The American Episcopacy: Affable Idiots Encouraged to Apply

Richmond Bishop Francis X. DiLorenzo

When did the Church institute affirmative action to encourage affable idiots in the American Episcopacy?

The Catholic Bishop of Richmond, Virginia, was given advance notice that his own charitable arm, Commonwealth Catholic Charities of Richmond, had signed consent forms and was about to help a Guatemalan girl, a foster care client of his agency, obtain an abortion. The bishop would have us believe that there was nothing that neither he, nor the Catholic Charities Executive Director could do to stop the abortion that their own staff had authorized.

The typical diocesan bishop oversees a huge network of parishes, schools, youth and seniors programs, hospitals, colleges, clinics, social welfare programs, stock and real estate portfolios, and cemeteries, and yet we are asked to believe that Bishop Francis X. DiLorenzo could not intervene with his own staff to save a life. And if he is unable to intervene to save a life, what confidence should any parent have that he could/would intervene to prevent their child from being sexually molested by his clergy or staff?

If a bishop is this ineffective, how is he allowed to remain in office? How is it that no matter how grievous the moral lapses and shocking the scandal, a bishop never resigns in disgrace or is censured by his fellow bishops? Even the U. S. Congress censures errant colleagues and has expelled Members of Congress from time to time.

Is such a bishop even eligible to remain in office? The Catechism of the Catholic Church states:

"Formal cooperation in an abortion constitutes a grave offense. The Church attaches the canonical penalty of excommunication to this crime against human life. 'A person who procures a completed abortion incurs excommunication latae sententiae' by the very commission of the offense, and subject to the conditions provided by Canon Law."

Given this teaching, is the Bishop of Richmond even a Catholic in good standing?

Governor Frank Keating, who had the opportunity to see the American hierarchy close up as Chairman of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops' National Review Board, likened them to the Mafia. He said:

To resist Grand Jury subpoenas, to suppress the names of offending clerics, to deny, to obfuscate, to explain away; that is the model of a criminal organization, not my Church."

And yet these same bishops have the audacity to lecture Congress on social justice issues, foreign affairs, tax and budget policy.

If the hierarchy in the United States and Rome is incapable of ridding itself of these rogues and charlatans, then American Catholics need to refuse them funding and force their resignations, as the Catholics of Boston did with Cardinal Law. The faithful have a right to holy bishops. As followers of Christ they have a responsibility to do all in their power to ensure a Church worthy of its founder.

Bishop knew of abortion plan

Told 'there was nothing he could do'

From The Washington Times

By Julia Duin

The Roman Catholic bishop of Richmond was told that a diocesan charity planned to help a teenage foster child get an abortion in January and did not try to prevent the procedure.

Bishop Francis X. DiLorenzo "was told erroneously that everything was in place and there was nothing he could do to stop it," said Steve Neill, Bishop DiLorenzo's communications officer. "He is very apologetic about the whole episode.

"It is very awkward, it is very embarrassing. A human life was taken. He certainly has not taken it lightly in any way. He is clearly opposed to abortion."

Mr. Neill said the bishop was informed Jan. 17, the day before an abortion was performed on the 16-year-old Guatemalan girl, who was a foster care client of Commonwealth Catholic Charities of Richmond (CCR), a group incorporated under the diocese.

CCR Executive Director Joanne Nattrass also knew about the planned abortion, Mr. Neill said.

"The director was very upset about it and it clearly went against all she stood for as a director of Catholic Charities," he said.

After The Washington Times revealed the abortion on June 18, Ms. Nattrass released a statement on June 19 saying the incident was "contrary to basic teachings of the Catholic Church."

Federal authorities are investigating CCR because the girl was a ward of the federal Office of Refugee Resettlement in the Department of Health and Human Services. HHS had contracted with CCR to take care of the girl, whose parents are not in the country.

Ms. Nattrass wrote that neither CCR nor diocesan funds paid for the abortion but did not say who did. Federal law forbids any federal funds to be used.

Ms. Nattrass' statement also said a CCR staff member signed the consent form necessary for a minor to have an abortion, even though Virginia law mandates parental consent for anyone younger than 18.

Martin Tucker, a spokesman for the Virginia attorney general's office, would not say whether a state investigation is under way.

After HHS officials learned of the abortion, they complained about the incident on April 23 to the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), a parent agency to Catholic Charities. Richmond Bishop Francis X. DiLorenzo has reasserted his opposition to abortion.

Bill Etherington, an attorney for the diocese and CCR, said Bishop DiLorenzo was given bad information about whether the abortion could be prevented, but didn't elaborate as to how.

"He was told it could not be stopped," Mr. Etherington said. "It was erroneous information. He didn't have to sign off on it. He was not personally involved."

He added, without elaborating, that the underage abortion did not violate state law.

After learning of the federal investigation, Bishop DiLorenzo and two other bishops issued an April 29 letter to the nation's 350 Catholic bishops detailing the botched management decisions that led to the abortion.

"He wrote the letter with the intent that word was going to get out and they should be notified of the circumstances," Mr. Neill said.

Four CCR employees were fired over the incident, and one USCCB official who worked with its office of Migration and Refugee Services was suspended.

"They were so caught up with the plight of the young girl who already had a child," Mr. Neill said. "She was not a Catholic. She got pregnant by her boyfriend, and she was determined not to have the baby."

The unnamed girl had been implanted with a contraceptive device provided by CCR two months earlier, according to the April 29 letter. Catholic doctrine condemns deliberate abortion and the use of contraception as mortal sins. Those who obtain an abortion or help someone else to do so can be excommunicated.

In this case, it was a volunteer, not CCR staff, who drove the girl to the abortion clinic, Mr. Neill said. CCR staff will be having "ongoing formation and education" regarding church teaching on the matter, he added.

The USCCB has refused to comment. A spokeswoman said the matter was a "personnel issue."

Libera -- "Onward Christian Soldiers"

A Real Choice

Patrick J. Buchanan: Who's Planning Our Next War?

War Buddies: Prime Minister Ehud Olmert with President Bush

The scenario presented by Pat Buchanan in the following column is horrifying and all too plausible. Certainly our President has all of the arrogance to carryout such a plan, and that he would confide its details to Ehud Olmert, but not to the American people or their representatives would surprise no one. But should a President, who has the confidence and support of 30% of the American people, at best, be allowed to do anything beyond pardon the White House Thanksgiving turkey and preside over the National Christmas Tree lighting? War on a third front will be even more disastrous than the two underway. Congress needs to ensure this does not happen.

