December 2003 Archives

The word mavens of Sault Ste. Marie have filed their annual report on expressions we've all heard a few too many times: away with them!

Happy new year.

Update: Here's the correct link for 2004.

Yes, it does.

"Christ, you are the light of the world."

In a private message, a Catholic Light reader mentioned his difficulty with prayer to saints, and I wanted to explain why I think it's important.

Sometimes you find a news story that really speaks to your own life situation.

The Irish Catholics of South Boston have won another round in court against the liberals who want to take over their St. Patrick's Day parade.

The parade has long been full of Irish, patriotic, and Catholic displays -- our parish was even represented one year by a float depicting an altar and promoting our indult Mass -- so the broad-minded liberals of Boston couldn't let that kind of institution go on. Oh, how atavistic!

For a while, they tried to force the parade organizers -- a private group, mind you -- to let a gay group join the parade, on the ground that the parade was a "public accommodation" and subject to anti-discrimination laws. That dispute led to lengthy court battles, the cancellation of the parade in 1994, and finally vindication.

Let's remember, folks, to get the rhetoric right here: since we approve of the court's judgment in Hurley vs. Irish-American Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual Group of Boston, it's to be described as a "landmark decision"; otherwise, it would have been just the opinion of some right-wing kook judge. In this case, it was a unanimous decision of the US Supreme Court: the selection of groups to participate in a parade is a form of expression, and thus a matter of free speech.

Even that, however, wasn't enough to dissuade the leftists from their efforts, and the city last year let an anti-war group piggyback on the parade by marching at its end. So -- ya gotta love the names in this case -- parade organizer John J. "Wacko" Hurley and attorney Chester Darling are keeping up the fight.

Although my Canadian readership will recognize the above title as a play on our national anthem, I am having second thoughts about moving back to Canada. Not too long ago, Mark Steyn – a fellow Canuck – penned an excellent editorial in the Telegraph. It concerned the Islamification of Europe. As Mr. Steyn wrote, “To those of us watching from afar the ructions over the European constitution - a 1970s solution to a 1940s problem - it seems amazing that no Continental politician is willing to get to grips with the real crisis facing Europe in the 21st century: the lack of Europeans.”

As many other commentators within the culture war have noted, the low reproduction rate among native Europeans coupled with increased Muslim immigration are quickly transforming Europe into another Islamic continent. Yet the European secularists refuse to face this problem. Having spent the past thirty years suppressing the consequences of biological coupling, the modern European remains clueless as to the consequences of demographic coupling.

Unfortunately, recent Canadian statistics and demographics demonstrate a similar trend. Thus Mr. Steyn’s observations could easily included our native land. A recent statistic quoted by the Canadian Society of Muslims on its website estimates Canada’s Islamic population at around 650,000. Over the past decade alone, this represents a growth from under one percent of Canada’s total population to well over two percent.

At first two-to-three percent of the population seems statistically negligible. Granted, the Muslim population more than doubled over the past ten years, but it still represents a small minority of Canadians. Yet factor Canada's declining reproduction rate as well as its liberal immigration policy into the equation. As an aside concerning the latter, in the aftermath of its 9-11 coverage, even Canada’s putatively conservative Globe & Mail questioned our government’s liberal immigration policy. The Canadian Security Intelligence Service, which is Canada’s closest equivalent to the CIA, had reportedly warned Canadian politicians that our loose immigration policy made us an attractive staging ground from which terrorists could easily attack American targets.

But returning to the subject at hand, Canada's Muslim population is much younger than our general population. Additionally, they enjoy a stronger reproduction rate. Has Pierre Trudeau removed the state from the nation's bedroom – likely located somewhere in the Burnaby-Douglas riding – only to see it replaced by the Sharia?

Speaking of which, one of my Envoy Encore recently emailed me a story published by Aljazeera. It detailed Muslim efforts to establish an Islamic tribunal in Canada. "Since arbitrators' rulings can be enforced by the courts," we read, "the development has raised eyebrows that Sharia will in effect be endorsed by Canada's secular courts." The story dismisses any negative reaction to this development as overblown . It then equivocates the proposed Islamic tribunal with various Rabbinical courts already enjoying limited legal recognition under Canadian law.

Setting aside the Sharia's peculiarities for a moment – and like Kathy Shaidle, a fellow Canadian Catholic author, I find myself among the some of us [who] think stoning rape victims is a bit peculiar – there are other reasons to remain skeptical about this comparison between Islamic tribunals and Rabbinical courts. Does modern Judaism regularly attack civilian targets among the Gentiles? Does Isreal sponsor terrorist activities on western soil? Islam is alone among the five major world religions in employing forced conversion as a legitimate means of evangelization.

Actually, I take that back. Secularism, which is Canada's new state religion, also imposes forced conversion. Just look at poor Mark Harding. Mr. Harding is a Christian who recently ran afoul of Canada's hate police for drawing attention to certain peculiarities within the Islamic world. As Doug Coup reports in the Christian Times:

“[Harding's] offending pamphlets discussed Islamic societies around the world where ‘Muslims are torturing, maiming, starving and killing Christians’ simply because of their faith. Harding argues that Islam ‘is full of hate and violence,’ and that its holy books teach that it ‘will always be at war’ with other religions. ‘Once a state becomes an Islamic state, no other religion is tolerated,’ he says.

“His outspokenness last June landed Harding in trouble with the Muslim community, and he is going to trial next month to face criminal charges on three counts of ‘incitement to hatred.’ Complaints were also lodged with the Canadian Human Rights Commission. He was arrested and spent a few days in jail before a hearing last summer.”

