Saturday, April 30, 2016
College Students Say the Darndest Things
Remember, before watching this, that Pope Francis has said that the gender identity movement is demonic:
Friday, April 29, 2016
Gay Marriage
I want nothing in this world more than to be a father. Yet I
can’t bring myself to celebrate same-sex marriage.
By Paul Rosnick
APRIL 28, 2015
Gay marriage has gone from unthinkable to reality in the blink of
an eye. A recent Washington Post/ABC News poll shows that
support for gay marriage is now at 61 percent—the highest it’s ever been. On
Tuesday, the Supreme Court will hear arguments in the case that many
court-watchers believe will deliver the final blow to those seeking to prevent
the redefinition of marriage. By all measures, this fight is over. Gay marriage
won.
As a
30-year-old gay man, one would expect me to be ecstatic. After all, I’m at that
age where people tend to settle down and get married. And there is nothing in
this world I want more than to be a father and raise a family. Yet I can’t seem
to bring myself to celebrate the triumph of same-sex marriage. Deep down, I
know that every American, gay or straight, has suffered a great loss because of
this.
I’m not
alone in thinking this. The big secret in the LGBT community is that there are
a significant number of gays and lesbians who oppose same-sex marriage, and an
even larger number who are ambivalent. You don’t hear us speak out because gay
rights activists (most of whom are straight) have a history of viciously
stamping out any trace of individualism within the gay community. I asked to
publish this article under a pseudonym, not because I fear harassment from
Christian conservatives, but because I know this article will make me a target
of the Gaystapo.
Marriage Is More than
a Contract
The
wheels of my Pride Parade float came off the moment I realized that the
argument in support of gay marriage is predicated on one audaciously bald-faced
lie: the lie that same-sex relationships are inherently equal to heterosexual
relationships. It only takes a moment of objective thought to realize that the
union of two men or two women is a drastically different arrangement than the
union of a man and a woman. It’s about time we realize this very basic truth
and stop pretending that all relationships are created equal.
Why was government
invited to regulate marriages but not other interpersonal relationships, like
friendships?
This
inherent inequality is often overlooked by same-sex marriage advocates because
they lack a fundamental understanding of what marriage actually is. It seems as
though most people view marriage as little more than a love contract. Two
people fall in love, agree to stick together (for a while, at least), then sign
on the dotted line. If marriage is just a love contract, then surely same-sex
couples should be allowed to participate in this institution. After all, two
men or two women are capable of loving each other just as well as a man and a
woman.
But this
vapid understanding of marriage leaves many questions unanswered. If marriage
is little more than a love contract, why do we need government to get involved?
Why was government invited to regulate marriages but not other interpersonal
relationships, like friendships? Why does every religion hold marriage to be a
sacred and divine institution? Surely marriage must be more than just a love
contract.
Government Is Involved
in Marriage Because It Creates Babies
People
have forgotten that the defining feature of marriage, the thing that makes
marriage marriage, is the sexual complementarity of the people involved.
Marriage is often correctly viewed as an institution deeply rooted in religious
tradition. But people sometimes forget that marriage is also based in science.
When a heterosexual couple has sex, a biological reaction can occur that
results in a new human life.
Government
got into the marriage business to ensure that these new lives are created in a
responsible manner. This capacity for creating new life is what makes marriage
special. No matter how much we try, same-sex couples will never be able to
create a new life. If you find that level of inequality offensive, take it up
with Mother Nature. Redefining marriage to include same-sex couples relegates
this once noble institution to nothing more than a lousy love contract. This
harms all of society by turning marriage, the bedrock of society, into a
meaningless anachronism.
A Good Dad Puts Kids
First
Same-sex relationships not only lack the ability to create
children, but I believe they are also suboptimal environments for raising
children. On a personal level, this was an agonizing realization for me to come
to. I have always wanted to be a father. I would give just about anything for
the chance to have kids. But the first rule of fatherhood is that a good dad
will put the needs of his children before his own—and every child needs a mom and a
dad. Period. I could never forgive myself for ripping a child away from his
mother so I could selfishly live out my dreams.
Same-sex
relationships, by design, require children to be removed from one or more of
their biological parents and raised absent a father or mother. This hardly
seems fair. So much of what we do as a society prioritizes the needs of adults
over the needs of children. Social Security and Medicare rob the young to pay the
old. The Affordable Care Act requires young and healthy people to buy insurance
to subsidize the cost for the old and sick. Our schools seem more concerned
with keeping the teachers unions happy than they are educating our children.
