And against my vow to not rant - I'm going to have a minor rant anyway - because.
I'm mad as hell! And so is Mr. Matt. If you need any back-up for your outrage, Mr. Matt will inject some steel into your spine - which is a hell of a lot better than having a dangerous death vax injected.
For over a year, we've been inundated with lie after lie. And no one except the "fringe" media, and the people I call "the littles" told you. Our reward? We were insulted, laughed at, "canceled", called "conspiracy theorists", and shunned. Was it worth it? Yes! If we persuaded even one person to eschew the death vax, it was not in vain.
Now the CDC is pushing for 12 - 17 year olds to be "vaccinated." Really? Why?
But through it all, there’s a common theme that continues to get ignored. So much was apparently known by Fauci and many others in and out of DC, yet we’re only learning about it all today and only because of the leaks. How is it possible that nobody spoke out before now? Doread the rest
Finally, a quote from the conclusion of an excellent article in Forward in Christ magazine, PSYCHOPATHS AND HERETICS, by Seth Robinson, in which he outlines what happens when we reject reality. Take some time to read the whole article.
"Refutation and rejection come at a price. Those who would resist a pseudo-reality must be prepared to face the wrath and scorn of its captives. Such resistance may prove terrifying, but as Jude reminds, the true Christ gives a spirit of power, love, and self-discipline—not of timidity. Fake realities and false gospels will enslave and destroy ‘the blessed company of all faithful people,’ unless they are resisted boldly. It can be done, it must be done, and it will be done—for the gates of hell will not prevail."
Indeed!
Michael Matt speaks to all Christians, not just Catholics, and he puts my puny little rant to shame. God bless him!
After watching Michael, please share his video far and wide, and then check out my links below. I've gathered up some fun and happy posts to lighten your weekend.
Bunkerville:Saturday’s Passel of PotpourriNot only does Bunk toil faithfully all week to bring us truth, but every Saturday she gathers up fun clips of the follies of humans. This week she's focused on animal follies - and we thank her.
Bluebird of Bitterness:Happy Caturday B of B brings us kittehs in slow mo. You don't have to be a kitteh lover to appreciate the grace and beauty of these lovely felines.
Don't forget to check out the Imperfect Foods website. Use this link to get $20.00 off each of your first four orders.
Not only do we Catholics have to deal with the loons in our government, but we also have one of the worst Popes ever. And, yes, Martha, he is your Pope just as Trump is your president.
All I have to know about Francis is that the majority of my family who are not merely lapsed Catholics, but actually apostates, think he's just so so so very humble and wonderful.
Remember this Catholics and non-Catholics - the teachings of the Church have not changed no matter how many commies the pope hangs out with.
The Remnant's Michael Matt sums it up quickly and succinctly:
Pope Francis is a mediocre politician...
Shop 12 Days of Deals at Amazon I receive a small commission when you purchase through my links - at no additional cost to you. Thank you. Why brick and mortar stores are failing:
After doing much research for a better floor wax for my bathrooms, I finally settled on one that I thought would do the job. So I'm on my local Home Depot site only to be told that, "No, we don't have that at the Coeur d'Alene store, but if you want to drive over to Liberty Lake (15 miles) they have three bottles or..........you can purchase it and we'll bring it over to the Coeur d'Alene store for you. Well, guess what? I don't want to drive to Liberty Lake and I'm not in a hurry so I purchased it only to be told that it would be at the store somewhere between Dec 3 to the 6th.
That was over a week ago. Are you freakin' kidding me? It's going to take them about 10 days to get a bottle of pre-paid floor wax 15 miles??? I guarantee you that someone who works at the Liberty Lake store lives in either Post Falls or Cd'A. They couldn't hand it to this employee and say, "How about dropping off this wax at the Cd'A store on your way home?" And, yes, I get it about hours worked, insurance, and all the other pesky things that go along with making that sort of request of an employee. That can all be handled.
These corporate run mega-stores have completely lost the concept of customer service. They also micro-manage from some headquarters making it impossible for an employee to make a decision (like dragging that wax to Cd'A) that would benefit the company image.
And that, my precious little peaches, is why brick and mortar stores are failing.
Make no mistake: God is not mocked, for a person will reap only what he sows, because the one who sows for his flesh will reap corruption from the flesh, but the one who sows for the spirit will reap eternal life from the spirit.
