A Few God Links (vol. 22)

I think after this week I may undergo a self-imposed moratorium on discussing "gay marriage" and the Obergefell v Hodges case, for a little while at least:

1. One thing which has long bothered me about this issue is the amount of deliberate deception practiced with regards to what Christ and His Church have and haven't aught regarding marriage in general and "gay marriage" in particular. Mark Shea has a good rundown of three lies employed in the present war against (Christian) marriage.
2. On a related note, seminarian Joe Heschmeyer has a good rebuttal to all of those ridiculous (insulting, and to be blunt, lying) flow charts put out as propaganda against the Christian position on marriage. I suspect that this set of propaganda--these charts, their approach, their successful misleading of many otherwise faithful Christians--have done more to directly erode the societal opposition to gay marriage than any other propaganda. I should also include a link to a good chart which upholds the Christian argument.
3. On a related note, The Gospel Coalition has a post on their blog asking 40 questions of those Christians who have been waving rainbow flags (and participating in "pride parades" etc.) in the wake of the Obergefell v Hodges decision. The blog is geared mostly for Protestants (in particular evangelicals)--and specifically ones who take their faith at least somewhat seriously--but most of these questions work for Catholics as well. Actually, a few of the questions are good reflection questions for all of us in general, on whatever side of this culture war battle we happened to fall on. "Do you believe it is possible to love someone and disagree with important decisions they make?" or "Do you hope to be more committed to the church, more committed to Christ, and more committed to the Scriptures in the years ahead?"
4. If marriage is a dignity-granting institution, where does that leave all the single people? When marriage--or at leas "romantic" (sexual") relationships--becomes the only way to know love, where does that leave friendship and the other loves?
5. You know that the "pro-gay" propaganda has an ulterior motive when we Christians have to introduce ourselves by saying, "I'm a Christian, not a bigot." The churches have always been the target and their destruction the goal here, not some mythical "equality" or "dignity."
6. Some forms of incestuous marriage are currently legal in some states. Did you assume I meant Alabama or Mississippi? No, I meant a progressive and urban state, like New York.
7. Double standards? What double standards? Whatever do you mean that their is an agenda against the Church among progressive fools and the societal elite and the media moguls (but I repeat myself)?
8. Where do we go from here? I agree with some of the suggestions that we should evangelize by our lives--show not tell--but I also admit that this is a very difficult proposition:
   
9. On another topic, it is necessary to put the pope's words in context. That is often needed, since our media likes to quote him out of context (at best) and then further misconstrue what he says or does (that is, they like put lies in his mouth which he never uttered).Here, for example, is some context about his recent remarks about weapons manufacture and arms trade.
10. A haunting and timely warning to America: no power on this earth lasts forever.

It's hard to discus other topics when one so large is looming on the horizon, or when one becomes the forefront of most discussion in society.

Mark of the Beast

"[The beast which arose out of the earth] deceives those who dwell on earth, bidding them make an image for the beast which was wounded by the sword and yet lived; and it was allowed to give breath to the image of the beast so that the image of the beast should even speak, and to cause those who would not worship the image of the beast to be slain.  Also it causes all, both small and great, both rich and poor, both free and slave, to be marked on the right hand or the forehead, so that no one can buy or sell unless he has the mark, that is, the name of the beast or the number of its name" (Revelation 13:14-17).

A friend suggested this passage a few weeks ago in connection with the possibility that Andrew Jackson be replaced by Margaret Sanger on the $20. Sanger is the founder of Planned Parenthood and as such was a devoted servant of Moloch. Now we find that it is not to be President Jackson, founder of the Democratic Party, who will be replaced--that would have been a good riddance--but rather Alexander Hamilton (founding father) on the $10. We do not yet know who will replace him hopefully someone worthy like Harriet Tubman or Rosa Parks or Elizabeth Ann Seton, but we'll see.

I do not think that my friend's assessment is wrong or misplaced, assuming that it is indeed someone like Sanger who appears on the bill. However, we are seeing it unfold even now that we need not wait until then to see the mark of the beast appearing prominently in public. And it is done willingly, in the name of celebration. Those of us who do not go along with this--which actually might be a majority and certainly otherwise a substantial minority--are nevertheless not allowed our place in the "marketplace" of ideas. The few who have spoken out at all have been quickly and vitriolically shouted down.

This is not to say that we live in the end time now. I do not insist on only a rigidly literal interpretation of revelations as occurring only at the end of the world, and thus I can see it play out time and again in history, both in big and small ways.

Saint Charles Lwanga and Companions, pray for us! Saint Athanasius, Pray for Us! Saints Thomas More and John Fisher, pray for us! Saint Michael the Archangel, defend us in battle!

And lest anybody mistake my intentions: no, I am not publishing this because I hate "the gays." I am at times very frustrated with certain people, but I don't hate them. I do, however, hate sins. I also hate ideologies which glorify sins, especially those which do it blatantly for the sake of the sin. The reason why I hate sin and ideologies, especially of this sort, is because they tend to separate the sinners from god, and they put enmity between their followers and the Church. That is truly the worst effect of all of this, and it is precisely one of the effects in which "the beast" would rejoice.

***

Update: Case in point, I may be on the same side of the culture wars as the fellow in Tennessee who put the "No Gays Allowed" sign on his hardware store (assuming he isn't doing this just as a parody), but I really don't stand with him. That is to say, I think he should have the right to refuse service, but I don't think that he is right to do so.

Also note that even some of the people who are simply opting not to engage in the "marketplace" are receiving their 2 minutes' hate for that decision. Witness some of the reactions--often on social media, but beyond that--to the Mississippi woman who is resigning from her position of 24 years as a county clerk rather than issue "gay marriage" licenses. There's plenty of vitriol focused on her, despite the fact that she is essentially doing what that side of the culture war claims we should do when we can't in good conscience provide a service to some sets of people (mostly, gays): that is, close up shop. Well, the Church has been through harder persecutions than this one so far is, and yet she has survived.

