I.R.S. Scandal.

I wasn't going to write about the Implacable Repression Service Internal Revenue Service Scandal.  I've read mys elf stupid reading about it, and people with more and better information than I are writing about it.  So I was going to leave it to others, except three things have made me change my mind.  Nancey "The Theologian" Pelosi has said it was the fault of Bush appointees, and it turns out the heat of the Treasury Department Employees union--which supposedly represents those mysterious "Low level Employees" met with Obama just prior to the start of the selective delays.  And, of course, the Apple Hearings.

Oh, and the is the Democratic "rank and file" member who said on TV that the idea of the IrS going after conservative groups sounded good to him.

The first thing we need to be aware of is the fact that the IRS has used the coercive potential of it's powers for political reasons since the 1920s.  During that decade, they used their power to go after congressmen, Senators and Representatives, who posed some sort of legislative of political threat to their power.  In the 1930s, after the Election of  FDR that changed--he used them to go after his political opponents.  During the Truman and Eisenhower administrations, the were fairly quiescent-simply keeping politicians from interfering with their little empire.  JFK used them to go after his political opponents, and so did Nixon.  Less well known was Clinton's use of them for the same reason. 

But here's what sets Obama's IRS apart--they did not go after individuals, they went after the ability of American Citizens to form voluntary associations in order silence organized dissenting speech.  They became, not an over mighty agency, but an arm of the nascent thought police. 

I alluded to the Apple Hearings.  You know why?  Because they are not accused of criminal wrong doing, and all they did was use the tax laws and regulations on the books to protect their personal interest.  The blame lies not on the corporation, but on the Tax Code and the IRS regulations, which were put into effect by Congress. 

Because, when all is said and done, Congress is the biggest threat to American Liberty, and needs cleaned up, cleaned out and a clean slate to start over.  The president couldn't pull his shenanigans, if he thought Congress wouldn't aid and abet him.  The current situation illustrates this--not less than four Democratic Congressmen wrote to the IRS suggesting they go after conservative groups. 

Perhaps the problem isn't so much the IRS, as the Democratic Party, and their drive to silence dissent and impose defacto one party rule.

No Free Passes!

I'm sure that this post will anger some people, and as usual, I don't care.  In fact, part of the reason I"m writing it is because of the self-righteous, self-justifying anger on that part of a fairly large segment of one moiety of our species--the female moiety--and the self indulgence and self excusing of the other. 

This is about modesty on one hand, and girl watching on the other.  Hopefully, even if you do not like what I'm about to say, you will at least give it a moment or two of thought.  This post is born out of something Christine Niles posted on face book, and the adamant refusal on the part of a commenter to hear of responsibility being placed.  There is responsibility to be placed, on both sexes.  Now I"m going to do so, in plain language,on both.

Ladies:  Men are not women!  Period.  We have a different biology, and that biology includes reproductive biology.  Which influences our sexuality and sexual responses, unless we're possessed of a a disordered affection and libido.  I'm going to give you a bit of socio-biology, to help you understand some things.

I studied Anthropology at University.  In those studies, I learned that Human Beings are classified as primates, zoologically.  An interesting thing about primates is this--among mammals they are more influenced by visual sexual stimuli than by olfactory stimuli, to a unique degree.  Humans to the greatest extent of all primates, and human males more so than human females.  We are hardwired to respond to what we see. This fact of primate behavior and sexual response even influences Human anatomy. 

I shall explain.  We are bipedal.  No other mammal is bipedal.  One of the primary signs among primates of sexual receptivity is the female buttocks.  During estrus it undergoes changes that alert male primates that the female is potentially receptive to coitus.  This, by the way, is why guys look at women's butts.  But being bipedal, the prominence of the female buttocks is reduced.  Human females have developed buttocks that differ subtly in shape from the male buttocks.  But there is another adaptation to bipedalism:  the human breast.  Human breasts are shaped much differently from other primate breasts, in as much as they are generally hemispherical or conoid in  shape, and serve as a visual stimulus that augments the stimulus of the buttocks.  This is why guys look at women's boobs. 

We have as well cultural influences of what we look at, which vary to a certain degree from culture to culture.  These are important too.

The upshot is this:  when a woman dresses in such a way as to highlight the visual cues which human biology have imbedded in us, we're going to look.  Many of us, for spiritual of cultural reasons, will resist the urge to look with varying degrees of success.  But the urge will be there, imbedded in our genes.

