An Arizona megachurch is promoting a series of Sunday worship services with the theme "Bringing Sexy Back."
Each of the services at Cornerstone Christian Fellowship Church in Chandler, Ariz., features a lecture on a topic such as "Greatest Sex Ever." Ads for the series feature two sets of bare feet sticking out under sheets. Center stage on the pulpit during the worship services is a giant, king-size bed.
The series was inspired by one at an Indiana church that was advertised via the Web site mylamesexlife.com. Cornerstone's version likewise has its own Web site, howsexyami.com.
On the Web site, Pastor Linn Winters may be seen introducing the "Greatest Sex Ever" service by assuring churchgoers that, even though it may seem strange to see a king-size bed on the pulpit, "God is not freaked out" by sex.
Some weekends, the church's wide stage features both the king-size bed and a small bed. "One analogy we use back and forth is that the world is really offering 'little bed sex,'" Winters said. “The world really comes and says, 'These are two bodies rubbing together' and that is all it really is at the end of the day."
But God, he said, intended that when men and women share a bed, their souls come together. "God says that when we begin to honor the soulishness of the sexual encounter, all of a sudden this thing changes and becomes what we describe as ‘big bed sex.'"
"We talk to people about what does that look like for a man to invite a woman, not to the 'little bed' but instead to invite her to the 'big bed,'" Winter said. “What we have said over and over is that every woman longs to be invited to the big bed — but only a man can make the big bed."
Can I just say that I don't care how big the bed is — AS LONG AS YOU KEEP IT OFF THE FREAKIN' PULPIT?!
As for the theology behind the pastor's mattress analogy, I'll stick to Pope John Paul II's theology of the body: "The gifts of the Holy Spirit, and especially the gift of respect for what is sacred, seem to have a fundamental significance here [in the marital embrace]. This gift sustains and develops in the married couple a particular sensitivity to everything in their vocation and life that bears the sign of the mystery of creation and redemption: a sensitivity to everything that is a created reflection of God's wisdom and love."
But I guess if you can't commune body and soul with the Holy Spirit both in the marital bed and before the altar, you might as well put the bed on the pulpit. It might help those who can't stay awake through seven choruses of "Awesome God."
Tonight I happened upon a television show called "TTEO TV" that features the music of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church. Having never seen footage of African Christians, I was mesmerized by the haunting music and fascinatingly choreographed videos.
Searching for videos online, I discovered the stunning singer Mirtinesh, who looks like a supermodel in nun's clothing and sings like an angel.
You don't need to know Amharic, the Ethiopian language, to appreciate the devotion of the Tewahedo songs. This Mirtinesh video, like a number of the Tewahedo songs I found, nearly brought me to tears.
What do the Pope, the Archbishop of Canterbury, and I have in common?
At my (pre-)birthday party last night, my proud father told my friends something I'd never shared with them.
No, it wasn't that, as an eighth-grader, I wrote a short-story about a fish-tailed siren named "Ethel Mermaid." (In fact, pretend you never heard that. Please.)
It was that a blog entry I wrote last year is included alongside writings by the Holy Father, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Joseph Bottum, Rod Dreher, and other luminaries in Loyola Press's The Best Catholic Writing 2007.
(Why the Archbishop of Canterbury,you say? Well, it is Loyola Press.)
I haven't yet told anyone besides my dad because I honestly still can't believe it. When Loyola Press editor Jim Manney contacted me to ask for permission to use my blog entry, it took me months to get back to him, because it didn't seem real to me. I wondered if it was like one of those "Who's Who" deals, where people pay to be included. Annual writing anthologies like his receive thousands of entries; how could I garner notice on the basis of a single blog entry? (Priests, theologians, and psychology professionals may recognize this as pride masquerading as modesty. I lacked such insight at the time.)
Thankfully, I eventually did get back to Jim, but I didn't really believe I was in the book until I received my two copies in the mail. (And I still need to send Jim my W-9 so I can get paid.)
I won't tell you which blog entry Jim used — you'll have to buy the book for that. Trust me, it is worth it, and not just for my contribution —check out the table of contents.
Many thanks to Jim for believing in the value of my blog entry more than I did myself. Seeing it in print, especially in context, I can finally see why it was chosen. As Publisher's Weekly said in its review, the book contains writing "chosen for its sacramental, incarnational perspective and sensitivity to the historic Christian tradition that is properly called 'Catholic.'"
