The most basic Right

I write letters to the editor to the Dallas Morning News expressing my thoughts on a regular basis and surprisingly they get published over half the time. I guess they want to provide letters from at least one person that provides a pro-military, conservative, Catholic, and veteran voice while also expressing an anti-Obama opinion!

The last one was on abortion and the right to life and today someone wrote a rebuttal accusing me of being unable to understand women’s rights or the need for abortion because I am a man.  She took offense since the point of my letter was that so called “women’s rights” should not trump the more basic right to life of a human zygote. All this is timely because the annual 40 Days for Life pro life campaign has been in full swing for the last several weeks and today my wife and I went and did our usual Rosary watch outside an abortion clinic. As we were walking on the sidewalk in front of a Planned Parenthood clinic I thought of how distorted the so called women’s rights has become to advocate that killing a human is OK and is a “constitutional right” of a women.

Science has proven that life begins at conception and that the human zygote meets all the biological criteria for life. When the Supreme Court made the infamous Roe v Wade decision in 1973 they based that decision on the assumption that it was not settled science when life began. So the whole basis for the argument that abortion is not killing a human being is based a on a lie just as Obama’s claim that there was no abortion funding in Obamacare was a lie. The Affordable Care Act provides funding for Planned Parenthood (the largest abortion provider nationwide) and over 40 of the state’s insurance partnerships (partially funded through Obamcare) must offer abortion.

The right to life is basic to the expression of all our other liberties (notice which comes first in the Declaration of Independence). You don’t have to be women to understand that – just a human being.

 

Christian persecution at home

W hile the genocide of Christians in the Middle East has gotten my attention we must not forget the subtle and increasingly more direct persecution of Christians in this country. There have been direct instances of our government actions persecuting Christians under the Obama administration. We have seen his Department of Justice go after a Minnesota Catholic bishop for “hate speech” by preaching against gay marriage and joining a suit (Hosanna-Tabor) against a church for discrimination in hiring only Christians. The Department of Defense ordered Catholic chaplains to not preach against the HHS mandate in their homilies and described evangelical Protestants and Catholics as potential terrorist organizations in National Guard training courses. While Obama’s HHS mandate gets the most attention for violating religious freedom his recent executive order prohibiting discrimination against gays contains no religious exemption thus setting the stage for a church being in violation of federal law if it refuses to hire someone who does not follow a church’ s beliefs. Now, it appears the IRS has an agenda of investigating churches as to whether they engage in political topics in sermons and homilies.

The IRS has adopted procedures for reviewing, evaluating and determining whether to initiate church investigations to enforce restrictions of political activity by tax exempt religious organizations and churches. Those procedures have not been implemented to date because the House of Representatives is investigating the IRS. However, the Freedom from Religion Foundation is demanding that the IRS immediately implement those procedures and has even brought a suit against the IRS to force them to “spy” on what is being said in a church.

The news media hasn’t been reporting this latest development of the administration’s attempt to violate the 1st amendment freedoms of speech and religion. It appears that the only check on the IRS is Congress. This highlights the importance of this years midterm elections. If we had a Democratic Congress at present the IRS would be investigating our churches. It is time to wake up and recognize what is at stake in the upcoming election.

Onward Christian Soldiers?

As a follow up to the last blog, the calamity that is occurring in the Middle East for Christians, I believe, has reached the level that military intervention is necessary. The Vicar of the only Anglican Church left in Iraq was recently quoted as saying “Our people are disappearing. Are we seeing the end of Christianity? It looks as though the end could be very near.” I know there are some who think we don’t have a “dog in this fight”. However, it is much more than an issue of Iraq dissolving or of it being perceived as just a civil war that Iraqis’ need to deal with. It is about being realistic, it is about honor and it is about saving lives.

The reality is that there is now a new terrorist state (ISIS) that will be a platform for future actions against the west, especially the United States. The vacuum of support we created by leaving Iraq as we did is being filled by Iran and their Russian advisors. Hamas, Hezbollah, the Muslim Brotherhood, Al-Qaida and all the other Muslim terrorists groups are embolden to carry on the “jihad” against the west. Obama’s administration policies in the Middle East set the stage just as Chamberlain’s Great Britain government did prior to WWII. History suggests a similar outcome may well be on the horizon.