So stop blaming us for looking, and stop saying just because you dressed in a certain way did not mean you were inviting attention! It's unrealistic.  Moreover, it's rude.  Let me repeat that:  it's rude.  It's a form of power over men, that women frequently use.  I'm 54 years old, and I've met way to many women who enjoy the use of that power to buy off on excuses and lame explanations.   I've seen it used for manipulation, for fun, and even as a way to humiliate men. (Here's a case in point:  I knew a very pretty young woman with nice breasts, who would wear a thin t-shirt braless, On the t-shirt was the phrase "Everyone is watching you stare at my breasts" .  If she didn't get the desired response, she would be sure to jiggle or sway in front of males until she had their attention, the verbally humiliate the male in question.  She did this because, she said, she was a feminist and men needed to learn how to act like humans).

It's obvious that young women--teenagers--might not have figured out yet how powerfully their visual presentation can affect men.  That's why sometimes one sees teenage girls in very immodest attire who don't realize how much and what kind attention they will attract.  This is where mothers, and especially fathers, become important--moms know from experience and observation how males will react, and dads know form internal experience what the  reactions will be, and the potential or probably social response will be.  This is why parents, not our society at large, and certainly not the fashion, cosmetic and entertainment industries should dictate how minors dress.

More experienced females, though, I will not give a pass too.  Quite simply, they will have learned the probable response they will receive, and must take responsibility for their sartorial choices.  I must say, in the interest of fairness, that mistakes can happen. (One that comes immediately to mind occurred when I was managing a deli.  The owner said that we should wear costumes on Halloween.  One of my employees was a student nurse, and wore a cute nurses costume.  What she didn't realize was that although it was cut to be not slutty, the fabric was nearly see though.  She was thoroughly embarrassed when she realized it, and asked to go home and change--a request I honored, not least because she made it just before I suggested it.)  The thing is, we can tell when something is a mistake, and those of us with an ethical underpinning feel sorry and awkward for the woman in question.  However, these things are exceptions. 

If you dress to incite sexual attention, there are two things that I think should come into play.  One, don't blame the guys for looking.  Two, if you are a Catholic or other variety of Christian, you should have enough charity to realize you are sinning by leading others into sin through impure thoughts. 

Leading others into sin is a sin.  If you deliberately provoke lust in someone under the guise of fashion, you bear responsibility for that.  Consider this--everyone plays in the final four.  Death, Judgement, Heaven or Hell are realities.  If someone is lost to perdition because of you, you are answerable for that.  Moreover, Christians are called to charity, charity being the disinterested desire for the greatest good of another.  Since salvation is the greatest good, doing things that endanger another persons salvation is a complete failure of charity.  You cannot get around this, no matter what arguments or verbal constructions you make. 

You do not get a free pass for dressing to incite lust.

Gentlemen:  The above in no way excuses you from impure thoughts or actions.  We men are primates, we will have the urge to look.  However, our species has the greatest degree of self awareness in the Animal Kingdom.  We are not puppets of our biology.  We have free will.  We can choose to strive for custody of the eyes.  If we value salvation, if we value our hope of heaven, we will try not to be led by our eyes into sin. 

If you are strolling down the boulevard, and someone who is dressed to incite impurity comes before you, you can resist.  Perhaps at first glance you will be distracted.  So what!  Exert your will and look away.  Say a quick prayer to Our Lady, or to St. Maria Goretti, or your patron.  Ask St. Michael or your Guardian Angel to protect you.  Recite the Jesus Prayer.  Do something!  You cannot be a meat puppet to your libido without your consent and cooperation.  Have you been Confirmed?  Then you have the Holy Spirit to help you.  Have you ever taken Holy Communion?  Then you have life within you--don't waste it.  Don't give yourself a spiritual abortion for the sake of titillation.  Take responsibility for your own eyes, your own libido, your own actions. 

But there is more.  We men are half of the Human Race.  We hold a great deal of responsibility for the shape of our society and culture.  As Catholics, and other types of Christian, we can help shape and flavor the world.  Think for a moment about how well you practice modesty and chastity.  Don't for one minute think that because you are not a fornicator, or a physical adulterer, that you are chaste. Chastity is far more than what we do with our bodies, it is also what we do with our minds.

We men are largely responsible for the degradation of our sisters in this society--w reward immodesty and the appearance of sexual availability.  We reward it financially and socially.  What TV shows do you watch?  Here's something--I find the show Two Broke Girls hilarious.  I don't watch it.  I don't watch it because I think Kat Dennings is very, very attractive.  Her face, eyes, figure and voice, quite frankly, are turn-ons.  I don't watch it for that reason.  I  choose not to, because it can be a near occasion, or occasion, of sin for me.  What magazines do you read?  I avoid quite a few magazne that are not considered erotica because of their pictorials. 

