I was confused by Lynn Sweet's headline. Not surprising. due to the subtle nuances of political language and all . I will be required to work for ticket -in order to - Obama bash?
The Chicago Tribune endorsed the President most comfortable with a woman's choice to murder her child in the womb, because the Bruce Dold's deep-thinkers want voters to "Think of the Children!" No kidding -
Tribune endorses Obama: Our children's America!
Super, Bruce. Not to be out done, Chicago Sun Times Obama maven Lynn Sweet invites us all willing to work to Bash Obama!
Shucks, President Obama has done a pretty effective job of setting up an Obama Bashing nearly every day these past four years -
However, To Bash ( v.transitive) is not the same as A Bash (n.). To Bash means to strike violently, or rhetorically to the criticize, diminish, or make small of a person. A Bash is a fete, party, or celebration where one might 'pitch a bitch!'
The DNC bash was moved in-doors because Team Obama Party Planners were concerned with the 70 degree weather in Charlotte , NC and certainly not a concern that tens of people would show up to celebrate Obama 2012 Foward. Likewise Bash enthusiasts determined that Grank Park just might be a wee bit nippy on November 6, 2012l therefore going Foward Indoor.
The cost to Bash Obama is signing up to work in Wisconsin.
The “Illinois Victory Volunteers” GOTV canvass in Wisconsin will take place Nov. 3, 4 and 5. Once completed, tickets will be handed out on a first-come, first-served system. Each shift will last between two and three hours.
The Obama team selected McCormick Place in part because they were worried about bad weather and wanted an indoor venue.
Obama’s field operation has used events as organizing tools since the first days of the 2008 campaign. More recently, the Obama campaign pegged a massive volunteer effort in North Carolina to tickets for what was to have been the Democratic National Convention finale at the Bank of America stadium in Charlotte. The outdoor stadium event was canceled because of bad weather and Obama and Vice President Joe Biden delivered their acceptance speeches inside at the Time Warner Cable arena. . . .Major donors are expected to get VIP treatment on election night, as they did in 2008. And for those who don’t want to canvass, a donation ($150 or even less to the Obama campaign) will get you entered in a lottery to get “right up front” with Obama in Chicago on election night. The campaign ran a similar program in 2008, promising a backstage pass and front row seats for Grant Park.The Obama drive to send Illinois troops to Wisconsin to help the president may have an unintended consequence before election day: It could drain a pool of motivated volunteers from the big Chicago area House races in the closing days of the campaign — when Tammy Duckworth, Bill Foster and Brad Schneider will also need GOTV help.
GOTV ain't cable - it means Go To Victory! Obama bash bashing on my part? Well, I just go where I'm invited - To Hell or to Victory! As Fats Waller was wont to say " One never knows, do one??
Written by Mike Houlihan Special to The Irish American News
Most Irish Americans are skeptical of President Obama’s supposed discovery of his Irish roots. That pint of Guinness he was seen hoisting in Ireland last year was no doubt his first. The real reason he made the trip to the tiny village of Moneygall was a craven attempt to cozy up to the Irish American vote. We’re also not buying Vice-President Joe Biden’s claims to be “Irish Catholic”. This chuckling buffoon is no more Catholic than Ian Paisley, but he still clings to the oxymoronic label of “pro-choice Catholic” like his pals Nancy Pelosi, Dick Durbin, and the late Teddy Kennedy. Actual Irish Catholics find an absurdity in the very idea of pro-choice Catholics. They may call themselves that, but the actual species does not exist. Ask the Pope. The liberal media has done its best lately to malign the Irish Catholic credentials of Vice-Presidential candidate Paul Ryan. But according to Rick Barrett, retired DEA Agent and Chicago history detective, Ryan is the most Irish of the four candidates running, and his heritage and religion make him “the real deal”- an Irishman. Barrett’s previous investigative research projects are celebrated in the Irish American community. His work is notable because of his discovery of Irish immigrants as historic figures and then championing these individuals as pioneers in law enforcement, including The Chicago Police Department’s Constable Jeremiah Sullivan, the first Irishman to become a policeman in America; Marie Connelly Owens, the first policewoman in the USA; and Constable James Quinn, the first Chicago Police Officer killed in the line of duty. The son of legendary Chicago police Lieutenant "Junior" Barrett, of 48th & Wabash-Southside of Chicago fame, Rick Barrett has a history himself of conducting criminal investigations and evidentiary historical research that bloodhounds would envy. Among Barrett’s discoveries is the heritage of VP Candidate Paul Ryan: Ryan is fourth-generation Irish, with a paternal line going back to Ullard in County Kilkenny. Ryan’s people were farmers. His great-great grandparents came from a small townland registered as Clohasty in the 1820's, but now referred to as Cloghasty North. The townland itself was less than 110 acres. James Ryan and Catherine Shea, Paul Ryan’s great-great grandparents, were married in the local Catholic parish of Graigeunamanagh. Their first daughter, Ryan’s great-grand aunt, was born and baptized in the same parish in 1849, two years before the family emigrated. So why is any of this important to the upcoming election? Because Irish Catholics tend to vote for their own. The best example of that is the late Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley getting the vote out for a young man named Jack Kennedy in 1960 and winning him the election. Ryan’s Irish roots could help determine how the battleground state of Ohio votes in the upcoming election. Barrett says, “There are many Irish Catholics residing in the state of Ohio. In fact, there are so many Irish Catholics living there that, years ago, the University of Notre Dame, home of the ‘Fighting Irish', made an agreement with the Ohio State University to never schedule a regular season football game between the two universities. Why would that be? Because neither Notre Dame nor OSU wanted to divide the state’s Irish Catholics—a game between these two universities would divide Ohio with some cheering for the Irish Catholic ND, thereby dividing Ohioans. Two of Paul Ryan’s brothers, Stan and Tobin, graduated from Notre Dame while Paul chose to attend Miami University in Ohio.” Paul Ryan’s Irish Catholic bona fides, as a Pro-Life candidate and with ancestors going back to Graiguenamanagh in County Kilkenny, could potentially sway Irish Catholic voters in Ohio to “stick with their own”, and very well swing the election to give the Republicans the victory on November 6th. And that night in Boston might be when Paul Ryan stands before the cheering crowds of Irish Catholics and tells them, “There are only two kinds of people in this world ‘Irish and I-Wish”!