A Few Good Links (vol. 21)

For those who do not know, I am being promoted to Associate Chair of my department, effective August 1 of 2015. My duties in that capacity commence then, but I've been fairly busy trying to learn how to do some of these ahead of time from our outgoing associate chair. On to the links:

1. Here's a roundup of a few Catholic reactions to the disastrous Supreme Court ruling from Friday.
2. And a few more reactions. It is a "tragic day for America's children." And not, coercion does not lead to love.
3. Rod Dreher's Benedict Option is looking pretty good these days.
4. Getting "gay marriage" is not enough. You must be made to celebrate. To quote the leadership of "Believe Out Loud" (a "gay Christian" organization), "As we look ahead to a movement beyond marriage equality, we know that the work of affirming Christians is not yet finished. It’s now time for churches to move beyond simply accepting what we understand, to affirming LGBTQ people as they are." They are not alone in hoping to go after the Church, other ecclesiastical communities, and other religious organizations. 
5. There's also more than a few who are happy to twist, corrupt, distort, or ignore Christianity--Scripture, Tradition, historical Christianity as practiced, and even the authority of the Church--to somehow "make gay ok." They might as well ask, "Did God say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree of the garden’?"
6. It's been corrected by now, but this was originally a very awful job of "reporting"/framing the issue concerning the Church and so-called "gay marriage." As in, appallingly bad (and you can still get a sense of it from the first few comments posted there, and for that matter from the parts of the article which aren't edited). Now it is merely "pretty bad," or "average lazy newsreporter bad," complete with the original title "Austin Catholic church will conduct same-sex weddings." The article has been updated to clarify that this is an "American Catholic" (that is, Anglican) church. The leading photo was originally of Bishop Vasquez. The oppening line is "As Bishop Joe S. Vásquez, bishop of the Diocese of Austin, says he is 'deeply saddened by the Supreme Court’s decision to require States to recognize same-sex marriages,' another catholic church — with no affiliation to the Roman Church — in the Austin-area will be officiating a same-sex wedding mass on Saturday." The bold color change represents what they added in after the fact. Agenda? What agenda? (N.B. the article was published June 26 2015 at 2:59 PM and "Updated" by 4:10 PM on the same day)
7. This would be a fairly welcome "side-effect" of the SCOTUS Obergefell decision would be the enforcement of concealed carry reciprocity for all 50 states + DC. But, I suppose it is probably too much to ask for the Court to be consistent.
8. Some inconvenient facts (including US murder rates) for the gun-grabbers, which will of course be roundly ignored.
9. A defense of memorization as one of the important aspects of education. To be honest, memorization is the first step in a good education--and as such, it is a crucial step. This includes training oneself on how to remember facts and other information.
10. Here's a long post about propaganda.
11. A lot of people were making fun of that pro-marriage pastor,Rick Scarborough, who threatened to set himself on fire if the Supreme Court legalized "gay marriage" (a threat which turns out to have been a bit of an exaggeration). They often would argue that this shows how darned nutty everyone on the "Traditional marriage" side was. As far as I know, he never set himself on fire. But tragically another pastor in Texas did immolate himself. This pastor was actually in favor of "gay marriage," and while his last note does not explicitly say that he did this to promote "acceptance" of "gay marriage," it's not a stretch to read that into his actions.
12. A few states--so far Oklahoma and Alabama--are considering completely nullifying all side in the "marriage" debates by ceasing to issue any marriage licenses at all.
13. Here are 5 Things Jesus Might Say to the Gay Community. It is a Protestant perspective, but I agree with quite a bit of it. They even managed to catch that Jesus does, in fact, have something to say about/against "gay marriage" (Matthew 19:4-6). I don't like the (accidental?) contrast between being rejected by "the church" and yet embraced by Jesus, so I would reiterate that the Church does not "reject" anybody, and that Jesus is ultimately found in the Church and with her, since she is His bride. 

Sometimes hatred is charming, while love must show itself severe (St. Augustine).

Optimism-Pessimism and Hope-Despair

Some people wonder about the seeming oxymoronic phrase "Hopefilled pessimist". This is because such people do not understand the distinction between hope and optimism or between despair and pessimism. Optimism and pessimism pertain to our outlook of things which are strictly in this word. The would-be progressive is aways optimistic about how the future will turn out, if not for himself than for society at large; the world is always progressing in a particular direction, and history has a right side and a wrong side to be on. The pessimist may or may not share this view of the progress and sidedness of history, or the ongoing march of social progress; he may or may not believe that history is, if not actually repeating in a cycle, then at least rhyming. He can read the signs of the times and sees something ominous.

Take, for example, the supposedly endless march of progress as concerns "gay rights." There are a number of pessimists such as myself who almost expect to end like this (I am/we are blindfolded here):

Some less pessimistic people suppose that it will stop somewhat short of this, or will do so in our lifetimes. Perhaps is will "only" be as bad as, say, Canada. I expect real religious liberties to be eroded (as much as I expect for the now-ironically named ACLU to lead the charge on that front), And on the other hand, there are some optimists on the other side who are looking forward to the day on which the result is more like this:

"The Deserter" by Boardman Robinson, n protest of the march of progress in 1916.

I gather this based, for example, on the kinds of comments which people are more-than-happy to post in public, including more than a few comments which are exchanged between supposed friends. The cause is greater than any mere friendship, apparently. So color me a pessimist. Better still, don't color me at all right now, since that's currently being used to celebrate the SCOTUS' decision in Obergefell. There's something about wearing rose-colored grassed which makes us incapable of seeing the difference between black and white.

But if I am a pessimist only, then I am lost. The pessimist can at least see black, but if he is a pessimist only, he may cease seeing white but only "less black," or possibly gray.

Hope is a virtue, a theological one which makes us look to something better in the next life. It is the reminder that there is something bigger than history, that while history is the sequence events taking place in time there is an eternity which is timeless. It is the reminder that there is a Providence which is God-ordained, and that, in the words of Joseph Pieper, history too will be judged. Blessed are those who mourn--if that mourning turns their eyes heavenward and reminds them that this vale of tears is not their final home; that it does not matter which side of history they are on when they die, but rather which side of eternity. Despair, then, is the loss (or lack, or negation) of hope. The mourning will receive no comfort if they turn to thoughts of vengeance.