Canadians political and religious commentators need not find Mr. Harding’s situation surprising. After all, the Canadian Human Rights Commission is the same quasi-judicial body that silenced as hate literature certain biblical passages pertaining to homosexuality. It is not too much of a stretch to silence international headlines as well. And thus I am reminded of Mark Steyn’s response to a similar flap over Johnny Hart’s recent allegedly anti-Islamic cartoon:

“Although I agreed of course that Islamophobic cartooning was the most pressing issue of the week, in my usual shallow way I'd become distracted by some of the day's more trivial stories - the 11 Hindus burnt alive by a Muslim gang in Bangladesh, the 13 Christian churches torched by Muslim rioters in the Nigerian town of Kazaure, and the 27 Turks and Britons murdered by Muslim terrorists in Istanbul. No dead Jews in that particular day's headlines, but otherwise a good haul of Hindus, Christians and, of course, Muslims...”

Like Mr. Steyn, I too cannot help but these headlines distracting. They may be as trivial as the First Amendment that protects my expression of concern over their content from the Canadian Human Rights Commission, but nevertheless I find them distracting.

Of a similar trivial nature is my concern over Canada’s apparent elimination of free speech from our public discourse. Criticism of another culture can be branded “hate speech” unless the critiqued culture is distinctly Christian or American. Yet if civil liberties in the Middle East are an example of what we can expect in Canada’s tolerant and multi-cultural society, the culture of death propagated by our secularists will eventually give way to the Islamosphere’s culture of fear.

Hope everyone had a blessed Christmas. Please keep me in prayer over a personal matter, as two of my New Year's resolutions are quite tough this year, but are problems in my life that need to be addressed. (Smoking is one of them.)

On to politics and predictions for the new year. I continue to think Howard Dean is gonna prove more difficult to the President's re-election bid than what most Republicans (and Republican sympathizers like myself) realize. While Dean is currently stumping to the left in the Democrat primaries, we need to keep in mind that the Howard Dean we see now is not the Howard Dean against whom President Bush and the Republican Party will square off against in the campaign leading up to the general election.

Already we are seeing Dean discover religion. Once the Dem nomination is firmly in hand, you will like see him continue his move to the center. Likely, he will trumpet his record of balanced budgets in Vermont. We need to hold Dean to the left. Health care, taxation for middle-class families and agriculture are three areas where Dean is weak.

Next, we need to recognize that President Bush is still politically vulnerable over the war in Iraq. I know this sounds strange, but over the short-term, Dean is likely to prove right in that the capture of Saddam Hussein will not make things any safer in the West. Basically, Hussein's capture is radicalizing the islamo-fascists who were reluctant to jump into the frey as long as Hussein was still hanging around. So don't be surprised to see terrorist attacks increase over the coming year. Additionally, you're seeing the Dean camp spin the fact Osama bin Looney still hasn't been captured.

Of course, the best answer would be to capture bin Looney and/or uncover WMDs in Iraq. Barring this possibility, however, the best way to to counter the Dean spin is to point out the long-term security benefits yielded by the capture of Hussein. For example, Libya abandonning its WMD programmes is a direct result of the President's firm leadership. Libya has had a long history of sponsoring terrorism. Additionally, Time Magazine reports that the Al Quack network has recently diverted much of its resources to Iraq. Given the geo-political makeup of Iraq versus that of Afganistan, it should be much easier to capture or kill key terrorists in Iraq than in Afganistan.

Finally, there is the gross human rights violations that took place under Saddam's regime. A number of leftists who support the war, such as Prime Minister Tony Blair in the UK and Alexa McDonough (former leader of Canada's socialist party) have often appealed on the left to Hussein's brutality against his own people people as justification for the Iraq war.

What about an anti-Dean candidate? The only one of the other Democrat candidates that I think presents a credible challenge within the Dem. primaries is Joe Lieberman. Neither Braun nor Sharpton present a credible challenge. When it comes to African-Americans, the Dems prefer tokenism to actually giving blacks real power. Note that it was the GOP who appointed Clarence Thomas on the Supreme Court, Colin Powell as Secretary of State, and who have seriously floated the idea of putting Condi Rice on the 2004 ticket where she could become the first African American and the first woman to become Vice-President.

Kucinich is out of the question. Not only are his policies to the left of Dean, but he makes Al Gore look charismatic. Edwards and Gephart also lack any charisma or marketability within this race. Finally, Kerry and Clark have flip-flopped over too many issues to be credible candidates at this point. Both of them come across as desperate, and not in a good sense.

Yet where Lieberman also comes across as somewhat desperate, his centrist credentials are solid. Other than Dean, he's the only serious candidate among the Dems who hasn't wavered in his position on key issues such as national security. Therefore, I would not be suprised if he emerges as the key anti-Dean candidate.

I would like to give amateur Catholic Web sites -- such as this one -- a Christmas present. Or rather, an Ordinary Time present, because that's when this project would be completed, without a doubt. I'd like to do a little "Saint of the Day" feature that could be inserted by anyone who wanted to include it on their Web page.

The HTML for the feature would be taken via client-side JavaScript, so the Web site's owner would simply have to insert some Javascript on the site's home page. Everything else would be taken care of by my server. I would think this might be a great little inclusion for many Catholic sites.

My question is 1) has anyone seen something like this out there? I'm not looking to re-invent the wheel; and 2) do you think other sites would like this? I don't want to do this and find that I'm only doing it for my own amusement.

Oh, yeah -- Merry Christmas!

Giles, today there comes to
redeem us
A shepherd boy, our kinsman,
God Omnipotent!

He frees us from
Satan’s prison;
But he is kin of Bras,
Menga, and Llorente,
Oh, He is God Omnipotent!

If He be God, why sold
And crucified dies?
Giles, in His suffering innocently,
Do you see, He vanquished sin?
He is God Omnipotent.

Oh, I saw Him being born
Of a shepherdess most fair.
If He is God, why did He
desire
Among such poor folk to be?
See you not that He is Omnipotent?

No more questioning,
Let us serve Him
Llorente, since He comes to die,
Let us die with Him.
He is God Omnipotent.

Thanks to all at St. Blog's for your kind condolences at the death of my mother last week. The funeral was on Monday at her parish church in New Hampshire.

The new pastor, a kind young fellow who works on the diocesan tribunal, celebrated the Mass with reverence and peace, and gave an encouraging homily. At the end of the Mass he read out my own message of thanks to the parish, which sounds like a little homily on its own, come to think of it....