Haven’t children suffered enough to make adults’ lives more convenient? For
once, it would be nice to see our society put the needs of children first.
Let’s raise them in homes where they can enjoy having both a mom and a dad. We
owe them that.
At its
core, the institution of marriage is all about creating and sustaining
families. Over thousands of years of human civilization, the brightest minds
have been unable to come up with a successful alternative. Yet in our hubris we
assume we know better. Americans need to realize that same-sex relationships
will never be equal to traditional marriages. You know what? I’m okay with
that.
Paul Rosnick is a pseudonym.
Thursday, April 28, 2016
Just Catholics
Today in Catholic circles one would be forgiven if one equated Catholicism with nothing more than the concept and rhetoric of “social justice.” This `unfortunate reality takes place because the phrase social
“justice” is not used as the traditional vocabulary suggests, as a virtue present
in individuals, but as a matter of policy. Misunderstood as such, social
justice is reduced to whatever progressive policy one finds desirable. This disengages
the dialog about social justice from a moral framework of virtue, and makes it prone
to exploitation by any special interest group vocal enough to demand assistance
from the public treasury.
As I recount in my book, around the time of the Second Vatican
Council, there was the rhetoric of “letting a breath of fresh air into the
Church,” opening her to a more understanding relationship with modernity. Many Catholics,
it turned out, were unable to escape the effects of the confusion and waves of
social revolution and antinomianism that hit during the decade of the ’60s. Typical
of many people in that generation, borrowing a line from liberal activism, was to
set up a false dichotomy between the Church’s sacramental action – always the
center of her activity – and her secular/non-sacramental activity, which was
not as great as it should have been. Here their primary fault was
imagining that the Church can, without prejudice to her
supernatural nature, engage in any activity that is not
sacramental and salvific, which is merely mundane, secular, institutional,
“social.”
What, for example, is the meaning of “human liberation”? Catholics
who equate Catholicism with working for justice seem to mean freedom from forms
of political/economic oppression. Yet true liberation comes only in the freedom
of Christian life in God, and so this understanding is little more than Marxist
utopianism. Our Lord lived under the brutal regime of Rome. Did He make make
its slavery or violations of dignity the focal point of his doctrine? Rather, Christ
focused on seeking first God’s kingdom of holiness. All else would be added.
So—working for “social justice,” can either be at the service of
a socialist utopianism, an antagonistic centralizing government, or the true
Kingdom of God, which cannot be reduced to the lack of political oppression or
the complete possession of economic independence. Properly understood, the
Kingdom of God is the sacramental union of all mankind with the Father in
Christ brought about by the Holy Spirit.
Catholicism teaches that the greatest oppression is the law of
sin reigning in human hearts. Thus, social justice can be truly
transformational only if it is sacramental. Relief from external
oppression, if not supported by inner transformation of mind, leads only to a
new kind of slavery. Secular social justice thinking leaves no room for the
transformative element, for the spiritual rebirth that the works of mercy can bring
about in both the worker and the object of the work. Genuine Catholic social
work leads both the benefiter and the benefited on the way of transformation in
Christ, calling both of them to the higher social order of the Church, which is
spiritually redeemed humanity, the Body of Christ.
The promotion of justice is a vital function in Christian
society – not only as a praiseworthy work of mercy, but even as a requirement
for full participation in the liturgical-sacramental life. How can one pretend
to love God if we don’t empathize with our suffering brethren? Christ calls us
to establish the reign of justice and peace on Earth, which almost always means
struggles with the unjust powers ruling the earth. Indeed, traditional Catholic
social teaching is quite a bit more feisty in its demands on earthly rulers and
on the necessity of reforming political-economic structures. Just read Leo XIII
or Pius XI.
Catholics ought to take part in works of mercy and social justice
initiatives. It is often our duty to do so. But if we are to take on the full
mind of the Church, we must not let
ourselves be carried away by the sort of ideologies with which these things are
often associated. The “source and summit” of the Christian life is not human society or any particular work
we do, but the sacred liturgy of the Church, the work of Christ in and for
us, which saves us and saves the world.
Justice is a natural virtue, and the establishment of more just
economic and political systems is the Catholic citizen’s duty. As the hedonism
of society further corrodes the image of human dignity in the popular mind, the
Church may very soon be the only one who can show people a true vision of just
society. But she becomes superfluous if she is just another NGO, a sort of U.N.
service. Her priests, as many did after the Council, must not downplay their
sacramental role as sanctifiers to spend all their time as “liberators” in
“social work.” When they leave off praying the Office, when their negligence
reduces liturgy to its bare minimum of sacramental validity, we see a vital
loss of perspective.