My old friend Steve Harvey forwards a message from Rosie Flores requesting prayer for Janis Martin, a singer, songwriter, and guitarist who made headlines in the late 1950s as the "Female Elvis."
Rockabilly artist, Janis Martin has been diagnosed with terminal cancer and it has spread all over her body. Her husband Wayne Whitt has told me that she is napping most of the day in a hospital bed at her home in Danville, VA. She will soon go and take a temporary residence in Raleigh for a round of radiation treatments to try and reduce the size of the tumors behind her lungs, shoulder and leg. Janis had been suffering from severe headaches over the past several months so she found it necessary to cancel her recent booking at the Americana Festival in England. The headaches turned out to be stress related from all the grief she's had to endure from losing her son Kevin who passed away in January of this year. Recently when a large tumor appeared on her shoulder, Janis and Wayne headed back to the doctors for tests. The tests revealed that she has a very aggressive type of cancer and is spreading all over her body. I can't even believe that I'm writing this, it is so hard to accept that this amazing person and dear friend is going through such an intense sickness at a time in her life when she was retired from her day job and finally ready to start performing again. I hope that everyone who knows her and has been touched by her unique talent for performing and her gifted voice as a rock n roll, blues and country singer will keep Janis and her family in your prayers. She has given so much to the world of music and to her fans both here in the US and in Europe and the rest of the world.
The blog entry includes an address to send cards and flowers to Martin.
Flores goes on to note that the 67-year-old Martin "just never stopped rockin'," and she's not kidding. Watch Martin wail just two years ago in Green Bay, Wisconsin:
Many thanks to everyone who came to my (pre-)birthday party last night at Teaism in Penn Quarter. Going to bed now, so most of the blurry cell-phone shots will have to wait 'til tonight. In the meantime, I offer this photo of me with my dad, which I like because you can tell that we both look so happy.
I was elated that Dad attended. As we've lived in different cities for most of my life, it was his first time at a birthday party of mine in about 30 years. I joked with him beforehand that this time, he didn't have to bring a pinata. It was wonderful getting to introduce him to my friends.
For those who notice such things, that cord hanging around Dad's neck is for his ID — not a scapular. Alas, nobody told me that my scapular was showing.
A speechwriter for a U.S. senator, who came to the party with a friend of mine, listened in rapt attention as Dad conversed with me and another guest. After Dad walked away, the speechwriter said, "That was your father? I thought he was [Primary Colors author] Joe Klein!"
I was extremely blessed to have three priests in attendance, which did make it a little confusing when introducing my Dad. "Father, I'd like you to meet my father ..."
RELATED:Father M. has more on the party, including his wonderful account of the efforts he made beforehand to buy me a gift of Assam tea:
What kind of tea? Christine endorsed Assam so off I went to find Assam at the local "Whole Foods". Please note that while "Whole Foods" will valet your SUV they will not purvey Assam. Trust me-- they don't know their Assam from a hole in the wall. I was directed upon request to the tea aisle. There, rising before me, like a Canaanite altar to Baal, was an entire wall of tea: Teas to loose weight or gain health. Teas with names like Sleepy Time and Zinger, Fruity "Free and Lemon Bliss" alas, no Assam. There was even something called "Republic of Tea" which on principle was completely unacceptable. Most likely there had, at one time, been a tranquil Kingdom of Tea and then some socialist tempest-in-a-teapot came to pass and infused the Teas with a bureaucratic Tea welfare state where no one gets to spout off and everyone gets steamed, hence, no Republic of Tea for me. No Sir. I settled on a nice variety box of recognizable teas and shook the dust from my capped-toed shoes.
Word came this morning that a dear friend, Fr. William C. Smith, passed away late last night after a long illness at the age of 87.
"Fr. Bill" was a good and humble priest, as well as a tireless - and I mean TIRELESS - defender of the unborn. You could find him most Saturdays down on Main Street in Danbury picketing with a small group at the abortion clinic. When he wasn't there, he was writing Letters to the Editor and speaking out against abortion at every opportunity.
Fr. Smith was one of 10 children. He had one or two brothers who also entered the priesthood - in missionary capacities. He was the last surviving member of that immediate family.
I knew Fr. Smith through my mother. He was her high school religion teacher at Mount St. Joseph Academy in Hartford in the late 1940s. Over the years, they kept up their friendship, and I saw him often at different functions.
I believe the last time I actually saw him in person was this past October. My aunt picked him up after a Saturday picketing session and brought him up the street to my house to visit with my mom. Before he left, he blessed me, mom, my aunt and the house multiple times!