(In response to Ken Shepherd's comments below about the "Messiah" being fine for Christmas.)

Ken, we're running into one of the big differences between the liturgical and non-liturgical Christian traditions (and no matter how much Evangelicals like to deny it, Evangelicalism is as much a tradition as Roman Catholicism.)

You say, "...Christianity is not about cycles, it's about the linear unfolding through time of God's eternal plan towards the end of this age and the inauguration of a new heaven and a new earth." In the Catholic view, the Christian life has a very strong cyclical component. We celebrate the birth of hope in winter, as the days begin to lengthen; we do penance before Spring so we can celebrate the resurrection of Christ.

To the Catholic, there is nothing wrong with following the cues of nature as we live out our baptismal vocation. Nature was created good by God, and we must adapt our lives to it even in the modern world. Those two facts urge us not to keep a constant focus on one aspect of the Christian mission -- spreading the word of God -- to the exclusion of others. Sometimes we should preach Jesus Christ, and sometimes we should merely adore and worship Him. The remembrance of his birth is an occasion for the latter.

Evangelicalism, as the name implies, has an omnipresent emphasis on conversion and downgrades adoration to a lower priority. What about the prophetess Anna, who "never left the temple but worshiped night and day, fasting and praying" (Lk 2:37)? Does the Evangelist imply that she should have been out proclaiming the Word, a la John the Baptist? No. She was living out her vocation: to pray for her fellow men and to adore God in the one place in the world where he dwelled in a special way. Clearly her example is one way to live out the Christian life.

To everything there is a season. There is a time for the Cross; but for now, it's still off in the distance. This is the season to kneel at the Christ child and be astonished once again that God wanted to become one of us.

Mark Steyn, whose wisdom and intellect are not yet legendary but should be, has some things to say about Europe's practically non-existent birthrate:

I recently had a conversation with an EU official who, apropos a controversial proposal to tout the Continent's religious heritage in the new constitution, kept using the phrase "Europe's post-Christian future". The evidence suggests that, once you reach the post-Christian stage, you don't have much of a future. Luke, a man of faith and a man of science, could have told them that.

My personal opinion is that the European Union is nothing more than a continent-wide suicide pact, designed to ensure that Europeans can live comfortably at the state's expense as they contracept and abort themselves into oblivion. Look at Europe's birthrates and tell me that's incorrect.

Two brief comments this evening:

1. As part of my personal crusade to "Keep the Incarnation in Christmas," I want to reiterate, contra every choral society in the English-speaking world, that Handel's "Messiah" is an Easter oratorio. Furthermore, the "Halelujah" chorus from that oratorio is a celebration of THE RESURRECTION, not the Nativity. The words are from Revelation, not Luke. It's exciting music. I love it. But it ain't for Christmas.

2. Some mischevious persons change the words of "Hark! the Herald Angels Sing," because their tender ears can't stand to hear masculine pronouns used in an inclusive manner. "Pleased as man with man to dwell" is what Charles Wesley wrote, and that's what we should sing. If you are "uncomfortable" with standard English, and you like gender-bending music, my advice is to write your own damn song.

Aside from eliminating the play on words with the double meaning of "man" (since when did liberals favor artistic censorship?), it's an attempt to fly from the meaning of the Incarnation. "Pleased with us in flesh to dwell" is less theologically robust and it puts the emphasis on us, the worshippers.

Anyone else have Christmas hymn atrocities against which they would like to rail?

As an opponent to capital punishment, I was going to comment on Saddam Hussein and the possibility of his execution. However, Kevin Miller -- whose theological opinions I hold the deepest respect for -- already beat me to the punch. I agree that Saddam is the exception foreseen by the Catechism of the Catholic Church. While I do not believe that capital punishment should be used as retributive justice, no matter what atrocity is committed, there is always the danger that he could continue to inspire and lead the insurrection if kept alive. This would place other human life and the new Iraqi society at great risk. Therefore, unless Saddam openly and sincerely owns up to his past, denounces it, repents from it and agrees to spend the rest of his life doing penance for it (in which case he should be locked away in a maximum security American prison) this is one of those exceptions to the Church's prudential stand against capital punishment.

Godfried Cardinal Danneels, the liberal Belgian cardinal -- come to think of it, is there any other kind? -- figures that Saddam deserves to be dead, but in name only.

I guess this makes sense: his Eminence is considered papabile, but that's only talk too.

As Advent is a season of hope, this past week has brought much hope to the beleaguered conservative cause in Canada. First off, the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada and the Canadian Reform Conservative Alliance Party voted overwhelmingly to unite the right in Canada. They are now merging into the Conservative Party of Canada. Secondly, noted Jewish Canadian conservative author Ezra Levant has put together a team to resurrect the old Alberta Report. It will now be known as the Western Standard.

Finally, John Pacheco and a number of Catholic conservatives in Canada have launched The Rosarium. The purpose of this website to help organize a movement to petition the reversal of the Winnepeg statement. This was a controversial statement made by the Canadian Bishops in the aftermath of the Second Vatican Council which dissented in some respect from Pope Paul VI's Humanae Vitae.

"Even now, thirty years later, I could still go to that remote path in the Black Forest, not far from Basel, and find again the tree beneath which I was struck as by lightning.... And yet it was neither theology nor the priesthood which then came into my mind in a flash. It was simply this: you have nothing to choose, you have been called. You will not serve, you will be taken into service. You have no plans to make, you are just a little stone in a mosaic which has long been ready. All I needed to do was 'leave everything and follow,' without making plans, without wishes or insights. All I needed to do was to stand there and wait and see what I would be needed for."

English Translation: Peter Henrici, S.J. "Hans Urs von Balthasar: A Sketch of His Life."

Woohoo! Just in time for Christ-Mass, my friend Jim Erhart and I have designed a bunch of new banner ads that are just the right size for most of St. Blogosphere. To access the html code for them, please go here

And now, for the unveiling....

In lieu of sending your favorite canonist Christmas presents this year, please consider linking to this worthy Catholic apostolate on your blog or website.

