Our Children Are Being Groomed

 Andrea Widburg today, at the American Thinker has a story from Fairbanks, Alaska about a conservative school board member who was silenced from reading from a book that is on the shelves at one of their local schools. It is must read. This is happening in YOUR school district, I guar-an-tee! Widburg leads us in with this:

When I think of Alaska, I tend to think of a sturdy conservative state that elected Sarah Palin as its governor. Then, I remember that Alaskans keep sending Lisa Murkowski to the Senate. Clearly, there’s a leftist strain in that state. It was clearly revealed at a Fairbanks School Board meeting regarding a proposed revision to school policies that would have required teachers to wade into controversial, polarizing subjects. That’s an interesting discussion and one school boards should have. What I found noteworthy, though, was the desperate speed with which leftist board members moved to silence a conservative board member who peacefully began to read from a book readily found on the high school library shelves.

But here is the money quote, which tells you all you need to know:

“I can tell you, if it’s good for the goose, it’s good for the gander,” he responded. “It’s in our schools. If the kids can read it, I don’t see what the problem is with reading a couple of excerpts from a book … If it’s too inappropriate for the school board, but it’s appropriate for the kids, I don’t know what to say.”

Exactly. Our children are being groomed.

God calls us all to dump the BLM signs and follow Him

 Our church, not one of those "woke" churches, is surrounded by houses with BLM signs in their yards.  The signs are typically of the type seen here. The sayings written on the signs vaguely sound like religious creeds, as if they are mocking God. For example, Christians have the Apostles Creed, which provides a shorthand summary of Christian beliefs. On the other hand, the sayings on the signs are a series of nice sentiments but when one drills down an inch or two, you realize they have no real meaning. Yet these people act as if these are newly discovered profundities no one has ever thought of before.

"Black Lives Matter." Well, of course. But it is not only black lives that matter. All human lives matter. We are all created in the image of God, and therefore to destroy someone's life without justification is to destroy an image of God. It is a very serious matter. Frankly, I don't believe most police take the killing of anyone lightly.  On the other hand, the organization "Black Lives Matter" is a Marxist group formed to suck in a lot of money and power to its founders.  The organization doesn't care about black lives, or any lives for that matter.

"Women's Rights are Human Rights." Please note that women are a subset of humanity. Thus the saying is a tautology. Rights, properly understood are entitlements granted to all human beings by our Creator, such as freedom of religion or speech. Women have, and have always had the same rights to these things as men. I understand that these rights may not have always been recognized as they  should have been, but that does not mean that women did not have rights. What is NOT a right are entitlements that require another person to supply goods or services to make the entitlement manifest. For example, each of us has the right to self defense, and for that defense we have the right to own and carry weapons. But we can not require the government supply weapons to us at taxpayer expense. Similarly, we have freedom of the press, but no one is required to provide presses to any individual.

"No Human Is Illegal." This saying is simply deceptive. The issue is not illegal people, but rather peoples' behaviors that are defined in the law as legal or illegal. Simply crossing a border without going through the established process is defined as illegal, and the person who does this is an "illegal alien." If, say Americans were to cross into Mexico without going through a port of entry, Mexico, take the jobs of Mexicans, then send the money back to the United States, one suspects the Mexican government would prosecute these people, sentence them to a term in prison before deporting back here. Indeed, can a nation exist without defending its borders? Knowing that Mexico's justice system is very different from ours (and considerably less just) would these people actually prefer to have Mexican justice here?

"Science Is Real." Well, of course. But that is not what they are actually talking about. This is another deception. What they really mean by "science" is "scientism." Science tells us, for example, that one's sex is not "assigned" at birth, but is a part of everyone from conception. A male may cut and mutilate himself all he desires, but he is still male. He has not changed his DNA one iota. He still can not conceive and bear a child. Only a woman can bear a child, and it is for this reason that women should be cherished. Of course, there are a lot of other wacky ideas in "scientism" that science does not support, but you get the idea.

"Love Is Love." (Sigh) Another Tautology. Of course, love is love, but that has never been the point. Raising children is the point. Children are best served with a mother and a father in a stable, respectful relationship. Note that I did not say "loving" relationship. Having a father and mother who love each other is a plus, but the idea of marrying for love is relatively modern, and the older I get the less it seems a good idea.  My own parents did love each other, but more importantly, the truly respected each other.

And finally, "Kindness Is Everything" is a beautiful sentiment. But it is not true. Read the Gospels. Jesus was not always kind. Look at how he tore the Pharisees a new one, or his thoughts on the Sadducees.  Yes, God does love every one, but he also does not suffer fools lightly.

If the sayings on these signs is a creed, a religion if you will, it has to be one of the most flaccid, insipid manifestos ever devised by man. But God calls us all to be better people than these signs would indicate.

The True Purpose of Mask Mandates

 I know I promised not to beat on the mask drum again.  What is left to say?  Masks are clearly useless for controlling the spread of respiratory viruses, and the so-called "experts" know it.  Apparently, even our cognitively challenged President knows it.  But it turns out there is at least one more thing to say about masks: namely that Mandatory Face Convering's Only Purpose Was Promoting Fear, an article by Hrand Tookman at The Federalist.

It's as old as civilization itself, and indeed it is how tribal chieftains became Kings and so-called "noblemen." Create enough fear in a population, and they will agitate for someone to save them. Then you present yourself as their savior, but of course the salvation requires giving up power. "But, anything, just save us!" they reply. This is exactly the scam run on us for the last 2 plus years.