The last time I spoke with his was this past January. His birthday was January 11; my mom's was January 15. We could always count on a call from him on her birthday to see how she was doing.
He was open, honest and always had a delightful twinkle in his eye. I remember going to him for Confession one Saturday. After patiently listening to me and giving me absolution, he told me, "Now go in peace, not in pieces."
Just a scant three weeks after my mom's passing, I find it ironic that the priest who most influenced her formative years and helped make her the woman of faith that she was, has now passed from this life to join her at the heavenly banquet. Mom will be so glad to see him.
Although I have true assurance that he is with Our Lord today, please pray for this holy priest who loved God above all else. If he doesn't need the graces anymore, I know he'll give them to someone who does.
The picture below was taken about 8 years ago following my mom's second hip operation. Fr. Smith came to visit her at the rehab center. He always left her - and everyone else - laughing.
Her spirit lives in blogger Radical Mama who, in a post called "Breaking the Cycle"[which she has since removed — see update #2 below], boasts of her ongoing attempts to convince a 15-year-old girl to abort against her mother's wishes.
Radical Mama knows the girl, Julia, through the 4-H group to which the teen belonged. "I am trying to think about this [pregnancy] objectively, but I just can’t," the blogger writes. "This is one of my kids. Isn’t this why I volunteer? To prevent this sh-- from happening?"
"This sh--" — e.g. baby — must be prevented, Radical Mama says, for every reason imaginable. Julia was pressured into sex (or so the blogger assumes); she is only 15; her family is poor and her father is an abusive drug addict, etc., etc. Yet, the girl's mother insists that the baby would be welcome — a reaction that has Radical Mama seething with self-righteous fury.
Julia herself is open to adoption. That, Radical Mama says, would perpetuate
a vicious cycle; ignorance breeds poverty and poverty breeds ignorance. There is only one cure for both, and that is to stop breeding these things. Stop bringing to birth children whose inheritance cannot be one of health or intelligence. Stop bringing into the world children whose parents cannot provide for them.
Whoops, wrong quote. That was Margaret Sanger. Radical Mama says,
that [adoption] would be great except…
She’s fifteen. How likely is it that after 9 months of pregnancy, and a labor, and then a little adorable baby being placed on her tummy…. how likely is it that she will say good-bye?
Or will she think, “Hey look at that little thing that I made! I can do this, no problem.”
But as we all know, that adorable little baby turns into a tantruming toddler (at which point Julia would only be a senior in high school). And that’s just the beginning. What are the odds that the child turns into a 15-year old announcing her pregnancy?
When does this end?
When indeed? When "Radical Mamas" and her comrades decide to put some real effort into fixing the problems that cause poverty — like no-fault divorce and the social consequences of the abortion mentality — instead of trying to convince poor teens to kill their offspring.
UPDATE: Radical Mama, whom a commenter informs me is named Vanessa, reports that Julia decided to have the baby and let her mother raise it. She also laments being labeled a "pro-choice nut job" and says her words were taken "taken completely out of context." I never called her a "nut job," and I'll be glad to add further context to her quotes if she can show me what relevant part of her pro-abortion stance I omitted.
UPDATE #2: Radical Mama, perhaps realizing that the powers-that-be at 4-H might not look kindly upon her pro-abortion evangelism, has replaced her original post with a poem by Sylvia Plath. Her original post has been saved by a reader.
"At some point, it was just too offensive. I didn't like what he was saying at all, especially the racial jokes," said Jessona McDonald.
McDonald is one of many students who walked out during the barrage of bad language, including the n-word and racist and sexist humor.
The university says the comic promised a clean show:
"We have a contract and we say we are a Catholic university. We have standards that we want met. Even when he was here that day, we talked about having a PG-13 show. So, we really did the things that we normally do. It was very upsetting. He was very offensive," said Kathy Byrnes, and assistant vice president of student life.
Kudos to the university for at least having the judgment to Trevino offstage 15 minutes into his 90-minute show. But their claim that they were promised a clean show seems facile; why even hire a comedian known for foul-mouthed, racially charged, "misogynistic" humor? Looking at Trevino's Web site — which features a T-shirt depicting men waving money at a pole dancer (caption: "I SUPPORT SINGLE MOTHERS") — one has to wonder, what were they thinking?
* * *
P.S. When I entered New York University, the freshman-orientation comic was a pre-fame Mario Cantone. Definitely not appropriate for a Catholic university. Even so, his one-man version of "West Side Story" remains one of the funniest things I have ever seen. He pointed out the incongruity of the Jets' being so tough and yet breaking into pirouettes.
