Let's Hear It For The GOP!

From NewsWithViews.com

By Pastor Chuck Baldwin

I think it is time that we all stood up and gave the Republican Party a big round of applause. I mean, they have done us all a huge favor. By an overwhelming majority, the GOP has prevented a potential plague from enveloping these United States of America, and I think it is time that we acknowledged it. Yes, the GOP stopped a potential catastrophe. Without the combined efforts of millions of Republicans, there is no telling what kind of disaster might have ensued. Let’s hear it for the GOP! Hip Hip Hooray!

For a few minutes there, I thought the GOP might have lost its mind, but I am glad to report that all is well with the Republican Party. The international bankers and oil companies, and the military-industrial complex, as well as the presidents of Mexico and Canada, can breathe easy. With John McCain as the presumptive Republican nominee, the globalist power brokers who have dominated the last three Presidential administrations can know that they are still in charge. There will be no changing of the guard this November.

It was scary there for a while. You see, there was this kook who was running for the Republican nomination that had the potential to upset the applecart real good. But thankfully, the fine people within the GOP rose to the occasion and beat back the attempts of his nutty supporters to vault him to the nomination.

After all, just think what would have taken place if this kook Ron Paul had won the Republican nomination for President. This nut case actually believes that the U.S. Constitution is the supreme law of the land. Imagine that. That means he would never take America to war except with a Declaration of War by Congress. Think how such a thing would prevent America’s meddling and interventionism worldwide. Think of the billions and even trillions of tax dollars that would not need to be spent overseas. Think of how much money Halliburton would lose. Think of how much money the Federal Reserve bankers would lose by not being able to loan money to the U.S. government. It is too ghastly to think about.

Furthermore, this Ron Paul nut might have actually insisted that the federal government declare unborn babies to be “persons” under the law. Think of it. This would mean that every unborn baby would have the immediate protection of law. And this would have happened without the necessity of appointing a single Supreme Court justice. Whew! The Republican Party dodged a bullet on that one. Now they can continue to talk about being “pro-life” for the next thirty years in order to fool Christian conservatives into voting for them without having to actually do anything about it.

This Ron Paul kook would also have put a stop to the incessant spying on the American people by their own federal government. Egad! This Paul character would have set America back two hundred years. Think of it. No more illegal wiretaps. No more reading private emails, letters, and telegrams. No more harassment by the BATFE of law-abiding firearms dealers for honest errors in paperwork. No more using the wars on “terror” and “drugs” to violate the Fourth Amendment. Think of the money that would be lost by the feds not confiscating the private property of the American people.

In addition, if this Ron Paul nut had actually become President, he might have succeeded in abolishing the Internal Revenue Service and overturning the Sixteenth Amendment. Holy Horrors! Can you imagine the tragedy that would have ensued? No more income taxes. No more tax forms to fill out. No more IRS agents arresting hard-working citizens for “tax evasion.” No more government tracking of our private financial transactions. Think of the US attorneys whose services would no longer be necessary. Imagine that. The federal government would actually be required to live within its means; it could no longer raise taxes, because there would be no more taxes to raise.

And if all of the above is not bad enough, this Ron Paul kook would actually demand that the federal government obey the Tenth Amendment. This, all by itself, would reduce the size and scope of the federal government by at least fifty percent. Imagine if the American people suddenly had the federal government out of their pocketbooks and off their backs? What would they do with all that newfound freedom? It is too scary to contemplate.

Do not worry, however. Thanks to the fine men and women of the Republican Party, John McCain will carry their standard into the November elections. Yes, my dear friends, David Rockefeller and his fellow travelers at the Council on Foreign Relations can rest easy. Should McCain win the general election, they will retain their influence in the White House. Indeed, we can all rest easier knowing that John McCain will be the Republican nominee for President.

After all, John McCain will see to it that our borders and ports remain open to illegal aliens. In fact, a McCain Presidency will ensure that illegal aliens become permanent U.S. citizens. Or better yet, that the U.S. and Mexico will be merged into a North American Community, thus eliminating the need for U.S. citizenship altogether. This will greatly help the Chamber of Commerce and Big Business. Think of the money they can save by hiring cheap Mexican labor. Think of the plants and factories that can be moved to Mexico. Think of the cheap Chinese goods that can be loaded onto Mexican trucks from Mexican ports and shipped into the United States on the NAFTA superhighways.

And did I mention the advantage a John McCain Presidency will provide to incumbents in future elections? Because John McCain does not believe in the U.S. Constitution, the First Amendment means nothing to him. This is good, because he can use the bully pulpit of the Presidency to promote his McCain/Feingold bill that would make it illegal for citizens to voice their concerns and opinions regarding the voting records of incumbents during a general election. That means those sinister organizations such as the National Rifle Association and Gun Owners of America will no longer be able to publicly promote their views regarding the anti-Second Amendment voting records of congressmen and senators.

That Ron Paul kook would never have tolerated such a law as McCain/Feingold. But thanks to the fine men and women of the Republican Party, we do not need to worry about these little inconveniences such as the First and Second Amendments (or any of the other articles within the Bill of Rights, for that matter), because they wisely selected John McCain to be their standard-bearer.

Furthermore, because the good men and women of the GOP decided to nominate John McCain, we can look forward to one hundred years of war in the Middle East. We can all anticipate the opportunity of sending our troops into harm’s way all over the world to promote the interests of international corporations, nation-building, and other U.N. machinations.

Had that nut Ron Paul been elected, he would have practiced a non-interventionist foreign policy. He would have sought peace with all nations. And, instead of preemptively invading foreign countries, he would have dealt constitutionally with terrorists, resulting in their capture or death, the protection of America, the absence of long-term war, and the respect of nations throughout the world. Furthermore, that nut Paul would have refused to use U.S. forces to do the bidding of the United Nations and other international entities.

However, we do not need to worry about old-fashioned, out-of-date ideas such as constitutional government, conservative principles, or common sense, because the fine men and women of the Republican Party wisely chose John McCain as their presumptive Presidential nominee. Yes, indeed. Let’s hear it for the GOP!

Chuck Baldwin is Founder-Pastor of Crossroads Baptist Church in Pensacola, Florida. In 1985 the church was recognized by President Ronald Reagan for its unusual growth and influence.

Dr. Baldwin is the host of a lively, hard-hitting syndicated radio talk show on the Genesis Communications Network called, “Chuck Baldwin Live” This is a daily, one hour long call-in show in which Dr. Baldwin addresses current event topics from a conservative Christian point of view. Pastor Baldwin writes weekly articles on the internet [1]

http://www.ChuckBaldwinLive.com and newspapers.

Placido Domingo To Sing At Papal Mass In Washington

It has been announced that opera great and General Director of the Washington National Opera, Placido Domingo, will sing at a Mass to be celebrated by Pope Benedict XVI on April 17, during his first pastoral visit to the United States.

Domingo, who will sing Cesar Franck's "Panis Angelicus," was accorded the same honor and sang the same hymn for Pope John Paul II during his 1995 visit to New York and New Jersey. Video of Domingo singing at that Papal Mass follows:

Divided We Stand

Unable to unite behind a GOP candidate, religious right

leaders face a wilderness road to the White House

From WORLD Magazine

By Warren Cole Smith

Last month at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in New Orleans, several dozen leaders of the "Christian right" met to strategize next steps—but the meeting inevitably included discussion of missteps in the GOP presidential campaign. Michael Farris of the Home School Legal Defense Association, an early supporter of Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, chided the group for cold-shouldering his candidate until it was too late. Others, including Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council, disagreed. The meeting quickly threatened to dissolve into accusations, rebuttals, and recriminations.

Then, venerable Paul Weyrich — a founder of the Heritage Foundation, the Moral Majority, and the Council for National Policy (CNP) — raised his hand to speak. Weyrich is a man whose mortality is plain to see. A freak accident several years ago left him with a spinal injury, which ultimately led to both his legs being amputated in 2005. He now gets around in a motorized wheelchair. He is visibly paler and grayer than he was just a few years ago, a fact not lost on many of his friends in the room, some of whom had fought in the political trenches with him since the 1960s.