A lot of people will make a lot of claims. A tiny sliver will continue to claim mask mandates actually helped mitigate the spread of Covid-19.

They will be the outliers because, in terms of stopping the spread of Covid or any other virus, wearing a mask is the equivalent of doing a rain dance: it might make you feel better, and some quacks will tell you it works, but ultimately it does nothing except make you look foolish and give you a false sense of security. (Vaccine mandates were the modern equivalent of burning witches at the stake.)

It was all so stupid, and foisted on us by people we’re supposed to trust, which is why we need this honest accounting of what it was really all about. A lot of people will claim the masks were about establishing and maintaining control.

That’s fair, but it wasn’t their primary purpose. The primary purpose of the mask mandates was to make every person who wore one a walking advertisement for fear.

The emphasis is mine. Yes, it was to make us afraid. In this effort, the nightly news programs cooperated by constantly telling us the nightly numbers of Covid cases. Retail outlets unwillingly in many cases, cooperated by enforcing masking on customers for fear of losing their business licenes. I am sure many a grocery store manager wanted to let everyone do his own thing, but was forced by states with such threats. By July 2020, most of us already knew that the virus was not spread on surfaces like door knobs, and that masks were as useless as tits on a boar hog. But we were compelled in many cases to send a message of fear that we didn't believe. That is a violation of free speech rights, by the way.

Tookman hopes that we can prevent this from happening again. But what is the inflation concerns, if not trying to create fear? Sure, inflation is very real, but we have been here before. We will survive, and we already know how to stop it. So fear is not an appropriate response. The Administration has escalated the war in Ukraine and created fear of a nuclear war. Biden wants to be a war president, because we have never tossed a president out of office while a war was going on. Michner said it best: "The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary." Rather than hoping to stop what is unfortunately, human nature, it makes more sense to be ever vigilant and not be afraid. After all, we are not in control...God is.

Easter 2022

 Paul Krause has an Easter Sunday article at the American Thinker entitled Liberalism Can Never Accept the Real Jesus. When I hear people speak of Leftist Christians, to me it sounds like an oxymoron. But it is this desire to be our own god that causes the Left to deify the state. The Left seems to have turned such narcissism into a civic virtue. But I will let Krause tell it, because he does it better than I do:

The central truth of Christianity is that Christ is not only the Son of God but that he came to suffer and redeem us by his sacrificial atonement. In this world of suffering, the suffering of Christ alleviates ours and heals us of our brokenness. Liberals, however, cannot abide by this Christ because they see the state, not Christ, as the path to redemption.

Christianity asserts that the world is broken, as such the world needed to be healed by a Love that took on this brokenness and wounds of the world. Another central claim of Christianity, one that is now often distorted and twisted for the service of liberal humanitarianism, is that God is love. These two claims intersect with Christ on the Cross. On the cross the incarnate God of love came into the world and offered healing and reconciliation through his sacrificial death, bearing the suffering of the world to himself.

How broken are we? We sin even in our sleep! God the Father cannot even bear to look upon us, his own creation. He shies away. But God the Son entered into history, and lived for 33 years as one of us. He suffered the usual stuff we all go through, from having colds and the flu, having to go to school to learn the Torah like all the other kids, suffering the death of friends and loved ones. For at least 3 years he was homeless, living on the kindness of strangers. And while he was God, he had to forget he was God and trust the Father in all things.  That night, in the garden of Gethsemane, he no doubt suffered mortal fear.  And on the cross, he suffered total abandonment.  "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken me?"  But then, at the appointed time, he served the Father by submitting to be despised, tortured beyond belief, and be crucified, because that was the only way to reconcile us to God. He was absolutely innocent. But, as a result of his dying and rising, when we pray, God looks at us, but sees the image of his beloved Son.

We don't really have a word for that kind of love. We can kind of understand it when we sacrifice ourselves for a loved one, perhaps. But for total strangers, people yet unborn? There are no words. Meanwhile:

Liberalism accepts certain Christian truths before corrupting and distorting them -- which is the way of Satan. Liberalism accepts that the world is broken and suffering. Liberalism accepts that there is a certain lust for domination that permeates the world. Liberalism accepts that the salvation of man involves overcoming the brokenness and suffering of the world. But that is where the similarities end and the great divergence commences.

...snip...

The liberal Christ is anything but the Suffering Servant who redeemed the world through his suffering which was the highest expression of love possible and who, in His suffering, fulfilled the promises to the patriarchs and prophets. As stated, the liberal’s Christ -- if they even keep Christ -- is just a figurehead for politics and to advance certain state-sponsored policies. Liberals take an element of Christ’s character and make that the entire essence of who he is.

Let Krause close this Easter post:

The Christ of Easter is the Christ that so many flee from but is the Christ who calls us to love because love entails suffering -- thus, Christ tells us to pick up our cross and follow him. This Easter, as with every Easter, we must always keep sight of the True Christ, the Christ who hung on the Cross and brought salvation through his sacrificial love. As St. Paul says, “For I judged not myself to know anything among you, but Jesus Christ, and him crucified.”

In this Easter beset by suffering, we are reminded that God came to suffer with us. Christ, not the state, heals us. Christ, not the state, brings our redemption. Insofar that liberalism sees the state as the vehicle of redemption it can never accept the real Christ.