Stop rewarding female immodesty--I tend to not buy products that use sex to sell themselves--I choose other products if there is any alternative.  Choose your female friends wisely.  At work, be careful how you treat co-workers, don't let sexual cues (deliberate or accidental) influence you. 

Grow up!  At 14 we men were more or less walking sacks of hormones with perpetual erections as our bodies and minds adjusted to the flow of testosterone.  But we are not 14 anymore, and if we haven't learned self control by now, it's time to grow up and learn it.  Yes, sometime we see things or experience things that are sexually interesting or arousing without our planning for it, wanting it, or consenting to it.  So?  Sometimes I experience things that scare me, but I don't let the fear run me--and so I have an example of how not to let lust run me.

Look at yourself with a critical, perhaps even hostile, eye from time to time.  Do you gravitate towards women who constantly produce overt and deliberate sexual cues through dress and action?  Well then brother, you need to exercise free will and choose not to.  Do you like movies that place a cinematographic emphasis of female boobs and butts?  Watch something else.  Use your mind, and use Grace to resist.

Remember this--most women who are immodest are immodest because we reward that.  In so doing, we are leading our sisters into sin, and possibly to perdition.  We will be judged for it, because we too play in the Final Four of Death, Judgment, Heaven or Hell.  We helped to build the over sexualized, libidinous society in which we dwell, so we must help to heal it, in and by our individual choices concerning immodesty and sexual activity.

We don't get a free pass either.

"Hey Redneck! Why the Heck Are You Still Catholic?"

Q:   "Look Redneck, you are obviously uncomfortable in the Church.  You don't trust priests very easily at all. You have zero trust in nuns who are at least not wearing a veil.  You despise the CCHD as an anti-catholic group bent on financing the Church's enemies, even though it's an outreach of the USCCB.  As for the USCCB you think it over reaches itself and has had a deleterious effect on the Faith of the U.S. .  You think the LCWR is a heretical, crypto-schismatic organization promoting anti-christian feminism, abortion and homosexuality.  You expect to be lied to my your clergy, disrespected by a large segment of the laity and relegated in most places to the status of a tolerated eccentric.  You find most American and European bishops to be spineless moral cowards. You are appalled by the attitude of most Catholics to the Blessed Sacrament... the list goes on and on.  In fact, if we got a couple of beers in you at the end of a bad news day, you could probably go on for hours!  So why do you stay?"

A:  Because it's the Church Christ founded, upon the Apostles and upon Peter the Fisherman, the Rock, the first Pope and the Vicar of Christ.  Because despite it's troubles in the current time, and the lack of faith on the part of Clergy, Religious, Laity and Curial Officials, there is no other.  I have no where else to go.  I stay here, do my best, hold to the magisterial teachings and traditions of the Church, p\hope and pray that our beloved liturgy will be restored and obey the Pope, even when my Ordinary doesn't. 

There is no alternative.

Guest Blogger

I have a lot of family members and good friends who have left the Catholic Church because of various reasons.  Some because they are angry or ashamed of the members, ie: priests nuns any number of laity.  Face it, there have been a lot of scandals in the Church.  Some have even asked me how I can remain Catholic.  Well, here it is . . .

You are on a ship at sea and there are sometimes storms and waves crash over the side throwing lots of water into the boat.  You know the water has to be either pumped out or bailed out, but as you walk across it you see a shipmate boring a hole in the bottom of the boat.  You run over to your shipmate and say with alarm, “What are you doing?!”  He plainly says, “I’m boring a hole so that the water can drain out of the boat.”  Now you look up and see that there are lots and lots of your shipmates who are also following this same idea – they are all boring holes in the bottom of the boat and you just can’t see that the boat can stay afloat! 

What do you do?  Do you jump over the side into the rages of the sea?  NO!  You start plugging up the holes and teaching your shipmates the reality that holes in the boat don’t let the water out. They let it in!

Or consider this

The Church is the body of Christ.  This body is sick, even leperous.  You are only a finger or a toe on this leperous body, though not infected. What do you do?  Cut yourself off from the body so you can live? NO! If you cut yourself off, you will die anyway.  No, you stay with the body and work to care for the infected parts of the body and pray for the healing that can only come from God! God will cut off the parts that have to go in order to save HIS body, the Church!  In this way the body is saved and you as a member of the body are also saved.

Qoth

I'm Expecting a Bumper Crop This Year...