Let us not grow tired of doing good, for in due time we shall reap our harvest, if we do not give up. Galatians 7: 7-9
Unless you're a lying commie/marxist/libtard - in which case you're giving new meaning to completely insane, off the rails, bat-shit crazy, unhinged, demented, and crack-brained.
Jim Acosta is the latest to whine that Trump is causing people to hate and harass the media. It was okay when Maxine Waters demanded her followers to make life miserable for Trump supporters. Doubling down, Acosta accused Hannity of spreading propaganda. Yawn.
Meantime the Poop Pope is changing the catechism on the death penalty. Is he committing formal heresy? Very possibly. It's one thing for him to voice his opinion on a subject, but to actually change the catechism stating that the previous teaching was "wrong" is dangerous territory. What's next? Perhaps the teaching that homosexuality is intrinsically disordered is wrong? If he's trying to distract from the outing of the homosexual predators in the Church, he picked a good subject.
Is This the Calm Before the Storm?
Lately the news has held little interest for me. Trump is doing his job (with 50% approval) allowing me to do mine.
As I go about my duties in conservative North Idaho the populace seems even more optimistic and cheerful than usual. Is it the same in other parts of the country? Perhaps you can let me know in the combox what you're witnessing in your little slice of the country.
However, the commie/marxist/libtards firmly ensconced in the deep state, will stop at nothing to get rid of Trump. They will accomplish this by trying to impeach him or, dare I say, actually killing him (there - I said it!)
If that happens (God forbid), I envision a civil war breaking out that will decimate this county.
During these difficult times, as the forces of good and evil battle for the high ground, it is a time for prayer, reflection, and calmness.
After a doctor's appointment yesterday, I stopped into a local eatery for breakfast. I generally have a book with me for such occasions. While I was reading and sipping my coffee a nice man came up and said, "It's so nice to see someone actually reading a book instead of having their face glued to a phone."
The sight of people sitting at a table with other people and all of them staring at phones is, in my opinion, just plain creepy. It's particularly offensive when the person is young - as in pre-teen.
It's actually an advert video for the Dolmio Pepper Hacker. It’s a functioning pepper mill with a twist. When you start to grind pepper it shuts off WiFi, TV's and other electronic devices in the home.
In the video we see a cute little pre-teen boy, sitting at the table wearing a wife-beater T-shirt, a big fake diamond earring in one ear, and so glued to his device that he is completely unaware that his family has been switched out for strangers.
The parents are urged to buy a device to shut off the internet access. Is there any earthly reason the parents can't simply tell the little brat, "Put away your phone and while you're at it, go put on something appropriate for dinner?"
Moving on to the much more distressing stuff:
This article at Breitbart made me livid with fury:
Caterpillar Hires H-1B Foreign Graduates, Fires 300 American Professionals
Caterpillar is firing 300 American employees in Mossville, Illinois, even though it is continuing to recruit and pay foreign “H-1B” guest-workers to do the white-collar jobs sought by American professionals in the United States.
Caterpillar’s combination of
white-collars layoffs and H-1B outsourcing matches the much-criticized
decision by Carrier, a company in next-door Indiana, to outsource 1,400
blue-collar factory jobs to Mexico. read the restso I won't be the only one pissed off.
Over at Zero Hedge we have this:
If Donald Trump Wins US Election, Will Hillary Clinton Nullify Results Because Of Vladimir Putin?
Call it “Plan B”…It’s all being laid out, right at
our feet . On Google and Facebook, during US late night shows, through
CNN, MSNBC, the Washington Post and New York Times.
It will be the final death of whatever was left of American democracy. The test run was accomplished with few casualties during the Democratic primaries, where Hillary Clinton and the DNC assured victory by rigging the entire voting process. Debbie Wasserman Schultz lost her job as DNC Chair,
but found a better job with the Clinton Campaign, and then won her
Democratic primary Congressional District in Florida with little
difficulty. Bernie Sanders, who had the election stolen right from under his feet, fell quickly in line with his masters, and pathetically kissed Hillary’s ring in an embarrassing display of beta manhood.
Now we are all being prepared for the ultimate con. The
Ocean’s Eleven of heists. The Presidency of the United States of
America. The preparation is well underway. read the rest and ponder it.