There are no SUVs on Neptune

Apparently, A New Mystery On Neptune has Astronomers Baffled. But, but but...there are no SUVs on Neptune, so how could there be temperature changes? I mean, here on Earth, all the temperature fluctuations are tied to fossil fuels. But of course, the climate was changing long before man even existed, let alone was burning fossil fuels. The climate change hoax is not really about the climate, which man can not change anyway. It is really all about achieving power for the proponents of it. The Greta Thunburgs of the world are the useful idiots who give cover to the power grabbers. After all, if it was just the power grabbers pushing this hoax, it would be obvious to all.

I suspect that they will find this has everything to do with the Sun. It supplies all the energy in this solar system. So, I put my money on the Sun

The Best Documented Historical Event..

 Scott Powell has a Christian apologetic at The Federalist entitled Jesus Resurrection is Probably the Best-Documented Historical Event Ever. Of course, ultimately you must believe, because no matter how much evidence there is, the Resurrection is still a supernatural event that none of us has any experience with. But if God could Himself become a human, live as one of us, die a horrible death, and resurrect Himself, can anyone not believe?

Still, people do. I just watched a History Channel hit piece by nonbelievers claiming the whole thing was a big hoax. Of course, they had to claim the Gospels weren't written by those who had witnessed the events portrayed.  No evidence for these claims was provided, however.  In fact, hundreds of so-called "Gospels" were written, but the early Church Fathers took into account the authors of these books and the dates they were probably written in deciding which books to include in Canon.  We have pretty good evidence that the books included were written within 100 years of the Resurrection.  But St. Paul, writing in the First Century A.D. would have recognized those that did not believe:

but we preach Christ crucified, to the Jews a stumbling block and to the Greeks foolishness,

My pastor doesn't like Christian apologetics because, as the above makes clear, they are in effect singing to the choir. Nonetheless, they have value for providing the believer ammunition to convince those who are open to Christianity. Remember that it is not our job to save others, it is merely our job to carry the message. So, with all that said, Powell writes:

There are many religions with different founders, prophets, and teachers going back thousands of years. But only one of them, Christianity, has a founder who professed to be the Messiah—the son of God—who provided irrefutable proof of who he was by conquering death through resurrection. Easter is the celebration of Christ’s resurrection.

Christ is also the only person in history who was pre-announced starting a thousand years before he was born, with 18 different prophets from the Old Testament between the tenth and the fourth centuries BC predicting his coming birth, life, and death. Hundreds of years later, the details of Christ’s birth, life, betrayal, and manner of death validated those prophecies in surprisingly accurate and minute detail. One thousand years BC, David prophetically wrote about the crucifixion of Christ at a time crucifixion was unknown as a means of execution.

You can read the rest of Powell's article. It is very well written. Please also meditate on the meaning of the resurrection for each of us today and in the future.

Addiction reflects a God size hole in our souls

 I have some personal experience with alcohol addiction, and indeed with addiction in general.  When friends suggest I might like a drink, I tell them that I have already had a lifetime supply of the stuff, so thank you but no thank you.  This is said humorously, and the "joke" is taken as such and the conversation move on.

So, I was interested when I saw Andrea Widburg's post at the American Thinker entitled A retired New York Times columnist offers an incredibly classist take on alcoholism. The columnist that Ms. Widburg is writing about is one Nicholas Kristoff, who grew up on his family's vineyard and cherry orchard. But despite this upbringing, his parents were college professors, and young Kristoff went to Harvard, and then took a job at the NYT. Widburg notes Kristoff's huge blind spot concerning alcoholism and the class of people who drink the fine Pinot Noir produced by his family's vineyard:

So, despite his execrable political views, Kristof seems like a decent human being. It’s that decent quality that makes all the more interesting his strange views about alcoholism. As far as Kristof is concerned, people in his class don’t have that problem. It’s a poor person’s thing.

In an article published in New York Magazine’s Intelligencer, the author describes a walk through Kristof’s vineyard, on the farm on which he grew up, where he grows grapes used for Pinot Noir. Kristof acknowledges the scourge of alcoholism, but denies any connection between that and his grapes:

“I don’t think that most people appreciate that most years, alcohol kills more people than drugs,” Kristof told me, though he clarified that he does not believe this is true of the type of alcohol that he makes. He also does not think that profiting off the sale of alcohol and lowering rates of alcohol addiction, two of his stated immediate goals, are in conflict. “You know, I’ve lost friends to alcoholism, but I haven’t lost any to Pinot Noir alcoholism,” he said.

The article’s author apparently suggested that Pinot Noir could be a “gateway” alcohol, but Kristof wasn’t buying it:

“I take your point that some people start with nice Pinot Noirs and then… ,” he trailed off. “But I think that is much less common, and those who die, the mortality from alcoholism, it’s driven really by working-class Americans, and it’s in kind of bulk hard liquor particularly. I don’t think that good wine and cider add significantly to the problem.”

Widburg is correct that alcoholism affects all classes of people, the poor, the rich, even the religious. And despite my experiences with alcoholism, I feel sorry for the "wine moms" Widburg cites, because they often have a hole in their souls due to paying too much attention to the World.  I do not look at alcohol itself as the evil thing, and Kristoff is not a bad person for making fine wine. Alcohol  just is an inanimate object, with no will of its own.  It is, rather a symptom of a deeper issue. The Evil One takes advantage of alcohol to tempt us. In other words, it is fundamentally a spiritual problem, an attempt to fill a hole in our souls left by God when we kick him out. Of course God could force his way in, but that is not His way.

