Film review: AMAZING GRACE

March 16, 2007

The film Amazing Grace, currently playing in theaters, is a multi-layered story of love and triumph against powerful cultural forces that supported the slave trade in the United Kingdom. On the most basic level, it's the personal story of William Wilberforce, a British Member of Parliament, who championed the abolition of slavery in the UK during the 18th Century. On a deeper level, the film chronicles the cultural conflict between the entrenched evil of the slave trade and the force of the Truth. It is an unabashedly Christian message in our morally ambiguous age.

William Wilberforce, played by Ioan Gruffudd, was only 21 when he was elected to Parliament fresh from Cambridge, where he was graduated in 1780. Soon after entering Parliament he had a profound Christian conversion, and then began a twenty-year crusade against the slave trade. The film chronicles his life from that point on, using long flashbacks to alternate between his early public life and his climatic strugglesto achieve a vote against the slavers.

Wilberforce suffers physically during the second act, and his friends show great care and concern for him by seeing to his medication and encouraging him to rest. As the film progresses, his physical suffering from untreatable colitis seems to parallel the spiritual suffering he underwent trying to convince his countrymen of the evils of the slave trade. The film draws us into the debate as we accompany Wilberforce on a tour of a slave ship, guided by a freedman, Olaudah Equiano (Youssou N'Dour). He describes the brutal conditions of the hold where women were raped, the weak were cast overboard to lighten the load, and death stalked each African slave on the passage. Wilberforce and his friends also arrange for a river "tour" of the harbor for aristocrats, causing them to pass close by a slave ship where they could smell the stench of death emanating therefrom. The capstone for me was the scene where Equiano bares his branded chest and explains, "They give you this so that you know that you no longer belong to God, but to a man."

When his suffering is almost too much to bear, Wilberforce's friends come to the rescue by introducing him to the woman who would be his wife, Barbara Spooner (Romola Garai). She is intelligent and full of life, and, through her, his passion and strength for the cause is renewed. As their love blossoms, we see color return to the screen and the grey of suffering begins to pale. There is one scene in particular that becomes the turning point for his life's work. William and Barbara have spent the entire night talking, he narrating his effort to free the slaves and she encouraging him to go on, when he walks to the window and realizes it has become morning. As the third act begins, he opens the curtains to let the sunrise into the room, and Barbara reminds him, "after the night comes the dawn."

The third act begins with the wedding of Barbara and William, and the story is then completed in a series of scenes depicting the backroom political maneuvering in Parliament. As victory nears, Wilberforce's good humor returns and the story lightens a bit. Clearly his new wife, Barbara, and their children have a positive effect on Wilberforce, even apparently improving his physical condition. At the end, after achieving the political victory with the vote to outlaw slavery throughout the British dominion, he is so recognized for his achievement that even his political adversaries acknowledge his character.

Amazing Grace has a talented supporting cast, including Albert Finney who plays the evangelical preacher, John Newton, author of the popular hymn that lends the movie its name. Newton provides the binding of the film, and in some ways the voice of God, in guiding young Wilberforce to discern how best to serve God. Newton looks him straight in the eye and tells him flatly, "You have work to do." Wilberforce recognizes it as his commission. The rest of the cast is equally spectacular, giving performances both effortless and powerful.

The photography and musical score guide the mood of the film without becoming overbearing, lending credibility to each scene, and immersing the audience in the Britain of 200 years ago.

The film explores a number of themes: the dignity of life, the value of suffering, and the necessity for perseverance for truth, even, with a simple remark by Barbara, of the true end of marriage -- being open to life. I was struck again and again by the parallels between the fight then against the slavers and the fight now against the abortionists. As my dear mother often said, "the more things change, the more they remain the same."

Men of faith like William Wilberforce led the way for the abolitionists, and there was considerable cultural conflict between institutions and groups over the issue in America as well. At one time, the U.S. Postmaster General refused to carry abolitionist publications to the South, teachers with abolitionist beliefs were excluded from Southern schools, and even Harvard, Yale, and Princeton resisted the tide of abolitionist feelings in the North and sided with the slaveholders. Predictably, there was conflict between American Catholics and the Pope over the issue, with some American Catholics dissenting from Pope Gregory XVII's bull In Supremo Apostolatus that forcefully decried slavery and the slave trade as a "disgrace from the whole confines of Christianity" and "utterly unworthy the Christian name." Undoubtedly there were some Catholics, clergy among them, who took the position of "personally opposed" to the issue of the permanent bondage of another man.