The Pope Videos:
Pope Francis, in an effort to stay relevant and hip, has been putting out little useless videos every month. Mostly they're just stupid. But this month he published one that is scary.
At the 1:00 mark we see the main thrust in the words flashing up: "For
everyone to contribute to the common good and to build a society that puts the human person at its center."
Can the humanism be any more explicit? It is God who should be at
the center of society, not man. But in this thing produced by the
Vatican, we don't hear the Name of God or Jesus mentioned once. This is
the idolatry known as humanism, plain as day for all to see (provided
no one is wearing rose-colored glasses).
Is it not enough for him to claim that not caring for the planet is some sort of sin? Or that not using plastic is more important than the millions upon millions of babies being aborted every year?
Unfortunately, the majority of Catholics today know so little about their faith that they'll fall for this crap. Fortunately, the majority of Catholics are not watching these silly videos.
Those same un-catechized Catholics will part with their hard-earned money to help the "less fortunate" through the yearly collections for the USCCB (United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.)
I've cautioned for years to never give your money to these scam collections.
Which brings us to:
The Money Trail: Why Catholic Bishops Are Silent on Hillary
Crickets.......
The
silence about Hillary Clinton is deafening. One hears nothing but
crickets from the U.S. Bishops and Cardinals about the democratic
presidential candidate’s radical pro-abortion stance, but for the
banished Cardinal Raymond Burke.
Why are they sitting mute on the sidelines? How could they be conflicted
between an abortion laden democratic platform and the most prolife
republican platform ever? Seems like an obvious choice for Catholics.
After all, St. John Paul II described life as “the most basic and
fundamental right and the condition for all other personal rights.”
What’s going on?
When in doubt, follow the money. This ecclesial trail is flush with cash. read the rest and witness the astonishing amount of money the feds give the USCCB.
Now that your blood pressure is spiking, allow me to close with something guaranteed to calm you down:
Donald Trump delivered a policy speech today in
Philadelphia outlining his military perspectives and vision for U.S.
military engagement moving forward. You can find the transcript HERE
and below.
However, something a little different. Along with the transcript
below we are going to present pictures of recent military and foreign
policy events which Donald Trump seemed to specifically refer to. read the rest
How dare Trump suggest that we place a moratorium on admitting Muslims into the country until they can be properly vetted. Personally, I wouldn't admit any - ever, so you may feel free to pull out "you're being un-Christian guns" and shoot me. I do realize that the possibility of this happening are zero to none since it violates law. Except, in my opinion, those who do not qualify under the law as either immigrants or "refugees", which is most of them.
This morning I wasted minutes of my life reading John Podhoretz, over at Commentary Magazine, who declared Trump a "shock jock", thereby casting himself into irrelevancy by his latest statement about immigration.
Podhoretz starts out by trumpeting the recent poll in Iowa that shows Cruz and Rubio ratcheting to the top. (emphasis mine)
So Donald Trump just called for a ban of all Muslim entry into the
United States — tourists, too. Instantly, he changed the focus of
today’s political news from the failure of Barack Obama’s speech and
(more important in Trump’s eyes) a rigorous new poll in Iowa showing him
falling behind Ted Cruz and into a virtual tie with Marco Rubio.
Then he says (emphasis mine)
Now, I know the general line about Donald Trump is that his
outrageousness and irresponsibility doesn’t hurt him. He says things no
politician could say and gets away with it, or at least seems to get
away with it because his poll numbers don’t crater. It’s hard to argue
with this point, save for the fact that polling is incredibly unreliable
and not a single person has yet to cast a single vote for Trump — so we
actually have no idea what has hurt him or harmed him or made trouble
for him or helped him.
Next he says (emphasis mine)
Nonetheless, he’s finished, and here’s why:
If the polls do indicate with some accuracy his level of support,
he’s got something around 25 percent of the GOP primary vote. This means
that five months into his candidacy, running as the best-known and most
covered person in the race, 75 percent of those polled are not only
choosing someone else, they are not supporting him. For him to win, he has to get more of them—a great many more.
Well, which is it, John? Are polls a viable means of assessing someone or not? Makes my head hurt.
Vatican Light Show
ROME, December 4, 2015 (LifeSiteNews)
-- The Catholic Church, founded to shed the light of Christ on the
world, has quite literally invited the world to shed its light on her.