I think I will close this brief reflection with a passage from Tolkien's Return of the King, since it grants comfort and a glimpse of hope:

"Far above the Ephel Duath in the West the night-sky was still dim and pale. There, peeping above a cloud-wrack above a dark tor high up in the mountains, Sam saw a white star twinkle for a while. The beauty of it smote his heart, as he looked up out of the forsaken land, and hope returned to him. For like a shaft, clear and cold, the thought pierced him that in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty forever beyond its reach. His song in the Tower had been defiance rather than hope; for then he was thinking of himself. Now, for a moment, his own fate, even his master's, ceased to trouble him."

It is when we have hope that we are able to set aside our worries for a time, knowing that they won't go away in this life, but also knowing that in the end, that they will be insignificant and "passing" things. However substantial they may seem in this life, they are but shadows which must fade to naught when the light of eternity pierces our vale.

Social Media Celebrations

I'm seeing a lot of social media profiles being changes with a "gay agenda rainbow" filter over their picture. his is to celebrate today's Supreme Court ruling. I guess I should do my part. I'm the guy facing the camera:

Consider that today they are "celebrating," and are in their most ecstatic and satisfied state: yet I've noticed that the slightest comment expressing disapproval, sadness, frustration, consternation, or fear is shouted down by the outsider's alleged friends. What will they do in a week or two when the ecstasy of today's ruling has faded?

And So It Goes

Where it leads is this, then on to jackboots.

So it ends.

"If, even as the price to be paid for a fifth vote, I ever joined an opinion for the Court that began: ‘The Constitution promises liberty to all within its reach, a liberty that includes certain specific rights that allow persons, within a lawful realm, to define and express their identity,’ I would hide my head in a bag. The Supreme Court of the United States has descended from the disciplined legal reasoning of John Marshall and Joseph Story to the mystical aphorisms of the fortune cookie." (Scalia's Dissent)

And so it continues.

"The Catholic faith has constantly taught, that marriage is the unique relationship between one man and one woman that needs to be promoted and strengthened. Marriage is a gift from God, rooted in nature itself. The biological realities of male and female together with the complementarity they bring to the institution of marriage allow for the natural procreation of children and the opportunity for the child to be nurtured and to learn from a mother and a father who each bring unique gifts to the family. Neither today’s United States Supreme Court decision, nor subsequent alterations to civil law, can change this truth which we profess."

And so it begins.

" just ten years ago they swore Lawrence would not lead to gay marriage, and then two years ago swore that gay marriage would not lead to you being forced to bake them a cake. 

So if a top Hillary advisor dodges the question of tax exempt status for churches who refuse to perform gay marriages -- you can take her non-answer to the bank, Bigots.... 

religious conscience is more than just what we do in the two hours a week we spend in church. Though Kennedy reassures you that for those two hours, you are free to "advocate" for your bigoted, unsupportable, and evil views. 

For now, anyway."

Saint Thomas More, pray for us.

A Difference Between Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter

I don't have anything in particular against the children's fantasy series by J.K. Rowling (disclaimer: my wife does). It's a somewhat entertaining piece of popular fiction which has somehow been a worldwide phenomenon and which made a fortune for its author and entertained countless children (and, let us be honest, no small number of adults).

With that said, Tolkien's works--here I include specifically Lord of the Rings and The Silmarillion--are collectively an epic masterpiece which should be counted among the great works of western literature. There is simply no comparison between the two.

There is also a very vast difference between the two authors. Ms. Rowling is a talented writer who can tell an entertaining story. Tolkien was a brilliant thinker who developed not only a story, but a whole mythology to underlie it, a whole world which could exist as a mirror of our own. He was also a Catholic Christian, and quite faithful (if at time curmudgeonly) concerning his religion.

Rowling, for her part, loosely defined herself as a Christian writer, but on the other hand openly embraces a number of doctrines incompatible with series Christian thinking.

So, to give one simple example of a difference between the two, whereas Rowling is openly cheering this on (and condemning in the name of tolerance all others whose beliefs differ from hers) Tolkien is rightly rolling in his grave over it.

The Good, the Bad, and The Ugly in One Article

The good, the bad, and the ugly has been encapsulated in one article. The good is the top half , the article itself: another state is recognizing the need for the protection of religious liberty. Hence, its legislature, which is for now dominated by members of the only party which retains or feigns some sanity in the culture wars, has passed a law which allows religiously-run institutions (think Catholic Charities) to obey their collective consciences (not to mention religious doctrines) when placing children for adoption.

The ugly, which is ginning up for the bad, is in the bottom half of the article on the internet. You see, allowing free conscience exercise must simply not be allowed. Here there is a soft-target, in appearance at least: the entities in question accept state monies to provide a service to the state. Said entities would happily do the service for free, I'm, sure, if not for a byzantine set of social, economic, and legal rules which make their operation quite costly, indeed more costly than would be if the state were completely uninvolved.

The bad is that this provision will likely not stand: for it to do so, a large number of politicians must exhibit one of those traits which the class generally lacks, which is the courage of conviction. The ugly, as seen in the bottom half of the internet, is that the result will be the explicit removal of these protections, plus a strong public backlash against anyone who supports them.

RIP National Review

That magazine once stood athwart the march of progress yelling, "Stop!" Now, it seems, that they are standing athwart the march of history and yelling, "Stop! Wait for me!" First, let us acknowledge soem fo the good that National Review has done:

For decades, National Review has performed a hygienic function on the right, defining the bounds of respectable conservatism, marking it off from unreasoned, bigoted or conspiratorial worldviews. It acted as a virus check, targeting ideas which in fact were Trojan horses for dangerous radicalism — whether racial, religious or ideological. On several occasions, that magazine used its power for good, excluding from its pages apologists for ultra-nationalism, eugenics, racism, anti-Semitism and paranoid anti-government hysteria.

