The clear eye of youth?

Global warming concerns are keeping children awake at night

Half of young children are anxious about the effects of global warming, often losing sleep because of their concern, according to a new report today.

A survey of 1,150 youngsters aged between seven and 11 found that one in four blamed politicians for the problems of climate change.

One in seven of those questioned by supermarket giant Somerfield said their own parents were not doing enough to improve the environment.

The most feared consequences of global warming included poor health, the possible submergence of entire countries and the welfare of animals.

Most of those polled understood the benefits of recycling, although one in 10 thought the issue was linked to riding a bike.

Lets see... Politicians cause global warming? ok; lots of hot air there.

'Nuf said..

Utopia by force

Sleight-of-(2nd) Hand?

That is one thing that is true, regardless of the issue. Implementing any sort of utopia requires that the truth be damned, and use of force.

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Mike is on to something here

Cardinal Giacomo Biffi on Antichrist

here is something he wrote two years ago regarding the Antichrist:

The days are coming, and are already here…
by Giacomo Biffi

The Antichrist, says Soloviev, was "a convinced spiritualist." He believed in goodness, and even in God. He was an ascetic, a scholar, a philanthropist. He gave "the greatest possible demonstrations of moderation, disinterest, and active beneficence."

In his early youth, he had distinguished himself as a talented and insightful exegete: one of his extensive works on biblical criticism had brought him an honorary degree from the University of Tübingen.

But the book that had gained for him universal fame and consensus bore the title: "The Open Road to Universal Peace and Prosperity," in which "a noble respect for ancient traditions and symbols was joined with a sweeping, audacious radicalism toward social and political needs and directives. Limitless freedom of thought was united with a profound comprehension of everything mystical; absolute individualism with an ardent dedication to the common good; the most elevated idealism toward guiding principles with the complete precision and viability of practical solutions."

It is true that some men of faith wondered why the name of Christ did not appear even once, but others replied: "If the contents of the book are permeated with the true Christian spirit, with active love and universal benevolence, what more do you want?" Besides, he "was not in principle hostile to Christ." On the contrary, he appreciated his right intentions and lofty teaching.

But three things about Jesus were unacceptable to him.

First of all, his moral preoccupations. "The Christ," he asserted, "has divided men according to good and evil with his moralism, whereas I will unite them with the benefits that both good and evil alike require."

He also did not like Christ's "absolute uniqueness." He was one of many, or even better – he said – he was my precursor, because I am the perfect and definitive savior; I have purified his message of what is unacceptable for the men of today.

Finally, and above all, he could not endure the fact that Christ is alive, so much so that he repeated hysterically: "He is not among the living, and will never be. He is not risen, he is not risen, he is not risen. He rotted, he rotted in the tomb…"

But where Soloviev's presentation shows itself to be particularly original and surprising – and merits greater reflection – is in the attribution to the Antichrist of the qualities of pacifist, environmentalist, ecumenist. […]

Did Soloviev have a particular person in mind when he made this description of the Antichrist? It is undeniable that he alludes above all to the "new Christianity" that Leo Tolstoy was successfully promoting during those years. […]

In his "Gospel," Tolstoy reduces all of Christianity to five rules of conduct which he derives from the Sermon on the Mount:

1. Not only must you not kill, but you must not even become angry with your brother.

2. You must not give in to sensuality, not even to the desire for your own wife.

3. You must never bind yourself by swearing an oath.

4. You must not resist evil, but you must apply the principle of non-violence to the utmost and in every case.

5. Love, help, and serve your enemy.

According to Tolstoy, although these precepts come from Christ, they in no way require the actual existence of the Son of the living God to be valid. [...]

Of course, Soloviev does not specifically identify the great novelist with the figure of the Antichrist. But he intuited with extraordinary clairvoyance that Tolstoy's creed would become during the 20th century the vehicle of the substantial nullification of the gospel message, under the formal exaltation of an ethics and a love for humanity presented as Christian "values." [...]