At another level, a response is necessary if we are to truly “honor” our Christian duty to defend the faith and the faithful.  As mentioned on my last blog the ISIS genocide of Christians is the just the tip of the iceberg. After the Nazi directed holocaust in WWII the cry heard around the world was “never again”. That cry was used in the 1990’s to mobilize UN, NATO and US efforts to intervene in Bosnia and Kosovo. Where is that cry heard today? Our administration is mute and the latest polls show that well over the majority of Americans say they do not support military action against what is occurring. So, I guess we can call ourselves a Christian nation and believe in Christian brotherhood as long as we don’t have to place ourselves in harm’s way to defend other Christians who are being persecuted and killed for the same faith we confess. Where is our sense of Christian obligation?

Finally is the need to take military actions to save lives. The Catholic Church over the centuries has worked to define the criteria for a “just war”. While there are many differing descriptions most contain the following: 1) there must be a just cause such as defense of the innocent from unjust aggression, 2) there must be a right intention to restore order and justice not seek revenge, 3) the use of force must be a lawful authority such as a nation or international body, 4) there must be a reasonable probability of success, 5) all peaceful means for resolving the conflict are exhausted, 7) the force applied should be proportional to achieving the goal and 7) there should be no targeting of civilian populations. If we were to take targeted military action against ISIS to save Christian lives all those criteria are met. It can be done now and would save lives now. Everyday we wait Christians die or are displaced. All it would take is resolve. Unfortunately that is not a trait demonstrated by our current President or the United Nations.

The frustrating part is that there is only limited action we can take as individuals. We can, however, donate to humanitarian efforts and we can communicate to our political representatives and leaders our concern. There are group petitions that one can sign that encourage taking immediate action which are being forwarded to the United Nations and our own government. (www.catholic.org, www.citizengo.org, www.aletia.org). Finally, we can pray. These may be small efforts but at least, as individuals, we would not silently be sitting by while a Christian genocide is taking place.

 

 

 

The new endangered species: Christians

There is a 21^st century holocaust occurring yet the news media is barely reporting on it and our   government and those of Western Europe do not appear to be paying much attention to it.  Christians are being killed by the thousands and they have been for several years in Muslim countries. The ISIS Jihadists in Iraq recent declaration that Christians must either convert to Islam, pay a huge tax, leave their homes immediately or face death is just the tip of the iceberg.

We have seen the persecution of Christians and Christian communities by the Muslim brotherhood in Egypt, the Syrian rebels, the Sudanese government, and the Iranian Mullahs that include Church bombings, forced removals from homes and towns, incarceration and out and out killings of Christians. The end result is that the Christian communities in the Middle East that have been there since Jesus’ time will be all destroyed and gone in the near future. It is estimated that already between the killings and forced evacuations there has been a 70% reduction in the number of Christians in the Middle East in the last 10 years. Yet, there is little news attention or outrage expressed.

It’s ironic that the so called “Christian” western nations (NATO and the USA) responded to the persecution and killings of Bosnian and Kosovo Muslims. News outlets covered in detail what was going on, the “bully pulpit” was used by our government and others to condemn the aggressors, sanctions were used and military force was applied. Where is a corresponding response to the current Christian persecutions?

Fortunately, many Christian, especially Catholic news websites are covering what can only be called genocide that is occurring on a daily basis. The pleas from Church leaders in the affected areas and eyewitnesses are being published in those outlets. Pope Francis is using his position to call for a response. Various Church charities and refugee agencies are reacting as well as a universal Church wide call to prayer. The question to raise is why aren’t the media and western governments, especially ours, taking notice of what is happening and taking action ?

It is both disgraceful and dishonorable for our country’s leader and our government to not address this new holocaust. The plight of illegal immigrant children gains much more press and calls for government action. While those children deserve attention they are not suffering the systematic persecution that middle eastern Christians are undergoing that is costing thousands of lives.