The room — which had been taken over by argument and side-conversations — became suddenly quiet. Weyrich, a Romney supporter and one of those Farris had chastised for not supporting Huckabee, steered his wheelchair to the front of the room and slowly turned to face his compatriots. In a voice barely above a whisper, he said, "Friends, before all of you and before almighty God, I want to say I was wrong."

In a quiet, brief, but passionate speech, Weyrich essentially confessed that he and the other leaders should have backed Huckabee, a candidate who shared their values more fully than any other candidate in a generation. He agreed with Farris that many conservative leaders had blown it. By chasing other candidates with greater visibility, they failed to see what many of their supporters in the trenches saw clearly: Huckabee was their guy.

Why were the leaders of Christian conservatives divided and ultimately ineffective in the 2008 campaign?

The story may have begun a year ago when Newt Gingrich appeared on Focus on the Family's national radio broadcast on March 16, 2007. During the broadcast, Gingrich confessed past sins and Focus founder and host James Dobson declared, "I cannot under any circumstances support John McCain." Many thought that Gingrich would be Dobson's candidate, but those who had been disappointed by Gingrich's ineffectiveness as speaker of the House, or by his extramarital dalliance, withheld their backing.

That same day Sen. John McCain pulled in a disappointing $150,000 at a luncheon fundraiser across the country at the Westin Hotel in Charlotte. He was polling in single digits, behind Gov. Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani, even behind former Sen. Fred Thompson, who had not declared his candidacy. At an after-lunch press conference, McCain took a reporter's question about Gingrich's performance on the Focus broadcast with an icy stare: "First of all, let me say that I'm a believer in redemption."

For McCain, political redemption was a year away. Gingrich failed to rally support from those who knew him best, and some conservative leaders turned instead to Romney, who had long courted them. In 2006, Christian public-relations guru and Romney backer Mark DeMoss had his candidate meet with about 15 conservative activists. In a gesture that — like much of Romney's campaign — was both opulent and desperate, Romney sent everyone in attendance an expensive office chair, along with a note that read, "You'll always have a seat at our table."

Despite the largesse, Romney gained only a footstool at the Christian conservative table, whose leadership increasingly was troubled over his flip-flops on gay civil unions and abortion. On Sept. 29, 2007, he spoke at a CNP meeting in Salt Lake City. The next day he met with Dobson, Perkins, and about 40 other leaders. Conservative talk show host Rick Scarborough told WORLD the verdict: Romney as governor of Massachusetts "just a few short years ago . . . fought against everything we're fighting for." He would not win the group's backing.

So, with Gingrich not in the running, and Romney a "no," Thompson's leisurely campaign and Ron Paul's iconoclastic one did not impress many Republicans. Giuliani's pro-abortion stance alienated most. The candidate who continued to draw support from grassroots folks: Huckabee.

"The other candidates come to you," Huckabee told 2,000 Christian conservatives at the Washington, D.C., Value Voters Summit in October 2007. "I come from you."

That line generated one of more than a dozen standing ovations during Huckabee's 20-minute address, and he gained most of their votes in a straw poll of those present.

But Huckabee could not gain traction among the religious right leaders who could have generated the financial backing he needed to run a national campaign. In October, as well, he met with a group of conservative Christian leaders — most drawn from the ranks of the CNP gatherings — who say they were "vetting" the candidates. Most didn't like Huckabee's positions on immigration and tax reform. Others thought him insufficiently ardent in criticizing Islamic extremism and abortion. Members of the group believed that Huckabee was "their guy" from a religious perspective but said he was not quite ready for "prime time."

But no other candidates thrilled the leaders, either, so Huckabee was the one candidate they invited back for what one leader called a "do-over." He did much better the second time, yet the group remained too divided about his winning potential to agree to endorse him. When he won a stunning victory in Iowa, he didn't have the resources to take advantage of that upset in the primaries that immediately followed. McCain beat Romney in New Hampshire, and the Arizona senator soon became the unexpected front-runner.

On Jan. 22, just days after the South Carolina primary, Fred Thompson dropped out of the race. The next day, American Values president Gary Bauer wrote the 100,000 supporters on his email list: "Fred Thompson — sadly, in my view — dropped out of the Republican presidential primary race yesterday. He was the one candidate who understood Reagan conservatism and who appealed to all three segments of the Reagan coalition — social conservatives, economic conservatives and defense conservatives."

Thompson's departure should have helped Huckabee, but Huckabee himself had finished a disappointing second in South Carolina — to McCain. When Giuliani failed to win Florida on Jan. 29, a state in which he had spent much of his time and money, he withdrew — and McCain got most of Giuliani's supporters.

On Super Tuesday, Feb. 5, 2008, McCain won nine states to Romney's seven and Huckabee's five. McCain took 601 of the delegates to Romney's 201 and Huckabee's 152. When it was too late for Huckabee, Dobson endorsed him, but by then McCain had the endorsement of inevitability. On March 4, nearly a year after Dobson had said he would not vote for McCain, McCain won the Texas primary and enough delegates to clinch the GOP nomination.

Three days later the CNP met again, this time in New Orleans. McCain, trying to stroke conservatives, took the stage with a hand-held microphone. He received applause when he praised Huckabee, when he said, "We've let spending get out of control," when he said, "Radical Islamic extremism is evil. It's evil," and when he said, "As for the rights of the unborn: The noblest words written are the words 'inalienable rights.' That means the right to life."

When asked about his own faith in God, though, McCain launched into the story he has told often about a prison guard in North Vietnam who showed him compassion and once, in the prison yard, drew the sign of the cross in the dirt at McCain's feet, then quickly brushed it away. The story received polite applause. Later Family Research Council head Tony Perkins told WORLD, "He had a golden opportunity to talk about his faith. Instead, he talked about the faith of his guard. It was a great story, but not what we were looking for." Bill Owens, founder and president of the Coalition of African-American Pastors, was more direct: "It was a disaster. It just proves he has no clue what we're about."

But Phil Burress, who by championing a marriage amendment in Ohio in 2004 became instrumental in winning Ohio — and reelection — for George W. Bush, was among the last to speak before the New Orleans meeting broke up. Burress had been a part of the "vetting process" in Washington where the leaders reviewed and dismissed the GOP candidates early on.

With the election now just over six months away, he told the New Orleans gathering, "McCain wasn't my first choice, and I'm not sure about him now, but we've got a zero chance of getting a conservative Supreme Court justice out of either Clinton or Obama. I don't know whether we've got a 25 percent chance, or a 50 percent chance, or a 100 percent chance with McCain — but it's better than zero, and I'm going to do everything in my power to help get him elected. He's our best shot."

http://www.worldmag.com/articles/13894

FITNA: GEERT WILDERS' FILM ON ISLAM

Geert Wilders, a member of the Dutch House of Representatives has been Europe's most vocal opponent of the Islamization of that continent. Unlike some deluded and ignorant Western politicians, he knows that Islam is not a "religion of peace," but rather a creed authored in the pit of Hell. It abhors Western ideas of multiculturalism, liberal democracy, human rights and even the right of Christians and non-Muslims to exist.

The West faces a challenge far greater than those posed by Nazism and Communism, and yet a culture that has forgotten its Christian roots, purpose and identity is often consumed with a self-hatred that prevents one from seeing the superiority of our own culture to that of the barbarians already inside our gates.

In a valiant effort to rouse the West to the reality confronting us, Wilders has made the following film. Please share it with friends and family, and keep its brutal images in mind in the voting booth, in your personal and professional life, and in prayer.

No Surprise Here: Romney Campaign Co-Chair Endorses...OBAMA

By Gary Glenn

The man who would have advised the White House on future U.S. Supreme Court appointments, had Romney been elected president...

Pepperdine Law Professor Doug Kmiec served as co-chairman of the Romney for President campaign's "Advisory Committee on the Constitution and the Courts."
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=YTJhYTgyZjdkYjAwZDFhOGQ0YTEzYzYxNTMzZWE5ZTA

Now that his first choice philosophically is out of the race, the top advisor on future judicial appointments to the allegedly "conservative" Republican presidential candidate has now endorsed -- naturally, who else? -- the pro-abortion on demand, pro-homosexual agenda, socially liberal Democrat from Illinois, Senator Barack Obama.
http://www.slate.com/blogs/blogs/convictions/archive/2008/03/23/endorsing-obama.aspx

Which explains...