Who's Planning Our Next War?

By Patrick J. Buchanan

Of the Axis-of-Evil nations named in his State of the Union in 2002, President Bush has often said, “The United States will not permit the world’s most dangerous regimes to threaten us with the world’s most destructive weapons.”

He failed with North Korea. Will he accept failure in Iran, though there is no hard evidence Iran has an active nuclear weapons program?

William Kristol of The Weekly Standard said Sunday a U.S. attack on Iran after the election is more likely should Barack Obama win. Presumably, Bush would trust John McCain to keep Iran nuclear free. tors

Yet, to start a third war in the Middle East against a nation three times as large as Iraq, and leave it to a new president to fight, would be a daylight hijacking of the congressional war power and a criminally irresponsible act. For Congress alone has the power to authorize war.

Yet Israel is even today pushing Bush into a pre-emptive war with a naked threat to attack Iran itself should Bush refuse the cup.

In April, Israel held a five-day civil defense drill. In June, Israel sent 100 F-15s and F-16s, with refueling tankers and helicopters to pick up downed pilots, toward Greece in a simulated attack, a dress rehearsal for war. The planes flew 1,400 kilometers, the distance to Iran’s uranium enrichment facility at Natanz.

Ehud Olmert came home from a June meeting with Bush to tell Israelis: “We reached agreement on the need to take care of the Iranian threat. … I left with a lot less question marks regarding the means, the timetable restrictions and American resoluteness. …

“George Bush understands the severity of the Iranian threat and the need to vanquish it, and intends to act on the matter before the end of his term. … The Iranian problem requires urgent attention, and I see no reason to delay this just because there will be a new president in the White House seven and a half months from now.”

If Bush is discussing war on Iran with Ehud Olmert, why is he not discussing it with Congress or the nation?

On June 6, Deputy Prime Minister Shaul Mofaz threatened, “If Iran continues its nuclear weapons program, we will attack it.” The price of oil shot up 9 percent.

Is Israel bluffing — or planning to attack Iran if America balks?

Previous air strikes on the PLO command in Tunis, on the Osirak reactor in Iraq and on the presumed nuclear reactor site in Syria last September give Israel a high degree of credibility.

Still, attacking Iran would be no piece of cake.

Israel lacks the stealth and cruise-missile capacity to degrade Iran’s air defenses systematically and no longer has the element of surprise. Israeli planes and pilots would likely be lost.

Israel also lacks the ability to stay over the target or conduct follow-up strikes. The U.S. Air Force bombed Iraq for five weeks with hundreds of daily runs in 1991 before Gen. Schwarzkopf moved.

Moreover, if Iran has achieved the capacity to enrich uranium, she has surely moved centrifuges to parts of the country that Israel cannot reach — and can probably replicate anything lost.

Israel would also have to over-fly Turkey, or Syria and U.S.-occupied Iraq, or Saudi Arabia to reach Natanz. Turks, Syrians and Saudis would deny Israel permission and might resist. For the U.S. military to let Israel over-fly Iraq would make us an accomplice. How would that sit with the Europeans who are supporting our sanctions on Iran and want the nuclear issue settled diplomatically?

And who can predict with certitude how Iran would respond?

Would Iran attack Israel with rockets, inviting retaliation with Jericho and cruise missiles from Israeli submarines? Would she close the Gulf with suicide-boat attacks on tankers and U.S. warships?

With oil at $135 a barrel, Israeli air strikes on Iran would seem to ensure a 2,000-point drop in the Dow and a world recession.

What would Hamas, Hezbollah and Syria do? All three are now in indirect negotiations with Israel. U.S. forces in Afghanistan and Iraq could be made by Iran to pay a high price in blood that could force the United States to initiate its own air war in retaliation, and to finish a war Israel had begun. But a U.S. war on Iran is not a decision Bush can outsource to Ehud Olmert.

Tuesday, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Adm. Michael Mullins left for Israel. CBS News cited U.S. officials as conceding the trip comes “just as the Israelis are mounting a full court press to get the Bush administration to strike Iran’s nuclear complex.”

Vice President Cheney is said to favor U.S. strikes. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and Mullins are said to be opposed.

Moving through Congress, powered by the Israeli lobby, is House Resolution 362, which demands that President Bush impose a U.S. blockade of Iran, an act of war.

Is it not time the American people were consulted on the next war that is being planned for us?

McCain's Day of Repudiation

From Real Clear Politics
By George Will

Two of Thursday's Supreme Court rulings -- both decided 5-4, and with the same alignment of justices -- concerned the Constitution's first two amendments. One ruling benefits Barack Obama by not reviving the dormant debate about gun control. The other embarrasses John McCain by underscoring discordance between his deeds and his promises.

The District of Columbia's gun control law essentially banned ownership of guns not kept at businesses and not disassembled or disabled by trigger locks, even guns for personal protection in the home. The issue in the case was: Does the Second Amendment "right of the people to keep and bear arms" guarantee an individual right? Or does the amendment's prefatory clause -- "A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state" -- mean that the amendment guarantees only the right of a collectivity ("the people," embodied in militias) to "bear" arms in military contexts?

In an opinion written by Justice Antonin Scalia, who believes that construing the Constitution should begin, and often end, with analysis of what the text meant to its authors, the court affirmed the individual right. Scalia cited the ancient British right -- deemed a pre-existing, inherent, natural right, not one created by government -- of individuals to own arms as protection against tyrannical government and life's other hazards. Scalia also cited American state constitutional protections of the right to arms, protections written contemporaneously with the drafting of the Second Amendment.

Scalia's opinion, joined by John Roberts, Sam Alito, Clarence Thomas and Anthony Kennedy, radiates an understanding that the right to arms is the right of each individual to protect his rights to "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." Hence the Second Amendment is integral to the Bill of Rights and is, for weighty reasons, second only to the First.

Obama benefits from this decision. Although he formerly supported groups promoting a collectivist interpretation -- nullification, really -- of the Second Amendment, as a presidential candidate he has prudently endorsed the "individual right" interpretation. Had the court held otherwise, emboldened gun-control enthusiasts would have thrust this issue, with its myriad cultural overtones, into the campaign, forcing Obama either to irritate his liberal base or alienate many socially conservative Democratic men.

