">This is the demographic Presid<span style="font-size: x-small;">ent </span>Obama <span style="font-size: x-small;">appealed to <span style="font-size: x-small;">in <span style="font-size: x-small;">his infamous </span></span></span>
"Julia" ads, which followed the life of a single mother from government-assisted Head Sta<span style="font-size: x-small;">rt programs through ObamaCare and into <span style="font-size: x-small;">government-funded ret<span style="font-size: x-small;">irement </span></span></span>. The decline in family life leaves only the government as a
safety net for an increasingly impoverished population and culture. This is the demo<span style="font-size: x-small;">graphic that put Big Government back into the <span style="font-size: x-small;">White House, from where he<span style="font-size: x-small;"> now w<span style="font-size: x-small;">ields <span style="font-size: x-small;">extraordinary powers to disarm America and continue his attack on the institutions of our civil society</span></span></span>. Once again, culture has <span style="font-size: x-small;">asserted <span style="font-size: x-small;">itself as t<span style="font-size: x-small;">he driver of hman history<span style="font-size: x-small;">.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="color: #333399; font-family: Georgia;">Underlying this is a deeper
cultural problem. Romney won among married women. But most women and
most mothers today are not married. In addition, i<i><span style="color: black;">n
1950, 22 percent of American adults were single. </span></i><span style="color: black;">Now that number is
almost 50 percent. One in seven adults lives alone. Half of all
Manhattan residences are one-person dwellings. The Democratic Party is the party of single people, not famil<span style="font-size: x-small;">ies and nation-builders. </span></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="color: #333399; font-family: Georgia;"><span style="color: black;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">For more details on this demo<span style="font-size: x-small;">graphic analysis, <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2103235/Most-children-U-S-born-wedlock.html">see the recent report in the UK's Daily Mail</a>. The newspaper reported on a stud<span style="font-size: x-small;">y by Child Trends, a Washin<span style="font-size: x-small;">g<span style="font-size: x-small;">ton, D.C. research group <span style="font-size: x-small;">that analysed U<span style="font-size: x-small;">.S. govern<span style="font-size: x-small;">ment <span style="font-size: x-small;">data. The study reported that most college graduates marry before they have children, suggesting that family structure id becoming a new class divide in an already splintering U.S. culture.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="color: #333399;"><span style="font-family: georgia,serif;"><a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2103235/Most-children-U-S-born-wedlock.html" target="_blank">h</a></span></span></span></div>
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</span>Christina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6120413033555923852.post-73201577488909229042012-11-06T08:37:00.001-08:002015-02-21T17:11:58.515-08:00Our Freedoms Depend on Free Elections: Vote Fraud Alert from Philadelphia<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimwoQV0YX635nC2G8BVvv4b4PHK2hNBKDIcmelNSm9RT3WvZ2XXLd37csJG5OHr20c-MylA3_GP26-Hc1nDL5rdCxxY2AG68XbIH-Bg3-Il5IDYTTLrlwyB1zvSfAO34wAa78GOUfer1Fi/s1600/Obama+in+polling+place.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimwoQV0YX635nC2G8BVvv4b4PHK2hNBKDIcmelNSm9RT3WvZ2XXLd37csJG5OHr20c-MylA3_GP26-Hc1nDL5rdCxxY2AG68XbIH-Bg3-Il5IDYTTLrlwyB1zvSfAO34wAa78GOUfer1Fi/s1600/Obama+in+polling+place.jpg" height="223" width="400" /></a></div><br /><a href="http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/obama-mural-philadelphia-polling-place_661833.html">http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/obama-mural-philadelphia-polling-place_661833.html</a><br /><br />A reader of the Weekly Standard online magazine alerts the nation that there is illegal electioneering going on inside a Philadelphia polling place. The exact location is the 35th ward-D18 Franklin School.<br /><br />Readers should contact the <a href="http://www.phila.gov/mayor/">Philadelphia mayor's office</a> to complain. Christina at homehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11499903971705156407noreply@blogger.com0