...why Kmiec was also comfortable supporting Romney, given Romney's pro-abortion on demand, pro-homosexual agenda, socially liberal political record in Massachusetts.

...how fortunate social conservatives were -- this time -- that Romney's political fortunes did not allow him to elevate someone so lacking in philosophically reliable judgment to a position of influence over future Supreme Court selections.

...why, yet again, it is Romney's philosophical commitment and judgment that are not to be trusted by social conservatives. As if further evidence was needed on this issue beyond Romney's appointment to the Massachusetts bench of two homosexual activists, one a Lesbian and Gay Bar Association board member who'd been an outspoken proponent of homosexual "marriage."
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2007/may/07052510.html

Catholic Schools: Essential Yesterday, Today And Tomorrow

By Daniel J. Cassidy

The Catholic school system in the United States is unique in the world in that its founders intended that every Catholic child should be formed by it. Massive Catholic immigration to a nation with an alien culture and Protestant ethos persuaded bishops that formation in Catholic schools was essential to preserve the faith of millions of Catholics for whom they had responsibility.

When the first Council of Baltimore met in 1829, it is estimated that in a nation of 12 million, there were 500,000 Catholics. By the time of the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore in 1884, the number of Catholics had grown to more than 8 million. Despite enormous obstacles, the bishops of the United States, in three successive Councils of Baltimore, not only affirmed the importance of formation in Catholic schools, they committed themselves to building a massive parallel school system. The bishops agreed that every parish should have a tuition-free Catholic school, supported by the whole parish, and instructed parents that they “must send their children to such schools unless the bishop should judge the reason for sending them elsewhere to be sufficient.”

The foremost historian of Catholic schooling in the United States, Father Harold A. Buetow, explains that public schools in nineteenth century America were influenced by Nativism that sought to “Americanize” the children of Catholic immigrants. Thus, parents and the hierarchy “could not in conscience permit their children to attend schools conducted mainly by Protestant teachers, with a Protestant viewpoint, and with religious instruction and religious exercises of a decidedly Protestant (even if nondenominational) character.” The bishops were concerned primarily with what all bishops ought to be concerned, the saving of souls and the building of the Kingdom of God.

Today, many Catholic parents would be grateful for a Christian culture, Protestant or otherwise, in public schools. Instead, their tax dollars provide, and (unless they can afford private alternatives) law compels them to send their children to schools imbued with secular relativism, where immoral lifestyles are upheld, premarital sex is accepted as long as it is practiced “safely,” and where Christian history and culture, if it is taught at all, is often mocked and condemned.

Heroically dedicated parents often provide antidotes to a culture in the government schools that is deadly to both the body and the soul. Unfortunately, most of today’s parents are themselves victims of government schools and have little or no formation in the faith.

Numerous studies have affirmed the academic superiority of Catholic schools. In America’s inner-cities they are havens, affording the poorest of the poor a safe, ordered environment, where their children are made to feel a loved part of an affirming community. But they are also the seed-beds for the future Church. Sociologist Andrew Greeley has conducted research indicating that those formed in Catholic schools are far more likely to be practicing their faith in their thirties and forties, than are the products of public schools and the parish CCD program. Distinctively Catholic schools should be forming knowledgeable, dedicated Catholic laymen, they should be the source of many religious vocations, and given the large numbers of non-Catholics they serve, particularly in the inner-cities, they should be the source of many conversions to the faith.

However, in the face of virulent secularism and moral breakdown in America and throughout the West, today’s bishops seem more concerned with managing a profitable corporate enterprise than with the saving of souls. According to the Hoover Institution the Catholic population has grown from 45 million in 1965, to almost 77 million today. But the Hoover Institution also points out:

Catholic school enrollment has plummeted, from 5.2 million students in nearly 13,000 schools in 1960 to 2.5 million in 9,000 schools in 1990. After a promising increase in the late 1990s, enrollment had by 2006 dropped to 2.3 million students in 7,500 schools. And the steep decline would have been even steeper if these sectarian schools had to rely on their own flock for enrollment: almost 14 percent of Catholic school enrollment is now non-Catholic, up from less than 3 percent in 1970. When Catholic schools educated 12 percent of all schoolchildren in the country in 1965, the proportion of Catholics in the general population was 24 percent. Catholics still make up about one-quarter of the American population, but their schools enroll less than 5 percent of all students.

A system that at one time educated 1 out of every 8 American children is being closed at the very time it is needed most.

Is the Church in America less prosperous than it was in 1829 when it committed to providing every Catholic family a quality Catholic education? Are the threats to one’s soul and eternal salvation any less? Certainly not! What is markedly different is the commitment of America’s bishops to faith formation and the saving of souls. Archbishop Fulton Sheen said “the danger today may be the primacy of administration over love.” Today’s bishops with their expensively tailored suits and gold cuff links too often resemble corporate CEO’s preoccupied with managing real estate empires. And they are far more focused on material resources than on the divine. John J. Myers, the Archbishop of Newark, is a good example; instead of committing to evangelization and building up the Kingdom of God, he has paid millions to outside consultants to manage the difficult public relations problem of closing scores of churches and schools. Using the consultants’ state of the art psychological and public relations techniques, and employing slogans like “new energies” to imply some great work is underway, the Archdiocese of Newark speaks of mergers, collaboration and consolidations, but the net effect is that far fewer children receive a Catholic education today than when he was appointed seven years ago. Many of the schools closed served those who need them most, but are least able to pay. In the eyes of the Archbishop and his corporate management team, the schools were simply a financial drain, not the means to save souls. As such, they must be eliminated. But like so many of today’s CEO’s who are paid huge bonuses even when profits are down and employees are being terminated, the Archbishop of Newark has complained to his seminarians in Rome about having to pay $300 for each of the custom made shirts he purchases there, and he has also purchased a comfortable estate in New Jersey’s horse country and installed a new swimming pool for his personal enjoyment.

In contrast to what is happening in most American dioceses, two Kentucky priests have written a powerful letter to Catholic parents about the necessity of providing their children with a Catholic education. They even assure parents that if finances are preventing them from enrolling their children in the local parochial school, they will find whatever financial assistance is needed. (See their letter here) Their extraordinary letter is a throwback to the great bishops of the nineteenth century who actually believed that they had the awesome responsibility to shepherd souls to heaven, not manage the collapse of Catholic life and the closing of Catholic institutions with an “après moi le deluge” attitude. Let us hope the Papal Nuncio has fast-tracked them both to the Episcopacy.

In the week following Easter, the National Catholic Educational Association holds its annual meeting. Attendees are, for the most part, the principals and teachers that work for bishops. Their meetings are usually characterized by “happy talk” slogans that suggest, despite their decimated numbers, they are completely oblivious to the collapse of their once great school system. Let us hope and pray that in this late hour they recognize the urgent need for orthodox and distinctively Catholic schools. May they read the Kentucky priests’ letter and realize the awesome, divine role and responsibility they have in the salvific mission of the Church, and may they, by resolving to restore Catholic education in the United States, even provide the Christian witness that might save the souls of a few lost shepherds.