Should we sell our churches and the treasures of the Vatican to
fund liberation campaigns in South America? That’s not Catholic logic. Such
thinking is the post-Conciliar abandonment of the primary sacramental purpose
which stifles the Church’s efforts to transform society far more deeply than
anything else.
The Church’s firm doctrine, proclaimed through all of tradition,
is that only the reign of Christ the King over hearts and governments can lead
to the establishment of true justice. Because sin causes injustice, only by conforming the world sacramentally to Christ may evil be
overcome. The Church’s liturgical-sacramental function is absolutely
crucial; it is the only chance for the world’s salvation, because it is the
prime locus of Christ’s action on Earth. If there is no Mass, there is no hope
for the world. If we don’t take the Mass seriously, or think it is just
something we get out of the way before rolling up our sleeves to do the “real
work,” we forget Christ’s loving caution that “without Me you can do
nothing.” If the Lord does not build the house, in vain do the builders
labor.
Catholic social justice has to be Eucharistic. Within the Catholic Church, “social
justice” cannot be understood except Eucharistically and liturgically, as the resolute
effort to order the human community ideally in relation to liturgical worship,
providing all the material goods (and only those) that are sufficient to
support their easy acquisition of spiritual goods. Justice demands that people
have enough to eat so that they may eat of the bread which comes down from
heaven.
In the end, it is a question of faith. Is the Church just a
social service organization with some quaintly pleasing exterior forms, or is
she what she says she is – the very soul of the world, the hammer of demons,
the school of true perfection, the teacher of nations, the one place where
man can fulfill his destiny to abide with the divine?
Saturday, April 23, 2016
Dancing With Mr. D: LGTB
“I spent much of my life steeped in power analysis theory and taking a look at serving groups who were marginalized within any hegemonic group,” Michael Way Skinner, the York Catholic District School Board’s coordinator of Religious Education, Family Life and Equity, told about 30 teachers attending his workshop, half of them identifying as Catholic. “So, I was quite comfortable taking on how we could serve our LGBTQ students in our schools.”
Skinner’s workshop, titled “Implementing LGBTTQQ Supports Under the Catholic School Board,” revealed how the process worked to make his board explicitly pro-LGBTQ.
Wednesday, April 20, 2016
Libido Redux: Watch Out
It comes as no surprise to the thinking Catholic that since the onset of the sexual revolution we
have had to face an ever-increasing array of sexual problems. One has only to
think of the tremendous increase in the number of illegitimate
births and abortions, sexually transmitted diseases, opposition to censorship
of pornography (especially on the Internet), and the resulting sexual addiction
(in some extreme instances resulting in murder). Consider too the tremendous
blows to marriage and the family done by adultery, the battle over the
homosexual lifestyle in the United States, Canada and Europe (now to the point
of the redefinition of marriage under the law); the increasing incidences of
sexual harassment, child pornography on the Internet, Internet predators, the collegiate "rape culture", and of course, the divorce rate. Read the following and weep (or pray):
Online harassment of women at risk of becoming
'established norm', study finds
Australian research finds that nearly half of all women report
experiencing abuse or harassment online, and 76% of those under 30
Monday 7 March 2016 14.01 ESTLast modified on Monday 7
March 201614.15 EST
Harassment of women online is at risk of
becoming “an established norm in our digital society”, with women under 30
particularly vulnerable, according to the creators of a new Australian study.
Nearly half the 1,000 respondents in the
research by the digital security firm Norton had experienced
some form of abuse or harassment online. Among women under 30, the incidence
was 76%.
Harassment ranged from unwanted contact,
trolling, and cyberbullying to sexual harassment and threats of rape and
death. Women under 30 were overrepresented in
every category.
One in seven – and one in four women aged
under 30 – had received general threats of physical violence. Almost one in ten
women under 30 had experienced revenge porn and/or “sextortion”.
The online quantitative survey was carried out
with 1,053 women in Australia aged 18 and over in February this year.
Similar research was done on men’s experience
of harassment online, but those findings were held off in order to publicise
International Women’s Day, as well as the fact that the issue is
disproportionately experienced by women.
Researchers found that women received twice as
many death threats and threats of sexual violence as men.
One in four lesbian, bisexual and transgender
women who had suffered serious harassment online said their sexual orientation
had been the target. One in five online harassment cases attacked a woman’s
physical appearance.