Just as the Abolitionists were shouted down by "polite and established society," so the Pro-Life Movement is forced to shout to be heard. Once again, the established institutions of Harvard, Princeton, and Yale are on the wrong side of the issue, supporting the murder of the innocent as "choice." Pro-Life teachers are told to toe the line or loose their jobs, just like those who were sent away from the South in the 1850s. And once again, American Catholics, clergy among them, dissent from the magisterial teachings on the subject.

Just as his predecessor did, the current successor to Peter has spoken clearly to reaffirm the ancient Christian horror at the murder of innocent children. In 2005, Pope Benedict said, "For this reason, it is necessary to help all people to be aware that the intrinsic evil of the crime of abortion, which attacks human life at its beginning, is also an aggression against society itself." [emphasis mine]. Just as with slavery, Benedict knows that to cheapen a single human life cheapens all human life, and abortion most certainly reduces human life to a commodity, a child to mere property that a woman may dispose of as she chooses. Similarly, embryonic stem cell research takes tiny human beings and rips them asunder for their parts as one would disassemble a car for the a spare piston.

Some people on the pro-abortion side call for "compromise" and ask Pro-Life persons to "work together to make abortion rare." But there can be no middle ground in this issue because there is no middle state between life and death. Either a person is alive or they are not ... and innocent life must be defended. It is our responsibility, it is our duty, it is our vocation.

The success of the Abolitionist movement of the 19th Century should give us great hope, for far smaller groups than the Pro-life Movement inspired great progress in the protection of human beings from slavery. The new terrible slavery that grips the land is on the wane, despite what one might hear in "polite society." Two-hundred thousand people marched in Washington's freezing temperatures just a few weeks ago, and thousands more marched in other cities. Pro-Life politicians are being elected, and slowly the unjust laws that condemn men and society to the bondage of death are being rolled back.

It's really only a matter of time now, and I'm very proud to call myself an Abolitionist.

Copyright 2007 Catholic Exchange

Mickey Addison is a career military officer, and has been a catechist at the parish level since 2000. He and his wife have been married for 19 years and they have two children. He can be reached at addisoncrew@gmail.com.

The Great Global Warming Swindle

Complete video is available here

March 15, 2007
Global Warming Swindle
By Thomas Sowell (http://www.realclearpolitics.com)

Britain's Channel 4 has produced a devastating documentary titled "The Great Global Warming Swindle." It has apparently not been broadcast by any of the networks in the United States. But, fortunately, it is available on the Internet.

Distinguished scientists specializing in climate and climate-related fields talk in plain English and present readily understood graphs showing what a crock the current global warming hysteria is.

These include scientists from MIT and top-tier universities in a number of countries. Some of these are scientists whose names were paraded on some of the global warming publications that are being promoted in the media -- but who state plainly that they neither wrote those publications nor approved them.

One scientist threatened to sue unless his name was removed.

While the public has been led to believe that "all" the leading scientists buy the global warming hysteria and the political agenda that goes with it, in fact the official reports from the United Nations or the National Academy of Sciences are written by bureaucrats -- and then garnished with the names of leading scientists who were "consulted," but whose contrary conclusions have been ignored.

There is no question that the globe is warming but it has warmed and cooled before, and is not as warm today as it was some centuries ago, before there were any automobiles and before there was as much burning of fossil fuels as today.

None of the dire things predicted today happened then.

The British documentary goes into some of the many factors that have caused the earth to warm and cool for centuries, including changes in activities on the sun, 93 million miles away and wholly beyond the jurisdiction of the Kyoto treaty.

According to these climate scientists, human activities have very little effect on the climate, compared to many other factors, from volcanoes to clouds.

These climate scientists likewise debunk the mathematical models that have been used to hype global warming hysteria, even though hard evidence stretching back over centuries contradicts these models.

What is even scarier than seeing how easily the public, the media, and the politicians have been manipulated and stampeded, is discovering how much effort has been put into silencing scientists who dare to say that the emperor has no clothes.

Academics who jump on the global warming bandwagon are far more likely to get big research grants than those who express doubts -- and research is the lifeblood of an academic career at leading universities.