Benedict XVI - Homily for the Easter Vigil Mass

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

In his farewell discourse, Jesus announced his imminent death and resurrection to his disciples with these mysterious words: “I go away, and I will come to you”, he said (Jn 14:28). Dying is a “going away”. Even if the body of the deceased remains behind, he himself has gone away into the unknown, and we cannot follow him (cf. Jn 13:36). Yet in Jesus’s case, there is something utterly new, which changes the world. In the case of our own death, the “going away” is definitive, there is no return. Jesus, on the other hand, says of his death: “I go away, and I will come to you.” It is by going away that he comes. His going ushers in a completely new and greater way of being present. By dying he enters into the love of the Father. His dying is an act of love. Love, however, is immortal. Therefore, his going away is transformed into a new coming, into a form of presence which reaches deeper and does not come to an end. During his earthly life, Jesus, like all of us, was tied to the external conditions of bodily existence: to a determined place and a determined time. Bodiliness places limits on our existence. We cannot be simultaneously in two different places. Our time is destined to come to an end. And between the “I” and the “you” there is a wall of otherness. To be sure, through love we can somehow enter the other’s existence. Nevertheless, the insurmountable barrier of being different remains in place. Yet Jesus, who is now totally transformed through the act of love, is free from such barriers and limits. He is able not only to pass through closed doors in the outside world, as the Gospels recount (cf. Jn 20:19). He can pass through the interior door separating the “I” from the “you”, the closed door between yesterday and today, between the past and the future. On the day of his solemn entry into Jerusalem, when some Greeks asked to see him, Jesus replied with the parable of the grain of wheat which has to pass through death in order to bear much fruit. In this way he foretold his own destiny: these words were not addressed simply to one or two Greeks in the space of a few minutes. Through his Cross, through his going away, through his dying like the grain of wheat, he would truly arrive among the Greeks, in such a way that they could see him and touch him through faith. His going away is transformed into a coming, in the Risen Lord’s universal manner of presence, in which he is there yesterday, today and for ever, in which he embraces all times and all places. Now he can even surmount the wall of otherness that separates the “I” from the “you”. This happened with Paul, who describes the process of his conversion and his Baptism in these words: “it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me” (Gal 2:20). Through the coming of the Risen One, Paul obtained a new identity. His closed “I” was opened. Now he lives in communion with Jesus Christ, in the great “I” of believers who have become – as he puts it – “one in Christ” (Gal 3:28).

So, dear friends, it is clear that, through Baptism, the mysterious words spoken by Jesus at the Last Supper become present for you once more. In Baptism, the Lord enters your life through the door of your heart. We no longer stand alongside or in opposition to one another. He passes through all these doors. This is the reality of Baptism: he, the Risen One, comes; he comes to you and joins his life with yours, drawing you into the open fire of his love. You become one, one with him, and thus one among yourselves. At first this can sound rather abstract and unrealistic. But the more you live the life of the baptized, the more you can experience the truth of these words. Believers – the baptized – are never truly cut off from one another. Continents, cultures, social structures or even historical distances may separate us. But when we meet, we know one another on the basis of the same Lord, the same faith, the same hope, the same love, which form us. Then we experience that the foundation of our lives is the same. We experience that in our inmost depths we are anchored in the same identity, on the basis of which all our outward differences, however great they may be, become secondary. Believers are never totally cut off from one another. We are in communion because of our deepest identity: Christ within us. Thus faith is a force for peace and reconciliation in the world: distances between people are overcome, in the Lord we have become close (cf. Eph 2:13).

The Church expresses the inner reality of Baptism as the gift of a new identity through the tangible elements used in the administration of the sacrament. The fundamental element in Baptism is water; next, in second place, is light, which is used to great effect in the Liturgy of the Easter Vigil. Let us take a brief look at these two elements. In the final chapter of the Letter to the Hebrews, there is a statement about Christ which does not speak directly of water, but the Old Testament allusions nevertheless point clearly to the mystery of water and its symbolic meaning. Here we read: “The God of peace … brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant” (13:20). In this sentence, there is an echo of the prophecy of Isaiah, in which Moses is described as the shepherd whom the Lord brought up from the water, from the sea (cf. 63:11). Jesus appears as the new, definitive Shepherd who brings to fulfilment what Moses had done: he leads us out of the deadly waters of the sea, out of the waters of death. In this context we may recall that Moses’ mother placed him in a basket in the Nile. Then, through God’s providence, he was taken out of the water, carried from death to life, and thus – having himself been saved from the waters of death – he was able to lead others through the sea of death. Jesus descended for us into the dark waters of death. But through his blood, so the Letter to the Hebrews tells us, he was brought back from death: his love united itself to the Father’s love, and thus from the abyss of death he was able to rise to life. Now he raises us from death to true life. This is exactly what happens in Baptism: he draws us towards himself, he draws us into true life. He leads us through the often murky sea of history, where we are frequently in danger of sinking amid all the confusion and perils. In Baptism he takes us, as it were, by the hand, he leads us along the path that passes through the Red Sea of this life and introduces us to everlasting life, the true and upright life. Let us grasp his hand firmly! Whatever may happen, whatever may befall us, let us not lose hold of his hand! Let us walk along the path that leads to life.

In the second place, there is the symbol of light and fire. Gregory of Tours recounts a practice that in some places was preserved for a long time, of lighting the new fire for the celebration of the Easter Vigil directly from the sun, using a crystal. Light and fire, so to speak, were received anew from heaven, so that all the lights and fires of the year could be kindled from them. This is a symbol of what we are celebrating in the Easter Vigil. Through his radical love for us, in which the heart of God and the heart of man touched, Jesus Christ truly took light from heaven and brought it to the earth – the light of truth and the fire of love that transform man’s being. He brought the light, and now we know who God is and what God is like. Thus we also know what our own situation is: what we are, and for what purpose we exist. When we are baptized, the fire of this light is brought down deep within ourselves. Thus, in the early Church, Baptism was also called the Sacrament of Illumination: God’s light enters into us; thus we ourselves become children of light. We must not allow this light of truth, that shows us the path, to be extinguished. We must protect it from all the forces that seek to eliminate it so as to cast us back into darkness regarding God and ourselves. Darkness, at times, can seem comfortable. I can hide, and spend my life asleep. Yet we are not called to darkness, but to light. In our baptismal promises, we rekindle this light, so to speak, year by year. Yes, I believe that the world and my life are not the product of chance, but of eternal Reason and eternal Love, they are created by Almighty God. Yes, I believe that in Jesus Christ, in his incarnation, in his Cross and resurrection, the face of God has been revealed; that in him, God is present in our midst, he unites us and leads us towards our goal, towards eternal Love. Yes, I believe that the Holy Spirit gives us the word of truth and enlightens our hearts; I believe that in the communion of the Church we all become one Body with the Lord, and thus we encounter his resurrection and eternal life. The Lord has granted us the light of truth. This light is also fire, a powerful force coming from God, a force that does not destroy, but seeks to transform our hearts, so that we truly become men of God, and so that his peace can become active in this world.

In the early Church there was a custom whereby the Bishop or the priest, after the homily, would cry out to the faithful: “Conversi ad Dominum” – turn now towards the Lord. This meant in the first place that they would turn towards the East, towards the rising sun, the sign of Christ returning, whom we go to meet when we celebrate the Eucharist. Where this was not possible, for some reason, they would at least turn towards the image of Christ in the apse, or towards the Cross, so as to orient themselves inwardly towards the Lord. Fundamentally, this involved an interior event; conversion, the turning of our soul towards Jesus Christ and thus towards the living God, towards the true light. Linked with this, then, was the other exclamation that still today, before the Eucharistic Prayer, is addressed to the community of the faithful: “Sursum corda” – “Lift up your hearts”, high above the tangled web of our concerns, desires, anxieties and thoughtlessness – “Lift up your hearts, your inner selves!” In both exclamations we are summoned, as it were, to a renewal of our Baptism: Conversi ad Dominum – we must distance ourselves ever anew from taking false paths, onto which we stray so often in our thoughts and actions. We must turn ever anew towards him who is the Way, the Truth and the Life. We must be converted ever anew, turning with our whole life towards the Lord. And ever anew we must allow our hearts to be withdrawn from the force of gravity, which pulls them down, and inwardly we must raise them high: in truth and love. At this hour, let us thank the Lord, because through the power of his word and of the holy Sacraments, he points us in the right direction and draws our heart upwards. Let us pray to him in these words: Yes, Lord, make us Easter people, men and women of light, filled with the fire of your love. Amen.

Climate Facts To Warm To

From The Australian
by Christopher Pearson

Catastrophic predictions of global warming usually conjure with the notion of a tipping point, a point of no return.

Last Monday -- on ABC Radio National, of all places -- there was a tipping point of a different kind in the debate on climate change. It was a remarkable interview involving the co-host of Counterpoint, Michael Duffy and Jennifer Marohasy, a biologist and senior fellow of Melbourne-based think tank the Institute of Public Affairs. Anyone in public life who takes a position on the greenhouse gas hypothesis will ignore it at their peril.

Duffy asked Marohasy: "Is the Earth still warming?"