Father Robert Barron is the founder of the global ministry, Word on Fire, and the Rector/President of Mundelein Seminary.
Bishop Fulton J. Sheen, the television pioneer holy man, wit, historian and priest, had it made - he spoke to very open ears and attentive minds. For decades Bishop Sheen was welcomed into the homes of not only American Catholics on the tube ( Catholic Hour, Life is Worth Living and Fulton Sheen Program), but captured the hearts and minds of other Christians and Jews as well. One of his major topics was the universal fight against Communism. Like Satan, Communism managed to fool people that it never existed. Families who lost sons at the Pusan Perimeter, Inchon, the Chosin Reservoir and Pork Chop Hill in Korea, gradually became comfortable with Reds.
Here is a program from Bishop Fulton J. Sheen Program (1961-1968) from 1968 - on this taping the Bishop lays the economic, political, psychological and religious advantage of communist keeping non-Marxist nations at war: He nails it at 3:01
Joe Stalin croaked and avuncularly cartoonish shoe thumpers took his place. Americans no longer worried about Reds in academia, the State Department, or organized labor, because, like Joe Stalin, Senator Joe McCarthy croked. However, Bishop Sheen continued to offer sermons warning against Communism and the devil's co-equal until advertisers to his national television program was limited to MagicKist carpet cleaning and American Catholics, Jews, and Christians became more interested in Laugh In and The Smothers Brothers and the return of Pete Seeger and his Red Banjo from America's basement. How dangerous could a skinny old geezer with a banjo strapped on be to anyone?
Like the Devil, Communism was no biggie. The very same mindset of Aw-Shucks American hospitality and fair-play bumped science up in place of religious worship.
Now, decades after Bishop Fulton J. Sheen's return to Christ another witty and scholarly priest has stepped onto the American scene -Chicago's own Father Bob Barron, rector of St. Mary of Lake University in Mundelein, IL. Unlike, Bishop Fulton J. Sheen, Father Barron plays to a very hostile audience.
Like Bishop Sheen, Father Bob Barron has used the communications media (television, radio, print and the web) to engage the Devil and all of his works. One of the best tools of evil is science. Science has a huge altar and an enormous pulpit, as well as very talented and very bigoted voices shouting down people of faith who are no less schooled in the arcana of science, yet retain humbled before the author of the cosmos - God.
In the 19th Century, faith was eliminated from the discussion via the usual suspects - Hegel, Dewey and Marx. Curricula K-20 offers no consideration of thought ( philosophy, science, history or literature) that does not consider culture except through the lens of Hegel, Dewey, or Marx. American literature in high school text books practically dominates Emerson, Thoreau, Melville, Hawthorne, Garrison over any other consideration in order to valorize the subsequent identity-politics light weights who string out the canon. In philosophy of education future teachers of American children receive an eye-dropper of Plato's thin broth redacted of course and feast upon Rousseau, Fichte, Mann, Dewey and now, comically sad but true, William Ayers.
As for science, there is no search for truth, only solutions to problems. You can go to the moon, but you can not recall why we went there . . .to beat the Commies, Remember? Commies are not a problem they are our bankers; therefore, cancel NASA shuttle flights. We are tickled to death that we are getting great pictures from Mars, but why are we there? What's the plan, there Hawking and Dawkins?
Father Barron chats with a priest scientist Father George Coyne:
Man built cathedrals that attempted to match to awe and majesty of God's love of man. Man illuminated and preserved the works of Aristotle, Plotinus, Heraclitus, Empedocles and the plays of Aristophanes in beehive stone cells of monasteries far from the reach of savages in order to justify God's ways to Man. That is called piety. The opposite of piety is pride and pride on steroids is hubris. Hubris is what the Greeks worried about - if man forgets God, Man is screwed. We like to forget that. We need Fulton J. Sheens and Bob Barrons.