Environmental movements around the world are committed to global warming hysteria and nowhere more so than on college and university campuses, where they can harass those who say otherwise. One of the scientists interviewed on the British documentary reported getting death threats.

In politics, even conservative Republicans seem to have taken the view that, if you can't lick 'em, join 'em. So have big corporations, which have joined the stampede.

This only enables the green crusaders to declare at every opportunity that "everybody" believes the global warming scenario, except for a scattered few "deniers" who are likened to Holocaust deniers.

The difference is that we have the hardest and most painful evidence that there was a Holocaust. But, for the global warming scenario that is causing such hysteria, we have only a movie made by a politician and mathematical models whose results change drastically when you change a few of the arbitrarily selected variables.

No one denies that temperatures are about a degree warmer than they were a century ago.

What the climate scientists in the British documentary deny is that you can mindlessly extrapolate that, or that we are headed for a climate catastrophe if we don't take drastic steps that could cause an economic catastrophe.

"Global warming" is just the latest in a long line of hysterical crusades to which we seem to be increasingly susceptible.

Correction: Britain's Channel 4 produced the documentary "The Great Global Warming Swindle," not the BBC. References to the BBC have been corrected or removed.

Copyright 2007 Creators Syndicate

"Religion" of Environmentalism

Czech President: "Religion" of Environmentalism a way of
"masterminding human society from above"
A "New World Order" With Warming "Deniers" Threatened

By John-Henry Westen

LONDON, March 12, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The general appreciation for taking care of the earth's resources, of being stewards of creation is being exploited to drive a political and even mythological system of environmentalism. The President of the Czech Republic spoke at the Cato Institute Friday calling "environmentalism" a "religion", and warning against the hysteria being generated by 'global warming' enthusiasts."

All of us are very much in favour of maximum environmental protection and protection of nature," said President Vaclav Klaus during a follow-up interview for a Cato podcast. "But it has nothing in common with environmentalism, which is ideological and practically attacking our freedom."

Environmentalism is, he said "a way of introducing new forms of statism, new forms of masterminding human society from above." The Czech President noted that the citizens of his nation experienced communism first hand giving them awareness of agendas of domination. It is, he said, "something we feel very strongly about because our experience with communism gives us very special sensitivity in this respect."

Almost as if on queue, Gordon Brown, likely to replace Tony Blair as the next British prime minister, delivered a speech today calling for a "new world order" to combat global warming. He called on the United Nations to make the fight against global warming a core "pillar" of its international mission.

The warnings of President Klaus come as no surprise to the pro-life movement which has warned for years that Kyoto and similar proposals to counter global warming have at their core a population control agenda.

According to scientists who contest the science behind global warming, the faithful followers of the environmentalist religion do not sanction dissent. Timothy Ball, a former climatology professor at the University of Winnipeg in Canada, told the Sunday Telegraph that he has received five deaths threats by email since raising concerns about the degree to which man was affecting climate change."

I can tolerate being called a sceptic because all scientists should be sceptics, but then they started calling us deniers, with all the connotations of the Holocaust," said Ball. "That is an obscenity. It has got really nasty and personal."

The Telegraph also reports that Richard Lindzen, the professor of Atmospheric Science at Massachusetts Institute of Technology recently stated that: "Scientists who dissent from the alarmism have seen their funds disappear, their work derided, and themselves labelled as industry stooges." Dr Myles Allen, from Oxford University, concurred: "The Green movement has hijacked the issue of climate change. It is ludicrous to suggest the only way to deal with the problem is to start micro managing everyone, which is what environmentalists seem to want to do."

To hear the podcast interview with President Klaus:
President Vaclav Klaus: Environmentalism as Religion

Moment of Reckoning

From the March Editorial in "This Rock" magazine

Here at Catholic Answers, we begin every day with Mass celebrated by our chaplain, Fr. Vincent Serpa, O.P. At the “sign of the peace,” Fr. Vincent says, “Peace be with you,’ and we respond “and also with you.” Then he proceeds with the breaking of the host. In other words, we skip the handshaking, hugging, kissing, waving, and peace-sign flashing that is characteristic of most parish Masses.