This won't turn into a family blog, I promise. To round out the pictures of the Johnson family, here are Charlie, 4 1/2, and Christopher, 10 months.

I realize Christopher's skin color looks strange, but I'm still learning how to use our new digital camera.

I received this in my Inbox:

Hi Eric,

I was wondering if you could post an announcement for me on your blog. I'm doing some publicity for a literary journal of orthodox Catholic poetry and prose that will be started up next year. We're looking for contributors and subscribers. The journal is called the St. Linus Review. Here's the website: www.stlinusreview.com. Thanks!

Sarah DeCorla-Souza

Sounds like a good idea to me. I think it's a little ambitious to expect that the prose must be under 350 words -- that's practically haiku! -- but I'm not much into fiction, so my opinion doesn't count for much. Good luck to you, Sarah, and all your collaborators and contributors.

Open Source Shakespeare, a Web site created for my graduate thesis, is available for your perusing. It's in "beta" condition, meaning it's not quite finished. However, I wanted to get some comments about it, so be nice. Also, maybe when Google spiders Catholic Light, it will start indexing OSS because of the link in this post. I submitted the URL several days ago, and Google still hasn't visited.

From AFP's end-of-year wrap-up:

SANTIAGO - After living together for 57 years, Isolina Ojeda, 107, and her 86-year-old lover Oscar Martinez finally decided to make it official by getting married. After the ceremony, the blushing bride, slightly hard of hearing, said: "We had to get married, as God intended. It's a sin to live the way we were living."

Time for a break from controversy. Here's a photo of my daughter Anna before the preschool Christmas concert tonight. On Saturday, she'll be 3 1/2.

Michael Novak puts Cardinal Martino's comments in perspective, saying the bishop "has not ceased being an embarrassment to his superiors."

The article is worth reading, as is just about everything Novak writes, but here's the most intriguing passage:

The big Vatican news of the past month has been the major change in the way Islamic terrorism has been directly confronted, with gloves-off honesty in the Jesuit periodical Civilta Cattolica, whose pages are always cleared by the secretariat of state. Over a third of the Christians of the Middle East have been driven out during the past decade, the journal reports, and it lists many abuses by extremists, against the background of much greater tolerance in the past. It also analyzes carefully just how the extremists function in practice.

The secular Left has co-opted the slogan "war is a defeat for humanity" from Pope John Paul II, but in the original passage, you'll see that the Holy Father isn't saying what they think he's saying.

He has used the words many times since, but he uttered the phrase in question almost four years ago, on January 1, 2000, and therefore could not have been speaking about the Iraqi War. He was talking about wars in general, but he enumerated legitimate reasons for war that were applicable to the original decision to remove the former Iraqi government. See the passage I highlighted below to see if that's a fair summary.

"In the century we are leaving behind, humanity has been sorely tried by an endless and horrifying sequence of wars, conflicts, genocides, and “ethnic cleansings” which have caused unspeakable suffering: millions and millions of victims, families, and countries destroyed, an ocean of refugees, misery, hunger, disease, underdevelopment, and the loss of immense resources. At the root of so much suffering there lies a logic of supremacy fueled by the desire to dominate and exploit others, by ideologies of power or totalitarian utopias, by crazed nationalisms or ancient tribal hatreds. At times brutal and systematic violence, aimed at the very extermination or enslavement of entire peoples and regions, has had to be countered by armed resistance.

"The 20th century bequeaths to us above all else a warning: wars are often the cause of further wars because they fuel deep hatreds, create situations of injustice and trample upon people’s dignity and rights. Wars generally do not resolve the problems for which they are fought and therefore, in addition to causing horrendous damage, they prove ultimately futile. War is a defeat for humanity."

Which is more contrary to human dignity, this...

...or this:

?

Cardinal Renato Martino, the reflexively anti-war prelate who predicted a gigantic disaster if Iraq's government was replaced by force, gets a little sad about poor Saddam:

"I felt pity to see this man destroyed, (the military) looking at his teeth as if he were a cow. They could have spared us these pictures," he said.

"Seeing him like this, a man in his tragedy, despite all the heavy blame he bears, I had a sense of compassion for him," he said in answer to questions about Saddam's arrest.

Medical exams upon capture are perfectly legal and routine. Releasing a videotape of a prisoner is also legal, and proving that he was in custody serves a military purpose.

"It's true that we should be happy that this (arrest) has come about because it is the watershed that was necessary... we hope that this will not have worse and other serious consequences," Martino said...."But is seems to me to be illusory to hope that this will repair the dramas and the damage of the defeat for humanity that a war always brings about."

Joseph Lieberman said that if it were up to Howard Dean, Saddam would still be in power, killing Iraqis and threatening his neighbors. The same thing can be said -- and I say this with a heavy heart -- about many bishops.

Unlike the Holy Father, the good cardinal has been content to repeat the European line about war being obsolete without any nuance or reservation, and does not even bother to root his comments in the Gospel. You know who I feel compassion for? The Iraqis who lost their loved ones because of this man. I feel pity for Saddam because of the fate that awaits him if he remains unrepentant. But compassion? I'll reserve that for the mothers whose sons were dragged off and murdered, or used as cannon fodder in useless wars.

Reflecting on the sex scandal comments, I'd like to propose a different way of thinking about problems within the Church. Before we, the laity, start criticizing bishops and priests, shouldn't we ask what we have done to prepare the ground for a scandal? Have we supported good priests and bishops? Worked to make our parishes, schools, and institutions worthy of the name "Christian"? Striven to consecrate our culture to God, or at least to make sure it doesn't offend him?

I'm not suggesting that bishops who covered up serious sins and crimes should not be punished, either by civil or canon law, nor am I suggesting that blame should be shifted from the perpetrators. The Church doesn't operate franchises that provide holiness on demand, it provides houses of worship for sinners. The conditions within those houses are largely determined by those who inhabit them, and that means us, dear laymen. If our local house is out of order, perhaps the place to start the renovation is within our own souls.

