Tales From The Cult

He grew up in a stereotypically uptight Catholic household, was a drummer in a rock band, and had a transformational religious experience in his early 20s. After writing a book that received national attention and a Catholic bishop's imprimatur, he founded a movement that swept across the country gaining numerous adherents. It made him a millionaire.

If you think I'm talking about Christopher West, you're wrong.
I'm talking about his spiritual grandfather, Larry Tomczak.
Who is Larry Tomczak and why would anyone consider him Chris West's spiritual grandfather?

Therein lies a tale...

Back in the 1970's, Larry Tomczak was a young midwestern Catholic man who underwent a Pentecostalist conversion experience, becoming "born-again" without leaving his Catholic faith. He used his experience at Pentecostal churches to become a major player in the then burgeoning Catholic charismatic movement. In fact, the man from Cleveland, Ohio founded and oversaw charismatic communities through the same Sword of the Spirit umbrella community (search the PDF in this link with the phrase "Mother of God community") that saw Ralph Martin found the Word of God community.

Despite extremely dodgy liturgical theology, his autobiographical national best-seller, Clap Your Hands, received an imprimatur from Cardinal William Baum.

Why would the Cardinal do such a thing? Well, the charismatic movement was the latest theological fad in a Church whose leaders were trying to speak to the culture, to be really "up-to-date." Tomczak's book really appealed to the nation's young adults. Liturgical theology was in upheaval anyway. So, why not give it an imprimatur?

Tomczak moved to D.C. in the early 1970s, founding the nondenominational communities Take and Give (TAG) and People of Destiny International (PDI). Ultimately, however, the dulcet sounds of his own voice seduced him.

By 1982 he had left the Catholic Church to co-found Sovereign Grace Ministry. By sheer coincidence, PDI and Sovereign Grace Ministry were based in Gaithersburg, Md. -- where the Mother of God Community was and is based.

And, again by happy coincidence, the Word of God community which took its philosophy in part from Tomzcak's theology, was the progenitor for the Mother of God community. All of these Tomczak-inspired communities subscribed to the same "headship" principle of "shepherding", a principle that in the 1980's caused many Catholic bishops to become wary.

As it happens, the Mother of God community's "shepherding" technique was so heavy-handed that, despite initially receiving the approbation of the local bishop, it eventually invited a Washington Post series on the "Catholic cult" aspects of the community.

It was this series of articles that first brought Christopher West national exposure. He became the "star" stool pigeon in the series, whose progress out of the community was followed in breathless detail by WaPo reporters. Before the series was finished, West had, with characteristic understatement, made the claim that the Gaithersburg Catholic religious community had raped him.

So, as this thumbnail history shows, Christopher West not only has a Catholic charismatic background, his charismatic background is shaped by a "shepherding" technique developed by a Catholic apostate. It is a set of techniques that turns spiritual direction into a mockery of the real thing, and religion into a mockery of Catholicism.

Given this, is it any wonder that Chris West's view on sexuality is somewhat... different... than the view of Catholics who had a less severe upbringing, people who did not grow up in a cult atmosphere? Can the cult's attitude towards its own members explain why Christopher West seems to view Hugh Hefner as a kind of hero or saviour, someone who is somehow spiritually on par with John Paul II? Does West, like Tomczak, carry so much baggage from his cult past and family upbringing that he simply cannot properly explain the Catholic Faith?

It is certainly the case that Larry Tomczak eventually left the Catholic Faith, although the man who was once endorsed by many Catholics, both lay and ordained, remains a very successful speaker and presenter even to this day. But programs which appeal to the nation's youth have a habit of going astray.

We have not only seen this with Tomczak's version of the Catholic charismatic movement, we also saw the same thing with the Lifeteen movement which was so heavily promoted by various Catholic leaders, both lay and ordained, because it so "energized" Catholic youth.

There, too, we saw a movement whose founders regularly misrepresented Catholic theology and liturgy, but whose defenders explained those "minor" mistakes away by pointing to all the "good" it accomplished, all the orthodox teachings it did present, and the thousands of youth who returned to the practice of the Faith because of it.

But, where are those episcopal and lay Lifeteen cheerleaders now? To whom have they apologized now that Lifeteen's founder is excommunicated and defrocked and its movement become non-denominational? How many Catholics now carry a distorted understanding of what liturgy should be thanks to Lifeteen's "minor" distortions?

How many times do we have to go through this?

Lest this essay be seen as a pure slam of the Mother of God community, which still exists, it should be pointed out that the Mother of God community began a series of reforms the same year the WaPo series was published.

Indeed, within a few months of the WaPo articles (and before the reforms began), Christopher West would leave the Gaithersburg's community "cult" behind to begin his study of Catholic Faith at the John Paul II Institute in Washington DC.

Upon his graduation, someone would secure this unknown graduate with a freshly-minted MA in theology a speaking gig at an international theological conference in Brazil.