...because the bull shit is just-a-flyin' every which way!  In fact, I can't read fast enough, or listed to enough audio to keep up with it.  Here's a few tid bits of pissed off Redneck for you, just to get it off my chest so I can get around to writing about Benghazi and the IRS and our week kneed, ball-less bishops.

Common Core:  MY granddaughter brought home a book from school that was stamped right on it, "Common Core", even though it has not been approved for use in this state.  Two things stood out about it to me--one it was copyrighted "2014".  I have no idea how that got copyrighted for next year this year, but it did.  I smell organic fertilizer, and least.  The other thing was that the stories and reading assignments in it were all new--absolutely nothing from the classics, or the cultural deposit of the western world.  As if nothing that transpired before 2012 had any bearing on anything.

Transparency in the Administration:  The ACLU initiated a FOIA request concerning government interception and use of citizens text messages.  They got a 15 page document, with all 15 pages blacked out.

Here's a pick of the cover sheet:

Martial Law:  We saw illegal home searches going unchallenged in Boston, when the powers that be locked town a town so they could go door to door, searching every house.  It turned up nothing, of course, the bad was caught by a civilian tip.  But read this:

 Federal military commanders have the authority, in extraordinary emergency circumstances where prior authorization by the President is impossible and duly constituted local authorities are unable to control the situation, to engage temporarily in activities that are necessary to quell large-scale, unexpected civil disturbances.

For anyone who doesn't know what a commander is, it's someone whose job title is "commander", or who is in command by default.  It could be a corporal!  This is scary.  Read a little more here.  No system in place, no definitions in place, no limits in place, and no reference to the existing chain of command.  It can--and probably will--be used as a hunting liscence by some activist commander, like the LTC who tried to make witnessing your faith a crime in the Army, and define Catholics and Evangelicals as "extremists".

Durka, Durka Mohammed Jihad Judge:  Federal Judge Patrick J. Duggan   of the US District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan ruled that Christians right to free speech ends when it pisses off Muslims.  The case as the secondary effect of legalizing mob violence against Christians.  I guess the Constitution is a dead letter in Michigan, especially the equal protection things.

San Fransico Calls Quoting Terrorists "Bigotry" and "Islamophobia":  Ads appeared on municipal busses in SF containing quotes from Jihadists, as an attempt to educate some very willfully ignorant people to the reality of Global Jihad.  The City fathers are all-a-tizzy screaming about bigotry and calling the peopl who bought the ads "extremists".  Really?  Why aren't they calling the people who said "Killing Jews is Worship...." extremists?  Oh that's right,they don't want to end up like Harvey Milk.

Invalid and Unconstitutional:  The US Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit  has ruled that Obama''s NLRB appointments were unconstitutional and invalid, backing the DC Court of Appeals ruling earlier.  You know there was piece up recently, that didn't get much traffic, where Obama's peers among lows school professors who had to work with him called him "lazy and unqualified".  I can see why.

Cheaper to Deport:  It's cheaper to deport  illegals than keep them here, according to DHS.  Turns out that it would cost about 135Billion to get rid of them all through deportation (but I bet we could bring that down with a little common sense!), but it costs us 113 Billion a year to keep them.  So in two years, we spend more this way--more from an over taxed, running out of credit and underemployed economy.  Not only that, if we did that, and just deported the illegals the flow would stop sooner.  Heck, we could put them in jail at hard labor and save tax dollars on road projects.

This Guy Needs to Go:  Archbishop Roberto Gonzalez    is way past his sell buy date.  He's under pressure from the Vatican to resign, but is refusing.  I hope that means he gets removed outright.  Just look at him:  He's got the kind of face that's just aching for a slap:

He is also in favor of civil unions and cohabitation for  Sodomites and Lesbians, he was a protege of Cardinal Law, has been suspected by the church of covering for molesters and the Lavender Mafia, and he put an "Altar of the Fatherland and the Maternal Womb of the Puerto Rican Nation in his Cathedral.  (last year, 5% of Puerto Ricans wanted to seperate from the US--95% wished for the staus quo--in a voter referendum).  Really, I though we Christians erected altars to The Lord--not to nationalism.

So there you have it, the easy stuff.  Now I gotta start working on either the IRS post, or the Benghazi Post, or the Mice-in-Miters post--I just have to figure out which one will not reduce me to a smouldering pool of angst and anger, and do that one first.

Another Blow to Christian Free Speech:  A Christian Group   was arrested for street preaching in New Orleans after dark.  They were charged under the "no soliciting" ordinance.  They heard the officer in charge of their arrest instructing the other officers to be sure to find out what Church they were from because they needed to "go after these churches".   So much for the home of the free--we are only as free as the cops, DHS, IRS and NSA think they will get caught at.