I have said this before, but perhaps not often enough, we humans are spiritual beings in a material World.  It is easy for us to pay too much attention to the material, and not enough to the spiritual.  We Christians must be in the World, because that is where God placed us, but we can not be of the World, as the other animals are.  We can not, for instance, retreat as the Monks do, because we must be in the World.  At the same time, we can not become depressed by the events of the World because He is in control.  And this Easter season is a good time to begin paying attention.  Your church may have Maundy Thursday, the day Christ celebrated Passover, Good Friday, the day he died, an Easter Vigil Saturday, and Easter celebration Sunday.  If they do, please attend as much as you can, to bring you more into spiritual awareness. 

May His will be done!

Maybe We Should Try Using Our Constitution Before Changing It

 I have argued elsewhere that a Convention of States, COS for short, is both dangerous and ineffective.  My reason?  Exactly the same as Matt Rowe in his article at the American Thinker entitled Against the Convention of States.

Many folks calling for a Convention of States (COS) to solve our country’s current political problems are making a fatal assumption about the purpose of COS. They see this as a powerful mechanism for undoing political corruption at the federal level. Unfortunately, a COS is not the tool to handle this particular problem and, under current conditions, could easily lead to a very different US Constitution that actually supports rather than prohibits common government activities.

First, what we want changed is typically not clearly defined. Are COS supporters hoping for term limits (congressional and judicial), the abolition of federal agencies, changing the interstate commerce clause, or altering the 2nd Amendment? Let’s assume these are just some examples they would cite. I won’t go into them here, but each of these and many other issues were thoroughly considered and documented by the Founders who had very clear explanations for why they chose to write the Constitution the way they did.

Second, the several states have not surrendered these powers to the federal government. This is a very important point. Rather, by force of interpretation and the general lack of constitutional knowledge in our country, the federal government has usurped these powers a little at a time—clearly in violation of the constitutional limits placed on that government.

Let me repeat “…clearly in violation of the constitutional limits placed on that government.”

So, if the government is already acting against the Constitution, the supreme law of the land, which they are, why wouldn't they act against any other Amendments that try to block them? This is what I mean by a COS being ineffective. As with crime being a criminal control problem, not a gun control problem, so the problem is a lack of respect for the law by the people who make the law. So, on the one hand, voters get what they voted for. But let's not place the full blame on voters. The fact is that many politicians hide their true nature from the public and in the case of Democrats, they have a large protective screen around them.

A runaway convention is completely possible. There is no rule stated in Article V of the Constitution limiting the scope of a COS. The fact that 3/4 of the several states have not agreed on a purpose for COS is not the point. In fact, there is evidence indicating the Founders fully expected any COS to operate exactly as the original constitutional convention. They clearly placed all the power in the people and those people who are empowered to participate in a COS have no limitations, other than the later ratification of proposed amendments by 3/4 of the several states.

In other words, anything is possible, except probably, a limited issue Convention of the States.

And that is what I mean by dangerous. The Left will be involved, they can't be excluded. And they will maneuver the COS such that what comes out will not be what the people actually want. Imagine if Nancy Pelosi had managed to Federalize elections? Now imagine that that attempt becomes a Constitutional Amendment? How about the elimination of the Electoral College? Anything is possible, and your worst nightmares are probable. Tourot just tells us why a COS is a really terrible idea. He also offers solutions, that not only make a COS unnecessary, but would bring us back to following the Constitution we already have.

We must address the lack of Judeo-Christian morals and education, a lack the Founders knew was the only way their new country could fall from within.

We must ensure that we teach our citizens what the US Constitution actually says, why it says that, and how it works.

We must vote against and actively oppose political ideas that do not fit within the scope of our Constitution.

We must hold politicians, government functionaries, and their suitors accountable for misdeeds.

We must take the golden eggs out of serving in Congress—no more millionaires clubs.

We must remove power from the federal agencies that regularly overstep their authority for lack of oversight and statutory limitations.

We must work to return power to the states and, ultimately, to the people.

Some years ago, South Africa was looking to rewrite their constitution. One wit suggested we give them ours. After all, he said, we weren't using it.

We Need More Criminal Control, Less Gun Control

 Over at the American Thinker today, Charles Tourot has a think piece asking the question After a gang shooting, who should be deprived of guns? In this case, he is writing about the April 3 gang shooting of six people in Sacramento, California. The shooting made national news, so I won't describe it here. But Leftists like Joe Biden made yet again, the illogical leap that the law abiding population should have their guns taken because felons, who can't by law possess guns, continue to commit crimes. The problem is criminal control, not gun control.

I hate to keep brining this up, but nobody seems to be listening. Maybe they will listen to Mr. Tourot, though, so here goes:

The Officeholder Formerly Known as Joe Biden reacted immediately, quite unsurprisingly calling for further restrictions on the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding Americans. For leftists, this non sequitur comes as easily as breathing. Privately owned firearms are anathema to the authoritarian left. American Democrats are newly emboldened by their ability to commit massive election fraud without consequences. It stands to reason that they will seize any opportunity, no matter how bereft of logic, to grab guns. It's what they do.

As we confront yet another assault on our God-given right to defend ourselves, let's imagine how firearms laws yet to be enacted might have protected those killed in Sacramento. Most were non-white people. One was a 57-year-old woman, homeless for years. She was caught in the crossfire, as happens often in a war zone. It's a too common occurrence now in presumably civilized American cities. How might lawmakers have saved their lives had they acted sooner?