In your kindness please pray today for the repose of the soul of Elsie Fay (Browning) Chonak, my own dear mother, who passed away Monday afternoon, December 15, during an operation. She was born in 1930 and was baptized in 1997. May the Lord who rewards the workers of the late hour bring her to Himself in everlasting life.

Is it possible for Rod Dreher to write about any Catholic topic except sexual scandals? One wonders. Do a Google search on "rod dreher" child sex and you'll see what I mean. Here's his take on Lauryn Hill's embarrassing speech:

...What [she] did was rude, but prophets don't stand on protocol. I'm thrilled she went right to the heart of our Church and said what she did. The AFP report quotes her as having told the cardinals and invited guests: "Holy God has witnessed the corruption of your leadership, of the exploitation and abuses which are the minimum that can be said for the clergy." She also called on the hierarchy to "repent."

Good for her. It's a shame it takes a non-Catholic to show that kind of courageous witness to the hierarchy, which has so grievously failed Catholic children and their families in the sex-abuse scandal.

And to him, she's a prophet, like Jeremiah or Isaiah! The Lord must be hurting for prophets these days. Maybe a more articulate prophet can explain what "the exploitation and abuses which are the minimum that can be said for the clergy" means.

Come on, Rod. You're a smart guy and a faithful Catholic. Being shrill and strident isn't going to help anything. You might consider taking a sabbatical from the kiddie-sex beat for a while.

Lauryn Hill, a singer whose oevre I am completely unfamiliar with, denounced the Church's leadership at the Vatican's Christmas concert. Maybe someone can explain why a non-Catholic was performing at the event. I know nothing about the her, except that she's made some pro-life music in the past, which I assume is why she was invited in the first place.

I don't agree with the stereotype that says Americans are all insensitive boors who are eager to share their ill-formed, ignorant views on many topics, but it's not hard to see where that opinion comes from.

While on the run, Hussein ran out of "Just for Men"

I never met an Iraqi who didn't have a dead relative because of Saddam Hussein. From Adil, my civilian colleague in London, who had a brother gunned down in the street by the Republican Guard, to the scores of Iraqis I met in their cities and towns, everyone was closely related to at least one of Saddam's victims. Many parents were missing two, three, four children because of the tyrant. It was as if a plague like the Black Death had visited the country, striking down men at random.

That explains the visceral reaction that the Iraqi journalists showed during the press conference announcing Saddam's capture. When they showed him undergoing a medical examination, they started yelling and screaming at the television, as if he were in the room with them. (Maybe the Western journalists can lecture them privately about how the press is supposed to live in a world beyond good and evil.) It was gratifying, to me at least, seeing him treated like a common criminal on his way to arraignment.

Whatever you might think of the Iraqi war, you would have to be spiritually blind not to be happy for the Iraqi people on this day. They will have the opportunity to put their tormentor on trial for his monstrous, scarcely believable crimes. Today, let's pray that the Iraqi citizens get the quiet, normal existence that they deserve.

My lovely wife and I are heading to Chicago next week for a music convention. While we are there, we intend to visit St. John Cantius. Any others you readers might suggest? We're especially interested in old, beautiful parishes that have some historical significance. Here's your opportunity to tell us where to go...

Movie Star Killer Whale dead at 27.

Keiko the Killer Whale was found floating face up in a Norwegian Fjord by his long-time friend Charlie the Tuna. "We were supposed to go clubbing tonight. It's so sad. I knew he'd been a little sick, but I never knew it was this bad."

Keiko is survived by a generation of American children who vaguely remember him jumping out of the water and have long since abandoned their desire to become marine biologists.

PETA put up this outrage in Rhode Island, the most Catholic state in the Union (population 65% Catholic), and it's gone already -- after the billboard company said they didn't want to be held liable for protestors going to the site and possibly getting injured while there.

Yet PETA's campaign coordinator William Rivas-Rivas says he'll use the image again and claims, "We're still at a loss as to why it was offensive." He said, according to a CNS story, that the image of Mary was respectful and "beautifully drawn".

What a confession of idiocy. If you haven't figured it out yet, Mr. Rivas-Rivas, how about this explanation: replacing the image of Jesus Christ, our God, with the image of a dead chicken is indeed offensive. I suppose the minds of PETA extremists and those of chickens are comparable, but we Catholics really do believe that God and men and chickens are not all interchangeable.

Public reaction, the spokesman claimed, was great: their web site got -- wow -- 1000 hits. Since PETA's web page contains 118 images, and each image retrieval counts as a hit to the web server, that means maybe 9 people connected in. Yeah, guy, go ahead and keep spending your ad money this way.

Bishop Robert Mulvee made his objection pretty clear: "This use of one of the most sacred images of the Christian faith trivializes not only the Mother of Jesus but also the very cause PETA strives to advance."

Planned Parenthood Kills Record Number of Babies; Brings in Over $36 Million Profit in 2002-2003

"You must love yourself. The most important love you can have is love for yourself," according to a message given to our students today by Dr. Lonise Bias, who has made a career out of recovering from the death of her son, Len, a basketball player who took cocaine in 1986 after being drafted by the Celtics.

I am not judging this woman. I have never lost a son. I hope I never do. But it seems to me that Dr. Bias is responding to feeling guilty about the way she raised her boy and that she is attempting to atone for this by charging PTAs and taxpayers $5000 per session to bring a message of hope and self-respect to students.

I have no issue with the good doctor's zeal, but her message gets the cart before the horse. Of course we, who are made in the image of God, are lovable, but only because we are made in the image of God; there's nothing in and of ourselves that is intrinsically good. All that we have is from God and it is possible that we ourselves only if we understanding that the good we love is a gift of God. We are unworthy. In addition, if we choose to take mind-altering drugs we are even less worthy of our own love. I'm sorry Len Bias died of a drug overdose, but a lack of self-love wasn't his problem. Of course, at only $5000, she couldn't be bothered to go into all of this.

In case you're keeping score, the following is free speech:
-- Computer-generated child pornography;
-- Burning the American flag;
-- Making rap songs about injuring women's genitals while having rough sex.