Harsh, Judgmental, Mean-Spirited and Narrow Minded

And you know, I'm just fine with that.

The struggle against the murderous practice of abortion is hampered by our Bishops.  They support an death mongering regime on one hand, while mouthing anti-death sentiments on the other.  Their support for the Regime is nothing less than two faced.  A Regime which promotes the murder of it's weakest members cannot be supported in anything. A Tyrant who failed to protect newborns from murderers like Gosnell cannot receive any support, for it only confuses the issue and the Faithful.

Cardinal O"Malley's  little demonstration of not going to the Boston College commencement is window dressing.  Had he the courage on display by every teenage recruit on the confidence course of the Military Services initial entry training, he would exercise his authority under Ex Corde Ecclesia and declare thae school to be non-catholic, and he would exercise his authority under canon law to declare the president and all religious of the Society of Jesus at the school to be personna non garatia in his Archdiocese.  But he wont'.

Just like these mice-in-mitres won't refuse communion to pro-murder politicians and religious--setting aside canon law because  they fear repercussions for being Christian.

But they are not the only ones who haven't the moral courage to call a spade a phreakin' shovel.

We who support the right of people to be born, and not murdered by medical assasins in the womb, have a failing too.  It's the cult of victimhood.

I reject that.  I emphatically reject that.  Quite simply, in the absence of coercion, women who go to a clinic are simply paying someone to murder their child.  It's no different than if a mother decided her 12 year old was unruly and paid some thug to shoot him.  Yeah, I said it, and I mean it.  The truth of the matter--the morality of the matter, is well known to everyone in America--we've managed that.  These women choose murder over motherhood.  It's that simple, if you strip away the layers of rhetoric, and the fear of speaking the truth.  They are not victims, they are perpetrators.

We need to make this clear--if you murder your kid, you're going to go to hell.  If you murder your kid, you are a villain.  If you murder your kid, you are not a victim. 

We have decided to be "nice" and "compassionate", and we've killed off 1/4 of two generations.  It's time to speak the truth.  It's time to treat those women who, without coercion, have paid to have their children murdered as what they are--moral pariahs. 

It's also time to purge the Church, through excommunication and every other lawful means, of those who do not think it's wrong to murder babies, and to drive those priests and religious--especially women religious--who do not accept the truth or who are afraid to speak it out.

It's our salvation at stake, and the lives of millions.  The Church gets criticized for not speaking more forcefully against the T-4 programe, the "Final Solution" and the other genocidal crimes of the Nazi's--and our priests, bishops and religious wring their hands and do exactly jack shit to those among us who facilitate a system thathas killed ten times thenumber that Hitlers Minions did--because it's largely the Democratic Party and the Feminists who do it, and that's where their heart is.

So here's a hearty call to all the weak minded, cowardly and murder-approving Catholics, clerical, lay and religious--repent, for you will find hell much worse than the outcry of the death-mongering elite you wish to join or remain a part of.

CINCO de MAYO!!!!

That's all I have to say about that... .

Skewered

Father's homily today left in my pew feeling skewered.  I thanked him for it.

That's part of what a Homily is for.  Homilies are to explicate the Scriptures and the Gospel particularly, and to exhort us to living our faith daily.  If all I hear are "warm and fuzzy" homilies, I'm not being fed, in a spiritual sense, and I'm not receiving adequate pastoral care.

Jesus' ministry contained both the affirmation of God's mercy, a call for us to be merciful, especially in our actions, and a call to repentance.  When our pastors don't include this, in a meaningful way, when they don't exhort us to live our faith in it's fullness, they fail to preach the whole Gospel.

So I"m thankful for being skewered.

Frankly, if I wanted warm and fuzzy instead of the Challenge of Christian Life, I'd just raise puppies.

"Phreakin' Horrible"

That's the title of one of the book mark folders on my 'puter.

I just cleared out 107 links. 

This is a temporary folder, where I put news stories and commentary I think I should comment on, about the state of the Church and the World.

Yeah, I get discouraged right now.  I'm weak.

Amorphous Grumbling

I'm sick of hearing about the coming trials and persecutions.  They're not coming, they're here.  And we called them upon ourselves through our unfaithfulness.  Actually, at this point I see no reason to be tactful--we've called them down upon ourselves by tolerating--at times applauding,  some of us--the unfaithfulness of Bishops, Priests and Religious.