My relationship with St. John Paul II

With the canonization of John Paul II this weekend I have reflected on what he meant to me. I feel a personal connection to him for many reasons and he has had an impact on my ongoing faith journey. So, I want to share these thoughts. First, I converted to the Catholic faith a couple of years after he became the Pope. The first impression I had of him, especially with his first visit back to his native Poland was this guy has courage. As an Army veteran of the cold war, I sensed a comrade in arms with his strong stance against communism. This was no “namby pamby” guy in a skirt. His model helped me to consider being a Catholic.

My wife and I had the opportunity in 1988 to travel to Poland to conduct some training of Polish physicians. I was overwhelmed by the spirit of the Polish people as the Solidarity movement was getting off the ground. Their reverence for John Paul II was inspiring. The anticipation of freedom was in the air and John Paul II gave them hope. Again, I left with the conclusion that this was quite a guy.

A few years later we were in Rome and attended his weekly Sunday address that he would give in St. Peter’s square. It was only about a 15 minute speech but the response was overwhelming. There were thousands of people with many youth displaying their country’s flags. He recognized each and as he did the cheering was deafening. He was treated as a rock star. His impact on young people was amazing. If he was around when I was a teenager I think I might well have converted to the Catholic faith earlier even though being a student in a Lutheran high school.

In doing background work on a book on a Christian faith based foundation for why we should be physically active I discovered many addresses and speeches that John Paul II made focusing on exercise and sport. He encouraged all to exercise and provided a faith based and doctrinal rationale for why we should be physically fit. John Paul II was a model of physical activity his entire life and I believe helped sustain him during his later pain filled and debilitating years. I felt that we shared a common bond for living a strenuous life. Again, he was a model for me and in his later years an example for how to age.

In preparing another book that dealt with a Catholic ethic for being a steward of the environment. I discovered John Paul II also delivered a number of messages and speeches on the subject of the environment and our role as responsible stewards. As before, they were incorporated into the book. At the same time I was introduced to the St. Malo Retreat Center in Colorado and to the brothers of Sodalitium Christianae Vitae who ran the Center. The Sodalit family includes the Christian Life Movement and an organization called CREATIO. In the last several years I have gotten involved with CREATIO as it provides a variety of faith based environmental stewardship efforts worldwide.

In many respects, John Paul II serves as our spiritual mentor for CREATIO efforts. Besides his strong voice for stewardship of creation, in 1993 John Paul II came to St. Malos to relax and hike as a break from the World Youth Day in Denver. Unfortunately the St. Malos Retreat Center was destroyed in a fire in 2011; however the many memorabilia such as pictures and his walking stick were saved. Before losing St. Malos we reestablished the trail he hiked on as the “John Paul II Trail” and placed meditation stations where he stopped with quotes made by him. At the same time, a special retreat was established called “Following in the Footsteps of John Paul II”. Two outdoor education programs for students were established called the “JPII Adventure Institute” and “Camp Wojtyla”.  Once I had the privilege of leading members of the Polish American community in Denver on the JPII trail and learned that several of them had met him while he was a parish priest. To me, John Paul II was the “ecological Pope”.

Those of us involved with CREATIO continue to provide such programs along with ecological mission trips, retreats and talks on stewardship of both creation and the body (fitness). I truly believe that the connections to John Paul II and his spiritual influence has facilitated and enabled those efforts.  So, I think I have a special relationship to John Paul II. As the late Father Richard Neuhaus noted, we should now call him “John Paul II the Great”. I agree.