On December 8, the Feast of the Immaculate Conception as well as the
opening of the Extraordinary Jubilee of Mercy, Pope Francis has allowed
climate-change partisans and population-control advocates to project a
light show onto the façade and cupola of Saint Peter’s Basilica in Rome —
the most important church in the Catholic world — so as to “inspire
change around the climate crisis.”
The
show titled “Illuminating Our Common Home” will project onto St.
Peter’s “images of our shared natural world” in order to “educate and
inspire change around the climate crisis across generations, cultures,
languages, religions and class,” states a press release about the event put out by one of the sponsors. Do go read the rest - it's scary.
I don't usually expound on Pope Francis or the goings on at the Vatican. The simple reason is I have a Catechism, and I know full well the teachings of the Church. If Pope Francis says something silly, it makes me no never mind. If he leads others astray, that's simply not my problem. Those people should get their own Catechism. If one of these poor souls makes a heretical statement directly to me, obtaining and studying a catechism would be my only advice.
However, this whole light show thingy (from 1:00 pm to 4:00 pm EST), is really disturbing. Not only because of the participants, but because it's just plain tacky. A light show on a church? They could be blasting Holy Family pictures on to the side of St. Peter's, and it would still be tacky.
Is nothing sacred anymore?
Not only is it tacky, but it's sacrilegious.
This is a building that has been blessed, dedicated, and consecrated for religious use. To blast a secular light show on the side, no matter how splendid, depicting endangered species, and whatever heart-rending pictures they find to defend the unscientific threat of global warming, is a sacrilege. It's as simple as that.
The amount of "ink" being spilled over a platitude-filled speech has been staggering. Along with it came the usual virulent anti-Catholic smears from people who know nothing at all about the teachings of the Church.
We love our soft boiled eggs around here. I'm used to whacking them on the side with a knife and scooping out the insides. That approach hasn't been going too well the past few months. Often I'm left with an egg that has multiple cracks and I'm unable to pull the two halves apart. That leaves me with a soft boiled egg that I have to try and peel. Doable, but not fun. We buy Wilcox eggs at Costco, and I suspect, due to a superior chicken diet, the shells are thicker and harder to crack.
Years ago, I had a egg scissor cutter like the one in the picture on the right. It was so long ago that I don't even remember if it worked very well.
Off to Amazon in search of a solution. The scissor slicer is still available, but the reviews weren't too good.
The next on the list was the Rosle Egg Cracker/Topper pictured at left. You pull the handle up and release, the spring mechanism causes vibration, wherein the sharp edge in the dome perfectly cuts the shell.
It had fairly good reviews, but seemed a bit pricey at $15.00 + shipping.
The search continued, because the good Lord knows we can't do anything anymore without hours of research on the internet. Maybe I should just stick with my knife approach and hit the egg harder.
It works like a little French guillotine. Stick the egg up the hole and cut it's top off. Does it work? Pictured below is my first egg to be sacrificed in the interest of scientific research.
Why you would need it for hard boiled eggs has escaped me. One reviewer said she loves it for when she makes deviled eggs. WTHell? You just cut the end off your hard boiled egg. How are you going to make a deviled egg out of a decapitated egg?
I'd say it worked pretty well for soft boiled eggs, and if I ever want to play French Revolution with a Barbie doll, I'm set to go.
Movies
Woman in Gold
If you haven't seen this movie, I urge you to view it as soon as possible.
From the Producers:
Woman In Gold is the remarkable true
story of one woman’s journey to reclaim her heritage and seek justice
for what happened to her family. Sixty years after she fled Vienna
during World War II, an elderly Jewish woman, Maria Altmann (Helen
Mirren), starts her journey to retrieve family possessions seized by the
Nazis, among them Klimt’s famous painting Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer
I. Together with her inexperienced but plucky young lawyer Randy
Schoenberg (Ryan Reynolds), she embarks upon a major battle which takes
them all the way to the heart of the Austrian establishment and the U.S.
Supreme Court, and forces her to confront difficult truths about the
past along the way.
Helen Mirren is brilliant (as usual), and the rest of the cast is also exceptional.
What I want you to pay special attention to is the Nazi's arrival in Austria and how quickly the people were turned against the Jews. Take heed, and when you hear people say, "It cannot happen again," know that it can.