Now, for the bad, and I expect it to eventually get ugly.

I do not have the time for a full fisking of this piece. It does not rise to the level of an honorable surrender. Four points stand out, however:

1. Steorts writes that
   

   "Civil marriage was instituted, let us concede, to safeguard the interests of children by endorsing and protecting the kind of stable, committed relationships that produce them and are suited to their upbringing. But there is no way to know in advance which couples can or will have children."

   If this is the reason for the government's having instituted civil recognition of marriages, and such has failed, then the correct solution of to cease insisting on such civil recognition. Abolish the death tax, or allow joint ownership of property, and allow up to two people to file taxes jointly (better still, get rid of the IRS entirely), etc., and call a failure a failure and remove it rather than expanding it.
   
   
2. Later in the article, he states that "Many traditionalists do deny that same-sex couples have any reason to adhere to traditional marital standards. This denial is usually based on the idea that their relationships have no value to begin with." Here he is not merely arguing that we should surrender on a lost cultural front, but is in fact insisting that the view that such relationships between sodomites are inherently bad. Implication--those of us who continue to recognize sin as sin are to be cast out. To whit: "In their ideological absolutism, many traditionalists today stand in the way of such a synthesis. Their position on same-sex marriage is tragic, in that they have taken a stand against burgeoning social endorsement of commitment and sexual exclusivity as ends in themselves." This misses a large part of the point of why sexual exclusivity and commitment matters to begin with. Morally, the answer is evident, but beyond the religious aspects of morality, there is this: the point of exclusivity and commitment is to foster a healthy relationship between two people, to foster a healthy intimacy. Homosexual relationship lack this, because the two do not become "one flesh," neither in the spiritual-religious moral sense nor the strictly physical, biological, anatomical, and physiological sense.
   
3. There is one point which he gets partially correct, namely:
   

   "There is something that traditionalists could do to make their views seem less cruel and arbitrary: They could return to Christianity’s original, austere understanding of the purpose of sex. The early Christians hotly debated whether marriage even between a man and a woman should be endorsed; many thought celibacy was to be preferred. And even though marriage was finally recognized as a sacrament, the mainstream of the early Church did not think of marriage and sex as a way of expressing love and affection at all, but rather regarded procreation as its sole purpose."

   Ignore the part where he puts an implicit opposition between a sacramental view of marriage and the early Church's view of it. This diagnosis is in part correct in that if we Christians would abide by our marital vows--including, notably, openness to life (which precludes contraception) and closedness to the false idea of dissolving marriages with divorce, then so-called "gay marriage" would likely not be such an issue.
   
4. He attempts to throw a bone towards traditionalists (and Christians) by stating that there is a difference between opposition to homosexual relationships and racism, between opposing "gay marriage" and supporting racial segregation. There is, after all, a choice involved in engaging in homosexual activity. But then, he writes
   

   "But one can push that point only so far, given the reality of congenital sexual orientation, i.e., the fact that, for many people if not for all, the kind of emotional and physical attraction that precedes sexual intimacy is by nature limited to or predominately directed toward members of a particular sex. What traditionalists must in honesty be said to reject is, if not a deep aspect of personal identity per se, then the expression of a deep aspect of personal identity. And the significance of that rejection is often minimized in ways so glib and irrelevant as to suggest that those who offer them refuse to grapple seriously with the issue — for example, their facile observation that there are many people who, for whatever reason, are unable to achieve romantic fulfillment (as if being unable to achieve it were the same thing as being told not to try), and their facile observation that “we are all sinners” (as if what counts as a sin were not in question here)."

   In other words, we who call a sin a sin ought to just keep our mouths shut, because anything we say will always sound hollow or "glib" or callous. Perhaps it will, and that's unfortunate. We can always improve in the tactfulness and charitableness departments. But ceasing to proclaim some aspect of truth because it hurts someone's feelings? That seems like a bit of an overcompensation in the other direction. And, of course, it also can lend itself to severe curtailing of free speech and freedom of religion, if acted upon.

This is all disappointing, but not unexpected.

When Is Vandalism Justified?

Never. Almost Never. And If I lived in Austria, especially Vienna, I would be livid too. It's disappointing to see how quickly so many of the "holdouts" in the west are folding. And in other news, it's not just the so-called gay "rights" issues that Christians nations (and, to be blunt, Christians themselves) seem to be willing to fold on. It's on a lot of issues, if certain theologians and commentators are to be believed.

Sometimes it's government impositions, and sometimes they are obvious, which weaken a religion. Other times it more subtle. I expect an onslaught of both where the religion called Christianity is concerned.

A Few Good Links (vol. 19)

So many links, so little time:

1. My favorite living sci-fi author is profiled by the New Yorker. They fail to mention my favorite of his works, however, which is the fantasy duo The Wizard Knight.
2. Why don't religious liberty arguments work better, particularly in regards to the question of Christians and "gay marriage?" For one thing, it's because there are a number of people who aren't religious, and therefore don't really understand or care about the religious rights of others; they therefore don't see the importance of defending religious liberties when these conflict with something else which is desired. Others are openly hostile to religion, and so will support any cause simply because it will conflict with (and thus could destroy or hamper) the recognition of and preservation or protection of religious liberties. Further, there is a divorce between religious doctrines concerning "theology" or "beliefs" (the "creed" part of religion) and the morals which are sometimes not so obvious from those beliefs (the "code" part of religion). Finally, because religious liberty arguments are perceived as whining; nevermind that most feminist or homosexualist arguments also sound like whining--the people who present (and thus, largely narrate and at times frame) the debate are friendly towards gays and feminists, but not towards people of faith. Bottom line: we need to do a better job of evangelizing and then catechizing the culture.
3. The world needs more everyday heroes, but it also needs for everyday men to be heroic when called upon. Sometimes they are.
4. We need more moral and religious heroes, too. Unfortunately, being a morally, religiously, or virtuously heroic man is often a harder road to toe, in particular because the world hates this kind of hero more than any other. Thus, for example, a bishop who is on the whole doing his job in a meaningful manner looks like moral hero, for the simple reason that he faces much backlash for it, and for the reason that there are no other men of valor to march with him in the field. There are a few, however, who lend there pens (or keyboards) to the cause.
5. Actually, heroism isn't all we need. A simple return to virtues, basic morality, and even simple human kindness and decency (soft virtue, those) would work wonders for society. Unfortunately one side in the culture wars is increasingly (though not surprisingly) warring against private morality or public virtue.
6. Speaking of good witnessing to the culture, have I mentioned that I love the Dominican Sisters of Mary, Mother of the Eucharist?
7. There is a certain romance to rituals, religious or otherwise.
8. Churches have been vandalized in the name of homosexualism. These vandalisms are under-reported in the name of "tolerance." 
9. Elsewhere, we see that holding beliefs against the homosexualist agenda must be punished on a personal level. Meanwhile, those who are being fined--and whose businesses are being shuttered and thus whose livelihoods are being ruined--are now being denied aide via such sources as crowdfunding. And of course, the real reason behind the push for "gay marriage" should be obvious to any with eyes to see or ears to hear. Happily, there's still Samaritan's Purse, which won't be so easily shut down.
10. A nice flowchart to answer the important question: "Did I buy a good whiskey?" However, the chart should flow through "taste it" more often.
11. Fear of the Lord means hating our sins--and we should pray that we are given a holy fear of the lord, and thus that we hate our sins enough to overcome them.

With great tragedy and great calamity often comes the opportunity for the harder virtues to be practiced. Let us hope that we see more fortitude, and indeed even some heroism, emerge from these increasingly hot culture wars.

Misleading Misreading of the Day--Matthew 5:41

I've finally encountered an actually interesting attempt to argue that people of faith should bake the cake. It hinges on the teachings in Matthew 5 about how to respond to those who wrong you:

“You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I say to you, Do not resist one who is evil. But if any one strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also; and if any one would sue you and take your coat, let him have your cloak as well; and if any one forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles. Give to him who begs from you, and do not refuse him who would borrow from you.

The argument of the article hinges in particular on Matthew 5:41 t argue that if someone forces you to bake a cake for a "gay wedding" then your response should be to bake two. The author of the post also leaves the disclosure that she does in fact support "gay marriage," and this is one of the few arguments I have found which cannot simply be reduced to "Do this because we told you too, bigot," and so I commend her for making it. In these polarized times it is far too rare to see any attempt at making a good-faith argument as to why people should be forced to violate their consciences as the price for doing business (read: making a living for themselves).

Many of the problems of this interpretations of Matthew 5 have been addressed elsewhere. One which stands out in particular to me are the fact that there is a difference between going along with somebody you don't like, even doing something for them which you don't want to do (or permitting them to wrong you in some way); and willingly helping them to do something which you know (or at least believe) to be wrong. Another is that there is a difference between being extra kind to others, including those who want to wrong us (which is what the teaching in Matthew suggests), and helping these people to wrong us.

Christ tells us to turn the other cheek, even to become servants; but a servant is not a doormat. As one commentator notes, turning the other cheek was a very edgy teaching precisely because the expected reaction was to grovel in the dirt, quite literal to fall down at the other's feet (doormat, much?). The teaching is to not resist evil with more evil--which in turn means not participating in the other's evil and helping him to commit it. Refusing service is not in and of itself evil, and if there ever was a good reason to refuse service it is because the service is known to be for an evil end.

To go back to the (imaginative, I'll grant) misreading, the lady who wrote the post which inspired this response attempts to set the stage (with [my comments]):

To the Israelites, the Romans were evil and ungodly. They had no place ruling over God’s chosen people in God’s chosen nation. That land had been promised to Moses and his descendants when God brought them out of Egypt. Their very presence in the land was blasphemous. [There's a problem with this statement as it is. That problem is that the Temple in Jerusalem was built with an outer court for the Gentiles, which would presumably include Romans. At worst, it was an outrage that the Romans were present as conquerors--but their very presence could hardly be a blasphemy in and of itself].

One of the Roman laws stated that any man could be required to drop what he was doing and carry a Roman soldier’s equipment for him for up to a mile. In the Sermon on the Mount, with his followers gathered around him, Jesus referenced that law and told his followers what they should do in that case:

“If anyone forces you to go one mile, go with them two miles.” ~Matthew 5:41

Go with them two miles. That was not the advice that most of the people in the crowd that day had been hoping for. That was not the conclusion that they would have come to on their own, following this man that they hoped would lead them to victory over the Romans. That was certainly not respecting their religious beliefs [Jesus was God. He is the source of religious truth, and so He need not respect a false "religious belief." But the state is not God. The state is more akin to Caesar. Render unto Caesar what is Caesar's...] — go with them two! What if their neighbors saw! What if seeing them carrying the Roman’s equipment caused other Jews to think the Roman oppression was okay? [This is a false equivalency. Part of the objection to providing services to sinful events is the possibility that doing so will lead to scandal, but at this point in time (and cultural decay) it is a very minor part indeed. The bigger problem is that this is participating in those events, and thus to some extent in the sins which they represent] What if there was other work that needed to be done — good work, charity work even, but they spent all that time carrying equipment for the evil oppressor? [Is this even an argument which has actually been made? If so, I am not aware of it. It can't be a really serious argument, since it presupposes that the subjugated person in question would otherwise be spending all of his time doing good works and acts of charity, or at the least otherwise providing for his and his family's needs. The argument in religious liberty cases is precisely that we should be allowed to turn down opportunities for doing this, not because we have something better to be doing with the time, but because it is better to do nothing at all with the time then to do something which violates our consciences.]