I don't what to spoil things, but if you don't want to read the whole thing, let's just say that Tourot takes each suspect in turn, points out that there have long felony records, and therefore by law may not possess a gun of any sort. Yet here they were, out on the street, with weapons that they may not possess, gotten no doubt through yet other illegal means. After all, they couldn't possibly pass an NCIS background check. So, these suspects are not "victims." Let us shed no tears for them. They are brutal killers with no conscience and no regard for the law.

If the three suspects, or others with similar backgrounds, are in fact responsible for the carnage on April 3, no proposed new firearms law could have prevented it. They could not legally buy or possess firearms anywhere in the United States. A highly reliable federal background check system prevented any retailer from selling them a gun. They had guns anyway. They ignored multiple laws when they stole them or bought them on the street, and when they carried them. If they are tried, jurors must consider whether they will ignore those laws again after regaining their freedom. A reasonable jury might easily conclude they will and impose a life sentence.

...snip...

None of this will stop crime. The people affected by the new legislation the administration will propose very rarely commit crimes. Their intent is to protect themselves from violence by the most effective means available: the private ownership and carry of a weapon. They obey the law. They dutifully undergo background checks, apply for permits, and take training courses as required. They present no threat to the public.

Like the armed citizens of any free nation, they do present a threat to those with designs on freedom. It is for that reason that they, not criminals, have legislative targets on their backs.

We are to Die to Self to Live for Christ

 I have two today, both from the American Thinker. Both deal with similar themes, the purpose for which we were created:  the fight against evil.

First up is a piece by Anthony J. DeBlasi entitled A War You Don't Hear About. DeBlasi is talking of course about the war of Good vs. Evil. As DeBlasi makes very clear, we humans are called to be God's soldiers in the fight against the Devil. And while it is sometimes actual violent warfare, more often, and for most of us most of the time, we are fighting, as Paul wrote in Ephesians 6:12:

For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.

Deblasi starts off his piece in a similar vein:

An old hymn that religious progressives deleted from their hymnals was “Onward Christian Solders.” The war it called upon was not against other nations, as in the Left’s campaigns for “regime change,” but against spiritual principalities of evil that wage war on humanity. In the language of the Christian faithful, the fight was against Satan.

The spiritual fight against evil referred to has no date or political origin and is ongoing. Before I go on, some background notes…

When God was swept aside for strictly political action against evil, as in France in 1789, later in England, then in Russia (1917), finally in America after the world wars, this alarmed not only those who sang the old hymns in church and who today are called “conservative” but the faithful and morally principled of every religious orientation. Expressed in the “supernatural” terminology common to Christian laymen, “Satan invaded the West,” including its churches. It was in other words apparent that Christianity had been assaulted in a major way by the very forces of evil against humanity that people have fought since the beginning of time.

It was Christianity that civilized Europe and taught people how to propagate good will and wellbeing from ground up and top down of the social order, a requisite of human life that today’s media-certified “good guys” seem ready to demolish. It could be said, in the same “biblical” language cited above, that a church vacated by God was occupied by the devil who, according to many a theologian, even made it to the Vatican.

What is relevant in any language is that retreat from the Church’s teachings on reforming the self is “good news” only for Christians-in-Name-Only and others who have been ignoring God, consciously or not. The folk who have always taken sacred scripture seriously -- how else is holy scripture to be taken? -- continue to rebel against the inevitable decay of civil order and the emergence of evil in our midst.

It has become clear to everyone everywhere that the United States has lost the moral high ground because we have lost our morality. We are no longer great because we are no longer good.  We must boot out, to the best of our abilities, the evil in each one of us, in order to chase the Devil out of our churches, then out of our government. We are called to this work. As DeBlasi notes, it is a constant struggle, because we have all sinned and fallen short of the mark.

Which brings me to the second post today, by J. B. Shurk entitled Finding Meaning and Courage in Holy Week. Jesus by His death and resurrection, shows us the Way to fight the evil living amongst us, ready to take advantage of our human weaknesses to strike. Shurk starts off:

Along with Christians around the world this time of year, I find myself thinking about Christ's crucifixion. Struggling to understand His sacrifice for our sins is an important part of comprehending our human relationship with the Almighty.

We are made in God's image, so within each of us is something divine. That which is divine is infinitely complex and eternal, yet we are bound by relatively simple, finite lives. I think this struggle between what is temporary and what is immortal causes deep conflict within us all, and we feel that conflict daily as we struggle with good and evil, virtue and sin.

Shurk believes that the Left has given up on Christ and instead embraced the evil. Where Christ ordered Satan to get behind him, the Left has instead been led by Satan. But Shurk goes further to diagnose the fault in the conservative position as well. We conservatives find much government action to be over reach, instead we argue for individual action. But this too, in God's eyes is over reach. We must find the right balance, and this can only be done by looking critically into the life of Christ:

The reason so many of the political left today embrace "ends justify the means" tactics such as disinformation and censorship is, I believe, because they have given up on Christ, virtue, and truth. A society that is encouraged to think critically, value wisdom and virtue, and embrace redemption has nothing to fear from the bombardment of false narratives that surround us daily. A society that cannot distinguish lies from truth and will not elevate virtue over sin, however, produces mindless beasts posing as men.