In my opinion, Father Barron has a tougher row to hoe. Bishop Sheen's foes, Satan and the Soviets, were much more understood by people during the American Golden Age ( 1945-1972). I mark the end of WWII and Nixon's Trip to China and the very next year Nixon cleared the way for Roe v. Wade and the American Genocide*. Once Tricky Dick ate egg-rolls with Mao and chatted realpolitik with Chou En Lai, Americans put on their eatin' pants too, burped away bad thoughts and watched the Tube and nodded that abortion was health care.
Father Barron offers a genuine consideration of modern hubris, or what Bertrand Russell called cosmic impiety, in an article from RealClear Politics. Here is a salient passage:
Though the sciences might be able to explain the chemical make-up of pages and ink, they will never be able to reveal the meaning of a book; and though they might make sense of the biology of the human body, they will never tell us why a human act is moral or immoral; and though they might disclose the cellular structure of oil and canvas, they will never determine why a painting is beautiful.And this is not because "science" is for the moment insufficiently developed, it is because the scientific method cannot, even in principle, explore such matters, which belong to a qualitatively different category of being than the proper subject matter of the sciences. The claim that "science" could ever provide a total understanding of reality as a whole overlooks the rather glaring fact that meaning, truth, beauty, morality, purpose, etc., are all ingredients in "the universe."
But as is usually the case with scientistic speculation, Carroll's thought is designed, above all, to eliminate God as a subject of serious intellectual discourse. The first and most fundamental problem is that, like Hawking, Dawkins and Dennett, Carroll doesn't seem to know what Biblical people mean by "God." With the advance of the modern physical sciences, he asserts, there remains less and less room for God to operate, and hence less and less need to appeal to him as an explanatory cause. This is a contemporary reiteration of Pierre-Simon Laplace's rejoinder when the Emperor Napoleon asked the famous astronomer how God fit into his mechanistic system: "I have no need of that hypothesis."
But God, as the classical Catholic intellectual tradition understands him, is not one cause, however great, among many; not one more item within the universe jockeying for position with other competing causes. Rather, God is, as Thomas Aquinas characterized him, ipsum esse, or the sheer act of to-be itself -- that power in and through which the universe in its totality exists. Once we grasp this, we see that no advance of the physical sciences could ever "eliminate" God or show that he is no longer required as an explaining cause, for the sciences can only explore objects and events within the finite cosmos.
To demonstrate the relationship between God and the universe more clearly, it would be worthwhile to explore the most fundamental argument for God's existence, namely the argument from contingency. You and I are contingent (dependent) in our being in the measure that we eat and drink, breathe, and had parents; a tree is contingent inasmuch as its being is derived from seed, sun, soil, water, etc.; the solar system is contingent because it depends upon gravity and events in the wider galaxy. To account for a contingent reality, by definition we have to appeal to an extrinsic cause. But if that cause is itself contingent, we have to proceed further. This process of appealing to contingent causes in order to explain a contingent effect cannot go on indefinitely, for then the effect is never adequately explained.
Hence, we must finally come to some reality that is not contingent on anything else, some ground of being whose very nature is to-be. This is precisely what Catholic theology means by "God." Therefore, God is not one fussy cause within or alongside the universe; instead, he is the reason why there is a universe at all, why there is, as the famous formula has it, "something rather than nothing." To ask the sophomoric question, "Well, what caused God?" is simply to show that the poser of the question has not grasped the nettle of the argument.
No, Father, we have settled all that. Science says "toss up those big-ass wind-turbines (NIMBY Rules apply of course) and all is well." Go to Mars! "Why?" Because, there was water there billions and billions and billions of years ago! " And?" There was water there billions and billions and billions of years ago.
Keep at them, Father!
REV. ROBERT BARRON, M.A. (Phil), S.T.D., .
Francis Cardinal George, O.M.I., Professor of Faith and Culture
M.A., Catholic University of America; S.T.B., M.Div., S.T.L., University of St. Mary of the Lake; S.T.D., Institut Catholique de Paris. Former Associate Pastor at St. Paul of the Cross Parish. A member of the Catholic Theology Society of America, G.K. Chesterton Society, Paul Tillich Society. Author of The Strangest Way: Walking the Christian Path, Creation as Discipleship, A Study of the DePotentia of Thomas Aquinas in Light of the Dogmatik of Paul Tillich, Thomas Aquinas: Spiritual Master, And Now I See: A Theology of Transformation, Heaven in Stone and Glass and Bridging the Great Divide and The Word on Fire: Proclaiming the Power of Christ and of the Priority of Christ: Toward a Postliberal Catholicism. Articles on theology and the spiritual life have appeared in numerous journals.
*Planned Parenthood continues to get one third( $ 345 Million dollars) of its funding to murder children from the Federal Government.
Forget Mars. We got serious business here.
Catholics may hold the key to the 2012 Presidential and General Elections. Swing States are the focus of everyone who thinks that he, or she has a thumb on the national pulse. The choices at the Top of each ticket pits President Obama is a Christian Non-sectarian against Mitt Romney,a Mormon. Both Paul Ryan and Joe Biden are Roman Catholics vying for Vice President. Ryan and Biden reflect two distinct varieties of American Catholic - Paul Ryan is Anti-Abortion and traditional in his observation of Catholic moral teaching; Joe Biden is perfectly all right with abortion and the Planned Parenthood imprimatur on birth control.