The days will come, Soloviev tells us – and are already here, we say – in which the salvific meaning of Christianity, which can be received only in a difficult, courageous, concrete, and rational act of faith, will be dissolved into a series of "values" easily sold on the world markets.

The greatest of the Russian philosophers warns us that we must guard against this danger. Even if a Tolstoian Christianity were to make us infinitely more acceptable in the living room, at social and political gatherings, and on television, we cannot and must not renounce the Christianity of Jesus Christ, the Christianity that has at its center the scandal of the cross and the astonishing reality of the Lord's resurrection.

Jesus Christ, the crucified and risen Son of God, the only savior of mankind, cannot be transformed into a series of worthwhile projects and good inspirations, which are part and parcel of the dominant worldly mentality. Jesus Christ is a "rock," as he said of himself. And one either builds upon this "rock” (by entrusting oneself) or lunges against it (through opposition): "He who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; but when it falls on any one, it will crush him" (Mt. 21:44). [...]

So Soloviev's teaching was simultaneously prophetic and largely ignored. But we want to repropose it in the hope that Christianity will finally catch on to it and pay it a bit of attention.

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Hat tip to Simon-Peter

Scaremongers

By + Cardinal George Pell
Archbishop of Sydney
18/2/2007

Global warming doomsdayers were out and about in a big way recently, but the rain came in Central Queensland and then here in Sydney. January also was unusually cool.

We have been subjected to a lot of nonsense about climate disasters as some zealots have been painting extreme scenarios to frighten us. They claim ocean levels are about to rise spectacularly, that there could be the occasional tsunami as high as an eight story building, the Amazon basin could be destroyed as the ice cap in the Arctic and in Greenland melts.

An overseas magazine called for Nuremberg-style trials for global warming skeptics while a U.S.A. television correspondent compared skeptics to “holocaust deniers”.

A local newspaper editorial’s complaint about the doomsdayers’ religious enthusiasm is unfair to mainstream Christianity. Christians don’t go against reason although we sometimes go beyond it in faith to embrace probabilities. What we were seeing from the doomsdayers was an induced dose of mild hysteria, semi-religious if you like, but dangerously close to superstition.

I am deeply skeptical about man-made catastrophic global warming, but still open to further evidence. I would be surprised if industrial pollution, and carbon emissions, had no ill effect at all. But enough is enough.

A few fixed points might provide some light. We know that enormous climate changes have occurred in world history, e.g. the Ice Ages and Noah’s flood, where human causation could only be negligible. Neither should it be too surprising to learn that the media during the last 100 years has alternated between promoting fears of a coming Ice Age and fear of global warming!

Terrible droughts are not infrequent in Australian history, sometimes lasting seven or eight years, as with the Federation Drought and in the 1930s. One drought lasted fourteen years.

We all know that a cool January does not mean much in the long run, but neither does evidence from a few years only. Scaremongers have used temperature fluctuations in limited periods and places to misrepresent longer patterns.

The evidence on warming is mixed, often exaggerated, but often reassuring. Global warming has been increasing constantly since 1975 at the rate of less than one fifth of a degree centigrade per decade. The concentration of carbon dioxide increased surface temperatures more in winter than in summer and especially in mid and high latitudes over land, while there was a global cooling of the stratosphere.

The East Anglia university climate research unit found that global temperatures did not increase between 1998 – 2005 and a recent NASA satellite found that the Southern Hemisphere has not warmed in the past 25 years. Is mild global warming a Northern phenomenon?

While we might have been alarmed by the sighting of an iceberg off Dunedin as large as an aircraft carrier we should be consoled by the news that the Antarctic is getting colder and the ice is growing there.