The following is not free speech:
-- Contributing money to a political party you favor; and
-- Speaking out against a political candidate.

When are we going to realize that the Supreme Court, along with many of the lower courts, are mainly comprised of petty tyrants? Sooner or later, we must (bloodlessly) remove them from power. They are a threat to our liberties, and we have to deal with them as Americans have traditionally dealt with tyrants. It's time to remove them from their judicial thrones.

(from my great-grandmother)

Technically, these are really molasses cookies – but my family has always called them ginger snaps. They don’t have the acrid, overly intense spiciness of many ginger snaps. Rather, like good bread, they have a pleasant outer crust and a moist, satisfying crumb beneath.

You can chill the dough in the freezer for about an hour, or let it refrigerate for up to two days (wrap the dough in wax paper to keep it from drying out). If you refrigerate it, for easier handling you can take out the dough 20-30 minutes prior to forming the cookies.

Rolling the cookies in tubinado sugar – you know, Sugar in the Raw – gives the cookies a little more initial flavor, and compliments the molasses taste. That is my one minor improvement to this classic Johnson family recipe.

INGREDIENTS
3/4 cup butter
1 c. sugar
1/4 c. dark molasses
1 egg
2 1/2 c. flour
2 tsp. baking soda
1/8 tsp. ground cloves
1/4 tsp. ground ginger
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. cinnamon
additional sugar for rolling, preferably turbinado

DIRECTIONS

1. Preheat the oven to 375F.


2. In a medium-sized bowl, melt butter in the microwave until it is warm, but not hot.


3. Add sugar and molasses to the butter; add the egg.


4. Put all dry ingredients in a large bowl and whisk them together.


5. Add the liquid mixture to the dry mixture and stir until well-combined.


6. Chill the dough.


7. Form the dough into 24 small balls.


8. Roll the cookies in sugar until their entire little bodies are completely covered.


9. Put the cookies on two 13x18” ungreased cookie sheets. Parchment paper is optional. If you like a flatter cookie, you may gently press down on their tops with the heel of your hand.


10. Bake 8-12 minutes. If they still have that “raw” look on top, they aren’t done. If they’re stiff, they’re overdone. Remember, they will harden somewhat after they come out of the oven, so take them out when they’re still moist.


11. Remove them from the sheet to a cooling rack.


12. Consume.

Kathy Shaidle's Twas the Night Before Kwanzaa.

This just in: Mark thinks he's been "overly snippy [in] the last few weeks". An occupational hazard of full-time blogging, I suppose. Daily visits of Mark's blog will resume forthwith. However, the point about just war remains valid.

Mark Shea continues his snide attacks on Iraq war supporters on a near-daily basis, which has caused me to discontinue my daily visits to his site. He, and many other faithful Catholics, continue to question the motivations behind removing Saddam Hussein and his merry band of sadistic murderers.

I must ask: does 61,000 dead people in Baghdad count for anything? Between 300,000 and 1,000,000 people were executed under the previous regime. Do they count, either?

Mr. Shea, a man whom I respect, and at least one of whose books I own, comments, "Yes. Saddam is a monster. So as long as the country in question is ruled by a monster, Just War questions can be dispensed with and we can simply invade?"

The just war theory — it's not doctrine, keep in mind, it's a theory, as Shea himself has reminded us — must have room in it for a foreign power to intervene in the case of genocide. If it doesn't, then it needs to accomodate it. The theory is useful because it describes the circumstances under which a state may use military force to restore justice. If it is used to make excuses for inaction in the face of a crime that shrieks to God for intervention, then there's something wrong with it.

I don't happen to think that there's anything wrong with the just war theory, and I think it does cover instances where a foreign state is not the wronged party, yet acts with force. This isn't the time to go through it, as others have, and it's past my bedtime. I simply want to point out that saying, "So what about the tens of thousands of dead? There aren't any weapons of mass destruction found yet" is perverse. Human lives are less important than observing the just war theory? How Christian is that?

BONUS LINK: to a story about all the great work civil affairs soldiers are doing in Iraq. As a civil affairs Marine, I wish them well and pray for their work & their safety.

Algore, on the subject of invading Iraq: "...[M]y friends, this nation has never in our two centuries and more made a worse foreign policy mistake...."

Maybe it's the Internet, maybe it's our schools' failure to teach history, but have you noticed that hyperbole is the dominant mode of discourse these days? The Democratic presidential candidates are falling over themselves to show how gosh-darn mad they are. Fine — but why does everything have to be "the worst ____ in history" or "a total failure" or "a complete disaster"?

Hyperbole precludes real arguments from taking place. How can anyone seriously argue that "never" has there been a "worse foreign policy mistake"? Never ever? How about the failure to encourage France and Britain to crush Nazism in the 1930s? Or in 1919, to "smother Bolshevism in its cradle," as Churchill wanted to do? The prosecution of the Vietnam war in the 1960s? The flaccid response to Soviet aggression in the 1970s?

Or take a matter close to Catholic Light readers' hearts. Remember when the homosexual priest scandal was at its height? People who should have known better were saying that this might be "the end of the Catholic Church in America." Some fevered souls were saying that this would "shake the roots of the Church itself." While it was probably the most grave scandal in American church history (or is that hyperbolic?), it hasn't affected the direction of the Church, at least not yet. If anything, it has emboldened orthodox Catholics to press for true reform, and encouraged the heterodox We Are Church types to increase the volume of their shrill, rear-guard campaign to abandon the Church's solemn teachings.

For the record: Algore is the worst politician in 5,000 years of recorded history. So there.

(Thanks to Publius for bringing Algore's words to our attention.)

The Boston Archdiocese has to make good on its $85 million settlement deal soon, so it had to line up some quick loans to provide the cash as a short-term measure. Eventually, they'll be collecting from insurers, selling property, and doing Heaven knows what else to generate the funds.

The plan involves mortgaging the Seminary property and mortgaging the Cathedral property -- which, since the Cathedral is a parish, seems to break the promise not to use parish properties in the settlement.