The McCain-Feingold law abridging freedom of political speech -- it restricts the quantity, timing and content of such speech -- included a provision, the Millionaires' Amendment, that mocked the law's veneer of disinterested moralizing about "corruption." The provision unmasked the law's constitutional recklessness and its primary purpose, which is protection of incumbents.

The amendment, written to punish wealthy, self-financing candidates, said that when such a candidate exceeds a particular spending threshold, his opponent can receive triple the per-election limit of $2,300 from each donor -- the limit above which the threat of corruption supposedly occurs. And the provision conferred other substantial benefits on opponents of self-financing candidates, even though such candidates cannot be corrupted by their own money, which the court has said they have a constitutional right to spend.

Declaring the Millionaires' Amendment unconstitutional, the court, in an opinion written by Alito, reaffirmed two propositions. First, because money is indispensable for the dissemination of political speech, regulating campaign contributions and expenditures is problematic and justified only by government's interest in combating "corruption" or the "appearance" thereof. Second, government may not regulate fundraising and spending in order to fine-tune electoral competition by equalizing candidates' financial resources.

The court said it has never upheld the constitutionality of a law that imposes different financing restraints on candidates competing against each other. And the Millionaires' Amendment impermissibly burdened a candidate's First Amendment right to spend his own money for campaign speech.

This ruling invites challenges to various state laws, such as Arizona's and Maine's, that penalize private funding of political speech. Those laws increase public funds for candidates taking such funds when their opponents spend certain amounts of their own money or receive voluntary private contributions that cumulatively exceed certain ceilings. Such laws, like McCain-Feingold, rest on the fiction that political money can be regulated without regulating political speech.

The more McCain talks -- about wicked "speculators," about how he reveres ANWR as much as the Grand Canyon, about adjusting the planet's thermostat, etc. -- the more conservatives cling to judicial nominees as a reason for supporting him. But now another portion of his signature legislation has been repudiated by the court as an affront to the First Amendment, and again Roberts and Alito have joined the repudiation. Yet McCain promises to nominate jurists like them. Is that believable?

Chor Mlodych Serc -- "Barka"

"Barka" was a favorite song of the late Pope John Paul II. The English translation is: "Lord, When You Came to the Seashore." Whether you will be spending your summer vacation in the mountains, at a lake, at home, or at the seashore, I wish all of my readers blessed, happy and restful days.

Breaking the Bond of Communion

From National Post (Canada)
Father Raymond J. de Souza

Formal arrangements have yet to be made, but it now appears that the critical decisions have already been taken for a dissolution of the Anglican Communion. Every 10 years, all the world's Anglican bishops meet at the seat of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Lambeth Palace. They are scheduled to meet this summer, but already some 250 have decided not to attend, boycotting because of the failure of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams, to discipline American and Canadian Anglicans for blessing same-sex unions and ordaining actively homosexual clergy.

Many of those who are not attending Lambeth are in Jerusalem this week for an alternative meeting, to discuss how they see the way forward. The parallel meetings are a clear manifestation that the bonds of communion have broken down. The Archbishop of Canterbury is not in Jerusalem, and is not welcome there. The breach appears irreparable and therefore the Anglican Communion's days as a global community centred in Canterbury are numbered.

That is a sadness for those, like myself, who have affection for the Anglican sensibility. But sensibilities are not doctrines, and it cannot be the case that members of the same communion can hold directly contradictory views on matters of grave importance. The Canadian and American proponents of same-sex marriages are arguing that homosexual acts can be morally good, and even sacramental. The traditional Christian view is that such acts are sinful. That is a gap that cannot be bridged: Either one holds to the ancient and constant teaching of the Christian Church, or one rejects it in favour of a different position. It cannot be that both views exist side-by-side as equally acceptable options.

It is not a disagreement only about sexual morality. It goes deeper than that, to what status the ancient and apostolic tradition has in the Church today. There can be no doubt that the blessing of homosexual relationships is entirely novel and in contradiction to the Christian tradition. So if that tradition no longer holds, it raises questions about the apostolicity of those communities which have abandoned it.

An additional sadness for Catholic and Orthodox Christians is that if the Anglican Communion embraces the path of doctrinal innovation, they will be closing the door on closer ecumenical relations. By unilaterally choosing to do what Catholics and Orthodox have always taught is outside our common tradition, they would be choosing the path of division.

That has already become dramatically evident. I remember being at the opening ceremonies of the Great Jubilee of the Year 2000 in Rome, when pope John Paul II opened the Holy Door at the Basilica of St. Paul Outside The Walls. He invited the then-archbishop of canter-bury, Dr. George Carey, and an Orthodox archbishop to open the door together with him, three abreast in unity.

By the time of John Paul's death in 2005, matters had deteriorated significantly. The original draft for his funeral called for the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Orthodox Patriarch of Constantinople to offer joint prayers at the conclusion of the funeral Mass, but it never came off. By then it was thought more doubtful, above all in the eyes of the Orthodox, that the Anglican Communion was still in the historic tradition of the apostolic faith.

The Jerusalem setting for the alternative bishops' meeting is deliberately evocative -- and provocative. To return to Jerusalem is to return to the roots of the Christian faith, to return to the land of Jesus and the apostles. The choice of Jerusalem is meant to express fidelity to those roots. Yet Jerusalem also represents something more contemporary, namely the shift in gravity in the Anglican world from north to south. The majority of the bishops present in Jerusalem are from the south, in particular Africa, where Anglicanism is growing and vibrant. In contrast, the Lambeth conference will be held in a country where more Catholics go to church on Sunday than Anglicans, despite being outnumbered some 10 to one. The typical Anglican in church on Sunday is far more likely to be a young African than Canadian, American or English.

The see of Canterbury is one of the Christian world's most venerable, being occupied throughout her history by great saints such as Saint Augustine of Canterbury and Saint Thomas Becket. There will be other archbishops after Dr. Williams, but it seems likely now that none will preside over a global communion.

A Reader's Comments and My Response

I received the following, anonymous comment to an older post that I would like to share with readers, since it reflects an attitude frequently heard in regard to Bob Barr's campaign for the Presidency:

Anonymous said...

 

Oh great. Just what we need, someone to take away votes from McCain and put Obama in the White House. When that happens, I hope you are all satisfied. You might as well vote for Obama. In case you haven't noticed, McCain has an excellent record of bipartisanship.