She replied: "No, actually, there has been cooling, if you take 1998 as your point of reference. If you take 2002 as your point of reference, then temperatures have plateaued. This is certainly not what you'd expect if carbon dioxide is driving temperature because carbon dioxide levels have been increasing but temperatures have actually been coming down over the last 10 years."

Duffy: "Is this a matter of any controversy?"

Marohasy: "Actually, no. The head of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) has actually acknowledged it. He talks about the apparent plateau in temperatures so far this century. So he recognises that in this century, over the past eight years, temperatures have plateaued ... This is not what you'd expect, as I said, because if carbon dioxide is driving temperature then you'd expect that, given carbon dioxide levels have been continuing to increase, temperatures should be going up ... So (it's) very unexpected, not something that's being discussed. It should be being discussed, though, because it's very significant."

Duffy: "It's not only that it's not discussed. We never hear it, do we? Whenever there's any sort of weather event that can be linked into the global warming orthodoxy, it's put on the front page. But a fact like that, which is that global warming stopped a decade ago, is virtually never reported, which is extraordinary."

Duffy then turned to the question of how the proponents of the greenhouse gas hypothesis deal with data that doesn't support their case. "People like Kevin Rudd and Ross Garnaut are speaking as though the Earth is still warming at an alarming rate, but what is the argument from the other side? What would people associated with the IPCC say to explain the (temperature) dip?"

Marohasy: "Well, the head of the IPCC has suggested natural factors are compensating for the increasing carbon dioxide levels and I guess, to some extent, that's what sceptics have been saying for some time: that, yes, carbon dioxide will give you some warming but there are a whole lot of other factors that may compensate or that may augment the warming from elevated levels of carbon dioxide."

"There's been a lot of talk about the impact of the sun and that maybe we're going to go through or are entering a period of less intense solar activity and this could be contributing to the current cooling."

Duffy: "Can you tell us about NASA's Aqua satellite, because I understand some of the data we're now getting is quite important in our understanding of how climate works?"

Marohasy: "That's right. The satellite was only launched in 2002 and it enabled the collection of data, not just on temperature but also on cloud formation and water vapour. What all the climate models suggest is that, when you've got warming from additional carbon dioxide, this will result in increased water vapour, so you're going to get a positive feedback. That's what the models have been indicating. What this great data from the NASA Aqua satellite ... (is) actually showing is just the opposite, that with a little bit of warming, weather processes are compensating, so they're actually limiting the greenhouse effect and you're getting a negative rather than a positive feedback."

Duffy: "The climate is actually, in one way anyway, more robust than was assumed in the climate models?"

Marohasy: "That's right ... These findings actually aren't being disputed by the meteorological community. They're having trouble digesting the findings, they're acknowledging the findings, they're acknowledging that the data from NASA's Aqua satellite is not how the models predict, and I think they're about to recognise that the models really do need to be overhauled and that when they are overhauled they will probably show greatly reduced future warming projected as a consequence of carbon dioxide."

Duffy: "From what you're saying, it sounds like the implications of this could be considerable ..."

Marohasy: "That's right, very much so. The policy implications are enormous. The meteorological community at the moment is really just coming to terms with the output from this NASA Aqua satellite and (climate scientist) Roy Spencer's interpretation of them. His work is published, his work is accepted, but I think people are still in shock at this point."

If Marohasy is anywhere near right about the impending collapse of the global warming paradigm, life will suddenly become a whole lot more interesting.

A great many founts of authority, from the Royal Society to the UN, most heads of government along with countless captains of industry, learned professors, commentators and journalists will be profoundly embarrassed. Let us hope it is a prolonged and chastening experience.

With catastrophe off the agenda, for most people the fog of millennial gloom will lift, at least until attention turns to the prospect of the next ice age. Among the better educated, the sceptical cast of mind that is the basis of empiricism will once again be back in fashion. The delusion that by recycling and catching public transport we can help save the planet will quickly come to be seen for the childish nonsense it was all along.

The poorest Indians and Chinese will be left in peace to work their way towards prosperity, without being badgered about the size of their carbon footprint, a concept that for most of us will soon be one with Nineveh and Tyre, clean forgotten in six months.

The scores of town planners in Australia building empires out of regulating what can and can't be built on low-lying shorelines will have to come to terms with the fact inundation no longer impends and find something more plausible to do. The same is true of the bureaucrats planning to accommodate "climate refugees".

Penny Wong's climate mega-portfolio will suddenly be as ephemeral as the ministries for the year 2000 that state governments used to entrust to junior ministers. Malcolm Turnbull will have to reinvent himself at vast speed as a climate change sceptic and the Prime Minister will have to kiss goodbye what he likes to call the great moral issue and policy challenge of our times.

It will all be vastly entertaining to watch.

THE Age published an essay with an environmental theme by Ian McEwan on March 8 and its stablemate, The Sydney Morning Herald, also carried a slightly longer version of the same piece.

The Australian's Cut & Paste column two days later reproduced a telling paragraph from the Herald's version, which suggested that McEwan was a climate change sceptic and which The Age had excised. He was expanding on the proposition that "we need not only reliable data but their expression in the rigorous use of statistics".

What The Age decided to spare its readers was the following:

"Well-meaning intellectual movements, from communism to post-structuralism, have a poor history of absorbing inconvenient fact or challenges to fundamental precepts. We should not ignore or suppress good indicators on the environment, though they have become extremely rare now. It is tempting to the layman to embrace with enthusiasm the latest bleak scenario because it fits the darkness of our soul, the prevailing cultural pessimism. The imagination, as Wallace Stevens once said, is always at the end of an era. But we should be asking, or expecting others to ask, for the provenance of the data, the assumptions fed into the computer model, the response of the peer review community, and so on. Pessimism is intellectually delicious, even thrilling, but the matter before us is too serious for mere self-pleasuring. It would be self-defeating if the environmental movement degenerated into a religion of gloomy faith. (Faith, ungrounded certainty, is no virtue.)"

The missing sentences do not appear anywhere else in The Age's version of the essay. The attribution reads: "Copyright Ian McEwan 2008" and there is no acknowledgment of editing by The Age.

Why did the paper decide to offer its readers McEwan lite? Was he, I wonder, consulted on the matter? And isn't there a nice irony that The Age chose to delete the line about ideologues not being very good at "absorbing inconvenient fact"?

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,23411799-7583,00.html

Good Friday

All we like sheep have gone astray, every one hath turned aside into his own way: and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.
Isaiah 53:6

The Islamification of France

From The Brussels Journal
By Tiberge

The French website 5 Years Later has posted maps that illustrate the advance of Islam in France. I’ve taken the latest one from 2008 showing through shades of green the areas of implantation of the religion of peace and tolerance. The numbers on the map are those of the departments and have nothing to do with numbers of Muslims. The chart at the bottom runs from fewer than 5 to more than 30 mosques, prayer rooms or meeting houses. So we see that, in the southwest, department 33 has more than 30 while department 40 has fewer than 5.

For a complete list of all places of Islamic worship in France, click the link above. Even if you don’t know French you will find the listing impressive.

You will note also the inset in the upper left showing Paris (75) and its three surrounding suburbs. The name for that whole region is Ile-de-France, but someone has chosen to emend it to Êl-de-France.

McCain Must Resist Increasingly Surreal Hubris of GOP Elites

From TownHall.com

By Gregg Jackson

This week Fred Barnes wrote an article in which he suggests that McCain's best VP choice is Mitt Romney.

Wow!

Mr. Barnes is correct that McCain's VP selection is vital because of McCain's age (71) and because McCain needs to select an authentic conservative with widespread appeal to the GOP base-Evangelical and Catholic Christians, millions of whom have started to gag on the regularly scheduled forced doses of the GOP's shut-up-and-do-as-you're-told concoctions.

Mr. Barnes believes Mitt Romney is exactly the man to get them to swallow yet another bitter dose.

Such a claim could only issue forth from the increasingly bizarre, even surreal, consensus in which the "conservative" elites -- pundits, consultants, lawyers and self-styled "pro-family" power brokers -- swim.