My attention was caught by the fact that they're borrowing a few million from the priests' retirement fund and the cemetery endowment. That does look a little improper, doesn't it? Those funds belong, as a matter of justice, to their respective beneficiaries, and if the loans don't get repaid in a timely manner and with a just recompense for the risk (e.g.: a market-based interest rate), we can imagine lawsuits by retired priests or by the estates of the deceased.

A friend points out that, per canon 1295, the deal requires the consent of "those concerned", so one hopes that the retired priests and the cemetery's plotowners were represented by somebody independent. I won't be surprised, however, if that wasn't the case.

Literally. I'm not talking about a metaphorical, political earthquake -- I mean I felt the building tremble a little bit. I figured it was some kind of machinery in the building that was vibrating, but nope -- apparently it was an earthquake, 4.5 on the Richter scale.

That makes at least five quakes I've been in: three in California (not a big deal, I know), but the last one was a year ago in London, which set off the hotel's alarm system at 2 a.m. and scared the living crap out of me.

Everybody has their opinion about what we should do in Iraq, and I'll add my voice to the din; it will not necessarily be wise or correct, but at least it will be better informed than many, and tempered by some experience. We keep saying that we want Iraq to stand up on its two feet, to join the world community and become a normal country. Our leaders need to know that we don't have to win against the insurgency, we need the other side to lose.

That might seem tautological, but it isn't. We can simultaneously accomplish both goals if we let the Iraqi people, with American assistance, defeat the insurgency. After all, it's their country. Whenever we end up leaving, they're the ones who have to live there. If they want to live in a land dominated once again by the cruel whims of a small elite, so be it (though I don't think for a moment they want to do that.) If Iraq is no longer a cesspool of lawlessness and a potential threat to the U.S., we win.

Letting the people of Iraq establish justice within their borders will give them self-confidence, just as our defeat of the British strengthened our resolve to make a new nation. What do we care if we're not the ones who can exclusively claim victory, if Iraq is pacified and free?

UPDATE: Newt Gingrich agrees with me, saying, "Americans can't win in Iraq. Only Iraqis can win in Iraq." I'm frankly surprised he reads Catholic Light. Welcome, Newt.

I have no problem with using appropriately harsh tactics against insurgents anywhere. No matter whether they're domestic terrorists, like the Weathermen or Earth Liberation Front, or foreign terrorists, our government -- any government -- must ensure the safety of its own people. Those who make war on a society by killing officials and the innocent should be imprisoned or eradicated.

That said, articles like this disturb me. I find it unlikely that bulldozing civilian houses or arresting relatives of suspected insurgents is going to make murderous thugs go away. It's all well and good that the Israelis have used similar tactics in the last few years against the Palestinians, but one might ask whether their campaign has been a success.

Other observations:

1. The Army is no good at counterinsurgency operations. They are good at destroying large formations of troops, wrecking equipment, and smashing their way into enemy-held territory. They aren't good at the delicate, murky, gut-level actions that must be used against insurgencies. The Marine Corps is the only U.S. force that is good at such things, as they have proved in every clime and place (though usually the clime is hot and/or topical, e.g. Haiti, Nicaragua, Vietnam.)

2. Nobody ever rooted out a vicious band of thugs by cordoning off villages and monitoring who comes and goes. True, the British made similar moves in Malaysia, and defeated the Communist insurgency there. Anyone who thinks Malaysia -- where the Chinese minority lives under an apartheid regime -- is a model society, you're welcome to explain why.

3. An officer who makes an asinine statement such as, "With a heavy dose of fear and violence, and a lot of money for projects, I think we can convince these people that we are here to help them" should be shuffled off to a desk job in the bowels of the Pentagon, where he can exchange impolitic e-mail messages with colleagues instead of talking to New York Times reporters.

Help! I'm snowed in and can't get my car out of the drifts. If I stay home any longer, I'm going to start cleaning. Send Oreos!

Although he's a local musician, I hadn't heard about Tony DeBlois until the other day, but it seems he's already appeared on EWTN, played at WYD2K, had a movie made from parts of his life story, and won some international awards. That blind autistic kid is a jazz pianist savant, as his third CD attests.

The Catholic politician who was personally against abortion, but felt she could not impose her values upon everyone else, said to them, "Then what shalt I do with this blob of tissue which is called a foetus?" They all said, "Let it be aborted." And the politician said, "Why, what evil has it done?" But they shouted all the more, "Let it be aborted!"

So then the politician saw that she was gaining nothing, but rather that a judicial riot was beginning, she took the microphone and washed her hands before the crowd...

A nude mural of our Lord on the outside of an Orange County church is dubbed "The Bawdy of Christ".

A woman goes to the post office to buy stamps for her Christmas cards.
She says to the clerk, "May I have 50 Christmas stamps?"

The clerk says, "What denomination?"

The woman says, "God help us. Has it come to this?
Give me 6 Catholic, 12 Presbyterian, 10 Lutheran, 21 Baptists and 1 Anglican."

The Vox Clara committee met in Rome a couple of weeks ago:

Having examined sample ICEL translations from the Missale Romanum, the Committee expressed its gratitude for the excellent start made by the mixed commission in translating the Missale Romanum in an English style which is in conformity with the spirit and the specific provisions of the Instruction Liturgiam authenticam, approved by the Holy Father on March 20, 2001.

Either way, Padre Pio isn't happy. If the statue shedding tears of blood is for real, it's a cautionary sign; and if it's something phony, then somebody is in big trouble.

People should know: you just don't cross Padre Pio. After all, this was a saint who occasionally read the souls of his penitents and reminded them of sins they'd forgotten to confess. In one case, some gangster went to test him and was expelled from the confessional with a shout of "Pig!" That's one way of obtaining their conversion!

PLOT: An NYU professor wants to allow one of his film students to make a porno movie for his class. The university's administation, in a shocking display of common sense, tells the student she can't do that. The student, chastened, agrees that this is beyond the bounds of morality and good taste. The New York Times does not write a long story about it. The ACLU is not asked for a comment.