Although the exchange of a sign of peace among the congregation is optional, most Catholics are not aware of that. That is not surprising given the emphasis on the sign of peace in many parishes. Many people would interpret its omission her as a sign that we don’t care about community or peace.

That’s far from true; we have a genuine Christian community. Nonetheless, we are sinners, and like every other workplace, we have conflicts and tensions. So, I like the omission of the shake, rattle, and roll at our daily Mass. In that moment of silence, with nothing to distract the conscience, any lack of peace resounds like a foghorn.

Moreover, that moment of silence is a fitting metaphor of a Christian understanding of peace. This understanding gets lost in most conversations on the topic.

The world sees peace as something relatively easy to achieve, given the right intervention. But a moment’s consideration will make it obvious that peace is not accomplished by a simple gesture during Mass, let alone by picketing in front of the School of the Americas. Partial peace begins with each of us living lives of heroic virtue.

It is only partial because peace in this life is never fully accomplished. It is never absolute. It cannot be chosen, for example, in the same way chastity or temperance can be chosen because peace is dependent on other people. It is always temporary and always fragile. The world talks as if we could bring about complete and lasting peace by our own efforts. What we long for, however, can be found only in Christ.

In the words of Dietrich von Hildebrand:

We must not seek peace for its own sake, and on no account must we seek any and every kind of peace, but seek God and content ourselves with that peace which He alone can give to our soul. Those restless in the world are nearer to God than those satisfied in the world.

In that tension – the space between the peace we desire and the lack of it which confronts us – we Christians dwell.

Cherie Peacock, Editor, This Rock magazine

The Great Global Warming Swindle

On British TV:

Channel 4 Thursday 8 March at 9pm

In a polemical and thought-provoking documentary, film-maker Martin Durkin argues that the theory of man-made global warming has become such a powerful political force that other explanations for climate change are not being properly aired.

The film brings together the arguments of leading scientists who disagree with the prevailing consensus that a 'greenhouse effect' of carbon dioxide released by human activity is the cause of rising global temperatures.

Instead the documentary highlights recent research that the effect of the sun's radiation on the atmosphere may be a better explanation for the regular swings of climate from ice ages to warm interglacial periods and back again.

The film argues that the earth's climate is always changing, and that rapid warmings and coolings took place long before the burning of fossil fuels. It argues that the present single-minded focus on reducing carbon emissions not only may have little impact on climate change, it may also have the unintended consequence of stifling development in the third world, prolonging endemic poverty and disease.

The film features an impressive roll-call of experts, including nine professors – experts in climatology, oceanography, meteorology, environmental science, biogeography and paleoclimatology – from such reputable institutions as MIT, NASA, the International Arctic Research Centre, the Institut Pasteur, the Danish National Space Center and the Universities of London, Ottawa, Jerusalem, Winnipeg, Alabama and Virginia.

The film hears from scientists who dispute the link between carbon dioxide levels and global temperatures.

'The ice core record goes to the very heart of the problem we have,' says Tim Ball, Climatologist and Prof Emeritus of Geography at the University of Winnipeg in the documentary. 'They said if CO2 increases in the atmosphere, as a greenhouse gas, then the temperature will go up'.

In fact, the experts in the film argue that increased CO2 levels are actually a result of temperature rises, not their cause, and that this alternate view is rarely heard. 'So the fundamental assumption, the most fundamental assumption of the whole theory of climate change due to humans, is shown to be wrong.'

'I've often heard it said that there is a consensus of thousands of scientists on the global warming issue, that humans are causing a catastrophic change to the climate system,' says John Christy, Professor and Director of the Earth System Science Center, NSSTC University of Alabama. 'Well I am one scientist, and there are many, that simply think that is not true.'

The film examines an alternative theory that explains global temperatures, based on research by Professor Eigil Friis-Christensen of the Danish Space Center. The professor and his team found that as solar activity increases, and the sun flares, cloud formation on earth is significantly diminished and temperature rises.

Ian Clark, Professor of Isotope hydrogeology and paleoclimatology at the Dept of Earth Sciences, University of Ottawa explains: 'Solar activity over the last hundred years, over the last several hundred years, correlates very nicely, on a decadal basis, with temperature.'

Finally, the film argues that restricting CO2 emissions could actually be damaging for people in the developing world. James Shikwati, Kenyan director of the Inter Region Economic Network, says: 'The rich countries can afford to engage in some luxurious experimentation with other forms of energy, but for us we are still at the stage of survival.