The science is more complicated than the propaganda!

hat tip

Pursuing happiness and protecting the unborn child

Pursuing happiness and protecting the unborn child
E-Column by Bishop Robert Vasa

want to spend one more week reflecting on Father Robert Spitzer's presentation of the Four Levels of Happiness. Recall that he wrote: "these four levels of happiness dramatically affect our viewpoints on every important personal and cultural issue we face. The level of happiness we tend to live for will determine how we view success, what we mean by quality of life, what we think love is, how we interpret suffering, the system of ethics we live by, and how we understand freedom, rights, and the common good."
Father Spitzer writes his book, Healing the Culture, with a particular emphasis on the life issues, especially abortion. As implied above, the American attitude toward policies and agendas is dramatically affected by the level of happiness which is sought. In a culture where the quest for personal fulfillment and gratification, personal happiness and wholeness, personal pleasure and enrichment is largely accepted as an appropriate ultimate norm and goal, then permissive policies in relation to abortion, contraception, euthanasia, assisted suicide, same-sex marriage, and the like make perfectly good short term sense. When we consider ourselves as creatures of God, created in His image and likeness and redeemed by Jesus and destined, by God's plan and design, for an eternity in heaven, then these same permissive polices are seen as serious violations of human dignity. In other words the level of happiness we tend to live for will determine how we "understand freedom, rights and the common good."
It is axiomatic that young children are great at asking wonderful and simple questions, most notably: 'Why?' This is, in reality, the philosopher's question. For each of us striving and living with a view of heaven in mind, it is an important question as well. It is well known that some, and by some reports many, Catholics hold rather ambivalent views about the evil of abortion, contraception, euthanasia, assisted suicide, same-sex marriage and a host of other issues claimed as rights. I find it somewhat understandable that someone with no faith background could support and promote these things, but I find it incomprehensible that a thoughtful Catholic who has pondered eternal realities could do so.
Perhaps the "why" questions, even without the light of faith or belief in God, would proceed in this fashion: Why is it permissible to take the life of pre-born child? In order to promote the good of the mother or some other societal good. Why is the life of the mother superior to the life of the pre-born child? Because she has relationships and experiences and emotions and thoughts and the pre-born baby does not. Why should someone with a perceived higher quality of life be given the right to deliberately take the life of someone with a perceived lower quality of life? Because it's her body and she has the right to do what she wants, the Supreme Court said so. Why would the Supreme Court determine that a child's right to life is somehow less important than a woman's "right" to choose? Because freedom is an important American value and it needs to be protected. Why is it that, in the list of inalienable rights, life is always first, liberty second and pursuit of happiness third? Because without life there is no possibility of liberty, and without liberty there is no possibility of a pursuit of happiness. Why would the Supreme Court determine that a child's right to life is somehow less important than a woman's "right" to choose? Because they were operating out of a different value system, a system which prized individual liberty above life itself. Why should someone with a perceived higher quality of life have a greater responsibility to take care of the life of someone with a perceived lower quality of life? Because life is foundational and needs to be protected. Why is the life of the mother equivalent in value to the life of the pre-born child? Because the right that someone has to life can never appropriately be tied to one's productivity, usefulness, effectiveness, relational value, age, gender, or mental capacity. Why is it not permissible to take, directly and intentionally, the life of pre-born child? Because life is a more foundational right, even in civil law, than freedom or pursuit of happiness. The direct and intentional taking of the life of an innocent human being is wrong. This is not something we believe because of a determination of the Supreme Court. We believe it because it is true regardless of the opinion of the Court.
When we add a faith-related or God-related element to this consideration, the incomprehensibility of a pro-abortion position on the part of a thoughtful Catholic is further heightened. "Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception. From the first moment of his existence, a human being must be recognized as having the rights of a person - among which is the inviolable right of every innocent being to life." (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2270)
In order to comprehend a Catholic pro-abortion stand one must abandon Level Three and Level Four considerations and stay inflexibly at Level One or Level Two. At these levels one is able to maintain a pro-abortion stand because (Level One) there is an apparent immediate benefit to the one "choosing" the abortion. It appears to be "good" for her or for her family. This person is granted an instant and seemingly permanent solution to a short term (nine month) "problem." At Level One, with little consideration for long term effects or impact on a foundational good of another, abortion provides a solution. Level One thinking cannot see beyond the self. At Level Two, with its emphasis on control and exercise of power and freedom, the pre-born child is seen as an interloper who would "complete" with the mother for her personal resources or her personal happiness.
The child and mother are thus pitted against one another as competitors; one seeking life, the other freedom. The child is seen, not as a separate and distinct person with his or her own rights and dignity, but only as an impediment to the freedom of the mother, and at Level Two, impediments are made to be overcome or removed. But a child is not an impediment. A child is a human being who has a right to life and, if that right is not summarily taken away in favor of another's right to choose, a subsequent right to pursue Level Three and Level Four Happiness.