Now that's a story that would never get greenlighted, would it? Yet everything in the first two sentences is true; but the NYT did write a story about it, and the ACLU made frowny faces about the "university acting as a moral censor."

The student, Paula Carmicino, "planned to intersperse 30-second clips of passionate sex with scenes of the couple engaged in more mundane activities, like watching television and reading a newspaper."

"The whole concept of it was to compare the normal behavior of people in their everyday lives versus the animalistic behavior that comes out when they are having sex," she said. There are plenty of "animalistic" things that humans do besides sex: eating, pooping, breathing, sleeping. Funny how they aren't as interesting.

The professor, who goes by the improbable name of "Professor de Jesus," was foursquare behind the student. No one would imply that the professor or the students had anything other than noble motives for supporting their fellow artist, though they would have been present for the filming of the "graphic" sex.

The spoilsport administration, through its toady lacky running-dog book-burning soul-destroying mouthpiece Richard Pierce said that

...the school had long had an unwritten policy that student films should follow industry standards and was now considering putting that policy in writing. defending [sic] the university, he said N.Y.U. was considered very broad-minded on questions of artistic freedom, but had to draw the line at videotaping real sex before a class of students. He compared that to a filmmaker committing arson for a movie about firefighters.

"Someone give me a list of universities that allow sex acts in the classroom," Mr. Pierce said. "We're not going to be the first."

He also praised Ms. Carmicino as a "serious and valued" student. "The history of art is replete with examples of artists producing great art under limitations," he said.

Blasphemy! Surely this philistine knows that great art can only be created under unfettered freedom! I don't want to hear about Bernini or Bach and their "limitations." This is the 21st century, man!

One other priceless detail: NYU's president is named "John Sexton." Truly, you can't make up stuff like this.

A fan site for the Passion movie has photos, with news and FAQs in English and even Latin.

A Catholic father of two serving in the Army posted a comment about being away from his family on a one-year assignment. Maybe readers who've had that kind of experience will want to add to it. Add your comments to the thread where Christopher's note appears, and drop him an e-mail too.

NRO's David Frum comments today, "It really is incredible that the Democratic party seems determined to nominate a candidate who sounds, as James Taranto put it, like a conceited 15-year-old." (Taranto's original words are here.)

That statement is true, if by "the Democratic party" you mean "Democrat primary voters." The party establishment hasn't been tripping over themselves to support Howard Dean, for reasons both petty (he's not one of the D.C. power-lunch crowd) and substantive (many power-lunchers think he'll take the party way too far to the Left.)

If he weren't mildly scary, I'd be inclined to laugh at Howard Dean. For a man whose entire state has far fewer residents than cows, he certainly thinks a lot of his leadership ability. "Mr. President, if you'll pardon me, I'll teach you a little about defense." He could teach the president how to avoid military service, but it's tough to think of a defense-related subject on which he could tutor the president.

Dean is the quintessence of the liberal Baby Boomer: boundlessly arrogant, with a self-regard that borders on the pathological. He is gripped by a vision of his own righteousness, and -- mark this -- his first instinct is to tear down edifices and destroy people. Just like his contemporaries who protested in Vietnam, he has no particular vision of the common good, other than a vague idea that he will assist the lowly once he finishes savaging the rich and powerful. In the meantime, he spews calumny and promises an armageddon for his enemies.

Quick trivia question: when was the last time a non-Southern Democrat was elected to the presidency?

From Norway's Aftenposten:

The image, 11 meters (36 feet) high, hangs over the entrance to the capital's main downtown shopping center. The giant Christ welcomes shoppers with outstretched arms , and what appears to be a halo over his head.

"To be honest I didn't react to it so negatively at first glance. It is a reminder to shoppers about what Christmas is really about, namely, that God gave his son Jesus Christ to us all," said dean Olav Dag Hauge.

What he didn't notice the first time was that the halo shining behind Jesus' head is a compact disc.

There's a cute feature on Google, called the Zeitgeist, which lists the search queries gaining (and fading) in popularity.

What search query has led more people to Catholic Light than any other in the first two days of December? Why, it's "pamela anderson sunday school". CL is the tenth Google hit for that search. The public also apparently wants to read (and comment vociferously!) on that "al franken liar".

Of course, occasionally people have to read something substantial here: Eric's year-old "arguments against cloning" has proved to be a post of lasting popularity.

But I'm proud to say that we're #1 in the Google results if you search for the phrase "thongs at church".

One of the most decisive events in the Iraqi pacification campaign hasn't been mentioned much in our infotainment-driven news media. (In fairness, they have to save room for Michael Jackson stories.) Next month, the old Iraqi currency with Saddam's face on it will no longer be legal tender -- meaning that any stashes the ancien regime has will be worthless.

Maybe Saddam and his thugs have foreign currencies with which to buy attacks on Coalition forces. Hard to say. But if he's paying his minions in Swiss francs or euros, that kind of thing will stand out. If he hasn't got the money, look for the "resistance" to drop off precipitously. A lack of cash, coupled with some judicious ass-kicking, will convince the thugs and murderers to pursue more honest employment. You heard it first on Catholic Light !

On a typical weekday, I'm on a computer 8-12 hours a day. They're a great tool for getting things done, and I'm very glad for them because their existence provides a living for my family.

They are, however, a terrible waste of time for primary education, and with the exception of word processing or Internet-based research, they're probably a waste of time for later grades, too. This article -- from San Francisco, of all places! -- calls computer-saturated education a bunch of b.s.:

Throughout the country, computer technology is dumbing down the academic experience, corrupting schools' financial integrity, cheating the poor, fooling people about the job skills youngsters need for the future and furthering the illusions of state and federal education policy.

Education is a human activity. It can be supplemented by machines, but machines do not educate. Putting an excessive number of computers in schools, and using them as a panacea for true education, is thus one of the many tentacles of the culture of death, which attempts to subordinate men to processes, artifacts, and rules, rather than making those things subordinate to man's needs.