'I don't see how a solar panel is going to power a steel industry, how a solar panel is going to power a railway network, it might work, maybe, to power a small transistor radio.

'The thing that emerges from the whole environmental debate is the point that there is somebody keen to kill the African dream, and the African dream is to develop. We are being told don't touch your resources, don't touch your oil, don't touch your coal; that is suicide.'

Watch trailer here

More Schall

From the Schall archives:

The Political Philosophy of Aquinas

Thomas Aquinas put things succinctly. He found numberless things about which to think. He could, with few words, illuminate the whole of what is in logical form. He wrote little about political things. He discussed other topics normally called “political”—property, rebellion, prudence, justice, virtue, and common good. In commenting on the Gospels of Matthew and John, he spoke of the death of Christ and the things of Caesar.

Here, in propositional form, is what Aquinas held about political things. Presenting them this way gives, I hope, some overall view of where Aquinas's thought leads.

1) A human being, body and soul, is a single person, created for his own sake, with a destiny that transcends and therefore limits any political order. 2) Man is and remains naturally a political animal. 3) A state (polity) is an established relationship existing among real human beings, outlining the order of action, especially free actions, toward one another. 4) The highest end of man is thus not political. The political can and should provide “happiness,” usually called “temporal.” No actual polity is perfect. Often it contains laws or customs militating against the human good.

5) Human happiness consists in the activities of the virtues, the objects of which are our fears, pleasures, relation to others, property, wit, anger, and speech. Each person is responsible for his own self-rule. 6) Every action has an accompanying proper pleasure. Pleasure as such is never wrong, only its experience when out of order. It is designed to foster and enhance the goods that are given to us. 7) The forms of rule correspond to the order or disorder of souls. Polities reflect the habitual choices of the citizens, their self-definition of what they consider to be virtue or vice. Modern notions that the soul is only formed by the polity deny the basis and origin of vitality and action in the public order. 8) Law, defined as “the ordination of reason, for the common good, by the proper authority, and promulgated,” is the context in which Aquinas discusses most political things. An unreasonable law is no law, as Aquinas cites from Augustine; it lacks one or more elements of this definition.

9) A thing can be an end that itself becomes a means to a further end. Thus, the polity is an end, but it ordains those within it to a higher purpose. The polity does not itself define this higher purpose, but only recognizes it. 10) A polity needs to contain within itself at least some who are wholly oriented to what is beyond politics. All members of any existing polity are intended for a transcendent destiny. The presence of contemplatives and philosophers within any society is necessary for its well-being. 11) The life of politics is worthy but dangerous. The Fall is a factor in each individual life, including that of the politician. His virtues are prudence and justice; however, legal justice brings all virtues under the purview of the polity.

12) The majority of men are not perfect. Therefore the law should not be more strict than the majority of ordinary men can observe. 13) Law ought to be a standard of what is right or wrong even if it is not fully observed. 14) Virtue is not simply following the letter of the law; it is normally more strict or noble than what the law defines. 15) Aquinas holds that private property is the best way to meet the purposes for which the world is given—i.e., that the generality of men can provide for themselves.

16) Revelation is given so that ordinary men can do what is right and necessary both for their own salvation and, indirectly, for the good of the polity. 17) Revelation addresses reason. Reason will only recognize this address provided reason has already formulated genuine questions that it has asked itself and attempted to answer.

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

Bp Vasa speaks

There are just and unjust choices -
church teaching helps
03/01/2007 Bishop Robert Vasa

This week I had the honor of presiding, at both Bend and Baker City, over a ceremony known as the Rite of Election.

This is the ceremony in which those who have been engaged in the process of learning about the Catholic Faith with a view to joining the Church make a public declaration of their intention and the Church, represented by the Bishop or the Pastor, officially declares that the intention of the Church is to welcome them to full communion at Easter.

It is an important step for the Catechumens (that is, those who are preparing to be baptized) and for the Candidates (those who are already baptized). It is a day of decision, a day of deeper commitment, a day of resolution, a day of joy and a day of peace. The joy of the day is shared by the spouses and friends of the candidates and catechumens and it is shared, in a particular way, by the sponsors who have accompanied these candidates and catechumens on this portion of their faith journey.