1:19 PM |
Snape, crackle, and pop
Judging by the number of comments (114 and counting), I believe I have discovered the theological question that most divides Christians of our time.
With all due respect, seeing how some people have been spending even more time debating this issue than I spend blogging and checking my comments (you don't want to know), I think William Shatner's advice applies to everyone involved:
And yes, I know I started it — so the advice is very much for me too!
As Robert N. Going notes, "What a shame that some members of his family and others are using his name to advocate a position directly opposite of the one he took himself."
My pastor, Monsignor Edward J. Filardi of St. Stephen Martyr, recently spoke in a homily of the fumi-e — that is, Japanese apostasy pictures or treading pictures — that he saw at the Smithsonian's "Encompassing the Globe" exhibition. During Japan's lengthy and exceedingly bloody persecution of Christians, some of those who were suspected of being Christian had to step on such images or be killed.
I had read of such pictures, but never seen them until I found the image at left online. Many Japanese Christians were martyred for refusing to step on them, but many others likely caved in, as can be seen by the wear and tear.
"Pharmacists are not medical vending machines. They have a duty -- protected by their civil right of conscience -- to act with integrity and serve all those entrusted to their care, including women and their newly-conceived children. Coercive policies forcing them to dispense Plan B attack that integrity by driving a wedge between principles and practice."
— Deirdre McQuade, spokeswoman for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' Secretariat for Pro-Life Activities, quoted in a Google News point-counterpoint between her and Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards. Found via American Papist.
WASHINGTON, August 27 -- Addressing reports that over half of his $30 million fortune is invested in rapacious subprime lenders who are foreclosing on the homes of already-devastated hurricane Katrina victims, Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards yesterday reiterated his "strong personal opposition" to poverty.
"I have dedicated my entire life to not being poor," said the former North Carolina Senator. He stated that he "absolutely hates" the idea of lacking money and would never choose a destitute existence for himself or his family.
The campaign quickly moved, however, to quell fears that the comments signaled a willingness to impose the candidate's individual financial preferences upon others. "I would never deprive an unsophisticated, unqualified borrower of the right to choose a subprime mortgage with a 6.5% teaser rate which rapidly escalates to 32.99% plus a $120,000 balloon payment after three months," Mr. Edwards later insisted. "Some seek abject poverty and resent regulatory efforts to take away their Constitutionally guaranteed right to sacrifice their most precious asset to a profit-driven hedge fund."
Edwards' position echoed recent statements by Repubican aspirant Rudolph Giuliani regarding his hatred for abortion, a procedure he politically and financially supports. Edwards asserted that his distaste for the procedure exceeds Giuliani's, noting that his campaign employs former NARAL Pro-Choice head Kate Michelman as a senior adviser.
"I am so thankful that the Lord allowed me to be so broken last year that I could only see Him, and even more thankful that once the healing began, I still only saw, and desired, Him."
Why 'Sex and the City's fairy-tale ending is a lie, part 2
When I wrote part 1 on this topic the other day, I didn't know Grace Leigh had covered the same turf in her recent take on "Breakfast at Tiffany's":
"... Like the ladies of Sex and the City, to whom New York and its male inhabitants are a wild, intoxicating playground, Holly's party-girl lifestyle and subsequent quest for wealth and social status is one in which many 20- and even 30-somethings indulge themselves today, searching for their own happy endings all while recklessly party- and relationship-hopping in a manner that, at times, would make even Miss Golightly blush. And who can blame them, when such a lifestyle is glamorized in films such as Tiffany's and the more recent The Devil Wears Prada, and in TV shows like the afore-mentioned Sex and the City and its male-oriented, West-coast counterpart, Entourage. Yet when these real-life 20- and 30-somethings emulate the less-than-admirable characters they see onscreen, the result usually falls far short of a Hollywood ending.
"The problem? Though Holly Golightly and others may make it seem otherwise, happiness does not just fall into the laps of the undeserving. In real life, love, justice, respect, and other hallmarks of success are earned rather than stumbled upon, and their fruits are much sweeter as a result. Yet when the supposed role models we see onscreen behave carelessly and then have happy endings magically bestowed upon them, it is easy to be misled into thinking that such rewards are just – for our favorite characters as well as for ourselves, no matter what the circumstances. In the real world, however, the fact of the matter is that, when we have done nothing to attain the happiness we so crave, we should expect nothing less than frustration when we fail to find it.