The findings suggested that women believed that
online abuse was a growing problem and felt powerless to act over it.
Seventy per cent of women said online
harassment was a serious problem in 2016 and 60% said that it was getting
worse. More than half the women surveyed felt the police needed to start taking
victims seriously.
But 38% of those who had experienced online
harassment chose to ignore it, and only 10% reported it to police.
Melissa Dempsey, senior director for the Asia
Pacific region of Norton by Symantec, said the findings showed a need for
greater awareness and collaboration between the IT industry and law enforcement
agencies – before online harassment became “an established norm in our digital
society”.
Harassment is overwhelmingly taking place on
social media, which facilitates 66% of cases – three times as many as by email
(22%) or text (17%). Twenty-seven per cent of the women surveyed changed the
privacy settings of their accounts after their experience.
The findings will likely fuel the argument
that social networks such as Twitter and Facebook need to take greater
responsibility for harassment on their platforms.
Twitter announced in February a renewed push to
tackle abuse and threats made on the network. Around the same time, Facebook
launched a tool to offer supportto users perceived to
be at risk of suicide.
Tara Moss, a Canadian-Australian author and
advocate who partnered with Norton to help design the survey, said online abuse
was just one form of violence against women, all of which needed to be
addressed.
With nearly 96,000 followers on Twitter, she
said she had often been the target of abuse online, and received a spike in
threats when she was made a patron of the Full Stop Foundation, tackling rape
and sexual violence.
Georgie Harman, the chief execution of beyondblue,
a long-time partner with Norton, said the mental health organisation’s work was
increasingly being carried out digitally.
She was especially concerned by figures that
more than one in five (22%) of respondents who had experienced online harassment
felt depressed and that 5% felt suicidal.
Harman said 65% of contact made to beyondblue
was by women.
The Norton study coincides with a separate
survey of about 1,000 women working in the Australian media, which found that more than 40% had been
harassed on social media in the course of their work.
The survey by Women in Media, an advocacy
group supported by the Media, Entertainment & Arts Alliance, found that 41%
said they had been harassed, bullied or trolled on social media while engaging
with audiences.
Several were silenced or changed career as a
result of this harassment, which ranged included death threats and stalking.
Sixty per cent of respondents agreed that it was more likely to be directed at
women than men.
Only 16% of respondents were aware of their
employer’s strategies to deal with threats on social media.
Sunday, April 10, 2016
Libido Redux
If then you have been
raised with Christ, seek the things
that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set
your minds on things that are above,
not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hid with
Christ in God. When Christ who is our life appears, then you also will appear
with him in glory. Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: fornication,
impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry.
-Colossians 3:1-5
One hears often that the “liberation” of
the human libido began in earnest in the United States in the “sexual
revolution” of the 1960s. Americans, troubled over repressive attitudes toward
human sexuality, hoped for a revolution that would free them from outdated
moral and social constraints. It resulted not in liberation but in license and
a host of societal sexual crises. Since the onset of the sexual revolution, we
have had to face an ever-increasing array of sexual problems. One has only to
think of the tremendous increase in the number of post-1960s illegitimate
births and abortions, sexually transmitted diseases, opposition to censorship
of pornography (especially on the Internet), and the resulting sexual addiction
(in some extreme instances resulting in murder). Consider too the tremendous
blows to marriage and the family done by adultery, the battle over the
homosexual lifestyle in the United States, Canada and Europe (now to the point
of the redefinition of marriage under the law); the increasing incidences of
sexual harassment, child pornography on the Internet, Internet predators, date
rape, and of course, the divorce rate. To this we add the impact of social media, given human libido unchecked by Catholic sexual moral teaching. Here is a profound reflection questioning whether or not we as a Church will survive....
Saturday, April 9, 2016
On Amoris Laetitia
Various opinions ranging from orthodox-minded giving both their approval and dissent on Pope Francis' latest exhortation on Family Life, "Amoris Laetitia" (Joy of Love).The same goes for heterodox-minded likewise expressing both their approval and dissent on the document:
Samples so far:
Defenders:
a. orthodox edition--Amoris Laetitia is great or at least good. Pope upholds tradition. Marriage between a man and a woman. Mutual, exclusive, permanent, indissoluble union. Open to children. No gay marriage. No contraception. No abortion. Says nothing new, really, on pastoral level, though he's emphasizing mercy. Isn't that what Jesus is about? "Conscience" cases handled pastorally, according to the teaching of the Church. Inspiring vision for young people of what marriage and family are all about. Just as Jesus taught.
b. liberal/dissenting edition--Amoris Laetitia is great. The Pope is moving us forward to a reform of doctrine. The Church is going to change on certain issues regarding marriage, but it's going to take time. What he says on the pastoral level is key. Here there is a revolution, which focuses on the primacy of conscience and mercy over law. What he says about traditional marriage and family can be adapted to other kinds of union. We need to be more welcoming of a diversity of expressions of love. Francis is moving us toward being so. Just like Jesus wants.