Unbelievable.

June 25, 2008 10:55 PM

My response follows:

Anonymous, the Republican Party will soon nominate a man who inspires no enthusiasm among most Republicans, and would not even be our nominee had not Democrats crossed over in states like South Carolina to vote for him.

Some of us have come to realize over the past eight years that the lesser of two evils is still evil. I, for one, want no part in evil. You are quite right; "McCain has an excellent record of bipartisanship," and it is on that record of cosponsoring much of the worst legislation of the past generation that conservatives repudiate him. Let the Democrats, whose legislation he has championed and cosponsored, vote for him.

Bob Barr recently told The Associated Press that if John McCain doesn’t win, it’s because McCain is running on the wrong issues:

"If Senator McCain is not successful, it will be because his message and his vision did not resonate with a plurality of the voters."

And he is absolutely right. The Rockefeller wing of the Republican Party has decided they can win with Hillary supporters, mindless "independents," and McCain's admirers in the media, and without conservatives. They repudiate the policies of Reagan and the coalition he built. They will lose, and fortunately, when they do, Democrats will be blamed for bad policy, and not the Republican Party for the equally bad policies of John McCain.

Her Majesty Strips Mugabe of Knighthood

The following is from the superb blog, The Monarchist.

This is not the right time for the mangy old British lion to rise to its height and say this election is not good enough so we'll strip you of your knighthood. — Lord Malloch Brown, British Foreign Office Minister

Robert Mugabe pictured with the Queen during his state visit to Britain in 1994, when he was awarded the honorary knighthood

Despite both Gordon Brown and Lord Malloch Brown, the Foreign Office Minister, indicating in recent days that there would be little point in stripping him of the knighthood, the decision has been taken in view of the extreme nature of his actions in Zimbabwe and the way his regime has attacked opposition members.

The Foreign Office has been in discussions with Buckingham Palace over the move and it has just been agreed that the Zimbabwe president will no longer have the title that was bestowed on him in 1994. The Queen is stripping Robert Mugabe of his knighthood for 'abject disregard for democracy'.

South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu said: "He has mutated into something quite unbelievable. He has turned into a kind of Frankenstein for his people."

In 1994, during the Premiership of John Major, Mugabe was bestowed an honorary Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath by the Queen. It entitles him to use the letters KCB, but not to use the title "Sir."

A Thin Line Separating Islamism from Nazism? An Interview with Algerian Novelist Boualem Sansal

From World Politics Review

By Grégoire Leménager

A former official in the Algerian civil service and the author of four previous novels, the Algerian novelist Boualem Sansal has recently published a new book titled Le village de l'Allemand: "The German's Village." Via the reflections of two brothers of Algerian origin living in the Parisian banlieues, it tells the story of the brothers' father: Hans Schiller, a hero of the Algerian war of independence as a member of the National Liberation Front (FLN) -- and, as so happens, before that an officer in the dreaded Nazi paramilitary force, the SS. For Boualem Sansal, "the line separating Islamism from Nazism is a thin one." Grégoire Leménager spoke with him for the French weekly Le Nouvel Observateur. The interview appears in English for the first time in World Politics Review.

Le Nouvel Observateur: Your novel takes its title from the story of a Nazi war criminal, a former member of the SS, who went into exile in Algeria, where he trained FLN fighters and became a hero of the Algerian war of independence. . . . Is this a real story? How did the novel come about?

Boualem Sansal: "The German's Village" comes from a real story and the flood of questions that it inspired. One day, at the beginning of the 1980s, while I was on a business trip in the Sétif region of Algeria, I stopped in a small town [identified as Aïn Deb in the novel] whose exotic "look" intrigued me. It didn't blend in to the local landscape, it had a certain feel of "somewhere else." I had a coffee in the town and then when I arrived at my destination, I asked the people who were waiting for me there about it. I barely was able to say "On my way here, I stumbled upon a strange town that made me think of [the French comic book character] Astérix the Gaul" and they proudly exclaimed, "Oh! That's the German's village." They explained to me that the village was "governed" by a German man: a former SS member and former mujahideen, who was a naturalized Algerian citizen and who had converted to Islam. He was regarded as a hero in the region: as a kind of saint who had done a lot for the village and its inhabitants. I sensed that my interlocutors felt real admiration when they talked about the man's Nazi past. This didn't surprise me: the Hitler salute has always had its partisans in Algeria, like in many Arab and Muslim countries - and undoubtedly even more so today by virtue of the Israel-Palestinian conflict and the Iraq war. In order really to impress me, they underscored that this German had been dispatched by [Egyptian president Gamal Abdel] Nasser to serve as an expert advisor to the general staff of the ALN [Armée de libération nationale -- the armed wing of the FLN] and that after the war he taught at the prestigious military academy of Cherchell. He was "somebody," in effect. . . .

Since that time, I've often thought of his story. I find that there are lots of interesting aspects: the romantic and adventurous side of this European coming to Algeria to fight for its independence, his retirement in a small town in the middle of nowhere, his conversion to Islam, the esteem he came to enjoy in the eyes of the locals. And then there is the dark side of the story: that of an SS officer who served in the death camps.

N.O.: How could this latter aspect remain hidden?

B. Sansal: In thinking about that, I came to reflect on something of which I was somehow aware, but to which I had never attached particular importance: the Shoah was never spoken about at all in Algeria -- or if it was spoken about, then it was presented as a sordid invention of the Jews. I was shocked when I realized this. The fact is that to this day Algerian television has never shown a film or documentary on the subject, no Algerian official has ever said a word about it and, as far as I know, no Algerian intellectual has ever written on the topic. . . .

N.O.: Your novel presents a new and extremely dark vision of the relations between "the crescent and the swastika" (as the title of a book that appeared in 1990 [in French] put it). Especially inasmuch as in the background one can make out the role played by the Egyptian secret services of Nasser. . . . This aspect of the past is largely unknown, if not indeed purposely obscured, and it takes us far away from the Manichean visions of the process of decolonization that are so common. Doesn't this amount to a new way for you to deconstruct the history of Algeria's national liberation?

B. Sansal: When I decided to make the history of this German man the guiding thread of the novel, I found that I was confronted by numerous questions without answers. . . . I gathered some testimonials here and there and I dug into the historical literature, in order to reconstruct the possible trajectory of this man and, more generally, of the Nazi war criminals who found refuge in the Arab countries.