"While Holly Golightly is no doubt entertaining, we must keep in mind that her happy ending is a result of Hollywood magic rather than any actions of her own. Dissolute, self-indulgent, and frivolous throughout the entire film, she strives for no more than a fabulous wardrobe and an enviable social life, yet she has somehow become a role model. However, if we follow in her fickle footsteps, the most we can hope for is a happy ending that is just as magically bestowed upon us – although, without Hollywood's help, this is quite unlikely.
"Thus, rather than waiting for a happy ending to fall into our laps, an event about as likely to occur as Holly Golightly is to stop dreaming about Tiffany's, we should instead strive to achieve happy endings of our own - endings that we have earned through determination, diligence, and grace, and that we will appreciate all the more due to the effort we have made to attain them. And in the meantime, we can leave the fashion advice to Miss Golightly."
I'm delighted that the dynamic young woman who calls her blog la vie en vogue enjoyed The Thrill of the Chaste so much that she offers the photo above as evidence. Her blog entry on the book includes some highlights, which she puts partly in her own words. It is extremely gratifying to see how what I wrote hit home.
"Lev Grossman, in the July 23, 2007, issue of Time magazine, writes, 'If you want to know who dies in Harry Potter, the answer is easy: God.' In this he has expressed the core problem with the Potter series. There is much that could be written, and has been written, about the specific problems in the books. Without neglecting the valid point that good fiction need not be overtly Christian, need not be religious at all, we might ponder a little the fact that the central metaphor and plot engines of the series are activities (witchcraft and sorcery) absolutely prohibited by God.
"We might also consider for a moment the fact that no sane parents would give their children books which portrayed a set of 'good' pimps and prostitutes valiantly fighting a set of 'bad' pimps and prostitutes, and using the sexual acts of prostitution as the thrilling dynamic of the story. By the same token we should ask ourselves why we continue to imbibe large doses of poison in our cultural consumption, as if this were reasonable and normal living, as if the presence of a few vegetables floating in a bowl of arsenic soup justifies the long-range negative effects of our diet. Leaving aside a wealth of such arguments, let us consider Lev Grossman's insight.
"'The death of God?' many a reader will respond. 'Surely he is making too much of the matter! Aren't we discussing a single phenomenon in a vast sea of cultural phenomena? And aren't there a lot of positive values in these books and films - even some edifying moments of courage and sacrifice? And isn't it all about love?' Yes, in a sense it is. But what kind of love? What kind of sacrifice? And for what purpose?"
Why 'Sex and the City's fairy-tale ending is a lie
Emphasis mine:
"[T]he better road has become a radical, 'peculiar' one. Perhaps even a completely backwards one. Marriage is not, after all, meant to be the crash landing after a youth spent dating and partying. Rather it should be the mark of the commencement of a lifetime spent unconditionally loving, serving, and sacrificing for one's beloved.
"Tragically, though, the former image has become the preferred one. No wonder it is so begrudgingly entered, or so easily cast aside. Perhaps the solution, then, starts with reminding young people (and old) that commitment and fidelity are precious gifts, not curses."
A woman walks into a pregnancy resource center, saying she's a Muslim and her religion permits her to have an abortion.
The counselor whips out a "Pregnancy Options Workbook" and shows the woman where the book says Islam forbids abortions. Impressed, the woman opts to be a client of the pregnancy resource center and keep her baby.
If that really happened, you can imagine the uproar. News would reach Planned Parenthood that the pregnancy resource center blatantly used the woman's faith to manipulate her decision. Planned Parenthood would feed the story to its friend Linda Greenhouse at the New York Times, and the rest of the press would follow with a new wave of smear stories about pregnancy resource centers.
Well, someone really did use the Koran to influence a pregnant woman who was contemplating an abortion, but there was no uproar. And the reason there was no uproar is that it was not a pregnancy resource center employee who manipulated a woman's decision to keep her baby. It was an abortionist who boasted of convincing a Muslim woman that her faith permitted her to abort.
The Post-it said, "AT-TI-TUDE" all caps. The young woman was in traditional Muslim dress, African-American, and bristling with...with something. I guessed that it was my job to find out what.
It turned out to be not so different from many women who feel like they are caught in a trap of their own making. She got pregnant, then "did the right thing and married at age 16, to a man she did not love. She had 2 more children with him, still didn't love him, but clearly did not wish him pain either. She had fallen in love with another, someone outside her culture. She knew it could never work. It was a mess, but a compelling mess.