Me, myself and I – the new God and Trinity

Ash Wednesday reminds us we are not God. When receiving the ashes the priest says “Remember you are dust and to dust you shall return”. The act of putting on ashes symbolizes fragility and mortality, and our need to be redeemed by the mercy of God. That humble acceptance of one greater than me (God) is unfortunately being corrupted in our culture to a belief that there is nothing greater than me. Recent media stories have highlighted a disturbing and frightening cultural expression of what could be called a new “Trinity”. Instead of Father, Son and Holy Spirit it is Me, Myself and I. The topic of these stories suggest a whole different perspective of what it means to be human from the beginning, during and until the end of life

• Beginning of life    The Federal Drug Administration (FDA) is assessing whether to allow embryo creation with three parent donors to create a vehicle for gene splicing experiments to take out those genes that may cause inheritable diseases. This is an extension of the current effort to create and design life. Some scientists have already claimed they have been able to clone human cells. Scientists in Great Britain are seeking approval to create hybrid animal human cells.  The aim offered for these various efforts is supposedly humanitarian to  prevent disease. However, many have hyped the possibility that these emerging technologies will enable parents to create their own designer babies. So instead of God the Creator it is becoming me the Creator.
• During  life    Facebook announced that it will now provide 50 different options for      identifying one’s gender in an effort to “help people better express their own identity”. In      California, there is bill to allow a boy or girl to go into each other’s bathroom if they self identify themselves as transgender or of the opposite sex.  So instead of accepting the natural God given gender of our birth we now must view it as a personal choice issue to decide and make up our own gender? So called self-gender identification is just another example of making oneself into your own god.
• End of life   The Belgian parliament is working to legalize euthanasia of children. That      country, along with others such as the Netherlands have been permitting assisted suicide for adults but now they are taking that slippery slope to new horizons. The rationale is that kids shouldn’t have to suffer from  serious childhood diseases so just kill them. It’s a twist of the logic  used to justify abortion only instead of killing a baby in the womb so a mother doesn’t have to suffer the inconvenience of having a child it will now be OK to kill a child so he/she doesn’t have to suffer the inconvenience of having a disease. This is not only insane it is evil. It is giving the state the God-like power to take life before its time.

The implication of these related stories is that we view ourselves as a mini-god in our own self seeking world. Personal self expression and choice is the highest priority value under this new view of human nature. Instead of the concept of the dignity of the human person it becomes the dignity of “what I want”. All of this is reflective of a narcissistic and selfish sense of who the human person is. It is certainly not in the image and likeness of God as we know it.

The arrogant UN’s anti-Catholic “Rights of the Child” Report

On February 6^th of this year the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child dropped a media bomb on the Catholic Church that has received much attention. The Committee’s purpose was to provide an update of what the Vatican (a sovereign state) had done about the widely reported sexual abuse scandal within the Church. The gist of the Report is that the Church has failed to do anything about child abuse and then recommended that the Church change some doctrines that they (the committee) thought were causes for the abuse. The Report is just another example of projecting falsehoods to support an agenda. It’s getting to the point that almost everything coming out the UN needs a “fact checker”.  The Report offered no documentation for the accusations. So, what are the facts? There are three key ones.

1)  The UN Committee did not examine the policies and practices put in place in the last 10 years that the Vatican submitted to them for review. The Vatican has spent years addressing the scandal and under Pope Benedict XVI many policies have been implemented. In fact it could said that no other institution has done so much to protect children. Almost all the abuse was committed during the 1970s-1980s and, at least in the United States, the polices have had the effect that the number of current priests accused of abuse has dwindled to single digits. With over 40,000 priests in the US can any other church, education or youth serving agency show such a result? Of note, is that before the February Report, in Jan of 2014, some members of the UN committee had praised the Church for the steps it took the last decade to prevent abuse and protect kids. So why the “flip flop?

2)  The UN Report recommended awareness training for those who work with minors. If they had bothered to read the Vatican Reports submitted to them they would have learned that the Catholic Church has been the world leader in such initiatives since awareness of the abuse crises in the early 2000s. As a Knight of Columbus involved in many ministries of the Church I cannot do anything within the Church unless undergoing yearly mandatory training.

3)  The UN Report then went beyond its powers to interfere with doctrine and canon law. The UN demanded that the Holy See submit to the UN’s views in all matters pertaining to children’s rights to include changing Church teaching on homosexuality and abortion. An example of such arrogance was telling the Church to eliminate gender stereotyping in Catholic school books – in other words promote same sex marriage. Its rather ironic that the UN thinks that the Church’s attitude about homosexuality is a cause of the abuse when the John Jay College Report of clerical abuse in the United States indicated that over 80% of cases were acts of male priests against post pubescent males (i.e. homosexual acts). Another UN demand was to eliminate the practice of “baby boxes” outside Church’s where pregnant mothers could leave their unwanted babies (similar to the practice in the USA of leaving babies at fire stations). The implication is clear, it is better to have an abortion than leave the baby for adoption and a chance for life.