As I progressed in my research on Nazi Germany and the Shoah, I more and more had the feeling that there is a substantial similarity between Nazism and the political order that prevails in Algeria and in many other Arab and Muslim countries. One finds the same ingredients, and we know just how powerful they are. In Germany, they managed to transform a cultured nation into a narrow-minded sect devoted to the extermination of the Jews; in Algeria, they led to a civil war that attained extremes of horror -- and we still don't know everything about what happened. The ingredients are the same in both cases: a one-party state, the militarization of the country, brainwashing, the falsification of history, the exaltation of the race, a Manichean vision of the world, a tendency to claim victimhood, the constant assertion that there is a conspiracy against the nation (Israel, the United States, and France are invoked one after another by Algerian authorities when they find themselves in trouble -- and sometimes too our neighbor Morocco), xenophobia, racism and anti-Semitism elevated to the status of dogmas, a cult of the hero and of the martyr, glorification of the supreme leader, omnipresence of the police and of police informants, inflammatory speeches, highly disciplined mass organizations, large public demonstrations, religious indoctrination, incessant propaganda, the generalization of a wooden repetitive public discourse [langue de bois] that is deadly for thought, gargantuan projects that exalt the sense of power (for example, [Algerian President Abdelaziz] Bouteflika's plan to build the third largest mosque in the world in Angers, whereas we already have more minarets than schools), verbal attacks against other countries concerning anything and nothing at all, the resuscitation of old myths for current purposes. . . .

N.O.: What is especially striking in reading your novel is clearly this mirroring of the Nazism of the past and the Islamism of today. In his journal, Rachel insists on the specificity of the Shoah. But his brother Malrich, who sees the imam of his banlieue as a sort of SS, goes so far as to write: "When I see what the Islamists do here and elsewhere, I say to myself that if they ever come to power they'll outdo the Nazis." To what extent do you share this point of view?

B. Sansal: We live under a "National-Islamist" regime and in an environment that is marked by terrorism. We know well that the line separating Nazism from Islamism is a thin one. Algeria is perceived by its own children as an "open-air prison," as some say, or a "concentration camp," as others say who die little by little in its ghettoes. One doesn't only feel imprisoned by walls and impenetrable borders, but also by a shadowy and violent political order that leaves no place even for dreams. . . .

N.O.: How does one fight against the terrorist threat? Your book poses the question repeatedly, but it hardly gives any response. . . .

B. Sansal: The struggle against Islamism, which is the matrix of terrorism, requires the engagement of Muslims and of their theologians. It is up to them to save their religion and to reconcile it with modernity. If they don't, Islam will end up being nothing but Islamism. But the danger in the Arab and Muslim countries is that no theologian dares to undertake this necessary labor of itjihad. And the intellectuals who are engaged in this sort of work in the Western democracies (Soheib Bencheikh, Malek Chebel, Mohamed Arkoun, Abdelwahab Meddeb. . .) are barely heard in our countries. My humble opinion is that Islam has already suffered too much under the influence of Islamism and of Arab-Muslim nationalism. I don't see how it can resume the path of Enlightenment that was once its own. . . .

N.O.: The only solution that is indicated by your novel . . . is language, the word: the care taken to say the truth in defiance of forgetfulness, lies, and silence. Do you think that writing can be a political weapon? When September 11 occurred, you were one of the very first and one of the rare Muslim intellectuals to denounce the fanaticism involved. Do you feel less isolated today?

B. Sansal: The word is everything. It can kill and it can bring to life again. Of course, I'm not saying that I can do that. I write in order to talk to people: to brothers, to friends, to calm passers-by -- and even, if they want, to those who dream of destroying humanity and the planet. . . .

September 11 was a terrible shock for all of us. On that day, we began to understand that Islamism was engaged in an undertaking that is far more radical than we had imagined: We thought its project was to fight against tyrants in the lands of Islam and to institute the sharia. But its real aim is the extermination of the other: the "crusader," the Jew, the atheist, the secular Muslim, the emancipated woman, the democrat, the homosexual -- the list gets longer and longer. It is only limited in carrying out its project by the fact that it lacks weapons of mass destruction. The mobilization in face of such madness has been notably timid. Worse still: here and there one has come to an arrangement with Islamism, one has made concessions (concerning the headscarf, the management of mosques, education, televised sermons, the closing of schools teaching in French), one has abandoned whole geographical areas to its influence (in the cities and in the banlieues). Very few people nowadays dare to confront the question of Islamism head-on and still less that of Islam itself, which has been taken hostage by Islamism. In Algeria, in carrying out the government's policy of national "reconciliation," the very word "Islamism" -- like the word "terrorists" and many others -- has simply disappeared from the official vocabulary. One speaks instead of "those who have gone astray" and who have "been manipulated by foreign influences." One always comes back to this idea of a conspiracy against the Algerian nation.

N.O.: The narrator of your book notes that the book contains "dangerous parallels that could cause him problems." Don't you worry about having problems yourself? You had to retire from your official functions in 2003. And in 2006 your previous book, Poste restante: Alger, was banned in Algeria. Do you think your new book will be authorized? And, more fundamentally, why do you stay in Algeria, when many others have preferred to go into exile?

B. Sansal: The censors are legion in our countries and they are very vigilant. They monitor every word and comma and attitude. Poste restante: Alger was banned even before it got to Algeria. "The German's Village" will certainly be banned too. . . .

Like many other Algerians, young people and less young people, I'm constantly nagged by the desire to "escape" from the camp. And just when I'm about to pack up my bags and get on my way, I always say to myself that it's more intelligent, after all, to disrupt the camp than to leave. Algeria is a big and beautiful country that has come a long way: It has a long and highly interesting history, having rubbed shoulders with all the peoples of the Mediterranean. Algeria was not born with the FLN: It has nothing to do with its culture, its camps, its apparatchiks and its kapos. One sunny day, Algeria will rediscover its way and its land will turn green again. I would like to be there to see it happen.

Grégoire Leménager's interview with Boualem Sansal first appeared in January in the French weekly Le Nouvel Observateur. The above English version has been abridged. The English translation is by John Rosenthal. The full French version is available here on Bibliobs.com, the literary site of Le Nouvel Observateur.

Photo: Boualem Sansal in conversation with Le Nouvel Observateur (video here).