Her self contempt, her anger at her situation and everyone around her, seemed to spring from the great divide between what she wanted and what she knew was right. Her religion guided her in everything--it was her rock. She accepted the finality of it, as a guilty person accepts a punishment.
"It's against my religion," she said defeatedly as though there could be no further discussion. I said, "Well, it may not be as clear as that. Muslims believe that the soul enters the baby at 120 days--about 16 weeks. You are about 5 weeks." Then I pulled out the Pregnancy Options Workbook (www.pregnancyoptions.info) and read her the section about Islam and abortion. It does not offer a free pass, by any means, but it does put Mohammed's proscription about killing your children in some historical context. He decried the killing of female infants, a widespread practice in his time. It also listed the acceptable reasons for abortion. It talked about atonement.
When I read the part about atonement meaning fasting for two months, an invisible veil fell from her face and there was a beautiful look of hope radiating out. "I can do that," she said. This launched us into a wonderful discussion about forgiveness, compassion, the condition of women, and other topics.[Read the full entry.]
At the end of Bon's entry, the abortionist adds a P.S.: "I want to address the inevitable comment that I somehow made her feel 'OK' about abortion, or encouraged her to have one. It was clear to me that she would have one no matter what. What I offered was a way that she could 'be' with it that did not further cripple her life and the beautiful contribution she could make to life."
Coming after the abortionist wrote that the patient's "religion guided her in everything--it was her rock" and that she "accepted the finality of it, as a guilty person accepts a punishment," such a disclaimer is utterly disingenuous. Would any abortion advocate believe it if it came from a Christian pro-life counselor who had cited the Bible to a pregnant woman? Heck, I'm pro-life, and I don't think I would believe it. Of course the abortionist was trying to influence the woman's decision — otherwise, she would have saved the education in Islam for the post-abortion counseling (something I have a feeling she doesn't offer).
I can't say I'm surprised. People of faith have long served as abortion advocates' useful idiots — witness the Planned Parenthood-funded Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice. Still, Bon's brazen boasting suggests she needs a more thorough education in Islamic law. I recommend she run her apologetics by her local imam. No doubt he will be quite impressed by her "[putting] Mohammed's proscription about killing your children in some historical context."
11:13 PM |
Kellmeyer notes that, according to a promotional video for the program, the Christian segment of "God's Warriors" features a couple who homeschools their five children: "In the promotional video, this is represented as 'frightening.'"
For my friends J.D. and Kevin, here is one of the greatest songs by one of the greatest Sixties bands — the Small Faces with guest singer P.P. Arnold, lip-synching "Tin Soldier":
I wrote the liner notes to P.P. Arnold's best-of, but had no idea just how beautiful the former Ikette was until seeing this clip. She is also wearing what I have to admit, despite its abbreviated length, is the Best Dress Ever.
I caught some of the first episode of CNN's "God's Warriors" last night while waiting for a flight at a Detroit airport. It was odd to watch a program that so blatantly disparaged Jewish war heroes and elevated Muslim terrorists after I had passed through an elaborate and humiliating security system unofficially designed to root out Muslim terrorists.
The "God's Warriors" series, hosted by the ardently left-wing Christiane Amanpour, ostensibly covers modern-day blood-spillers of major world religions; Islam and Christianity are next. Newsbusters' Matthew Balan has reported that the Christian episode will liken a nonviolent Christian sect that favors modest dress to the Taliban. (Newsbusters has elsewhere covered a recent episode of CNN anti-Semitism; I'm waiting to see how the site will respond to the first "God's Warriors" episode.)
On last night's installment, Amanpour stressed that Jewish settlers in Palestinian-controlled territories were in violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention. Nowhere were the views of experts such as the late Eugene W. Rostow, dean of Yale Law School and U.S. Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs between 1966 and 1969, who wrote in The New Republic,
...The Palestine Mandate, recognizing "the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and the grounds for reconstituting their national home in that country," is dedicated to "the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people," ...
...The State Department has never denied that under the Mandate "the Jewish people" have the right to settle in the area. Instead, it said that Jewish settlements in the West Bank violate Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949.....[which] provides that the occupying power "shall not deport or transfer part of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies."
...But the Jewish settlers in the West Bank are volunteers. They have not been "deported" or "transferred" by the government of Israel, and their movement involves none of the atrocious purposes or harmful effects on the existing population the Geneva Convention was designed to prevent. Furthermore, the Convention applies only to acts by one signatory "carried out on the territory of another." The West Bank is not the territory of a signatory power, but an unallocated part of the British Mandate...