Ah, but therein lies the rub. There is nothing actually wrong with marching with the soldier for a mile, or two, or ten. That Christ is telling us to do this rather explicitly means that there is nothing sinful about providing aide to the soldier, even if that soldier was part of an army occupying Israel. The law in question was not particularly set up to oppress the Israelites (or any other conquered people), and there weren't in all probability soldiers going door-to-door to ask after Israelites who might object to carrying their load for a mile. Finally, the Israelite would not (or would not necessarily) know whether the soldier in question was taking his gear off to some evil purpose. Might the soldier be planning to participate in an unprovoked campaign of terror or Genocide? That seems out of character for the Romans (the phrase pax Romana is not for nothing). They would seem to be more interested in putting down uprisings (keep order) or perhaps expanding their territory than ridding their empire of their own subjects, however troublesome.

Even supposing that the Roman soldier was planning to do such a thing, merely carrying his equipment does not make the Israelite in question a willing participant in the campaign. This is true for the simple reason that the Israelite pressed into service does not know that this is what the soldier is planning to do, or that this is the purpose for which he is being pressed into service. Odds are rather against it, in any case. So at worst, the Israelite Disciple of Christ in question becomes a material participant in evil, and not a formal one (to make use a of a significant distinction delineated here). But to bake a cake for an event whose sole purpose is to give witness to an untruth, and whose major result will be the celebration of a grave sin? That seems to me to be a bit closer to providing support for that event, and thus for that sin. Such support is itself a sin, and thus must be resisted. Nor should the laws of a really free nation compel men to violate their consciences in this way. Such laws do not promote "equality" or "charity" or "tolerance/acceptance", but rather tyranny.

Today's Contrived Dudgeon

Two years ago, St. Mary's Cathedral in Sodom-by-the-Sea installed a sprinkler system to keep its doorways clean and clear of such things as refuse, feces, and needles which were being regularly left in and near the doorways of the Cathedral by the local homeless population. In doing so, they were following the lead of many others in the city's financial district. So why is this of interest today?

Because most people a) don't know this about Sodom-by-the-Sea, b) don't read much more than the headline and first paragraph or two of most news articles, and (most importantly) c) because there is a bit of a publicity battle being waged against his Excellency the Lion-hearted archbishop. This publicity battle is being waged (ostensibly) because the good archbishop said some truthful things about homosexual acts, and is asking those who are employed in positions of authority in his see to refrain from publicly promoting such things as as sodomy (and adultery, fornication, masturbation, pornography, and a host of other sexual sins, etc).

Therefore, anything which can be found to hurt his excellency's image, must be found, dug up, and trotted out on parade before the public. This must be done, even if a retraction must later be reprinted--because who ever notices (let alone reads) those, anyway? And why give the diocese benefit of the doubt in this policy--why hesitate to consider that there just may be some innocuous explanation--in short, why do the work of actually reporting, when the existence of the thing can be used to attack Archbishop Cordileone, or to paint him in an unfavorable light? For that matter, why bother to find out whether the archbishop had anything at all to do with this decision, when you can just assume that he did?

Meanwhile, the archdiocese gives some pretty valid reasons for the sprinklers' installation--and now will be removing it, thanks to the "optics":

This sprinkler system in alcoves near our back doorways was installed approximately two years ago, after learning from city resources that this kind of system was being commonly used in the Financial District, as a safety, security and cleanliness measure to avoid the situation where needles, feces and other dangerous items were regularly being left in these hidden doorways. The problem was particularly dangerous because students and elderly people regularly pass these locations on their way to school and mass every day. When the system was installed,after other ideas were tried and failed, the people who were regularly sleeping in those doorways were informed in advance that the sprinklers were being installed. The idea was not to remove those persons, but to encourage them to relocate to other areas of the Cathedral, which are protected and safer. The purpose was to make the Cathedral grounds as well as the homeless people who happen to be on those grounds safer. We are sorry that our intentions have been misunderstood and recognize that the method used was ill-conceived. It actually has had the opposite effect from what it was intended to do, and for this we are very sorry. We have also now learned that the system in the first place required a permit and may violate San Francisco water-use laws, and the work to remove this system has already started, and will be completed by the end of the day.

My thought is that if anyone is injured or endangered by stepping on (say) a discarded needle or made ill from contact with human feces as a result of the removal of this system, that is on the hands of these media piranhas.

A Few Good Links (vol. 18): Responses to that Misguided NYT Article by Gary Gutting

It's tempting to say that it all started when the aptly-named Archbishop Salvatore Joseph Cordileone insisted that Catholic School employees not publicly contradict Catholic doctrines (including, of course, moral doctrines, and of course this means sexual moral doctrines too). But Of course, the problem goes deeper, and his Excellency is only doing his job as pastor of the Church of San Francisco, centered in Sodom-by-the-Sea. The latest incident is, of course, a very misguided article in the New York Times, but I repeat myself. Here are some responses:

1. Since the article itself specifically calls out Profs. Robert P. George and John Finnis, I think it only fitting to give the first link to their response. It is a general (and deserved) shellacking of Gutting's poorly-reasoned piece.
2. It turns out that some of the school employees actually support the good archbishop. This is not surprising--nor should be the climate of fear created by the schoolyard bullies who oppose him, a climate which largely silences these voices of support.
3. William Briggs also has a response to these attempts at gutting Catholic moral teaching.
4. In other, but related, news, the gay Italian fashion designers Dolce and Gabbana have spoken out against "gay marriage" and gay parenting (via artificial insemination, rent-a-womb schemes, etc.). Dolce is a practicing Catholic, so he will be roundly ignored.
5. The largest evangelical church in Sodom-by-the-Sea has decided that it will now condone (and perhaps even bless?) homosexual acts (sodomy) provided that they are done in the context of "gay marriage." I guess that's a double coming-out.
6. Speaking of evangelicals, Rob Bell, last heard from for denying the reality of Hell, is now trying to affirm the reality of "gay marriages." He's not just affirming their reality as a cultural phenomenon, of course, but also their morality. In other words, this is not just a matter of saying "it's here, so we'll have to learn how to tolerate it" (as if any sin should be tolerated), but rather, "it's coming, so we should embrace it."
7. Daniel McInerny also has written a good response to Gutting's propaganda.
8. Professor J. Budziszewski will be writing a 7-part response to Gutting. The first part is now on his blog.