Apostate Clergy and Church Personnel Invest in Culture of Death

From Catholic World News

• Federal election donations: Simon, Denis (CQ MoneyLine)
• Brief biography of Deacon Simon (Girl Scouts)
• Clerical donations: Brooklyn seminarian Robert Mucci gives $1,550 to Obama (CWN)
• Chancery donations: Diocesan finance director Kathleen Laseter gives $1,300 to Obama (CWN) Diocesan officials (Diocese of the Virgin Islands)
• Clerical donations: Deacon (Richard Kovacs) with key role in papal visit supported Dodd for president (CWN)
• Priestly donations: Rhode Island’s ‘diocesan minister for priests’ Father Normand Godin backs Hillary (CWN)
• Priestly donations: 5 Obama contributions from NJ priest (Father Dennis Crowley) involved in Voice of the Faithful (CWN)
• Priestly donations: Prominent Tucson priest Msgr. Arsenio Carrillo backs pro-abortion critic of Archbishop Burke (AP)
• Priestly donations: Prominent San Jose priest Msgr. Eugene J. Boyle gives $4,600 to Hillary (CWN)
• Priestly donations: Louisville priest Fr. John Schwartzlose supported Edwards; opposition to Bush judicial nominee (CWN)
• Priestly donations: Detroit priest, ‘I Loved a Boy’ author Fr. James L. Meyer backs MoveOn.org (CWN)
• Priestly donations: Prominent SF priest Msgr. Bruce A. Dreier gives $500 to Obama (CWN)

Give Parents A Choice In Education, Says Bob Barr

The federal Department of Education is spending almost $70 billion this year on a function not even mentioned in the Constitution. “The Department should be closed down and the money left with the American people to use for education at the family, local, and state levels,” says Bob Barr, the Libertarian Party presidential nominee.

While spending so much money on programs that should not exist, in 2003 the Congress created a small voucher program started for students in Washington, D.C., which has some of the worst schools in the nation. Now the Democratic majority is planning on killing the initiative, putting nearly 2000 students back into the failed public school system. “The only federal education program Congress wants to get rid of is the one doing the most to help poor kids,” observes Barr.

But since education is not a federal responsibility, “a better way to promote educational opportunity is at the state level,” explains Barr. There are now 22 different choice programs in 14 states. Some of those initiatives provide vouchers; others create tax credits. “I commend Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue for recently signing into law legislation creating a state income tax credit for individuals and companies that donate to groups which provide private scholarships for students,” said Barr.

In fact, “private scholarships have become an increasingly important choice mechanism across the nation,” Barr notes. Examples range from the District of Columbia's Washington Scholarship Fund to Portland, Oregon’s Children’s Scholarship Fund. “In this way average people who want to improve education can avoid the political obstacles to reforming the public schools,” he adds.

America’s public educational monopoly is not working. “The failure to adequately educate our children to compete in the international marketplace and to be good citizens in a free society is truly scandalous,” says Barr. “The answers will not come from Washington. Instead, they will come from families across America as they educate their own children, put their children into private schools, and improve the public system,” Barr adds. We expect choice and competition throughout the economy. “It’s time to apply those same principles to education,” he insists.

Barr represented the 7th District of Georgia in the U. S. House of Representatives from 1995 to 2003, where he served as a senior member of the Judiciary Committee, as Vice-Chairman of the Government Reform Committee, and as a member of the Committee on Financial Services. Prior to his congressional career, Barr was appointed by President Reagan to serve as the United States Attorney for the Northern District of Georgia, and also served as an official with the CIA.

Since leaving Congress, Barr has been practicing law and has teamed up with groups ranging from the American Civil Liberties Union to the American Conservative Union to actively advocate every American citizens’ right to privacy and other civil liberties guaranteed in the Bill of Rights. Along with this, Bob is committed to helping elect leaders who will strive for smaller government, lower taxes and abundant individual freedom.

Dobson Accuses Obama of 'Distorting' Bible

By Eric Gorski
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (AP)

As Barack Obama broadens his outreach to evangelical voters, one of the movement's biggest names, James Dobson, accuses the likely Democratic presidential nominee of distorting the Bible and pushing a "fruitcake interpretation" of the Constitution.

The criticism, to be aired Tuesday on Dobson's Focus on the Family radio program, comes shortly after an Obama aide suggested a meeting at the organization's headquarters here, said Tom Minnery, senior vice president for government and public policy at Focus on the Family.

The conservative Christian group provided The Associated Press with an advance copy of the pre-taped radio segment, which runs 18 minutes and highlights excerpts of a speech Obama gave in June 2006 to the liberal Christian group Call to Renewal. Obama mentions Dobson in the speech.

"Even if we did have only Christians in our midst, if we expelled every non-Christian from the United States of America, whose Christianity would we teach in the schools?" Obama said. "Would we go with James Dobson's or Al Sharpton's?" referring to the civil rights leader.

Dobson took aim at examples Obama cited in asking which Biblical passages should guide public policy — chapters like Leviticus, which Obama said suggests slavery is OK and eating shellfish is an abomination, or Jesus' Sermon on the Mount, "a passage that is so radical that it's doubtful that our own Defense Department would survive its application."

"Folks haven't been reading their Bibles," Obama said.

Dobson and Minnery accused Obama of wrongly equating Old Testament texts and dietary codes that no longer apply to Jesus' teachings in the New Testament.

"I think he's deliberately distorting the traditional understanding of the Bible to fit his own worldview, his own confused theology," Dobson said.

"... He is dragging biblical understanding through the gutter."

Joshua DuBois, director of religious affairs for Obama's campaign, said in a statement that a full reading of Obama's speech shows he is committed to reaching out to people of faith and standing up for families. "Obama is proud to have the support of millions of Americans of faith and looks forward to working across religious lines to bring our country together," DuBois said.

Dobson reserved some of his harshest criticism for Obama's argument that the religiously motivated must frame debates over issues like abortion not just in their own religion's terms but in arguments accessible to all people.

He said Obama, who supports abortion rights, is trying to govern by the "lowest common denominator of morality," labeling it "a fruitcake interpretation of the Constitution."

"Am I required in a democracy to conform my efforts in the political arena to his bloody notion of what is right with regard to the lives of tiny babies?" Dobson said. "What he's trying to say here is unless everybody agrees, we have no right to fight for what we believe."