There's a fuzzy line between making everything about yourself and failing to realize that your faults or problems are indistinguishable from the ones you see in others. It's tough to operate as an individual without becoming so selfish that you ignore perspective. Ego and empathy can be two sides of the same coin. And for a lot of today's "woke warriors," the ones not intentionally embracing evil, I think they've become so lost in the meaninglessness of their lives that their capacity for empathy has been eaten away entirely by ego.

The final lesson for Christians is of course, courage. For we are not put on earth for our own amusement, but rather we are on a mission. We are to die to our old selves so that we can live for Christ. That means taking the focus off our selves, and putting it onto others.

Please read both articles, and if I have had any influence, read Paul's Letter to the Romans. Luther considered this to be the best summary of Christian belief.  Meanwhile, I am off to Palm Sunday, the beginning of Holy Week.

Uncle Screwtape Strikes Again

 M. B. Matthews has a piece that points out that evil starts out in a man through surreptitious temptations to known human weaknesses.  It sneaks up on us.  But this is nothing new, as the famous Screwtape Letters by C. S. Lewis made clear. Mathews article can be found at the American Thinker entitled Screwtape Comes to America.

C.S. Lewis' 1942 satirical Screwtape Letters is probably the best literary work of its kind in describing how evil and the devil take root, undetected, in the life of human beings. Our tendency is to think of evil as overt, obvious, and easily discerned. We believe we are smart enough to spot it but Lewis rightly warns us that we are not.

In this classic primer, Uncle Screwtape, a Senior Devil, writes a series of letters to his nephew Wormwood, a Junior apprentice Tempter, discipling him how to surreptitiously tempt a Christian man ("The Patient") away from God. It is a revelatory tour de force by Lewis, who admitted it gave him no pleasure to write Screwtape. The book was supposed to be light satire but is actually deadly serious and is treated as such by literary critics and Christians worldwide.

In America, evil is often overlooked because it does not come in a red velvet body suit, tail and horns. Still, evil is everywhere being mistaken for good. For example:

"It is funny how mortals always picture us as putting things into their minds: in Reality our best work is done by keeping things out…. turn their gaze away from Him [God] towards themselves. Keep them watching their own minds and trying to produce feelings there by the action of their own wills."

  Many are so self-absorbed that there is no room for God or anything else. In fact, our culture is set up to deliberately turn attention away from God inward toward one's own feelings. America's TikTok culture reflects this perfectly.

As Mathews points out, America is in the grip of great evil. We have given power to people who hate America as founded, who hate the people who are here, preferring instead people from countries where the government claims to take care of the people. Immigrants expect the same thing here. But make no mistake, the promises made to these people are never kept because they can not be kept. The people we have given power to want to turn the Unites States over to the globalists. But the globalists are nothing more than kleptocrats on a grand scale. If allowed into our system, they will bring nothing but misery and death to America, while stealing its wealth.

The Roman "elites" had a term for how they controlled the so called unwashed. It was called "Bread and Circuses." The Will Smith slap of Chris Rock incident is the perfect example. Everyone is talking about it. But what does it really mean?  Why is it "news'?  One entitled rich guy slaps another entitled rich guy on television. Yes, it was shocking. But why does it occupy the serious news shows? The answer is bread and circuses. Something to distract the average person and take his or her mind off more important things. And no, focusing on God is not another distraction, but rather allows us to see the real issues more clearly.

I have one bone to pick with Mathews. That is the notion that science is the Left's god. Science, the act of discovering how God's creation works through falsifiable experimentation is part of discovering God's Truth. Rather, the Left's god is the very opposite of science, termed "scientism." Scientism resembles science to those who do not practice real science. But scientism uses circular and unfalsifiable theories like climate change.  None of the Left's treasured agenda such as CRT, Transgenderism, climate change, etc. can not be supported by the facts.  In fact, as we keep discovering, science supports a belief in God, and why wouldn't it.  God created the universe.

Please go read Mathews article. 

Pope Francis Apologizes for Christianity in Malta

 Andrea Widburg points out that 457 years after the great siege of Malta, Pope Francis surrenders to Islam. Just as Obama went around apologizing for the United States, Bergoglio (Pope Francis' real name) seeks to be apologizing for Christianity. I think Jesus said something about being ashamed of Him.

Mark 8:38 For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him the Son of Man also will be ashamed when He comes in the glory of His Father with the holy angels.”

From the way Widburg talks about the tiny island nation of Malta, one might think she had been there. But she is right. Islam threatened to take over Europe. But the Maltese with the Knights Hospitaler stopped them at the Siege of Malta. After that, the Ottoman Turks never were a threat again. But now, "Pope" Francis seems to want to undo all of it.

The point I'm trying to make is that when it comes to Europe's survival as a Christian community, the Knights Hospitallers' defense of Malta was one of the most important events in European history. That's why it was so disturbing to read that Pope Francis, when he appeared in Malta, hid the crosses so he wouldn't offend illegal Muslim migrants on that tiny island:

Organizers canceled the crucifix from the papal podium because Pope Francis did not want to offend illegal Muslim migrants during the climax of his Malta trip.

Instead, recycled plastic bottles with red blobs were used to design the backdrop for the pope's address to migrants at the John XXIII Peace Lab in Ħal-Far on Saturday, a voluntary organization run by leftist Franciscan friar Fr. Dionysius Mintoff.