I think that Catholics will decide this election.
Me? I was all set to vote in 2009. I can not, did not and will not vote for Barack Obama for President.
Catholics went wild for Senator Barack H. Obama in 2008 thanks to the very warm reception he received from Catholic academics and Catholic Democrats like Kathleen Sebelius, Joe Biden, Richie Daley, Dick Durbin, Pat Quinn and the rank and file in cities like Chicago, Pittsburgh, Youngstown, and Minneapolis. Democrat used to be a euphemism for urban Catholic. Catholics in the GOP were suspected of being Planned Parenthood shills. The GOP was very Progressive years before the Democratic Party and then wised up.
My lack of enthusiasm for Barack Obama stems from my belief in his total lack of experience for the job of President, his long association with some of the daffier elements of the Democratic Party Nationally and locally and my personal contact with the man.
All politics is personal. I take the weather personally.
More so, I take umbrage when someone is insulting my faith, or people I respect all the while demanding that there is something intrinsically wrong with my beliefs, historical knowledge, reading ability, racial sensitivity and fashion sensibilities.
When I am wrong, I like to have bill-boards painted attesting to my latest sins and omissions.
I think that casting a vote against Obama in 2008 was a good thing and will not consign me to eternal damnation ( I have plenty more to account for in other departments), nor do I believe that encouraging at least my coreligionists to vote vigorously against a man and a world view at odds with my Church.
President Obama and his regime do not tolerate Catholics. He is abortion's son. He is a public service labor bully and no friend of real labor - which built the American Middle Class along with American business. President Obama Part II will make even more vigorous war on Catholics if he manages to snatch the election.
Aside from that, President Obama is an affable gent more than qualified to occupy elected office somewhere in Illinois. However, if he loses this one,God willing, there is no way he will return to the land of Lincoln.
Let’s be clear here: Women are not an interest group.-President Barrack H. Obama
"
"Thank You, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you! Thanks to all of you at Planned Parenthood for all the work that you are doing for women all across the country and for families all across the country-and for men who have enough sense to realize you are helping them, all across the country. I want to thank Cecile Richards (national president of Planned Parenthood) for her extraordinary leadership. I am happy to see so many good friends here today, including Steve Trombley and Pam Sutherland from my home state of Illinois. We had a number of battles down in Springfield from many years and it's wonderful to see that they are here today."
-- Barack Hussein Obama, speaking to the Planned Parenthood Action Fund, 17 July 2007
They’re mothers, and daughters, and sisters, and wives. They’re half of this country. They’re perfectly capable of making their own choices about their health. President Barack H. Obama The Dowager Class -Planned Parenthood/NOW & Etc. - own the White House. Here is their dignified and serious point of view -
The protesters carried signs saying such things as, “Read my lips. Leave my vagina alone,” and argued that pro-life Republicans are waging a war against women. But with the official proceedings, along with two Lynyrd Skynyrd concerts and the premiere of an anti-Occupy Wall Street movie canceled Sunday and Monday due to weather, it wasn’t until Sunday night at The Welcome Event that the protesters found a large group of Republicans to confront. -The Hollywood Reporter
Francis Cardinal George has more hop on the ball than Jake Peavy, at least these last few hours anyway. Kansas City went over the Sox 5-2 and Peavy took the loss hard.
Cardinal George fanned every "news" outlet in Chicago, again. Louis Farrakhan gets more favorable treatment and coverage from our Chicago Values Media than Cardinal George. Is the Medill Empire basically anti-Semitic ?
Hey, I heard from a guy very close to Senate Leader Harry Reid that Chicago Tribune Editor Bruce Dold has been given to wearing bow ties, lately . . . just sayin'!
Cardinal George, the Archbishop of the Chicago, a Catholic guy, wrote a wonderfully articulate reposte to Mayor Chicago Values over his remarks concerning Chick fil A River North and elsewhere. Every paper ignored the Cardinal's teaching document.
When Chicagoans noticed the Cardinal's words without any help from Manya Brachear ( Trib), or Carol Marin (Cosmic Local), the Fruit of Islam Chicago Tribune Editorial Board Minister Brutha Dold offered up a Chicken . . . Chick fil A . . .acknowledgment. Nothing Dold-idian Less than "Cardinal enters Chick-fil-A fray!"The Media went all Chick fil A on Bruce Dold's say - Google it your own bad self! Every news out outlet went all chicken . . . .
Here is a link above to the Cardinal's original response to our public yahoos in office - no chick, chicken, egg, poultry, feathers . . .& etc.
I don't believe I recall seeing the words Chick, Fil, A, or Chicken anywhere in Cardinal George's response to Ald. Proco-Joe Moreno and Mayor Coon Eyes Emanuel Mussolini Improve. It take a DOLD to build this village of the blind. The Chicago Tribune has had its bat on its shoulder since Dave Axelrod pow-wowed about a Barack Obama White House.
Cardinal George is no Louis Farrakhan afterall.