It's a magnificent painting:
Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer aka The Woman in Gold by Gustav Klimt
Books
I've never been a fan of Swedish writers. Probably the most famous is Stieg Larsson, who wrote The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. After reading some of the one star reviews on Amazon that referred to "graphic violent sexual abuse and animal abuse", I had to pass.
One reviewer said:
Hard to imagine that mutilating,
burning, sexually humiliating and stoning women and torturing animals to
death can be a good read.
I had to agree that didn't sound very good. I do not read books with graphic sexual episodes. If the author sneaks one in, I'm done. I'm an adult and I know how people have sex. I don't need to read about it.
Imagine my surprise when I dragged home The Hidden Child: A Novel by Camilla Läckberg, who grew up in Fjällbacka and now lives in Stockholm.
It's the newest in a series of crime novels she has written. I don't do book reviews. It reminds me too much of high school, where we were to read a book and do a book report. I was not good at that. Not at all.
I will say, after reading the Hidden Child, I borrowed all the previous books in the series and have enjoyed them all.
The novels are based in Fjällbacka, and as a result I was able to investigate the area online, learn some Swedish pronunciation, and discovered that Swedes drink an abundance of coffee. I also learned the keyboard command for an umlauted character, which is the two little dots over a vowel. It's a win-win.
I borrowed the book from the library and promptly purchased the book from Amazon. Since I'm such a cheap thrifty soul, that speaks volumes.
From Amazon:
Japanese cleaning consultant Marie Kondo takes tidying to a whole new
level, promising that if you properly simplify and organize your home
once, you’ll never have to do it again. Most methods advocate a
room-by-room or little-by-little approach, which doom you to pick away
at your piles of stuff forever. The KonMari Method, with its
revolutionary category-by-category system, leads to lasting results. In
fact, none of Kondo’s clients have lapsed (and she still has a
three-month waiting list).
First of all, I love the words "tidying up", rather than "decluttering." To call your possessions "clutter" is demeaning and negative.
Two things really spoke to me: Decide what you want to keep, not necessarily what you want to throw away, and keep what sparks joy.
You may think that your mop doesn't spark joy, but if you look at it through the eyes of it's function and the work it performs for you, it should.
I've been through the phase of buying multiple containers to house my "stuff", then the phase of organizing drawer by drawer, or cupboard by cupboard, and can verify what she's saying. It doesn't work!
I thought my closet was pretty well organized and my clothes pared down. Umm - no. When I heaped every article of clothing I owned on the bed, and went through them item by item, I managed to fill two trash bags, as well as a large box for the thrift store. Talk about sparking joy. Every time I open a drawer or walk into my closet, I'm overwhelmed with joy.
Next up were my books. Every book we owned was heaped on the dining room table. End result? Another eight boxes to the thrift store. My book shelves look wonderful, and every book I kept sparks joy.
Isn't she just the cutest?
Here is the only place I quibble with Ms Kondo (I understand it's now Mrs. Kawahara - Congrats!) - she has an aversion to stocking up, which I attribute to her being Japanese where most people have limited space, her age (30), and her belief that you will always be able to head down to the corner store for toilet paper. People in Venezuela would probably tell her something different.
I've always admired the Japanese approach to life, the sort of zen of it all, and Marie brings that to life.
Smoke, Prayers, and Pope Francis
North Idaho has been shrouded in heavy smoke from the forest fires raging in Washington and Idaho. Three firefighters have died fighting the multiple fires. Resources, including firefighters, are running very low. A call went out for volunteers, and three thousand people responded. Good on them! We have friends in Chelan, WA, who, along with their older children, had to defend their own property against fire, while forest service people rode around in pickups and did nothing to help. Ironically, our friend works for the forest service. Please take a moment and say a prayer for all the people who have lost their homes, the firefighters, and the people who are volunteering. The fires are due to the decades long mismanagement of forests by the Federal government.
Read
that sentence again, and let it sink in. The forests, thanks to the Federal
government, are stacked shoulder high with dead timber and diseased trees.
Now they want to confiscate even more of this forest land and keep us
from even accessing it.
Coming in September is Agenda 2030 from the UN. It has been described as Agenda 21 on steroids.
Forget about the stock market taking a nose dive - Agenda 2030 is the real danger.