We are here for a purpose; each one of us has a mission, if you will. We are supposed to be in the world, but not "of" the world. It is a difficult balance. The monks who retreat from the world did it wrong.  But too many of us also do it wrong.  And it seems clear that "Pope" Francis is doing it wrong as well.  He should be shouting from the roof tops in every nation that Christ is the only Way, Truth, and Light.  Perhaps it is time to fire this pope.

The Disney Company Must Die

I grew up with Disney characters and the Mickey Mouse Club. I remember watching Annette Funicello and the other Mouseketeers.  It was all good clean fun. Never went to Disney World, because we really couldn't afford it. Still, we could go see the movies such as Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. So it was shocking to see Disney's high level employees brag about grooming children into the LBGTxyz movement. Other companies have gone woke and it is disappointing, but this is an utter betrayal of all that Disney stood for. Walt Disney is no doubt rolling over in his grave. 

But right on time, Kurt Schlichter has an article at Townhall.com today entitled Destroy Disney. You should go read it. Kurt is up to his usual acerbic wit with this one:

Nothing personal, but the Mouse must die. Oh wait, it is personal, especially for people with little kids who this giant corporation has targeted at the behest of the minority of blue-haired, nose-ringed strange-os in its employ. That Walt Disney is likely turning over in his cryogenic chamber beneath the Disneyland Castle is irrelevant. The man who created an American institution is gone, as is said American institution. It's now a global institution, and the America part is vastly outweighed by the Chi Com component. We used to trust Disney to take care of our kids, not take them over. Well, it made its choice, and it's time to make ours.

The Republicans must figuratively post Mickey's soon-to-be public domain head on a pike. This is what happens to corporations that cross us.

And cross us Disney did. It did not have to stick Donald's beak into Florida's fight to keep grooming perverts from messing with first graders' heads. But stick it did, mewling and howling about the unfairness of Ron DeSantis taking the bullseye off our little ones. It promised to use its power to change the law, not just by advocacy but with contributions and veiled threats to pack up and go.

To which Ron the Avenger replied, "Pack your Schiff."

Schlichter points out that Disney gets an awful lot of special deals from governments and all levels. Republicans could, and should take these away. If Disney wants to help the Chicomms destroy the United States, let them get their special bennys from the Chicomms. But more to the point, the Republicans have to make an example of someone, and Disney has volunteered to be the example. We must destroy Disney to send a message to the rest of woke capital. So, in fact, it really isn't personal.

Understand that what two adults do in the bedroom is of no interest to me. But when they are grooming children, then I get, like Schlichter, quite worked up. It is the same way with homosexual priests. The fact of their homosexuality is between them and the hierarchy, but when they start corrupting children, I get upset. And make no mistake, when a group as small as the Gay and Lesbian community, and they are not even a substantial minority, can wield this much power, they are hardly an oppressed group. Indeed, it begins to feel as if they are the bullies.

Pope Francis Continues with his "Innovations" in Church Teachings

 For readers who believe the rot that all religions are equally true, you may stop reading now.  However, I put the lie to the statement by pointing out that Christians believe that salvation comes through Christ alone.  Christ did everything necessary, and we just need to accept Him.  Buddhists believe that by meditating hard enough one can become as god.  Two very different ideas.  Note that in one case, God does everything necessary, while in the other, it is man who does the work.  .  

Raymond Ibrahim has a post today at the American Thinker entitled Pope Francis: 'There Is No Such Thing as Just War'.

Pope Francis, a leading advocate of Doormat Christianity, is at it again, trying to reverse nearly two millennia of Christian doctrine, by preaching total passivity -- even against violent aggression.

On March 18, 2022, Francis declared before an audience that “A war is always -- always! -- the defeat of humanity, always. We, the educated, who work in education, are defeated by this war, because on another side we are responsible.”

So far, all well and good, if only because such lofty but impotent words are expected. But then he went so far as to say that, “There is no such thing as a just war: they do not exist!”

Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano has written, in a round about way, that Pope Francis is an illegitimate occupant to the throne of Peter. But if Francis, or Bergoglio as Vigano insists, can simply change 2000 years of church teachings, the question may not be whether this particular pope is legitimately the "head of the Church," but maybe it is the office of the pope that is illegitimate? Martin Luther evidently thought so .

Luther thought the Bible should be the touchstone of Christian life and not the sayings of this or that Bishop or pope.  Too many practices of the Roman church have no basis in the Bible.  That was the point of the 95 Theses nailed to the Wittenburg Castle Church door. Luther wanted to start a debate with the idea of bringing the church back to the teachings of Christ.  Oh, and Luther was excommunicated by the pope; he didn't leave the church, the church left Luther.

Actually, a man making himself the arbiter of Christian dogma, rather than searching the Bible, the inerrant word of God, for what He has to say, is the original sin.  It was also a gross power grab by the Bishops of Rome.  We want to be as God.  Everyone.  This was what Luther, a doctor of the church realized.  Unfortunately, the temptation of power was too much for the pope to resist.  But many protestant faiths have succumbed to the same temptation, ordaining the gender confused and sanctifying abortion.

As an aside, Vigano has taken digs at Lutherans as being schismatics.  As I said before, Luther did not intend to split the church, the church did that to themselves.  But I Vigano betrays his hypocrisy in his letter of September 1, 2020 answering Mr. Kokx with What should Catholics do now? with reference to the modernists. Vigano tells faithful Catholics to resist the innovations of Vatican II. But this is what Luther suggested his flock do with regard to papal innovations. Oh well...