Here is Cardinal George's fireball follow-up!
Tuesday, August 7, 2012 Chicago Values, Revisited: it’s not about chicken!
Responses to my reflections last week on “Chicago values” fell into two camps. There were almost universal plaudits for recognizing that the government should be concerned about actions and not about thoughts and values. The media, of course, are in this camp, because they are concerned about the free speech that is at the heart of their profession.
More complicated, on the other hand, was the reaction to the “value” that was the case in point: same-sex “marriage.” Some who are comfortably in the first camp deserted the field of argument on gay marriage. An argument is always made in a context that determines what can be considered sensible, and it seems to me that some of us are arguing out of different contexts. There are three contexts for discussing “gay marriage”: 1) the arena of individual rights and their protection in civil law, 2) the field of activities defined by nature and its laws, and 3) the realm of faith as a response to God’s self-revelation in history. Unfortunately, when the only permissible context for discussing public values is that of individual rights protected by civil law, then it is the government alone that determines how it is acceptable to act. Every public actor (including faith communities) then becomes the government’s agent. This is a formula for tyranny. We can see how appeals to pluralism and toleration gradually become tyrannical in the development of how we are now expected to regard the killing of unborn children. When the individual civil right to abort a living child was discovered in the Constitution, its justification began as a “necessary evil” for the sake of a woman’s health; it was then applauded in nobler terms as a positive symbol of a woman’s freedom; it is now part of the value system of our society and everyone must be involved in paying for it, either through taxes or insurance. It is mainstream medicine and settled social policy. Its opponents are relegated to a quirky fringe, outside of the American consensus not only on what it is legal to do but also on what it is good to support. When the government, the media and the entertainment industries agree to agree on how to use words and shape the argument, society itself is deliberately transformed in ways that bring academics, judges, legislators, lawyers, law enforcement officers, newspaper editors, actors, psychiatrists, doctors and every other public professional into public agreement, all portraying themselves as original thinkers. Anyone opposed to the new consensus, no matter the reason, is dismissed as a throwback to an earlier age, to be tolerated, perhaps, but removed from public life and, eventually, punished. It’s a very old story.
Getting people to think outside the context of “civil rights” is difficult. It’s as if Americans were forbidden to think beyond politics. What is singularly peculiar about the “gay marriage” argument is the way its proponents dismiss the field of nature itself as in any way normative for human actions. We would think it odd if the government, in order to please those who desire to fly without an airplane, were to repeal the law of gravity. If nature gets in the way of a new civil right to “gay marriage,” however, that’s too bad for nature. This strikes me as bizarre. Entering into the context of faith, the believer looks to how God has intervened in history through the calling of the Jewish people to a particular vocation, through inspiring the Hebrew prophets, by the incarnation of the eternal Son of God in Jesus of Nazareth, and the founding of the Church that speaks in Jesus’ name until he returns in glory. The God who created order in nature also reveals his plan for us in history; and the religious teaching on the nature of marriage is eminently clear. Those who dismiss any religiously based argument as simply private and therefore not publicly normative are at least consistent with the secularism that makes protection of individual “civil rights” entirely determinative of public life. What is puzzling is the case of those who, while claiming to be believers, ignore the history of salvation and reduce God to a cosmic wimp who smiles and blesses whatever comes down the track, as if God were without intelligence or the ability to discern right from wrong. Jesus is certainly “inclusive” as the savior of the whole world who invites all to follow him. But Jesus calls us to convert to his ways, which are not ours. Among the sayings of Jesus, there are about as many that start “Woe to you…” as there are those that begin “Blessed are they…” A Jesus reduced to our wishful thinking is useless. What remains a Gospel imperative, of course, is a respectful and loving concern for those who identify themselves as gay or lesbian, including them in the community of faith and accompanying them in their quest for holiness of life. The Archdiocese attempts this response, in part, through AGLO and Courage groups. Thanks to all who responded to last week’s blog; apologies to anyone who feels unfairly judged. I’ve tried to keep it at the level of ideas and social trends that seem to me to be dangerous to us all, Chicagoans or others. Francis Cardinal George, OMI (emphases my own)
You broke the clock gun there, Cardinal! They never even heard it coming, let alone saw it whiz by, Your Eminence!
Wazzit Say? Sumpin aboud . . .Exercisin Yer Free Will . . .don't cost nutttin.
True ease in writing comes from art, not chance, As those move easiest who have learned to dance. 'Tis not enough no harshness gives offense, The sound must seem an echo to the sense: - Alexander Pope
The measure the greatness of all other books against the greatest literary backdrop of all-time, the Bible, and I find with Joyce's Ulysses, the Bible doesn't even come close. If you're a writer, and you haven't read Ulysses, that fact is probably apparent in your writing . . . Joyce would have said as much. Joyce said a lot of things, such as: If Dublin was to be destroyed,Ulysses would be the book used to put it back together again. He said the same thing about the universe in accordance with Finnegans Wake.FW is a literary work that seems to have condensed time and space into a nutshell. Joyce also said of Ulysses: I'm writing a book to keep the scholars and professors guessing for centuries. That is the only way to ensure one's own immortality. Adam Michael Luebke
James Joyce is a tough read. When a reader manages to get through with Dubliners, a collection of short-stories, the novel Portrait of the Artist as Young Man tosses up an offensive line of cultural tropes and references from Western Civilization that is as daunting as Jerry Kramer, Jim Otto, Fuzzy Thurston, Jim Ringo, Forrest Gregg and Bob Skoronski. Those gents were the 1959-1963 Green Bay Packer offensive linemen - tough to get through.