Pope Francis will travel to the U.S. next month and speak to the U.N. about Agenda 2030. I am a cradle Catholic, and it saddens me to say this Pope is dangerous and a disaster. The Church will survive, but how many souls will be lost as a result? Babies are being torn limb-from-limb, with their little parts sold to the highest bidder, while this Pope spews his dangerous Marxist nonsense, which, I may remind you, is his opinion, and has nothing to do with Church teachings. Please, pray also for this Pope, and the many Catholics who are being led astray.
If your pastor, priest, or deacon preaches on "sustainable development", "global warming", or any of the other buzz words in use today, leave that church as quickly as you can. Thank you.
Maybe "worry" is not the correct word. After all, to worry about something that you can't do anything about is rather pointless. Actually, all worry is rather pointless. Would "concern" be a better word? Oh dear, now I've got another thing to be worried or concerned about.
Rachael showing off her latest creation from basket weaving 101
Rachael is a strange little creature and has already used up her 15 minutes of fame. Like the pull we feel to look at a traffic accident, I just had to watch avideo of her interview with Matt Lauer, who is another strange little creature.
Let me sum it up: Rachael thinks she is being picked on. Got it, Rach. Now go away.
I guess a part of this trade deal is to allocate money to retrain people for new jobs when they lose theirs due to all this wonderful "free" trade that's going to occur. Do you really need to be retrained to work at McDonalds? Oh wait, McDonalds is replacing workers with cute ordering kiosks.
Of course, I'm not sure about any of this because the whole thing is a big fat secret.
I do know this: If you are trading with countries who pay their workers pennies on the dollar without imposing tariffs, it's not free trade, it's suicide.
Is The Donald running for president?
Apparently he is.
Confession: I like him. Always have. We're a lot alike (minus the billions, of course. I also have better hair.)
From DaTechGuy: Pope Francis & the MSM : Steven Kruiser gets it
Almost since the day he was elected I’ve been telling people that the
MSM is spinning Pope Francis’ actual words, but my warnings have been
to no avail.
So you can’t imagine how great it is to see Steven Kruiser get it
What has befuddled me and several of my conservative
friends who are also devout Roman Catholics is the willingness of our
conservative friends to take news about this pope at face value from MSM
outlets that aren’t trusted for anything else.
He’s referring to this AP story that claims the Pope called Mohammad
Abbas the head of the Palestinian authority an “Angel of peace”.
In his article posted on Right Wing News , Pope Francis, the Climate and Leftism
(and what's up with those giant pictures of the authors on RWN? I find them very disconcerting and rather odd.)
To sum up the article, Mr. Prager makes his case for Pope Francis being a leftie with focus on the Pope's upcoming encyclical on climate change which he will present to the UN in September.
In that assertion, I would have to agree with him. I think the Pope is a product of his environment and, well, not very smart. It really pains me to have to say that.
From the article (emphasis mine.)
"How are we to explain that at the very moment that the oldest
Christian communities in the world are being violently destroyed; that
while Christians are murdered, raped and tortured in Africa and the
Middle East; and while horrific barbarities are committed daily in the
name of God, the pope issues an encyclical and travels around the world
to talk about climate change?"
"It is happening because leftism has taken over much of Catholicism,
most of mainstream Protestantism, increasing numbers of evangelicals and
most of non-Orthodox Judaism. Not to mention the secular worlds of the
news media, entertainment media and academia."
However, Mr. Prager runs off the rails when he states:
In the long run, this will bring down the Church — just as it has
mainstream Protestantism and non-Orthodox Judaism — as well as diminish
decency on earth.
No, Mr. Prager. The Church will still be here. It may be a smaller, and hopefully, a more authentic Church, but God was very clear in scripture when he said, "And I say to thee: That thou art Peter; and upon this rock I will build
my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it." Matthew 16:18
We've had far worse Popes than Francis. My all time favorite is Pope Alexander VI, of the famous Borgia (Borja) family, who was Pope from11 August 1492 until his death on 18 August 1503. His entire life was the stuff of soap operas.
As to the encyclical? I'll reserve judgement until I read it. I think it will be a fluff piece saying almost nothing of value. The danger is the uncatechized Catholics, which nowadays is just about all of them, the anti-Catholics, and the global warming cheerleaders will latch unto whatever he says and consider it science. But, then, who are we to judge?