The program was paid for by a Focus on the Family affiliate whose donations are taxed, Dobson said, so it's legal for that group to get more involved in politics.

Last week, DuBois, a former Assemblies of God associate minister, called Minnery for what Minnery described as a cordial discussion. He would not go into detail, but said Dubois offered to visit the ministry in August when the Democratic National Convention is in Denver.

A possible Obama visit was not discussed, but Focus is open to one, Minnery said.

McCain also has not met with Dobson. A McCain campaign staffer offered Dobson a meeting with McCain recently in Denver, Minnery said. Dobson declined because he prefers that candidates visit the Focus on the Family campus to learn more about the organization, Minnery said.

Dobson has not backed off his statement that he could not in good conscience vote for McCain because of concerns over the Arizona senator's conservative credentials. Dobson has said he will vote in November but has suggested he might not vote for president.

Obama recently met in Chicago with religious leaders, including conservative evangelicals. His campaign also plans thousands of "American Values House Parties," where participants discuss Obama and religion, as well as a presence on Christian radio and blogs.

From Our Mail -- Saving Iraqi Christians

Dear Daniel ,

Thank you for e-mailing President Bush to urge them to do more to Save Iraqi Christians.

Already hundreds are dead, and more than 400,000 men, women and children have been driven from their homes. But if we can convince our leaders to make religious persecution in Iraq a priority, we can save many lives.

Please help us spread the word about this crisis before it is too late. Simply share this information (www.SaveIraqiChristians.com) with your friends and family and urge them to join you in standing up for the religious minorities of Iraq.

Thank you again for your help.

Dr. John Eibner
csi@csi-usa.org

The Church of Oprah Exposed

Oprah's remarks rile some evangelical Christians

By HELEN T. GRAY
The Kansas City Star

Oprah Winfrey has offended evangelical Christians, and they are fighting back.

For the first time, 23 Christian newspapers across the country united for a joint investigative project. Their aim was to explore the spiritual beliefs of the popular entertainment mogul.

An article titled “Oprah’s God” ran in all the papers’ May or June issues, along with each one’s local input. Among the papers was Kansas City’s Metro Voice.

“The issue has produced the most feedback of anything we have run,” said Dwight Widaman, Metro Voice publisher and editor.

The effort is a result of mounting discontent over statements Oprah has made. Evangelicals believe her remarks are not in line with biblical Christianity.

Some of these statements were shown on a widely circulated YouTube video called “The Church of Oprah Exposed.” This came to the attention of Lamar Keener, a Christian newspaper publisher and president of the Evangelical Press Association.

“Personally, not being a viewer of any daytime television, I was unaware of both the magnitude of Oprah’s audience and the influence as well as the full nature of her message that is decidedly New Age and very much in conflict with biblical Christianity,” he said in a Christian Newswire report.

This came at a time when Oprah’s loyal fans were reading her latest book club selection, Eckhart Tolle’s A New Earth. Also, the May issue of O: The Oprah Magazine focused on spirituality. The first feature set the tone for the many articles that followed: “Welcome to the Banquet” was the headline.

Oprah’s empire also was the subject of a recent New York Times article that examined various reasons for an apparent dwindling in her appeal.

It noted that while Tolle’s book “sold faster than any of the previous 60 selections of Oprah’s Book Club, it also has attracted some criticism for Ms. Winfrey on her Web site, where some of her fans have said that the book’s spiritual leanings go against Christian doctrine.”

One segment of the YouTube video, taken from Oprah’s show, is a prime example of what angers many evangelical or traditional Christians.

“There are many paths to what you call God,” Oprah says.

When someone in the audience challenges that Jesus said he was the only way, Oprah retorts, “There couldn’t possibly be just one way.”

Widaman said the beliefs of other entertainers, such as Tom Cruise and Madonna, have come under quite a bit of scrutiny.

“But because Oprah is who she is, the media is much less willing to tackle her strange beliefs because of the power she holds through her production company, television show and magazine,” he said.

“We thought her views warranted examination as anyone who is using their power to spread them,” he said. “She really is using her television show as a pulpit for her gospel.”

In his investigative article, Steve Rabey gives further reasons for Christian discontent.

“Oprah speaks less about salvation through Christ than she does Christ-consciousness,” he writes. “Likewise, she describes heaven not as an eternal destination but an inner realm of consciousness.”

He quotes Larry Eskredge, associate director of the Institute for the Study of American Evangelicals at Wheaton College in Illinois: “Oprah’s theology seems to be a version of America’s secular theology of self-improvement, doing good to others and the prosperity gospel.

“She is also able to foster a tremendous sense of community around her TV show. People who watch feel they are involved in a great quest to improve society and improve themselves.”

Rabey says Oprah was raised in a Baptist church and frequently uses Christian language. She also uses her show’s influence to promote Christian projects.

Among Oprah’s supporters are people associated with Unity School of Christianity near Lee’s Summit, where Tolle spoke last month.

“Oprah has made a courageous commitment to raising the level of consciousness on this planet, and we at Unity applaud her for that,” said Paula Coppel, vice president of communications. “Her Web series with Eckhart Tolle was a phenomenal gift to the world and life-changing for many people.

“I have to wonder if Oprah’s critics have read Tolle’s book or watched any of the Web series beyond the inflammatory clips on YouTube.”

Coppel said Unity is “very much aligned” with the principles that Oprah and Tolle have been presenting.

“Unity teaches that there are many paths to God, that no one path is right or wrong,” Coppel said. “For fundamentalists who are happy with their beliefs, that is fine. We would never call them wrong.

“But we also know there are many Christians with questions who are looking for another way of relating to Jesus and his teachings that is progressive and empowering. We offer that alternative, and Oprah is doing the same thing.”

Coppel said Unity is “quite in sync with Oprah’s focus on the Christ-consciousness within each of us.” She said Unity defines “Christ-consciousness” as “the perfect mind that was in Christ Jesus.” It results from a process of self-mastery and “spiritual unfoldment,” she said.

Loyal and occasional viewers and former fans are divided on Oprah’s spirituality.

“I used to watch her all the time, but for the most part, I don’t even turn her on anymore,” said Bernice McKinney of Kansas City, Kan. “She lost me as an audience.”

McKinney said that if at one time Oprah accepted Christ as her Savior, then she needs to repent and get back to the teachings of the Bible.

“Otherwise, she is going to be held accountable for leading thousands of people astray,” she said. “I’m fearful for her. I just pray for her.”