When Christians--and I mean all Christian Bodies here, because we're all in trouble--were faithful, we didn't have this situation in North America and Europe.  Right now, Christians in the UK are seeking relief from government persecution by petitioning the European Court of Human Rights.  They are pointing out that actually living according to one's religious beliefs is being treated by the government  as a thought crime.  It's been a couple of years now since the Canadian Government, through their "Human Rights Tribunals" have banned a minister from ever preaching on sexual morality again.  The ongoing attempts by Universities and Academia to prevent Christian Leadership from developing by requiring Christian Student Groups to have their leadership positions open to non-christians, or to banish them from campus all together continues unabated, even in the face of court rulings saying they do not have to power to do so. 

The oppression of Christians is very advanced in France, where since the revolution various governments have tried mightily to destroy the Church.  The current (under reported) situation of massive demonstrations against the Government's attempt to force Sodomitic Unions on the polity of the nation under the guise of "Gay Marriage" has escalated to the point of State executed violence . 

Here the State is trying to require us to pay for the murder of children, lists us as extremists, calls us potential terrorists, (despite the facts of terrorism and mass murder in America) especially if we're vocal about being pro life, or pro family. 

And straight up, I'm blaming the Bishops, Clergy and Religious.  They've been sucking down our donations and giving them to groups that actively oppose our faith, consorting with the enemy, Cardinal Dolan gave Joe Biden Holy Communion in violation of Canon 915, and the pronouncements of two Popes about doing so. 

The one thing I know I can't count on in my Earthy Pilgrimage is the Episcopacy.  Bishops are very prone to twisting the words of the Pope, or of Scripture, or of the Deposit of the Faith to do whatever they want.  They really, really hate the fact that the Faithful have learned to read for themselves, to examine actions and to look to Rome for authoritative statements.  They seem to hate the internet and bloggers especially.  After all, it was the communications potential of the 'net that lead to the widespread exposure of the treachery endemic in the CCHD, allowed people to compare notes about liturgy, to spread the word about good things and generally enable each other to remain faithful, no matter how unfaithful their shepherds are.

Pope Francis gets it, and has spoken about the lukewarm trying to build the Church they want, instead of the Church Christ gave us. 

To bad about a lot of the other guys.  Guys like Cardinal Shoenborn, Archbishop Piero Marini, and the Austrian Bishops .  The Austrian Bishops are particularly vexing, because their little disobedience trip involves chnging Scripture and a tacit embrace of the Heresy of Universalism.

Then, there are the Nuns.  Like Sister Marguerite Kloos who just pled guilty to illegal voting.  Committing Fraud?  Perjury?  All good, for the cause.  The Liberal, Dissenting Feminist Nun Cause. Then there are the Sisters of Charity of Cincinnati  who have chosen to throw their lot in with those who promote the mass murder of babies as an industry.  Don't believe it?  Check out the pic:

There it is.












So, what do I propose you do about it?  Well, if you're reading this, you have a computer.  Use it!  Check out the webpages and sites of Religious Congregations in your Diocese, and when you find  bullshit, call bullshit.  Copy the page, send a copy to your bishop.  Send a copy, as well, to the Apostolic Nuncio.  Get your traddy, conservative, Beadsqueezin' friends to do the same.  Watch your bishop as well--if you meet him, smile, be joyful, ask for his blessing, then ask him why Father Slimebrain is still in good standing while supporting things inimical tot he faith, or leading new age and pagan practices, or what have you.  You can even ask him, "Your Excellency, why are you allowing Representative Fashistic Babyslayer to take communion?  Don't you realize it's bad for her soul, and your soul and the souls of all the faithful who get confused by it?"  Who cares if he hates you--our salvation is at stake here and our silence won't be a good thing to explain at our particular judgment. 

We must obey our bishops, in matters of the faith on which they have competence.  But we should also tell them--tell them in no uncertain terms--when they say things beyond our competence, we should call them on their political involvement with those who actively seek to subjugate us, we should call them on tolerating things within the Church that are contrary to the faith.    And most importantly when the bishop is upset, and tries to hush us up, we should scream to the roof tops the question: "I have said and done nothing contrary to the faith, but you're still tolerating the "Earth Spirit Eco Retreat and Drum Circle", the Condom dispensing catholic student girls  and Sister Lezbi Bitter's call for ordaining women and "gays in a committed relationship".  (And yes, these are all things I've seen fly, and that continue to fly.)  Be sure to leave a paper trail, and get friends to help.  One person sending a letter to a lukewarm bishop about a problem that involves orthodoxy will be ignored.  Fifty doing so, and sending copies to the Nuncio, and to the Vatican Dicasteries themselves will be harder to ignore.  Especially if they are networked, web savvy and good at getting the word out.