First, Mr. Barnes writes that McCain's VP should be acceptable to conservatives-especially social conservatives. Perhaps Mr. Barnes does not quite understand how right he is on this. It has long been apparent that among the conservative elites "pro-life" is merely a uniform that one puts on like a free agent ballplayer joining a team in search of a championship.

"You're now ‘pro-life,’ Mr. Romney? Why should we believe that?"

"Because I said so, and that ought to be proof enough. And only a fool would turn away a convert to the pro-life cause."

"Maybe so, Slick, and maybe not. But the question remains, why should we believe that?"

"Well, after my conversion to the pro-life side, with every bill that came across my desk I came down on the side of life."

"Hmmm. Well, does that include your massive government health care plan with which you delighted Ted Kennedy by establishing taxpayer-funded abortion on demand at fifty dollars a pop?"

"I thought Jay Sekulow, James Bopp, Gary Bauer, Tony Perkins, Tom Minnery, Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter, Laura Ingraham and the kids running the National Review had taken care of all that for me."

Mr. Barnes, like most of the chattering "conservative elites," has missed the glaring lesson of a Republican presidential primary in which millions of social conservative and constitutionalist voters just said no to all the RINOs the party nomenklatura stubbornly forced on them, preferring to pick from among the diverse options of Mike Huckabee, Ron Paul, Tom Tancredo, and Duncan Hunter. Does Barnes not grasp how much intellectual credibility and moral gravitas the "conservative" mandarins have squandered -- outside the beltway and away from the studio lights of Fox News?

McCain must select a running mate who is a credible opponent of abortion and who sees where we are being taken with the endless progression of political and constitutional concessions being made to appease the militant strategists of the obscenely overfunded global sodomy revolution. Behind the relentless waves of propaganda from the "conservative" political elites, the actual record of Willard Mitt Romney's record is that of a man who is best described as the GOP's Barak Obama.

Not only does the new, improved "pro-life" Willard Mitt Romney oppose a Federal Human Life Amendment, but as I've noted in numerous exposes here at townhall.com , he handed the abortion industry what no Democrat has by establishing abortion on demand with a $50 co-pay (after his stage-managed pro-life "awakening") as a "healthcare benefit". For those who have done the homework and know the Romney that Barnes dutifully (or naively?) whitewashes, it is no shock that his socialist healthcare plan was endorsed not only by Ted Kennedy but also by Hillary Clinton and Planned Parenthood.

The deeper one looks into the Romney closet the more disturbing the skeletons one finds. Notwithstanding an Orwellian cover-up by "conservative" mercenaries bribed and otherwise recruited to Romney's stable, the former governor also imposed homosexual "marriage" as governor in brazen violation of multiple articles of the Massachusetts Constitution, the exclusive authority of the Legislature and the marriage statutes. Lacking a constitutionally required enabling statute, he illegally ordered justices of the peace to perform homosexual "marriage" ceremonies or resign. In violating his oath to faithfully execute the statues and uphold the state constitution, he fulfilled a secret 2002 campaign promise to the homosexual Log Cabin Republicans.

Moreover, then Governor Romney unconstitutionally forced Catholic Charities, the nation's oldest adoption and foster care agency, to place children with homosexual couples or go out of business (which they eventually were forced to do). As even liberal Democrat former governor Mike Dukakis pointed out, the state law Romney claimed forced him to do this does not even exist! He similarly forced Catholic Hospitals to issue abortafacients, pretending again to be merely executing the law. Again Dukakis caught him lying red-handed.

Romney supports homosexual scout masters and sexual orientation non-discrimination laws that would penalize religious organizations and private businesses for not hiring transsexuals and cross dressers. The list of Obama-esque social policy decisions goes on and on, and is matched by aggressive lying about the law as governor in order to turn the social, moral and constitutional ratchet far to the left, while ruthlessly using Mormonism as a cloak to pass himself off as a reluctant conservative caught in one difficult position after another. In fact he became a master of creating elaborate smokescreens to cause conservatives to believe that he was fighting the radical policies he was pushing.

Does Mr. Barnes really believe that a Barak Obama in Republican clothing is acceptable to social conservatives? If so he needs to formulate a plan to break himself out of the surreal intellectual ghetto that three decades of hubris and brutally enforced consensus have created among the "conservative" elites. The grassroots increasingly see where we're headed and they’re getting off the train.

Barnes states that Romney would "shore up McCain's weakness on economic issues." He is correct that many economic conservatives who, despite McCain's recent support for making the Bush Tax Cuts permanent, reducing the corporate tax rate, and government spending, are wary of McCain's past opposition to the Bush Tax Cuts and support for carbon emissions "cap-and-trade" tax regimes.

But again, Barnes writes from the ghetto. Romney's actual record as governor shouldn’t instill confidence among fiscal conservatives. Romney did not support the Bush Tax Cuts (earning him praise from Massachusetts' neo-Marxist congressman Barney Frank). As governor, Romney increased taxes by $800 million (he cleverly called them "fees") which have truly harmed the Massachusetts economy. Romney's healthcare plan, in the words of the Wall St. Journal, is in "intensive care "with inflated costs that are estimated to double -- a plan he has said would serve as a model for a national plan.

Moreover, the absurd claim that a businessman has experience and expertise that directly applies to reforming by far the largest national economy on earth is not something that grownups ought to take even half-seriously. Romney has built vast personal wealth by cutting workforces, off-shoring jobs and aggressively marketing struggling firms as revitalized in order to sell them off to investors. This is known as short-term micro-economics. It has little if any relevance to macro-economics or long-term health of an economy or an industry -- which is exactly why Romney had to promise Michigan voters to rob taxpayers across America to prop up their dying manufacturing base, a promise that could just as easily have come from Barak Obama. As an "economic conservative" -- as much as a "social conservative"-- Slick Willard Romney is a snake oil salesman.

There is no doubt that McCain must choose an authentic fiscal conservative with a consistent track record of cutting taxes and spending, and implementing free market consumer-driven initiatives. Romney has no such record as governor. What McCain doesn't need is to select is a tax hiker whose signature economic "achievement" was an Orwellian pro-abortion healthcare plan endorsed by the Clinton-Kennedy- Planned Parenthood triumvirate.

Finally, Mr. Barnes argues that Romney has the support of many in the "Bush wing of the Republican Party" including Karl Rove and the Bushes themselves.

Like his friends over at the National Review, Fox News and other such lofty locations in the conservative ghetto, Mr. Barnes seems to have learned nothing at all from the last year. I don't know if he's noticed yet, but there seems to be a significant breakdown in communications between the GOP establishment and grass roots conservatives. Romney spent a king's ransom (100 million dollars, plus bribes and hush money for "conservative" and "pro-family" mercenaries) attempting to convince voters he was the second coming of Ronald Reagan. But many conservative voters rejected the screaming instructions from the self-appointed ghetto leadership, having figured out that Willard Mitt Romney is nothing more than Barak Obama in a Reagan costume. Candidates (McCain and Huckabee) adamantly opposed by the GOP elites, though vastly outspent, won the gold and silver respectively.

Voters have repudiated the "conservative" elites. Romney's support among the Bush nomenklatura is reason enough, all by itself, to reject him.


Gregg Jackson is a radio talk show host on WRKO in Boston and author of "Conservative Comebacks to Liberal Lies: Issue By Issue Responses to the Most Common Claims of the Left from A to Z."

A Reflection on Holy Week

By Saint Josemaría Escrivá

The tragedy of the passion

The tragedy of the passion brings to fulfillment our own life and the whole of human history. We can't let Holy Week be just a kind of commemoration. It means contemplating the mystery of Jesus Christ as something which continues to work in our souls. The Christian is obliged to be alter Christus, ipse Christus: another Christ, Christ himself. Through baptism all of us have been made priests of our lives, "to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ." Everything we do can be an expression of our obedience to God's will and so perpetuate the mission of the Godman.

Once we realize this, we are immediately reminded of our wretchedness and our personal failings. But they should not dishearten us; we should not become pessimistic and put our ideals aside. Our Lord is calling us, in our present state, to share his life and make an effort to be holy. I know holiness can sound like an empty word. Too many people think it is unattainable, something to do with ascetical theology — but not a real goal for them, a living reality. The first Christians didn't think that way. They often used the word "saints" to describe each other in a very natural manner: "greetings to all the saints"; "my greetings to every one of the saints in Jesus Christ."