Life is tough to get through. James Joyce was said to have revolutionized literature - not really. Many, many, many ink-slingers are as thick with cross-references and dark conceits - Rabelais, Laurence Sterne, Jonathan Swift and Marcel Proust to name a few. Joyce, however, could be as lucid and straightforward as a sportswriter when he chose to do so, or if the occasion demanded.
The more one brings to the blank paper, along with the standards of plain and truthful speaking, the richer the benefits for the writer's readers. James Joyce brought music to his reader via the written word. Sound and Sense merged in a beautifully orchestrated and executed performance - Ulysses and Finnegan's Wake make the 1959-1963 Packers' offensive line seem like Mae Kennedy Kane Dancers *confronting Ragen's Colts with hangovers. Those are two obscure Chicago references for the energetic reader.
Ulysses offers this - Mr Leopold Bloom ate with relish the inner organs of beasts and fowls. He liked thick giblet soup, nutty gizzards, a stuffed roast heart, liver slices fried with crustcrumbs, fried hencod's roes. Most of all he liked grilled mutton kidneys which gave his palate a fine tang of faintly scented urine (55).
Is there anything left un-uttered? Ulysses is that Roman name for that Greek guy what wandered when he pissed off the gods and took a long time to get home to the Old Lady and the kid, right? So, what's that got to do with Dublin on 16 June 1904? Plenty. That's the point. Michael Moriarty writes much like James Joyce and brings a vast arsenal of culture to his prose. This early morning before I could get to Kareem's Dunkin Donuts at 104th & Western, I was fully caffeinated with the following offering by my pal Michael Moriarty. Mr. Moriarty and I share a Jesuit education, a Catholic upbringing and Chicago roots. We learned that First Principles based upon obligation to God as the foundation to living a good and happy life. Without a sounding board, man is deaf. If we refuse to hear the sound of the unborn child in mother's womb, what is the point of going to a symphony. Michael Moriarty - read and listen:
Tonya Reaves, 24, died late Friday night at Planned Parenthood at 18 S. Michigan Ave. Chicago, IL - home of Personal PAC and our Abortion Friendly Illinois Government
Now here is a woman's choice gone worse thanks to the Dowagers of Planned Parenthood Illinois and Personal PAC's Boss Terry Cosgrove
A young woman has died after having a second-trimester abortion at a Chicago-area Planned Parenthood clinic. Tonya Reaves, 24, died late Friday night, according to a local CBS television station, of hemorrhage, with a cervical dilation and evacuation, according to the medical examiner’s office following an autopsy after the abortion that claimed her life.
CBS Chicago said Reaves died after the abortion she had at 18 S. Michigan Avenue Planned Parenthood facility. The woman was transported from the Loop Health Center Planned Parenthood abortion clinic to Northwestern Memorial Hospital where she was pronounced dead at 11:20 P.M.An autopsy conducted Saturday determined that she died from hemorrhage following a Dilation and Evacuation abortion. The D&E abortion method is one employed in pregnancies that have advanced beyond the first trimester. In involves opening the cervix and removing the pre-born baby by dismembering him or her. The Loop Health Center Planned Parenthood advertises abortions up to 18 weeks. (emphasis my own)
Having bought an Illinois Supreme Court Justice this last spring should but the butchers in good stead. Gov. Quinn, Boss Terry Cosgrove - you and the Dowagers own this one. No guns or bullets were involved in these homicides.
. . . Enough now; since the sacred matter that I mean
I should be wronging longer leaving it to float
Upon this only gambolling and echoing-of-earth note
What is … the delightful dene?
Wedlock. What the water? Spousal love.
Epithalamion1918 Gerard Manley Hopkins, SJ
Below - the Full Package Mainline Protestant - Lesbian Episcopalian priest and abortion blesser Rev. Dr. K. Hawthorne Ragsdale.
“When a woman wants a child but can’t afford one because she hasn’t the education necessary for a sustainable job, or access to health care, or day care, or adequate food, it is the abysmal priorities of our nation, the lack of social supports, the absence of justice that are the tragedies; the abortion is a blessing. “And when a woman becomes pregnant within a loving, supportive, respectful relationship; has every option open to her; decides she does not wish to bear a child; and has access to a safe, affordable abortion – there is not a tragedy in sight -- only blessing. The ability to enjoy God’s good gift of sexuality without compromising one’s education, life’s work, or ability to put to use God’s gifts and call is simply blessing. “These are the two things I want you, please, to remember – abortion is a blessing and our work is not done. Let me hear you say it: abortion is a blessing and our work is not done. Abortion is a blessing and our work is not done. Abortion is a blessing and our work is not done.” The Rev. Dr. Katherine Ragsdale was appointed as the sixth and newest president of Episcopal Divinity School (EDS) in Cambridge, MA, March 30 2009
INDIANAPOLIS (Reuters) - The U.S. Episcopal Church is poised to become the first major religious denomination in the United States to approve a rite for blessing gay marriages after its bishops overwhelmingly approved such a liturgy on Monday. . . .The United Church of Christ, a mainstream Protestant denomination with about a million members, has gone further so far than any other U.S. church, voting in 2005 to support same sex marriage. Chicago Tribune
Chances are that if you choose to believe that abortion is a blessing, you will also bless same sex marriage. You will considered yourself nuanced and fully evolved. This is marriage of opinion, or if you insist, conviction is as mainline as it gets.