2. Critics:
a. orthodox edition--Amoris Laetitia is a problem. Maybe a disaster. Yes, Pope upholds doctrine. Well, duh. That's his job. On the pastoral level, yes, he is right about the value of mercy. Of course. Who is against mercy? Again, duh. But mercy and morality aren't at odds. Francis' fuzzy thinking and muddled expression lead to big problems, which others will exploit to the grave harm of the Church. Many souls will likely be lost. Does he even know what he is doing? The Vicar of Christ should know better.
a. orthodox edition--Amoris Laetitia is a problem. Maybe a disaster. Yes, Pope upholds doctrine. Well, duh. That's his job. On the pastoral level, yes, he is right about the value of mercy. Of course. Who is against mercy? Again, duh. But mercy and morality aren't at odds. Francis' fuzzy thinking and muddled expression lead to big problems, which others will exploit to the grave harm of the Church. Many souls will likely be lost. Does he even know what he is doing? The Vicar of Christ should know better.
b. liberal/dissenting edition--Amoris Laetitia is window-dressing. It's maintaining the homophobic, cis-normal notions of sex and family. Pastorally, it may make life more bearable for some but in the long run it only perpetuates anti-human attitudes toward marriage. It's just another form of "control". We may not want to say this in public, but we know it's the truth. Jesus didn't talk or act this way.
Not surprisingly, the document seems ambiguous in itself.
Thus, do not to rely on abridged opinions appearing on various media forms. Read first the whole document and judge it for yourself. As the document itself says in #7 :
Friday, April 1, 2016
Marquette: Jesuit But not Catholic
In the fall of 2014, a graduate
student instructor of a philosophy course,
Cheryl Abbate told a student at Marquette University, which claims to continue
“the tradition of Catholic, Jesuit education” who secretly recorded the
exchange, that his defense of man-woman marriage was an unacceptable
topic in her ethics class and compared his views to racism. Abate said,
"You can have whatever opinions you want but I can tell you right now, in this class homophobic comments, racist
comments, and sexist comments will not be tolerated." And then she
told the student he should drop the class. Now, for Marquette to be truly
Catholic, a defense of a Cathodic understanding of marriage must not only be
tolerated, but promulgated.
Marquette Professor
McAdams blogged on the incident and charged the teaching assistant
with "using a tactic typical among liberals now. Opinions with which they
disagree are not merely wrong, and are not to be argued against on their
merits, but are deemed 'offensive' and need to be shut up." A firestorm
ensued that pitted the academic freedom of McAdams against the PC of the officially
"Catholic" institution.
McAdams was brought up
on charges. A "diverse" faculty committee recommended to the
university president that McAdams be suspended without pay from April 1 through
the fall of 2016 and that he lose his job unless he admits "guilt"
and apologized "within the next two weeks." Specifically, the demand
is "Your acknowledgement that your November 9, 2014, blog post was
reckless and incompatible with the mission and values of Marquette University
and you express deep regret for the harm suffered by our former graduate
student and instructor, Ms. Abbate." Marquette
had previously suspended McAdams without due process, treated him as though he
presented a violent threat, and cancelled his current semester’s classes.
The ever quotable and
crusty McAdams compared the demand to the "Inquisition, in which victims
who 'confessed' they had been consorting with Satan and spreading heresy would
be spared execution." He called the demand a violation of "black
letter guarantees of academic freedom embodied in University statutes." Marquette
informed McAdams on January 30 that it intended to revoke his tenure and
fire him. Marquette claimed that McAdams’s actions amounted to “serious
instances of … dishonorable, irresponsible, or incompetent conduct” justifying
his termination.
Now, I can appreciate those concerned with
academic freedom, but for me this misses the major point: why would Marquette
employ a graduate assistant who felt comfortable labeling Catholic teaching homophobic,
racist, and sexist? Marquette University seems to be sending a message to
students and faculty who support Catholic doctrine regarding marriage: if you
oppose gay marriage keep your mouth shut.
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