Go read the whole article.

Does Congress Have the Guts?

 What does the Bible have to say about money?  Plenty as it turns out, and America is heeding none of it, according to Jason Pierce at the American Thinker today in a piece entitled What the Bible Says About Money Inflation, Debt and the Fed. Setting the stage, Pierce writes:

It’s now common knowledge that the U.S. dollar is in danger of losing its status as the world reserve currency. This is primarily due to two factors, the first being the Federal Reserve’s inflation of the money supply, which drives price inflation. Money inflation destroys the purchasing power of the dollar, acting as a crippling tax on the poor, middle class, and retirees on fixed incomes. But the money inflation also distorts prices, and supply and demand structures and markets. This drives the boom-bust economic bubbles which blow-up into recessions. In addition, the money inflation also funds America’s destructive welfare state (which only incentivizes additional welfare), and America’s bankrupting wars of choice, as well as the ever-expanding federal Big Government. All of the above are as destructive as they are unsustainable. What they amount to is fraud and violence against the American people.

The other major factor threatening the dollar, is the Biden administration’s economic warfare in the form of sanctions on Russia. Whatever one thinks about the role the U.S. should play in the conflict (if any), the sanctions have driven Russia, China, and a handful of other countries to ditch the dollar in favor of the yuan, gold, and even bitcoin. One important takeaway every American should understand is, the dollar losing reserve status would mean a dramatic drop in the standard of living for all Americans.

Note that all this is being done deliberately in an effort to collapse America and render us a poor people. They want to turn the United States into what President Trump called a "sh*t hole." I used to think that the people now running our country hated us. But I now think it is worse. These people are indifferent to us. They see us as mere insects, of no more concern than a pesky fly. The self-appointed so called "elites" on the other hand, are the exalted ones, who deserve the power and wealth by virtue of their superior knowledge, and "moral" clarity. In reality, they are just scavengers sucking the life blood out of the American people.

This brings us back to the Bible. The following passages speak to God’s command for, and Israel’s attempt to commit to non-inflatable, or “honest” money. The money spoken of below are coins composed of metals (silver and gold, for example), pegged to a specified weight and purity:

“Do not use dishonest standards when measuring length, weight or quantity. Use honest scales and honest weights, an honest ephah and an honest hin (Leviticus 19:35-36).”

“Unequal weights are an abomination to the LORD, and false scales are not good (Proverbs 20:23).”

“Your silver has become dross, your choice wine is diluted with water (Isaiah 1:22).”

God's commands are often viewed by people as attempts to prevent us from having fun, or to control us. Viewed this way, religion is a sad affair. But these are not the points God attempts to make. Rather, the things God commands us not to do will beget their own punishments time after time. If we wind up in hell, it is our own doing. Only Jesus can save us.

Congress should have intervened when President Nixon took us off the gold standard. They could intervene now and put us back on it. But that would take rare courage, and I don't think they have the guts.

The Myth of the Party Switch

It's like the story of the babies switched at birth.  While it makes for a good literary plot line, I am unaware of it actually happening in real life.  Over at the American Thinker Bob Ryan has a piece asking When did the parties Switch on Civil Rights? I hear it often from Democrats, who claim the parties switched sides.  Really?  So, Bull Connor was really a Republican? Is that it?  Connor famously turned fire hoses onto Civil Rights protesters in the 1960s. Or maybe Governor of Arkansas Orval Faubus was actually a Republican? Faubus famously used the state national guard to prevent the "Little Rock Nine" from entering school when ordered to by the Supreme Court.

In 1957, the first major confrontation over this decision came when African American students attempted to integrate Central High School in Little Rock. After Governor Faubus surrounded the school with Arkansas National Guard troops, a showdown with federal officials ensued. On September 24, President Dwight Eisenhower (a Republican, I might add) sent 1,000 U.S. troops to Little Rock. The next day, the African American students entered under heavily armed guard. The episode served as a catalyst for the integration of other segregated schools in the United States.

No, the racist party has always been, and continues to be the Democrat party. That they are also the party of abortion and infanticide, and pedophilia only cements my belief that they are the party of evil. Note that not everyone who votes for Democrats is not necessarily in on the evil that the party stands for, but the Democrat Party itself is, in my opinion, the evil party.  End of rant.

Ryan presents a number of the people and places in history where Democrats point to as somehow switching sides, including using FDR.  Notes Ryan:

The Republican Party was the civil rights party right from its inception. From abolition to fighting for women to have the right to vote, it has always been the Republicans leading the way. But according to Democrats, the parties switched at some point in history. When asked for a specific date, different answers are given. There is no consensus as to when the switch happened. They just know it happened.

There is a great deal of disagreement from Democrats when the switch happened spanning many decades, but thoroughly convinced the switch occurred.

Spoiler alert, it never happened. It is why you see Leftists now resegregating dorms at colleges and graduation ceremonies. It is why there are separate "safe spaces." These and other perversions are not Republican ideas, they are Democrat ideas. The Party of Progressivism is bringing back from the dead the old ideas we fought so hard to get rid of. Even more disturbing is how so many young blacks seem to be embracing these horrid ideas. <sarcasm> Wouldn't their grandparents be so proud!</sarcasm>

Please go read the whole article.  While the Republicans have shown themselves to often be less courageous than we would like, they at least have the virtue of not standing as a group for evil.  Not much of an endorsement I know, but it may be all one can hope for this side of Heaven.