It's like the Arian Crisis--and it needs the same solution--Faithful Laity REQUIRING the Bishops to do their jobs.  Hey--it's not even an original idea!

"Earth Day"--yeah, right.....

So it's "Earth Day".  I am not impressed.  At all.

I've been known to make decisions on ecological grounds--choosing to do things that are less harmful to the environment, even when it is inconvenient.   I do these things not because of "Mother Earth Needs Our Love and Care" but for the same reason I use the bathroom instead of befouling my own bed.

But Earth Day is stupid.  It's just a leftover from the Dip Shit Days of the late 60s and early 70s, and I don't really give a rats butt about it, or most of the environmental movement.

You see, I'm not a dirt worshiping tree hugger,  I just have to live here.

Boston, Bombs, Bigotry and Me...

Someone once said there was no problem with me returning to the Catholic Faith, if I took comfort from it.  Unfortunately, I find myself in agreement with Pope Benedict XVI--"the ways of the Lord are not meant for comfort", and Catholicism isn't a comfortable religion for a Redneck like me.  it's damned hard.  The current hardship--well, one of them-- is the Boston Bombing.

Like most other conservatives--not mainstream Republican, but conservative I was appalled by the number and volume of voices asserting in the first few hours that it *must* be the TEA Party, or 2d amendment activists, or pro-lifers or whatever conservative group was least in favor with a given commenter.  Some of the talking heads seemed to be delighted that "conservative activists have over stepped their bounds", but worse were the comments I found in various comm boxes--expressing hope and delight that now the Government had a reason to round us all up.

 After several years of the Regime trying to paint us as the threat, once a gain an incident occurs where it is one of the groups they fawn on and cow tow to responsible, and conservatives are very relieved.  It's political score, or sorts, that we can point to people that the Administration has been lest than rigorous with as the perps, and say that the Administration is not protecting us from our real enemies, just painting those who oppose it as the bad guys.  Go Team.....

I was really upset that we would have a bombing incident designed to kill and maim as many innocent people as they could get.  I was upset that Islamist Chechens attacked us.  (The Chechen people themselves are wondering about a backlash. Considering the history of violence they have experienced in the last two decades or so it's not unreasonable.)  I was ready to break out a T-Shirt that said "I'll see your Jihad and raise you a Crusade" over a picture of a Crusader Knight and a ratty looking Islamist fighter playing poker.

Then I got to thinking.  Dangerous habit,  that.  One of the simplest things we've been left by our Lord is the Golden Rule--do unto others as you would have them do unto you.  I just got a good taste of smear and fear mongering from the Tranzies and Proggies, and I didn't like it.

So here I sit, ready to smear myself?  I didn't like it, and I can't let myself do it.  However emotionally  satisfying it would be just to allow myself to give in to hatred of Muslims in general, since I don't like it myself, I can't let myself do it.  A simple thought experiment will make my current position clear.

What if it had been Sede Vacantists striking at Boston because it's the See of Cardinal O'Malley?  (Yeah, very far fetched, but I did that on purpose!)  First, there would be a great outcry, and all the anti-catholics in the media would jump on the train.  Then, people would blame Catholic Extremists (Remember, it's not been two weeks since a Lieutenant Colonel tried to get the position that Catholics are by definition extremists into Army Training Literature... .) and never bother to point out that the Sede Vacantists are by their very nature schismatic and not actually Catholic at all--they are a "catholic flavored" sect.  We would all be tarred by the brush of two disordered individuals who acted more or less as free agents.  I'd hate that, and I'd think it unjust and a vile calumny.

We need to be American about this--and Americans think of people as being responsible for their actions as individuals.  It's been a hard road and a hard lesson,  with our own moments of shame--The Trail of Tears and the Internment of Japanese Americans spring immediately to mind.  At the end of WWII we held trials for Nazi war criminals, part of the point of which was to ensure that individuals were held responsible for their own actions, and not submerged into some sort of evil, collective other.  So too, must we deal with terrorists and mad bombers.  Because if let ourselves drift into, then harden into, a mind set of us and them, the fragile political unity which we have spent 240 years trying to perfect will vanish into factionalism and suspicion.  That has been our besetting curse, and it springs from forgetting the Golden Rule and thae fact that humans are individuals, not a collective.

So I have to fight my own tendency towards bigotry against Muslims, in order to be Catholic, and I must fight this tendency in order to remain a patriotic American--and for me, one will fail without the other, for I am not quite nice enough to simply renounce bigotry for Americanism.  It will take grace.   