Mainline Protestant churches and denominations have long approved Darwin's survival of the fittest. The Mainline Protestant churches ( United Church of Christ, United Methodist, Evangelical Lutheran, and Episcopal as well as Quakers and the various Moravian churches) get their name form the old Philadelphia suburb along the Pennsylvania Mainline Railroad, noted for its affluence. The more affluent one might be the more one might associate with Mainline Protestantism*. With affluence comes educational opportunity and a post-secondary degree more than possible. Mainline Protestantism takes a nuanced view of scripture known as High Criticism - this holds that the Bible should only be regarded as a neat read - "Mainline denominations generally teach that the Bible is God's Word in function, but that it must be interpreted both through the lens of the cultures in which it was originally written, and examined using God-given reason. Mainline Christian groups are often more accepting of other beliefs and faiths." ( emphasis my own).
If God's Word is regarded in function, no wonder Bill Moyers is the Mainliner's Pope. God never wrote speeches for LBJ insisting more kids get sent to Vietnam, after all. Likewise, God never should the 'good sense' to turn on LBJ when things got uncomfortable. The heart wants what the heart wants.
America's secularism is rooted in Mainline Protestantism. Margaret Sanger's genocide of millions has had the full communion and hearty support of Mainline Protestantism. Gay marriage is merely an adjunct of abortion.
The Episcopal Church in America announced its full and unflagging support for the marriage of Man and Man, or Woman and Woman. The Episcopal Church has fully evolved and joined abortion and gay marriage in its rituals, doctrines and teachings. Killing an unborn child is blessing. Wedlock without water - there will be no offspring in a same sex marriage no matter how many times the Rev. Doctor Ragsdale intones over the couple.
An Episcopal pre-school will be little more than a orphanage.
* Mainline Protestant Income:
25% Reported less than a $30,000 income per year.
21% Reported $30,000-$49,999 per year.
18% Reported $50,000-$74,999 per year.
15% Reported $75,000-$99,999 per year.
21% Reported an income of $100,000 per year or more, compared to only 13 percent of evangelicals.[31]
Usura slayeth the child in the womb
It stayeth the young man's courting It hath brought palsey to bed, lyeth between the young bride and her bridegroom CONTRA NATURAM. Ezra Pound -Canto "45"
Following enactment of ACA, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) has not joined in efforts to repeal the law in its entirety, and we do not do so today.The decision of the Supreme Court neither diminishes the moral imperative to ensure decent health care for all, nor eliminates the need to correct the fundamental flaws described above.We therefore continue to urge Congress to pass, and the Administration to sign, legislation to fix those flaws. -USCCB Statement on Supreme Court Ruling of Affordable Care Act
I tend to re-read. I ain't that bright. The more something is explained to me the more clear the nature and the necessity of instruction cuts through my brain-fog. Given my all too human limitations, it is often best to clarify instructions before proceeding - e.g. shut off all electrical circuits before placing the pliers in direct contact with the wires. No room for a quibble there. Will do. Authority speaks. "Eat not of the Tree." Simple. "Yeah, but . . .however, the Snake said 'the fruit is mighty tasty' and, after all, we are God's BFsF! What could happen? "
Original thought begat Original Sin.
An Original thought, impulse, show of will, or test of outcomes ( John Dewey) is and has been historically stupid. Disobedience and not lust or greed is result of origin of evil - have not all of us Banished Children of Eve stuck our tongues on Arctic-ly chilled flag pole?
Ignoring authority is the one sure path to pain - " Hold my beer and watch this" is often the prelude to disaster. I imagine a pale young Caucasian chap well versed in Hip-hop libretti *deciding to tell a corner full Gangster Disciples -wats up wit to all my folks imma “GD” AND ALWAAYS WILL BE TILL DA DAY I GET BARRIED SIX FEET UNDA TO ALL MY LADIES THATS UNDA DA SIX STAY UP AND TO ALL MY GANGSTA’S ONE LOVE.
A very unsalubrious outcome that -if not mortal.
Therefore, I read and re-read Authority . . .the Gospel, if you will. I have read Confederacy of Dunces as often as Gargantua and Pantagruel and Rape of the Lock much more often than I have Bridges of Madison County. In case of the former the rules of comic genius merge nicely, in the case of the latter Pope has more to say on love, vanity and heart-break than What's His Name? - Judgment works only when authority is obeyed. I might be a tad vague in this matter; therefore, do ask questions.