Pope Francis should be saving souls, not pocketbooks
What is the worst problem in the world today? Might it be war,
starvation, genocide, sectarian violence, murder, slaughter of babies in
the womb? Any of these would be a rational answer. When Pope Francis
was asked this question recently, he replied, “Youth unemployment.”
To be sure, youth unemployment is a serious problem. In some
parts of the United States, the richest country in the world, it has
reached 25 percent. These are people who are no longer in school full
time and are not yet 30 years of age. It is a problem for them and their
families, for their communities and for the welfare states that are
supporting them. Is it the worst problem in the world, though? Is it a
problem for the Roman Catholic Church? Is it something the pope is
competent to comment upon or to resolve?
The pope’s youth-unemployment comments recently were removed
from the Vatican’s website. No sooner had that been done than the Holy
Father issued his first encyclical — a formal papal teaching, as opposed
to his now-famous, impromptu back-of-the-plane yet on-the-record
comments.
His encyclical is about economics, and it reveals a disturbing
ignorance. I say this with deference and respect. I also say this as a
traditionalist Roman Catholic who laments the post-Vatican II watering
down of sacred traditions, lessening of moral teaching and
trivialization of liturgical practices. I also say this, though, as a
firm believer that Pope Francis is the Vicar of Christ on Earth and, as
such, personifies the teaching authority of the church. He is morally
and juridically capable of speaking ex cathedra — that is, infallibly —
but only after surveying and distilling traditional Church teachings and
only on matters affecting faith and morals.
Thank God, so to speak, that his teaching authority is limited to faith
and morals, because in matters of economics, he is wide of the mark. READ THE REST
for respectfully questioning statements made by Pope Francis.
I don't usually speak about Catholic issues, but this attack on Rush Limbaugh from groups supported by George Soros, has me ticked off really annoyed.
Let's start at the beginning. Since Pope Francis was elected, every time he opens his mouth there is an uproar over what he "really said." The only reason for this is the vagueness of his statements and the bad reporting by people who tend to misinterpret what's he's saying, or worse, interpret what he says to match their preconceived agendas.
Of course, it's beyond disgusting to see secular liberals
suddenly "embrace" Pope Francis because he said something they find
politically useful. Any of you pinheads feel like embracing Francis'
teaching on abortion? What's that? Speak up, I can't hear you,
liberals. Before you answer, remember that the Pope would be the first
to tell you that his Church's teachings are not a buffet, to be picked
over and consumed according to taste.
Let's examine some of the words used to describe what Mr. Limbaugh said: incendiary, scathing critique, mean spirited, naive, attack, blasted, and so on.
Was what Mr. Limbaugh said all of the above? Not at all. I listened to that segment and pretty much agreed with everything he said, which I might add was respectful and in which he pointed out how much he admired the Catholic Church to the point where he's "been tempted a number of times to delve deeper into it."
The Catholic Church and our current president share some traits in common. Many years ago the Church was infiltrated by left leaning clerics who have promoted the Marxist agenda. Does anyone really believe the preponderance of homosexual priests happened by accident? To borrow a phrase from the "Liar in Chief", "Let me be clear": there are many holy and wonderful priests and bishops. Unfortunately, most of them have little to no impact on the public stage.
Instead, we are fed a steady dose of the Cardinal Dolans of the Church, who are nothing more than misled buffoons spouting their social justice nonsense and enjoying the perks of cocktails and dinner with people who feed their egos.
I have for the past 30 or so years I been a student of the trajectory of the Church. For fewer years I have been a student of the trajectory of our country. And it has recently become clear to me that the two entities are running on a railroad track heading for the same destination.
While we have people who are intent on destroying this country (and doing a darn good job of it), these people also know that the Church has to be destroyed for their plan to work. The Catholic Church has always been anti-Communist, but you'd be hard pressed to find anyone who knows that since all they hear is social justice prattle from the pulpits.
Pope Francis is first and foremost a Jesuit. The Jesuits, who were once the most "Catholic of Catholics", are now the battering ram of the call for social justice, ecumenism, and any other progressive idea. Witness what is going on in any Jesuit institution of higher learning. He is also a product of the economic fascism of South America where he was raised. Most importantly, he can not be considered an intellectual giant.
Is he some sort of "anti-Pope." Of course not. We've had way worse Popes than Francis. Way worse! And guess what? The Church survived just fine and it will survive a Francis as Pope.