Take a look now at Calvary. Jesus has died and there is as yet no sign of his glorious triumph. It is a good time to examine how much we really want to live as Christians, to be holy. Here is our chance to react against our weaknesses with an act of faith. We can trust in God and resolve to put love into the things we do each day. The experience of sin should lead us to sorrow. We should make a more mature and deeper decision to be faithful and truly identify ourselves with Christ, persevering, no matter what it costs, in the priestly mission that he has given every single one of his disciples. That mission should spur us on to be the salt and light of the world.
Christ is Passing By, 96

Symbol of the Redemption

Let us not forget that in all human activities there must be men and women who, in their lives and work, raise Christ's Cross aloft for all to see, as an act of reparation. It is a symbol of peace and of joy, a symbol of the Redemption and of the unity of the human race. It is a symbol of the love that the Most Holy Trinity, God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit had, and continues to have, for mankind.
Furrow, 985

Thinking about Christ's death

So, in thinking about Christ's death, we find ourselves invited to take a good hard look at our everyday activities and to be serious about the faith we profess. Holy Week cannot be a kind of "religious interlude"; time taken out from a life which is completely caught up in human affairs. It must be an opportunity to understand more profoundly the love of God, so that we'll be able to show that love to other people through what we do and say. ...

That's the key. Jesus says we must also hate our life, our very soul — that is what our Lord is asking of us. If we are superficial, if the only thing we care about is our own personal well-being, if we try to make other people, and even the world, revolve around our own little self, we have no right to call ourselves Christians or think we are disciples of Christ. We have to give ourselves really, not just in word but in deed and truth. Love for God invites us to take up the cross and feel on our own shoulders the weight of humanity. It leads us to fulfill the clear and loving plans of the Father's will in all the circumstances of our work and life. In the passage we've just read Jesus goes on to say: "Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me, cannot be my disciple." (Luke 14:27)

Let us accept God's will and be firmly resolved to build all our life in accordance with what our faith teaches and demands. We can be sure this involves struggle and suffering and pain, but if we really keep faith we will never feel we have lost God's favour. In the midst of sorrow and even calumny, we will experience a happiness which moves us to love others, to help them share in our supernatural joy.
Christ is Passing By, 97

An Urgent Request from Christian Solidarity Worldwide

Dear Friends,

This week marks the fifth anniversary of Cuba’s “Black Spring” when 75 civil society activists, including independent journalists, human rights defenders, pro-democracy activists, and independent librarians were arrested. Today, human rights groups inside Cuba put the total number of prisoners of conscience at around 230. Many of these men and women are Christians.

CSW is particularly concerned by reports that prison authorities consistently violate the religious rights of political prisoners across the country. Political prisoners and their families have reported the repeated confiscation of bibles and other religious literature, the denial of the right to receive visits from a pastor or priest, and a refusal to allow Christian prisoners to meet together for prayer, worship or study, even in the presence of a member of the clergy. This is in violation of the Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners, adopted by the United Nations in 1955, which guarantees all of the above rights. The fact that these violations are repeatedly reported as occurring in prisons across the country also indicates that this is not a matter of local prison authorities abusing the rights of their prisoners, but a general policy instigated at government levels.

Interestingly, according to information received by CSW, prisoners who do not consider themselves to be religious report that they are able to exercise most of the rights listed above. This suggests that prison authorities recognise the importance of their faith to the Christian prisoners and that they are specifically targeting their faith in an effort to break them down psychologically.

For Christian prisoners, their faith is often the one thing they can cling to in an otherwise hopeless situation. Many former prisoners have told CSW how their faith encouraged and strengthened them in the darkest of moments. It is also vital for their families, as we were reminded by Elsa Gonzalez, the wife of political prisoner, Victor Roland Arroyo, who said,. “Faith is what has made all of this possible. If it were not for my faith in God and the strength He gives me, I would not have been able to endure any of this. Faith is also of the utmost importance for Victor,”

The following represent just a few of these cases:

• Dr Oscar Elias Biscet is a human rights defender who is serving a 25-year sentence. He had already served a three-year sentence and was free for less than a month between his release and his second detention. He is a devout Christian and has frequently had his Bible confiscated and has been arbitrarily denied the right to meet with a priest. He is in very bad health.

• Alfredo Rodolfo Dominguez Batista is a member of the Christian Liberation Movement, a pro-democracy organisation, and is serving a 14-year sentence. His Bible and other religious books were confiscated last summer and they have not been returned to him. He has been visited by a priest in the past but he and his wife have had to ask for this repeatedly, the last time they were refused. Generally, Alfredo has been allowed to meet a priest only once every four or five months. The priest also visits other prisoners but cannot hold services. According to his wife, Melba, although the prisoners cannot meet together for worship, Alfredo meets with them individually to share his faith.

• Normando Hernandez Gonzalez is 38-years old, an independent journalist, serving a 25-year sentence. He is in extremely poor health and Costa Rica has offered to grant him a visa if the Cuban government will release him for humanitarian reasons but thus far this offer has been refused. According to his wife, Yarai Amparo, he is a very strong believer and he has been allowed to keep his Bible but he cannot receive the visit of a priest and is kept in isolation, away from the other prisoners.

• Victor Rolando Arroyo is an independent journalist and a devout Christian. His prison sentence, 26 years, is one of the longest stemming from the 2003 crackdown. He is allowed to keep his Bible but the prison officials confiscated the other religious books brought by his wife for him. He is allowed a visit every three months from a priest chosen by the government. He is not allowed any type of spiritual fellowship with other prisoners and they do not allow the priest to hold a group mass for the prisoners to attend.

• Alexander Aguilar Sosa is serving a six-year sentence for “disrespect.” On January 22, 2008, a Cuban human rights organisation reported that the prison authorities at the Agüica Prison in Matanzas would not allow him to meet with other prisoners to pray or read the Bible. Alexander told the group that the prison “Chief of Interior Order,” a man named “Aramis”, had broken up the small worship service that he was celebrating on a regular basis with other prisoners.

• Dr Jose Luis Garcia Paneque is a medical doctor and independent journalist serving a 24-year sentence. His wife, Yamile told CSW that the doctor takes great comfort from his Bible which he has been allowed to keep with him in prison and which he reads every day. For some time, the prison authorities refused to allow him to meet with a priest, but have now changed the policy and are allowing a meeting once every two months. He is not allowed to meet with other prisoners for worship and prayer. He is in extremely poor health.

Pray

Please remember these men and their families in your prayers. Pray that their religious rights will be respected and that God will give them strength and comfort.

Protest

Please also consider writing to the Cuban embassy in London (address below) to ask that the religious rights of all prisoners, regardless of the reason for their imprisonment, be respected in accordance with the Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners. In your letter you may mention these prisoners by name but please refrain from criticising the Cuban political system or Fidel or Raul Castro.

His Excellency Rene Mujica Cantelar
Embassy of the Republic of Cuba167 High Holborn
London
WC1V 6BA, Fax: (020) 7836 2602

McCain: How To Lose The White House

From WorldNetDaily
By Janet Folger

It doesn't really matter how "honored" Mitt Romney would be to be chosen as Sen. John McCain's running mate, because if Sen. McCain wants to be president, he won't pick Romney. In fact, the very best way to lose the White House is to pick Mitt Romney for vice president. Here are just a few reasons why.

1. Mitt Romney did two "post conversion" things the Clintons and Obamas only dream about:
   
   a. He ORDERED homosexual marriage, and

   b. He made abortion a tax-funded "health care benefit" in his state mandated socialized medicine plan.

2. On life and marriage, there is no one worse than Mitt Romney.

3. He's billed as "Mr. Money," but he had to loan himself millions because he couldn't raise enough to run. Romney outspent Mike Huckabee by about 20 to one. If you want to spend 20 times more than you would if you picked Gov. Huckabee, Romney's your guy. According to the Los Angeles Times, he spent $98 million dollars ($42.3 million of his own money) and only won three primaries: Utah, Massachusetts and Michigan – his three "home" states.