...The controversy about Jewish settlements in the West Bank is not, therefore, about legal rights but about the political will to override legal rights ...
The American Thinker has more on last night's episode of "God's Warriors": "Amanpour utters not a word about how for 19 years, from 1948 to 1967, the Jordanians used Jewish graves on the Mount of Olives as latrines, or how they destroyed all the synagogues in the old city, and that they prohibited Jews from praying at their holiest sites."
11:49 AM |
Lama vs. Papa
Via Dennis Schenkel, watch irreverent Aussie TV host John Safran (on a show called "John Safran vs. God") stun young adults by showing them how the Dala Lama holds views on sex that they would normally ascribe to the Pope:
I thought of you tonight. I was at a restaurant in Santa Monica and heard a song that I had long forgotten about. I know that this wasn't really your musical genre of choice, but I was really into indie and post-punk music a few years back. There was a local band called Sense Field that had a quick radio hit with their song "Save Yourself." It was getting quite a bit of radio play on the rock format stations around the country. They are not a Christian band, and actually a lot of their stuff is pretty depressing. But this one song...I found a video for it on You Tube. Apparently it was on the Roswell soundtrack, so the video has clips from the show. Listen to the lyrics. It's amazing - I remember hearing it on the radio and wishing I could meet a guy who felt this way. At the time, I certainly wasn't living chastely, but can clearly recall relating to these lyrics. It's amazing that a little pro-chastity song snuck onto the airwaves. I have no idea about the bands personal beliefs or intentions with the song,* but the message is pretty clear.
Know any other songs that would make a good soundtrack to The Thrill? Post your suggestions on the "Chastity for the Ears" discussion board in the Forum section of thrillofthechaste.com.
*I looked up the band online — it turns out lead singer Jon Bunch went on to lead a Christian rock band, Further Seems Forever.
On the gorgeous sunny Saturday we had last week, my friend Kristina J. Grabosky of Photography for Valerie snapped some pictures of me in Old Town, Alexandria, for what I'm hoping will be a new publicity shot. She sent me the above photo as one of a few previews; the rest are coming later in the week. This photo won't be the official shot, but I love the way she captured me mid-laugh.
Running off to catch a plane to Green Bay, Wis., for a two-day business trip. If you're there and would like to say hello, drop me a line via my contact form. Will try to blog while there, though I'm not certain how much time I'll have. There's also a rumor that I am to visit Relevant Radio's studio and appear on its pledge drive (!). Oh, how I hated pledge drives when I was a kid — except when the local public-TV station would snag a member of Monty Python.
Letter from university chaplain Father Karol Wojtyla (later Pope John Paul II) to a student, December 1956:
Dear Teresa,
People like to think that Wujek [Fr. Wojtyla] would like to see everyone married. But I think this is a false picture. The most important problem is really something else. Everyone...lives, above all, for love. The ability to love authentically, not great intellectual capacity, constitutes the deepest part of a personality. It is no accident that the greatest commandment is to love. Authentic love leads us outside ourselves to affirming others: devoting oneself to the cause of man, to people, and, above all, to God. Marriage makes sense...if it gives one the opportunity for such love, if it evokes the ability and necessity of such loving, if it draws one out of the shell of individualism (various kinds) and egocentrism. It is not enough simply to want to accept such love. One must know how to give it, and it’s often not ready to be received. Many times it’s necessary to help it to be formed....
I was praying the First Sorrowful Mystery yesterday and found myself suddenly tearing up. Jesus' agony brought to mind an unresolved hurt in my life.
As I kept praying, I was reminded how painful Jesus' life was. He came from heaven, where he had all joy and no pain, so that he could enter time and immediately experience discomfort and privation. From there, His life on Earth continously opened up into more and more pain, until He died.
Sometimes I catch myself thinking that He didn't really feel the pain completely, because he could see the "joy set before Him." I have to remind myself that He really did feel the pain completely. He had to, otherwise it would have been worthless.
Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen used to quote C.S. Lewis: "God whispers to us in our pleasures, He speaks to us in our conscience, He shouts to us in our pain ..."
It never ceases to fascinate me how comforting it is to realize that, even if my own pain is seemingly unresolvable, I can take real comfort in knowing that Christ knows what it is like.