Feminism is a goofy comic-strip attitude. It is wildly confused and confusing. The only real authority on Woman in the last sixty years is Camille Paglia. Ms. Paglia makes sense and sound argument for her gender that runs counter to sexist arrested adolescent boys like myself and Frank Sinatra, but also the Amazon Gorgons like Katha Pollitt or Naomi Wolf. More on that at another time.
Feminists, like most Progressives, believe that Trees have Souls and a Fetus is merely Tissue. In the most recent paste-up for The Nation, Katha Pollitt decries the incarceration of a pregnant woman whose 'attempted suicide' ended in the murder of her unborn child , with the Medusan sneer for those who defend fetal personhood. These clowns must spend every waking hour crafting goofier memes for their tribe than Chester Gould drew villains for Dick Tracy. Feminism, as well as every Progressive Advocacy Meme, are Original Thoughts with the volume turned up most high. Feminism, as well as every other Progressive Advocacy Meme (Eco-Pantheism, Marital Ambiguity, Mad Secularism, Classism & etc.), are Original Thoughts with the volume turned up most high. America turned the corner on itself with Roe V. Wade and will only get better once American return to Authority and burnish its dulled judgment.
Womans Health has come to mean the murder of children for the sake of cosmetics - baby bumps. The dead heart wants. The living heart protects, provides and promotes the precious.
Great Gospel today and a great start for the month of July - America's Liberty Month. This is woman's health care - Jesus, heals and defeats death. No Medusa here.
When Jesus had crossed again in the boat to the other side, a large crowd gathered around him, and he stayed close to the sea. One of the synagogue officials, named Jairus, came forward. Seeing him he fell at his feet and pleaded earnestly with him, saying, "My daughter is at the point of death. Please, come lay your hands on her that she may get well and live."He went off with him, and a large crowd followed him and pressed upon him. There was a woman afflicted with hemorrhages for twelve years. She had suffered greatly at the hands of many doctors and had spent all that she had. Yet she was not helped but only grew worse. She had heard about Jesus and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak. She said, "If I but touch his clothes, I shall be cured."Immediately her flow of blood dried up. She felt in her body that she was healed of her affliction. Jesus, aware at once that power had gone out from him, turned around in the crowd and asked, "Who has touched my clothes?" But his disciples said to him, "You see how the crowd is pressing upon you, and yet you ask, 'Who touched me?'" And he looked around to see who had done it. The woman, realizing what had happened to her, approached in fear and trembling. She fell down before Jesus and told him the whole truth. He said to her, "Daughter, your faith has saved you. Go in peace and be cured of your affliction." While he was still speaking, people from the synagogue official's house arrived and said, "Your daughter has died; why trouble the teacher any longer?"Disregarding the message that was reported, Jesus said to the synagogue official, "Do not be afraid; just have faith." He did not allow anyone to accompany him inside except Peter, James, and John, the brother of James. When they arrived at the house of the synagogue official, he caught sight of a commotion, people weeping and wailing loudly. So he went in and said to them, "Why this commotion and weeping? The child is not dead but asleep."And they ridiculed him. Then he put them all out. He took along the child's father and mother and those who were with him and entered the room where the child was. He took the child by the hand and said to her, "Talitha koum," which means, "Little girl, I say to you, arise!"The girl, a child of twelve, arose immediately and walked around. (At that) they were utterly astounded. He gave strict orders that no one should know this and said that she should be given something to eat.
Yep, came home and re-read the instructions. Ignore the ridicule; grab on to the garments; Arise when told; keep your trap shut on the details ( Jesus did the masterminding, there and Pete, Jimmy and John were along for post-operative reports); feed the kid.
I better read this one again and again and again. Talitha Koum! Old Saint Augustine wrote in his Confessions about his departure from thinking purely on his own, or without reference to a solid Authority that he heard a voice cammand him - Tolle Lege! Take up and read. “The repentance that accompanies salvation is a continued act,a repentance never to be repented of (2 Cor. 7:10). That seemed to work pretty good for him and Old Augie didn't have an IPad. How about that? Read it and read it again. Got it? Not yet. I'll get there.
*Insecure white people that feel they must act "Black" to fit into society. Wat they dont know is that they are further outcastinq themselves & will never fit in with blacks or actually be black. May use words like: Niqqa, Homey....etc. We weep for these types of people .Dexter: Yo wats qood mah niqqa ?
Riley: Nm mah niqqa just chyllin bout to qet sum druqz and then later qo to this rap concert.
Dexter: Word, word. -Urban Dictionary
Dad always said that I couldn't find my butt with both hands. I can. Allow me to add this imperative -“Defend the unborn against abortion even if they persecute you, calumniate you, set traps for you, take you to court or kill you." - Pope Francis to celebrate Pro-life Mass, Vatican
"You stand up for what you believe in, even if it gets in the way of what other people think. You are proud of yourself and your accomplishments and you enjoy letting people know that."
A peach of a guy with all the sweetness one could expect from a life well-spent and in good company: short on brains but a terrific dancer!
Author:
Every Heart and Hand: A Leo High School Story
The Chorito Hog Leg, Book One: A Novel of Guam in Time of War