   In a cost/delegate analysis, there is no one worse than Mitt Romney.

4. According to Rasmussen, Romney has "the least core support" and "the most core opposition of all the leading candidates, Republican or Democrat." Nearly half of Americans, 47 percent, find Romney so politically repugnant that they say they will vote against him "no matter who else is on the ballot." Gallup Guru put it this way: "Romney is the 'only candidate with a more negative than positive ratio.'"

   When it comes to popular support, there is no one worse than Mitt Romney.

5. The one who attacked John McCain in the campaign the most was none other than Mitt Romney. If you want a guy that will attack you in an effort to get ahead, Romney's your pick. McCain's response to that attack is seen on video, speaking of "One of a number of [Romney's] attacks." McCain himself points out: "As we've gone up in the polls the attacks have grown more … hysterical." By the way, it was Huckabee during the race who defended McCain, calling him a "true … American hero" and calling the Romney attack "desperate and dishonest."

   When it comes to a record of personal attack against Sen. McCain, there is no one worse than Mitt Romney.
   
   If you want to lose, there is a sure fire way to do that: Pick Mitt Romney or someone else who can't be trusted to defend the right to life and the institution of marriage. Someone who can't be trusted, period. As the Myths of Mitt Romney point out, Romney has trouble with the truth. Here are a few that have been documented:

1. Romney said his father marched with Martin Luther King Jr. He didn't.
2. Romney said he marched with Martin Luther King Jr. He didn't.
3. Romney said: "I have a gun of my own." He doesn't.
4. Romney said he was endorsed by the National Rifle Association. He wasn't.
5. Romney said he's been a hunter "all my life." Well, he hunted exactly "Twice." Once every forty years. In fact, according to public officials in four states where Romney lived, he never took out a license.
   
   Not only did he flip on every major social issue just before running for president, he wasn't even honest about it: Romney said both: "I wasn't pro-choice." and "I was pro-choice."

According to Rasmussen, the candidate of either party with the least hard-core opposition among American voters besides John McCain (at 33 percent) is …Gov. Mike Huckabee (at 34 percent). Rasmussen reports the only candidate (of either party) with as much hard-core opposition from American voters as Romney is Hillary Clinton (tied at 47 percent).

The numbers don't lie. Sen. McCain, there is one sure-fire way to lose the White House: Pick Mitt Romney.

I'm not telling you whom to pick, but if you want the vice presidential candidate who in addition to winning the "must win" states in the primary, who has the best cost/vote ratio, who has proven he can energize the base of the party, who defended (not attacked) you even before you won the nomination, who is honest, consistent and according to Rasmussen, has the least opposition among American voters, Mike Huckabee is your guy.

Ask him, I'm sure he would be honored to be your vice president, and I'm sure millions more would be honored to vote for you if you do.

An Australian View: "Why US Is The Great Democracy"

From The Australian

By David Burchell

A few years ago I joined some colleagues on an academic conference jaunt to a large private university in the American northeast. The approved conference itinerary was to take us directly from our swish Chicago hotel to the campus gates, in the hygienic manner of the modern business traveller.

For reasons too complicated to retell, on the return trip we found ourselves becalmed in a village in the backwaters of rural Indiana, in the old American heartland. The streets we strolled down were lined with wooden bungalows, and there was a flagstaff with the Stars and Stripes in every other front yard. We ate in rural diners by the highway with orange-tinted windows, stained wooden cubicles and waitresses with chequered aprons.

Much like Columbus, we had voyaged in search of streets paved with gold, and instead we had accidentally discovered America.

It's a pity more Australian observers don't discover heartland America in this fashion, especially in this historic election year. Because we have more to learn from the rambunctious drama of American democracy than we are prepared to admit.

Many Australians believe they know all about America. On business trips they sidle through the galleries of New York, or amble down the boulevards of Los Angeles, and imagine that they have gained some essential insight into the American character. Back home they watch American TV and movies, and teach themselves that American society is gaudy, individualistic and lacking in decorum.

On the whole, though, most Australians' knowledge of American politics remains limited to a series of crude, child-like stereotypes of the type another generation may have attributed to deepest, darkest Africa.

It's true we have lately become fascinated by the Democratic Party's nominating process. At least to the extent that it reduces itself to the neat identity politics equation of White Woman versus Black Man.

Yet this vantage point obscures much of the substance of the contest. If Barack Obama is a historic figure, it's on account of his determination not to be the nation's first black president but rather an American migrant of mixed heritage who just happens to have a year-round suntan.

And while Hillary Clinton is undoubtedly a woman, her rancorous, grievance-based style of campaigning seems to belong to feminism's paleolithic era. If Clinton's campaign narrative were a movie, it would be called Thelma and Louise Go to Washington.

Look behind the identity politics drama, however, and the 2008 contest reveals a democratic culture which -- for all its excesses, irregularities and antiquities -- is still living, and even vibrant. Unlike the sad parody of democracy to which we once world-leading democrats often seem reduced.

One of our favourite fictions about the US is that its citizens, disillusioned by a lack of choice, don't bother to vote. And yet Americans vote, up hill and down dale, for everything and everybody that moves. For school boards, for precinct committees, for police chiefs, for judges, for district attorneys.

Like Australians, they vote because it's necessary to keep the wheels of organisation turning. But there's another reason. Somewhere underneath those layers of post 1960s cynicism, many of them still believe in their hearts that the act of voting is the consummation of the spiritual equality of Americans. How many of us could say that?

In the early 1800s, the French observer Alexis de Tocqueville -- who never settled for the business traveller itinerary, or confused a gallery tour with a social insight -- investigated the American predilection for local political association.

As a citizen of a frontier society, Tocqueville observed, an American "learns from birth that he must rely upon himself to combat the ills and obstacles of life".

Yet this didn't simply cause Americans to become hardy individualists: it also enforced upon them the importance of friends, neighbours and local community. And so it impelled them outwards as well as inwards, bonding in local associations to form clubs, organise festivities, or provide mutual aid.

Received wisdom has it that the old American impulse towards local association and community has withered. Television, the internet, the suburbs, even mass prosperity are all variously blamed with sending Americans back into the loungeroom.

The events of this election year have cast doubts on that fashionably gloomy hypothesis. Given at last some candidates who are attempting to address some of the complexities of mainstream opinion, Americans have been flooding out of their homes into voting halls and caucusing centres.

By nomination time, the better part of a hundred million Americans will have involved themselves, not infrequently standing in queues in the winter wind for several hours. Or they will have gathered in draughty community halls to be lobbied and harangued in the archaic yet quintessentially democratic caucus system.

Last week in New Republic magazine a young Texan journalist gave a worm's-eye view of his experiences in the Precinct 426 caucus in the city of East Austin. It reads like a chapter out of Tocqueville, suitably updated and digitised.

There are more than 8000 precinct conventions in Texas. They will elect some few dozen of the 4000 delegates at the Democratic National Convention in August. They are, in other words, the merest tip of the electoral iceberg.

Yet this year, when the Precinct 426 chair arrived with her sheaf of manila folders, more than 250 people were lined up outside the doors of the local elementary school. Most had never caucused before; some were old enough that they remembered voting for John F.Kennedy.

But there they all were, white, black and Hispanic, college-educated and high-school graduates alike, forming lines and making impromptu, hesitant speeches.

Australia's party system still echoes with the dying call of the old European class wars. Too many ALP branches are private clubs dedicated to the production of endless resolutions deploring everything (or expressing woolly solidarity with phoney liberation movements). And many Liberal party meetings, so rumour has it, resemble masonic lodges dedicated to the interests of local small business people.

No wonder most Australians (other than property developers and union functionaries) avoid the parties like the plague.

We could do much worse than to institutionalise our political parties, as the Americans have done. Give every citizen a voice in the selection of candidates, so long as they're willing to register in the name of one of the parties for the purpose. Encourage them to manifest themselves physically in the proceedings, and to make those impromptu, hesitant speeches.

The ends of democracy are vital. But as Tocqueville understood, the processes of democracy have profound significance, too. We ought not only to be enfranchised by our democracy: we should feel dignified by it as citizens, as Precinct 426's members did. I'd wager most Australians don't feel that way.