It seems pretty clear that UN interjected their own ideological preferences into the Report with the intent to discredit the Catholic Church. The UN has an agenda to support worldwide population control though all means including abortion and sterilization. In addition the UN promotes homosexual marriage as a human right.  The Church is one of last institutions in the world that stands up against these views reflective of the broader and prevailing secular relativism. As such it must be discredited, neutralized, and trivialized. It sure seems to be the objective of the United Nations with this report.

 

 

 

The truth and Pope Francis – II

The last post highlighted that the media is lying about what Pope Francis is communicating. So, what are those lies and how are they being projected? First I must be clear that I cannot speak for the Pope but in reading what he has said and written I believe I have an accurate fix of what I think he is conveying and why he communicates the way he does.

First, we have to recognize that he is a Jesuit and that priestly order has as its major apostolate, education. His and his order’s “modus operandi” has always been to challenge the learner to raise questions and think.  In many respects this reflects what we see in Jesus in the Gospels where he doesn’t answer many questions directly. Pope Francis wants us to think because that can lead to belief and actions.

John Paul II and Benedict XVI initiated the effort for the “New Evangelization”. The previous Pope’s felt there was a need to reinforce what the Church teaches (doctrine) and its implication for how we should act morally to respect the “dignity of the human person” to confront the cultural secularism and aggressive actions against Christianity  I think Francis is carrying on that same new evangelization but with a different tone and emphasis. The model I see for his version of the “New Evangelization” is to lead the way with highlighting the Church’s mission to serve others and the poor, to express mercy, to show the joy of the faith and to open more dialog with the culture at large.

Pope Francis has not said anything different than previous Popes (especially John II and Benedict the XVI) or what the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) teaches as a summary of Church teachings.

• He has not said that atheists can go to heaven. He repeats what the CCC (paragraph 847) states that one with a Godly heart, but who does not know Jesus, may receive the grace to not be denied salvation. It is up to God not us to judge that.
• He has not said that gay marriage  and the homosexual lifestyle is OK. He repeats what the CCC (paragraph 2358) says that we cannot judge what is in a person’s heart and we should respect even those that express a disordered condition. In a sense it is a restatement of “love the sinner but hate the sin”.
• He is not a Marxist and is not against capitalism. He is repeating what the CCC (paragraph 2425) says about the dangers within the free market where excessive greed can lead the lack of concern for the common good and the needs of workers.
• A linchpin of Catholic social teaching has been the priority for meeting the needs of the poor. Pope Francis is constantly expressing that as a major focus for our Christian mission (CCC paragraph 2444). It is the same concept that Pope John Paul II expressed with this emphasis on the dignity of the human person.

Contrary to what the media states, Pope Francis has not downplayed doctrine or moral issues. He has spoken many times on the dangers of abortion, the homosexual lifestyle and that marriage is reserved for a man and a women. But since those are “old” topics communicated by a Pope, the media disregards those communications. The media from the left and the right want to take Pope Francis’s comments to project their agenda. The most blatant example is the interview he gave to an Italian atheist Eugenio Scalfari in the Italian paper La Repubblica published on Oct. 1. The writer did not tape the interview, did not take notes and then wrote what he “remembered” as Francis’ responses. The Vatican has since disavowed any accuracy of that interview.

Evangelization is the heart of the Church. So I think Pope Francis’ strategy for that evangelization is to show the joy and mercy of Jesus Christ as the “light of the world” and the Church, as Fr. Robert Barron puts it, is but the carrier of that light.  He meets people where they are and engages them. From that engagement, people will want to know more, and then there will be time to talk doctrine. He knows what he is saying; unfortunately the media is too lazy and biased to think through what he is communicating.