Please pray for Archbishop Cordileone, for the Church as a whole, and for what's left of our civilization: that he will have fortitude, that she will remain steadfast in truth, and that it will cease its pursuit of the great liberal death wish before it is too late.

Archbishop Cordileone Nails It

His Excellency the Archbishop of San Francisco has come under fire recently for a set of proposed morality clauses to be used in employment contracts at the Catholic schools in his diocese. There is little surprise as to what the morality clauses contain, and perhaps even less as to what the reaction is from the Left. And to nobody's further surprise, several lawmakers have gotten involved, mostly by sending him a "disapproving" letter.

Oh, but the good bishop has written a response to the lawmakers. And it is quite good. After noting that there is a bit of misinformation concerning this morality clause--such as "the falsehood that the morality clauses apply to the teachers’ private life"--he writes that

The next thing I would like to mention is actually a question: would you hire a campaign manager who advocates policies contrary to those that you stand for, and who shows disrespect toward you and the Democratic Party in general? On the other hand, if you Letter to Legislators knew a brilliant campaign manager who, although a Republican, was willing to work for you and not speak or act in public contrary to you or your party – would you hire such a person? If your answer to the first question is “no,” and to the second question is “yes,” then we are actually in agreement on the principal point in debate here.

Now let’s say that this campaign manager you hired, despite promises to the contrary, starts speaking critically of your party and favorably of your running opponent, and so you decide to fire the person. Would you have done this because you hate all Republicans outright, or because this individual, who happens to be a Republican, violated the trust given to you and acted contrary to your mission? If the latter, then we are again in agreement on this principle.

Yes, this is all quite reasonable, and so I suspect that much of it will be lost on both the lawmakers and the general public, including dissident catholics and busy-body non-Catholics alike.

Do What Suits You

I was reading a post on the Witherspoon Institute's Public Discourse site about our culture's insanity concerning gender and sexuality. The gist of the post is that the woman writing it wore a tuxedo to her high school's prom (in 1985) as an expression of her 15-year-old gender confusion, but then moved on from there to live a "normal" life as a well-adjusted female/feminine member of society (happily married, mother of two, Ph.D. holder). This is to be contrasted with what would happen to the young girl who did that today: she would be applauded by the local LBGTQA community, then asked to become a member, and then practically harassed and coerced (but oh-so-sympathetically) until she embraced her secret identity as one or more of those letters (though not "A" for straight "Ally")

If she resists embracing a lesbian identity, she is encouraged to come out of denial and accept herself for who she is. If she seeks counseling, her therapist hews to a strict, professionally mandated protocol to affirm and validate her identity as homosexual. The counselor tells her that being lesbian is an unchangeable and good part of who she is, even though the girl is experiencing significant distress over the intense emotional and physical draw she feels toward other girls and women.

While she is in therapy, if she mentions wishing to resist these attractions and wonders whether she might develop heterosexually—or at least not identify as gay—it is considered unethical for the counselor to discuss this possibility with her. In some states, such as California and New Jersey, it is even against the law.

If she speaks of her religion and says there are faith convictions at stake that matter deeply to her, the therapist tries to help her overcome her “homophobic” values and free her from the “false consciousness” and oppression to which she is clearly subject.

And if she finally discusses the still unrevealed secret of sexual abuse—the fifty-year-old uncle and the summer six years ago? Exploring its possible connection with her same-sex attraction is forbidden. Any such discussion or treatment must still affirm her same-sex orientation and disassociate the abuse from her sexual development. She is, after all, only fifteen, and must be protected from dangerous ideas that might depress her further and chip away at her fragile self-esteem.

I've seen such things happen before, and I've seen some of the transformations which occur when they do: none have been for the better. There are a few who are out but also attempting to live chastely--but even this can be problematic (see, for example, the article about Gay Christians on page 31 of the January/February 2015 Touchstone magazine).

Society may (or may not) tolerate this particular position as a personal choice, but never as a policy or recommended course of action (especially not by a church!). It certainly doesn't tolerate the personal choice of desiring to not be "gay" or whatever term you may prefer to describe a person who is sexually deviant or gender-bent. Is it possible to (ethically) cure a person who identifies as gay (or whatever) and who has come out with it? It may well be (and there are many testimonies from those who were so cured), but then, this is a road which our society wants to see closed. It turns out that there are some "personal choices" which men will not be allowed to make by our supposedly permissive society. And those choices--whether they may actually be accomplish-able or not--will increasingly be the old moral choices in which we would have found real freedom.

Revolution of the Justices

A large number of probate judges in the state of Alabama have decided that they will not comply with a federal court's ruling that they should start manufacturing fiat marriages. It's nice to see that there are some judges who are actually interested in justice, which in this case means disobeying the orders of a higher court. Or, more appropriately, getting creative in their interpretation of what the higher court's orders actually are:

An attorney for the Probate Judge’s Association said that is not an accurate reading of the judge’s ruling. Probate Judges are elected in all 67 counties in Alabama and carry the responsibility of issuing and recording marriage licenses.

“Judge Granade’s ruling in this case only applies to the parties in the case and has no effect on anybody that is not a named party. The probate judges were not parties in this matter,” Al Agricola, attorney for the Alabama Probate Judges Association, explained. “The legal effect of this decision is to allow one person in one same sex marriage that was performed in another state to adopt their partner’s child. There is nothing in the judge’s order that requires probate judges in Alabama to issue marriage licenses to same sex couples.”

...Judge Greg Norris, President of the Alabama Probate Judges Association, hopes that misinterpretation of Friday’s ruling will not cause confusion among the general public. Probate Judges are elected in all 67 counties in Alabama and carry the responsibility of issuing and recording marriage licenses.