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This electronic newsletter may be duplicated, reproduced or retransmitted only in its entirety. Excerpts used for the purposes of quotation must be attributed explicitly to Bishop Robert Vasa and the Catholic Sentinel.

Pask a fisk?

This article is from professor James V. Shall, as published in Crisis Magazine (Feb 2007).

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Sense & Nonsense
James V. Schall
On Murder and War

Originally, Veterans’ Day commemorated the end of the Great War, the bloodiest of all wars. On its eve, I was invited to supper at the Army and Navy Club off McPherson Square in Washington, D.C. Walking from the bus stop, I approached a corner of the square where an earnest young man stood with a large sign that read: “If Murder Is a Crime, What Is War?” “If this logic is correct,” I thought, “Schall should definitely not be dining at the Army and Navy Club on Armistice Day!”

This street-corner question cannot be fairly answered. Distinctions must be made; definitions set down. We can agree that war is murder if, but only if, it is unjust. Though each may still be wrong, neither war nor murder by itself is a crime. Technically, a crime is a legally defined aberration. It presupposes an objective wrongness to which it gives the sanction of law.

But if war is just, it is neither murder nor a crime. It is quite possible that not to fight against injustice is itself both a crime and cooperation in murder. Those who participate in a just war, however, exercise the virtue of courage. They protect innocent lives and worthy institutions from precisely what is unjust.

What seems like logic would have us identify one thing with another—“war” with “murder”—when they cannot be so identified. Such confusions make me wonder whether more damage is not caused in the world by faulty thinking than by war itself. No one who thinks and, subsequently, practices the dubious doctrine that war is ipso facto murder can ever be relied on to repulse an enemy or to protect anyone from any criminal state or movement.

The tyrant’s greatest friend is the one who refuses to protect the innocent. Even worse are those unable to define what innocence is. Such a doctrine that war is murder, by its nature, turns the world over to the vicious, to those who understand that no just force stands in their way. Naïveté and innocence are not ready helpers of peace. Peace, when it means “no effort to defend ourselves no matter what the issue,” is frighteningly easy to attain in this world.

What about the principle that “all war is evil”? It sounds edifying. But again, one has to distinguish: Are all wars on both sides evil? Are there no cases in history in which refusal to fight has made things worse? Is not the main hope of tyrants to teach their enemies doctrines of pacifism—that nothing is worth dying for? Are people who refuse or are unable to make distinctions so innocent after all?

If the alternative to war is not justice, is war still murder? Can institutions of peace, dialogue, discussion, and diplomacy exist without the reasonable use of force behind them? Only if such things as disorder in human nature did not exist would this dream be possible. Such dire things might be minimized or controlled, but not without some rational presence of force. If all power corrupts, so does all lack of power.

Is this view not pessimistic? Where is the hope for a better world? In a trenchant phrase, St. Paul told the Romans that the emperor bears the sword for the correction of our wrongdoing. Was this just pious talk designed to cover what he really meant, namely, that no arms are necessary? Hardly. It was a clear and practical estimate of what occurs in human nature. Is the emperor—that is, the civil power—always benign? Again, hardly.

Why are soldiers honored? Why do we have Armistice Day? Is it because “war is murder”? Are soldiers, because they are soldiers, criminals? These arguments only make sense if we refuse to acknowledge that enemies exist and that our freedom and way of life are at stake—if we deny that such things as truth and justice exist. War is not the problem. Dubious ideas are, when willed.

Rev. James V. Schall, S.J . , teaches political science at Georgetown University.

I may get this yet...

same source

Initial lift off...

Ok, time to try this modern communications thingy out...

Shamelessly borrowed from Simon-Peter Says