I commend and thank all those who are involved in the catechetical process. I especially encourage all throughout the Diocese who are now involved, throughout this Lenten Season, in a particularly intensive spiritual preparation for Profession of Faith, Baptism, Confession, Eucharist and Confirmation.

The actual entry into the Church most properly takes place at the Easter Vigil for those who are preparing for Baptism. For them there is a Profession of Faith, the Baptismal Promises, Baptism, Confirmation and Holy Communion.

For those already baptized there is a Profession of Faith, Confession and then Confirmation and Holy Communion.

The Candidates recite the Creed and then add their personal attestation and commitment. It is this personal commitment which constitutes the heart of their conversion to the Catholic Faith. The phrase which is added is this: “I believe and profess all that the Holy Catholic Church teaches, believes and proclaims to be revealed by God.” It is a moment of great freedom; a moment of abandonment of oneself into the hands of God and into the teachings of the Catholic Church. It is an unconditional “yes” to Jesus while at the same time recognizing that we may never completely know all that this “yes” entails.

Nonetheless the commitment is made, the pledge is spoken and it is then sealed with the Gift of the Holy Spirit in Confirmation. This commitment recognizes that believing is a graced choice and not merely a feeling; it is a decision. It is a decision which irrevocably alters the whole of the rest of our lives. It is a decision which alters how we see the world.

For example, the commitment of Faith entails certain beliefs about the Most Holy Eucharist. The Church teaches that the bread consecrated at Mass really and truly becomes the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. My attestation of faith confirms that I choose, in response to the grace of Faith, to believe this. Once I make this commitment of faith, my own “I believe”, then it is incumbent upon me to live in a way consistent with that profession of belief. It is radically inconsistent to declare on the one hand that I believe the Eucharist is truly our Lord and at the same time to conclude that I owe no special deference or honor to that Eucharistic Lord. The conclusion belies the declaration. If I truly believe then my actions must be consistent with what I profess to believe. My actions must also defend what I believe. For example, because I believe that the Lord is truly present under the form of bread and wine it would be unconscionable for me to allow someone else to scatter Consecrated Hosts throughout a Church, to keep a Consecrated Host in their home as a personal possession or to allow someone to receive Holy Communion when it is patently clear that they lack the proper understanding or disposition.

Thus, if someone were to say to me in response to a question about the need to protect the Most Blessed Sacrament from profanation: “To me it is not even a question. God has given us a free will. We are all responsible for our actions. If you do not want to scatter Consecrated Hosts throughout the Church, you do not believe in doing that, then do not do it. But do not tell somebody else what they can do in terms of honoring their religious convictions. After all, they are just choices.” Clearly, such a position would belie one’s authentic belief in the Real Presence of our Lord. At very least such a position would contradict one’s attestation that they “believe and profess all that the Holy Catholic Church teaches, believes and proclaims to be revealed by God.”

Some months ago a prominent Catholic public person, described as faithful to the church, was asked if being pro-choice or pro-abortion was an issue which conflicted with the Catholic Faith. Here is what was said: “To me it isn’t even a question. God has given us a free will. We’re all responsible for our actions. If you don’t want an abortion, you don’t believe in it, then don’t have one. But don’t tell somebody else what they can do in terms of honoring their responsibilities.” According to a close relative the choice to have an abortion or not to have an abortion had no moral component whatsoever. “They were just choices.”

It seems to me that there are just choices and there are unjust choices. Choices would be the preference for chocolate ice cream over vanilla ice cream or sherbet instead of ice cream. That is just a choice.

A just choice would be to choose to pay a fair and living wage to employees as opposed to simply meeting the mandatory standard of minimum wage laws. An unjust choice would be to choose to terminate the life of another human being. This is not just a choice and it is not a just choice; it is an unjust choice.

Furthermore it is an unjust choice which is diametrically opposed to the clear and consistent teaching of the Catholic Church as well as to the clear and consistent teaching of God Himself in the Ten Commandments. The direct, intentional taking of the life of an innocent human being is inhumane and unjust. It is not just a choice!

It is categorically impossible for the same person to state that he or she believes simultaneously both what the Catholic Church teaches and that abortion is just a choice. What we believe must inform what we do.

Copyright 2002-2006, Catholic Sentinel, Portland, Oregon