Meg Shipley of Gardner agrees that Oprah’s spiritual views contradict the Bible.

One example, Shipley said, is Oprah has said that God is a feeling experience and “if God for you is still about a belief, then it’s not truly God.”

Shipley said she also has heard Oprah speak of teachings that God is a jealous God and how that didn’t seem right.

“At first I thought, wow, Oprah sure thinks highly of herself to assume that God is jealous of her,” Shipley said. “But then I began thinking, the verse she references means that God detests idol worship, and since Oprah now has such a huge spiritual following, it could easily be thought that she has followers who worship her, and it may very well be that God is now ‘jealous’ of her, but not in a flattering way.”

But Jessica Mellinger of Olathe praises Oprah for promoting spirituality instead of religion.

“It seems like a lot of people my age (26) are very intimidated by a lot of religion,” she said. “I was not brought up in a strict religious household. Oprah promotes spirituality.

“With spirituality there is a higher power, and you are connecting with your inner self. Oprah is not pushing a religion. She has said numerous times, ‘I believe in God, and whatever you believe in is your choice.’ Her audience is across the world, not just traditional Christians.”

Mellinger said she wants to be more open to other beliefs, and Oprah has shown her how to do that.

Widaman said feedback from the Oprah piece in papers across the country has been mostly positive. But some people have asked why they were picking on Oprah.

“We just wanted to shed light on her beliefs,” he said. “One result we are hoping for is that people would be more cautious in being influenced by her beliefs, especially Christians.”

A Difficult Place for Christians

From Break Point
By Chuck Colson

In early June, the German television network ARD aired a film called “God and the World: The Persecuted Children of God.” The “children” referred to are Iraq’s largest Christian community: the Assyrians. While any attention to the plight of Iraqi Christians is welcome, I only wish that the film could have aired in the country that is in the best position to help them: the United States.

The film tells the story of the suffering and persecution endured by Assyrian Christians through interviews with Christian refugees—or “internally displaced persons,” as bureaucrats call them—who escaped the most dangerous areas.

One Assyrian Christian who did not escape was Archbishop Paulos Faraj Rahho, the Chaldean Catholic archbishop of Mosul. On February 29, his car was attacked by gunmen who killed his two bodyguards and stuffed the archbishop in the trunk of their car.

While in the trunk, Archbishop Rahho called his church and told them not to pay any ransom, because the money “would be used for killing and more evil actions.” His body was found in northeast Mosul. An Al-Qaeda member was sentenced to death for his murder.

The archbishop’s death was only the most publicized attack on Christian clergy in and around Mosul. As the New York Times put it, “In the last few years, Mosul has been a difficult place for Christians.”

That is an understatement: As Lawrence Kaplan wrote in the New Republic, “Sunni, Shia, and Kurd may agree on little else, but all have made sport of brutalizing their Christian neighbors . . . .”

Making matters even worse is that American forces did not hesitate to call on Iraqi Christians to serve as interpreters, precisely because they were Christians. Their religion made them easier to relate to. Now, Iraq’s Christians are seen by extremists as “collaborators” and “crusaders.”

Conditions have gotten so bad in parts of Iraq that some Iraqi Christians now celebrate mass “in homes and sometimes, like their ancient Christian ancestors, in crypts instead.”

Anyone who knew anything about the history of the region—and its Christian minority—should have seen this coming. That is why Nina Shea of Freedom House, and others, called for special protection for Iraq’s Christians. Their advice was, is, and probably will continue to be, ignored by our government and the “international community.”

The only way this will not happen is if western Christians make their voices heard. To that end, Christian Solidarity International, and others, have launched “Save Iraqi Christians.”

Their goal is to get our government to “defend religious liberty in Iraq and create conditions that allow displaced Christians and other non-Muslim minorities to return to their homeland and live and worship in peace.” We ought to be using our “powerful leverage with government leaders in Baghdad and Kurdish authorities” to develop a “secure homeland province for religious minorities.”

Because without this, a Christian community that survived invasions by the Persians, Muslims, Mongols and Ottomans, might not survive the American liberation of Iraq. They certainly will not survive our indifference.

Terry Wey and the Vienna Boys Choir Sing Ständchen

King's College Choir -- Psalm 50

1 THE Lord, even the most mighty God, hath spoken : and called the world, from the rising up of the sun unto the going down thereof.
2 Out of Sion hath God appeared : in perfect beauty.
3 Our God shall come, and shall not keep silence : there shall go before him a consuming fire, and a mighty tempest shall be stirred up round about him.
4 He shall call the heaven from above : and the earth, that he may judge his people.
5 Gather my saints together unto me : those that have made a covenant with me with sacrifice.
6 And the heavens shall declare his righteousness : for God is Judge himself.
7 Hear, O my people, and I will speak : I myself will testify against thee, O Israel; for I am God, even thy God.
8 I will not reprove thee because of thy sacrifices, or for thy burnt-offerings : because they were not alway before me.
9 I will take no bullock out of thine house : nor he-goat out of thy folds.
10 For all the beasts of the forest are mine : and so are the cattle upon a thousand hills.
11 I know all the fowls upon the mountains : and the wild beasts of the field are in my sight.
12 If I be hungry, I will not tell thee : for the whole world is mine, and all that is therein.
13 Thinkest thou that I will eat bulls' flesh : and drink the blood of goats?
14 Offer unto God thanksgiving : and pay thy vows unto the most Highest.
15 And call upon me in the time of trouble : so will I hear thee, and thou shalt praise me.
16 But unto the ungodly said God : Why dost thou preach my laws, and takest my covenant in thy mouth;
17 Whereas thou hatest to be reformed : and has cast my words behind thee?
18 When thou sawest a thief, thou consentedst unto him : and hast been partaker with the adulterers.
19 Thou hast let thy mouth speak wickedness : and with thy tongue thou hast set forth deceit.
20 Thou satest, and spakest against thy brother : yea, and hast slandered thine own mother's son.
21 These things hast thou done, and I held my tongue, and thou thoughtest wickedly, that I am even such a one as thyself : but I will reprove thee, and set before thee the things that thou hast done.
22 O consider this, ye that forget God : lest I pluck you away, and there be none to deliver you.
23 Whoso offereth me thanks and praise, he honoureth me : and to him that ordereth his conversation right will I shew the salvation of God.