G.K. Chesterton, at the end of The Man Who Was Thursday, connected this strange comfort with the ending of the Book of Job, where Job is assuaged even though God only answers his question with more questions. He had addressed the same issue earlier in his "Introduction to the Book of Job," which was published exactly one hundred years ago. In that essay, Chesterton wrote, "The riddles of God are more satisfying than the solutions of man."
I would like solutions. I would like everything in my life to be wrapped up neatly, with no loose ends, nothing left unsaid, and no one able to wound me without apologizing from the heart.
But if I am going to sometimes feel pain that cannot be resolved, it helps to think about the riddle God offers in place of a solution to pain. As Chesterton wrote in The Man Who Was Thursday, it is, "Can ye drink of the cup that I drink of?"
"'Only ten percent of the food I serve contains cyanide' would not be an effective argument for a restaurant."
— The Curt Jester, responding to a Planned Parenthood/Chicago Area representative's claim that 90% of the organization's services are not abortions. (Read the whole entry.)
The June, July, and August archives have been added at left. Thanks to those who asked for them. It's taken me a while to put them up because I have to do it manually, due to a quirk in the Blogger software.
[The following post by my dear friend Drusilla contains material that originally appeared on her blog, Heirs in Hope. — Dawn]
[She] belonged to him so completely that he could even decide not to keep [her] for himself but to order that [she] be given to another, by an act of obedience… (C. S. Lewis, That Hideous Strength)
When I was seventeen, my foster father chose a husband for me.
He was an extremely fundamentalist Southern Baptist minister and Victorian relict who romanticized his childhood as well as an age that had begun passing away before his birth and, by the time he was a husband and father, been forgotten by everyone including him: what existed in his mind bore no resemblance to the reality that had been. But he was determined his fantasy would exist in his household. He owned the children he had fathered, the children he fostered, his wife – such was his firm belief. We were his possessions to dispose of as he saw fit. At sixteen, I had escaped by earning a scholarship to a small women’s college in the east but, when I ran out of money while traveling through the western United States,, reluctantly went back for the last three weeks of summer before my sophomore year.
The first Sunday after my return, I attended services at my foster-father’s church; since I needed him to buy me a ticket back to New York, I decided it best to humor him. On the way to church, he told me how glad he was that I’d meet his young student intern, told me I’d be able to hear him preach that day. I responded with a noncommittal noise. After the service, my foster father suggested the seminary student take me, suitably chaperoned by the assistant pastor and his wife, to Chinatown for lunch. And I thought nothing of it until our chaperones sent the two of us to get ice cream and told him to see me home. The set up seemed too much like a date and no one had asked if I was interested. Still, when he failed to run for the bus and I left him standing on the sidewalk with a dazed look on his face, I didn’t give him another thought, he was scheduled to return to seminary the next day. But during the following weeks, my foster father sang his intern’s praises and repeatedly asked what I thought of him. I didn’t think much, made more noncommittal noises. When he suggested he would not send me back to New York, that in fact, I should transfer to a nearby women’s college and think about settling down – perhaps with the seminarian who would graduate and return the following summer, I told him I’d join the army instead and travel around the world. He bought me a ticket to New York. I never returned to his house.
Several months ago I learned that the Church teaches there are two (and only two) vocations, marriage or the consecrated celibate life. I had honestly believed being single was a third vocation, had been told as much by both Anglican and Catholic teachers. Of course logically the default state is single. It’s the way we all begin. Yet the Church views it as a temporary state, as transitional – Catholics take Genesis seriously: "[i]t is not good for the human to be alone, I shall make him a sustainer beside him.” (Genesis 2:18 from Robert Alter, Genesis a Translation)
It has been almost exactly three years since I returned to the Catholic Church after spending a number of years in the Anglican Communion. In that brief period, there has been a radical change in me. As an Anglican, my immediate response would have been to deconstruct the Church’s teaching, to find in it the deep, spiritual meaning that ratified my belief that being perpetually single was actually God’s will. As a Catholic, I simply accepted it and now the real work begins.
I am accustomed to being single, do all sorts of things, conscious and unconscious, to remain that way, take great delight in doing as I please with my life. But I want to belong to God even when I fight against him, even when I resent him doing anything at all with me; too often I feel that he should do with me as I please. And I can’t fix myself – even to belong to God. I am so weak and inept I cannot even give myself to God unless he gives me the ability to do so. But my automatic response to follow church teaching, to relinquish my belief that I am okay on my own, is evidence that he is giving me that ability. Something truly has changed in me: I value the Church’s teaching more than I value