I now a lot of people think of the Islamic World as a sort of monolithic entity, but I don't think that this is accurate, bor since there are more than 1.2 Billion Muslims in the world, if they were uniformly desirous of subjugating or killing us off, we'd be gone.  Israel would cease to exist, the northern world would be in flames, I'd be out of ammo, and we'd all be living in a hell hole of violence, dirt and smoke.  The math is clear, and it's that simple. 

So I have to work on not hating, on not desiring a Crusade, on judging people by their character and actions, not their religious affiliation or complexion.

Father Schoenbaechler's Funeral

Father Scheinbaechler passed away yesterday morning.  I learned of it when our Pastor--the Ultramontanist--came out to celebrate Daily Mass in black vestments and announced his passing.

Father Scheinbaechler (pronounced Shane-BAKE-ler) was 97 years old.  He taught High School Latin in his 70s, and was still saying regular masses--on the schedule--in our parish at 94.  He was a short little guy--even for his generation--who didn't have to spend all those extra years in ministry, saying mass, preaching, hearing confessions.  He also had moral courage to spare...more spine than the 60% of the Archdiocesan Clergy of Louisville in aggregate!  He was actually inspirational to me, and I"m a layman with a crappy education who doesn't trust priests!!!!!

He introduced me to the Traditional Latin Mass.  My first one was a weekday mass I happened into by accident.  I didn't expect the TLM and expected the Novus Ordo.  I wasn't exactly impressed by daily mass in the E.F. (I still prefer the O.F. for daily Mass!) but he then preached.  He was a preacher by Vocation, a member of the Passionists, and they are--or were until they got all new agey and political--an order of preachers.  He preached, and I squirmed, because he simply laid it out, not sugar coating, no watering down.  I became a better person under his homilies.

His funeral is at 12:00 Noon, Monday.  I ame given to understand it will in the E.F., and that his body will be available for visitation for a "couple of hours" before Mass in the Church.

So, if you are in Louisville Metro Monday, please give consideration to paying respects to Father Shoenbaechler, the most obscure great man I've ever met.

Blowing Up Boston

We are 12 years into a war against Islamic Terrorism.

And someone set a bomb off in Boston.

I haven't checked the news sites or the Networks this morning--I probably won't for a couple of hours.  But as of last night I must say that I find myself appalled.  First, the very fact of a bombing like this is appalling.  But worse, is the chatter about the bombing.

As of last night, CBS was saying a wounded Saudi National was under suspicion, and NBC said a "youth here on a student visa" was being looked into as the perp.  Others were screaming that it was an act of TEA Party terrorists. (Doubtful.)  Other were saying it was the occupy movement people doing things--also doubtful, although "Occupy" activists were caught in an attempt to blow up bridges in Ohio, and one of them was a mass shooter, I don't see this as something the Occupy Movement would do as a whole.  I've also heard this described as a "false flag" operation designed to shift blame onto others, or to further the Regimes Agenda.  Again, Doubtful.

I'm not sure whether I'm going to buy off on a "Saudi National" who was acting suspicious, either.  People now tend to be suspicious of those the perceive as being Muslim, and a bomb went off.  Too easy to pin it on a Mohammedan just through association.

Here's what is appalling in short form--we are so divided in America today, that we can't grasp that a terrorist of some form or other just set off a bomb in a crowded place, and we need to find them through the use of reason.  Instead, everyone seems to be intent of placing the blame on whatever domestic group they don't like, or pin it on the most convenient group they can find and bury it.

We're going to have more terrorists, and more of this.  It doesn't, today, make much difference who it was--because they're out there.  If we don't want to turn into the Balkans, or the semi-failed states in south central Asia and the middle east, we need to get over hating each other and get into catching the perps.  We need to get past just assuming that it was done by our domestic political opponents (whoever they may be) and act like a nation of laws, not men, and a nation based on reason, and catch the perps without reference to where exactly they are on the political spectrum.

But it may be too late--there are too many people who will not believe the investigation (and hopefully, resulting trials and convictions) unless they implicate those they have decided are guilty on first hearing of the news.  We have too many people right now who want the Tea Party, or the Administration, or the Occupy Movement, or the Gays, or the Christians, or the Muslims or who ever to be guilty so they can move against them with the powers of the State.  And each of these groups has proven that they are not above concealing, twisting or just plain destroying the truth in this or other matters.  We now are more invested infighting among ourselves for politics, than for catching a mad bomber.

Sad.  damned sad.