“As probate judges, our duty is to issue marriage licenses in accordance with Alabama law and that means we can not legally issue marriage licenses to same sex couples,” said Greg Norris, President of the Alabama Probate Judges Associate. “The recent federal ruling does not change that.” Probate Judges are elected in all 67 counties in Alabama and carry the responsibility of issuing and recording marriage licenses.

Probate Judges are elected in all 67 counties in Alabama and carry the responsibility of issuing and recording marriage licenses.

Sometimes "the law" and "justice" are at odds. Sometimes,"the law" asks for the impossible, such as for people to "marry" two (or more) people of the same sex. Sorry kids, it's not a marriage, no matter what the piece of paper says. On the other hand, this seems like an awfully shaky method of making a stand, since it is here based more-or-less on the claim that no ruling has been passed (yet) which requires the state to begin issuing "marriage" licenses to homosexual partners. Of course, that particular situation can (and very likely will) change in the near future, probably about as soon as the first lawsuit is filed against the Alabama probate judges association (or perhaps if they are really stubborn, against each individual probate judge's office).

Jeb Bush

Eight years ago, I would have probably been thrilled with the prospect of a Jeb Bush candidacy. Now, not quite so much. His recent pronouncements on "committed" gay relationships, which sound a bit like preparing to outright surrender on the matter of gay "marriage", are not helping his stock in my opinion:

"I hope that we can show respect for the good people on all sides of the gay and lesbian marriage issue – including couples making lifetime commitments to each other who are seeking greater legal protections, and those of us who believe marriage is a sacrament and want to safeguard religious liberty."

Well, he did finish by throwing a bone to religious liberties, but the cynic in me suspects that as thing will go, the sentence could be read as "I hope that we can show respect for the good...gay and lesbian...couples making lifetime commitments to each other who are seeking greater legal protections." That tends to be the way these thing actually get implemented. He was more correct when he asked whether "sodomy [should] be elevated to the same constitutional status as race and religion".

Gay "marriage" sure feels a lot like a front in the culture war which we didn't so much lose as just outright forfeited. So much the worse for all of us.

Passive Aggressive Resistance

The Public Discourse recently had an article advocating an interesting sort of passive resistance for faithful Christians who are being increasingly compelled to violate their consciences as regards their participation in so-called "gay marriage."

Although it may not be acceptable to all in this situation, it would be acceptable to many. It is simply this: to obey the law and serve gay weddings, but to make it known publicly that you believe that the law forcing you to do this is unjust, needs to be changed, and is obeyed only under protest and out of your respect for law and the democratic process...
I could well imagine a pious religious couple, running the kind of wedding-focused catering hall that I once worked at in New York, posting on its premises an announcement something to this effect:

[lengthy statement declaring that the store owners are Christians, that they oppose "gay marriage and the "gay lifestyle," and that they will nevertheless provide the demanded services out of obedience to the law, but that they would like to see the law changed]

We are required by the Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity (SOGI) provision of New York State's anti-discrimination statute to make our wedding facilities available to anyone who seeks to use them, including gay and lesbian couples who want to marry under New York's same-sex marriage law. We believe strongly in the democratic process and the rule of law. For this reason, we will obey the state law governing our business. However, we obey this law only under the gravest protest, as we believe it violates our deepest moral and religious convictions. It does so needlessly and with apparent intent to polarize our country and inflame an already overheated cultural war.

Such a declaration would have many advantages over simply giving in silently to an unfair law to save one’s business. It would strike out in a public way against the injustice of such a law and gain sympathy from many quarters for the business owner’s point of view. 

It would also cast the business owner in the sympathetic role of the admirable peacemaker. His opponents would be cast in the role of authoritarian bullies picking on pious religious folks and opposing simple live-and-let-live solutions to the problems posed by American pluralism. Finally, such a declaration would probably discourage gays and lesbians from ever wanting to hold their wedding celebrations at any establishment that posted such a statement. The catering hall owners would have a strong First Amendment right to air their views, and by doing so they would probably end most instances where they are asked to do what their religion and moral sense forbids. 

It’s possible that such a declaration might drive away the business of liberals sympathetic to gay marriage, but it is just as likely that it would gain sympathy from many quarters, including not only from social conservatives who oppose gay marriage on principle, but from many liberals and moderates who resent small guys being pushed around by state bureaucrats. If the declaration were properly worded and sounded a courteous-yet-concerned tone of inclusiveness, it would probably attract and repel equal numbers of people. Most potential customers, I suspect, would not be affected one way or the other.

Suffice it to say that I am on the fence for this one. I think it is a good fallback position*, though I suppose that as a fallback position it loses some of the "we're just trying to leave in peace" overtones. I am also less-than convinced that it is a position that we will be allowed to fallback to--today, compulsion for participation, tomorrow laws against protesting against said compulsions. Today, it's free exercise of religion (and rights of association which are under assault--Constitutional protections thereof be damned--and tomorrow it will be the rights of free speech.

On the other hand, there is a slightly more aggressive version of this, in which the "shopkeepers" post (and state) that all proceeds from providing services to "gay marriages" (weddings, receptions, honeymoon,s etc as applicable) will go to support the National Organization for Marriage (or a comparable pro-marriage and frankly pro-sanity organization).

*Similarly, the idea that the Church should refer to the Sacrament only as "Holy Matrimony" and not ever as marriage," and to the civil institution/partnership as "marriage" but never matrimony, is a fallback position which ultimately leaves much to be desired. In both cases, there are better options even as "fallback" options.

First They Came for the Wedding Industry

First, the came for the photographers and bakers. Then they went after public and later private venues which hosted weddings and receptions. The next step is to go after actual (ordained) ministers, albeit minor ones who specialize in weddings. This has now officially begun.

Next it will be other ordained ministers, including one who run denomination churches, and Catholic priests who run parish churches. There will be demands for speeches, then sermons, and finally things said in the confessional.

First it was small fines, then ruinous ones, and then jail time. Now reeducation camp has been added, but one wonders what will be the penalty of those who resist this "reeducation": more explicit brainwashing, then our own gulags when even this fails?