The rest is, as they say, history.

At least some members of the Mother of God community, the community whose spiritual life had been approbated by bishops, exposed by a national news series in the secular media, then reformed by those same bishops, were undoubtedly proud of this happy achievement.

But, it should also be noted, today, not all members of the reformed Mother of God community are happy with Christopher West's teachings. Indeed, at least a few of the current members at the highest levels of the community are quite concerned with both the content and the method of West's presentations.

In that regard, it is difficult to know what to make of yet another set of happy coincidences: Ralph Martin, the founder of the Word of God community, is now an associate professor at Sacred Heart Major Seminary, along with former MoG community chair Mary Healy, current MoG chaplain Father Francis Martin and current Christopher West associate, Dr. Janet Smith.

Dr. Smith, it may be remembered, is not only a professor at Sacred Heart seminary, she is also an instructor for the corporation West created, the Theology of the Body Institute, which sponsors West's pricey courses. She collaborates with him in leading TOB Institute seminars, although she innocently failed to mention her work with him when she first began writing in support of West's teachings.

So, who is for Chris West and who is against him?

Well, the lines seem pretty clear.
The people who taught him theology are very concerned.
Many of the people who benefit from his association are not.

FYI
To Learn More about Christopher West's errors, click on Chris and the Cult.

Luther and Islam

When most people teach the religions of the world, they lump early Christianity together with Protestantism and tack Islam onto the back.

This is not wise. If we offer the religions in chronological order, and pay close attention to the world situation, especially the situation in Europe, we'll see something that most people miss. Lutheranism owes a heavy theological debt to Mohammed.

Now, to be fair to Luther, he recognized Mohammed as an Arian heretic who denied the divinity of Christ and called the Koran a book of Satan.
So it's not like he LOVED Mohammed.
He didn't like him at all.

But, that having been said, there are several points of contact between Islam and Luther's teachings.

1) War Against the Turk is War Against God
Both Islam and Luther agreed fighting the Muslim army was fighting God, although they thought this for different reasons. For Muslims, they really WERE on a mission from God because they were the true faith. After all, they started a rampage against Christians in 632, crossed into Spain in 711, conquered Constantinople in 1453, and headed up to Buda and Pest about the time Luther was hammering theses on a church door.

However, from Luther's point of view, as represented in his defense of the 95 Theses, while Muslims were an heretical faith based in Arianism, they were also sent by God to scourge Catholic Europe, so no opposition should be brought against them. This was especially true given that Luther held that the Pope was more evil than Islam. So, while the Pope was trying to gather Christian armies to fight crusades against Muslim rapacity Luther was actively trying to keep any Christian from fighting. Luther only began to modify his stance when the Muslims finally captured Buda and Pest, and began to advance on Vienna.

2) The Jews are Perfidious Because They Reject ME

Both Martin Luther and Mohammed began their careers exhibiting friendship and love towards the Jews. Both men expected the Jews to embrace their amazing new theologies. In both cases, the Jews rejected the men, correctly regarding them as theological nut-cases with delusions of grandeur. In both cases, Martin and Mohammed responded to the rejection with towering rage and hatred directed towards the Jewish community. Both changed their preaching to proclaim that the Jews were perfidious liars who needed to be destroyed. 

3) Iconoclasm (the destruction of images) 

Both Islam and Lutheran Protestantism destroyed images because they argued that God commanded it. For both, the use of images was idolatry.

But again, to be fair, Luther and his compatriots were not the first to be taken in by this aspect of Muslim theology. The Eastern Christian Church in Constantinople underwent at least two different bouts of iconoclasm between 700 and 1000 AD, both a result of the fact that Muslim armies were constantly attacking the city.

Within 100 years of the first assault, the Christian emperor of Constantinople decided to join his Muslim opponents in destroying images, the beginning of the great Iconoclasm heresies. In both outbreaks of iconoclasm, it took decades to put down the heresy.

So, we should not be surprised to see Protestants changing the Decalogues' teaching on images as Muslim armies attacked Budapest, in much the same way the Eastern emperor had when Muslim armies attacked Constantinople.

4) The Irrationality of God
In both his sermons and in the collection of sayings called Table Talk, Luther stated:

"But since the devil's bride, Reason, that pretty whore, comes in and thinks she's wise, and what she says, what she thinks, is from the Holy Spirit, who can help us, then? Not judges, not doctors, no king or emperor, because [reason] is the Devil's greatest whore." The original German is "Vernunft ... ist die höchste Hur, die der Teufel hat" Martin Luther's Last Sermon in Wittenberg ... Second Sunday in Epiphany, 17 January 1546. Dr. Martin Luthers Werke: Kritische Gesamtausgabe. (Weimar: Herman Boehlaus Nachfolger, 1914), Band 51:126, Line 7ff

Islam, of course, has always taught that Allah is not bound by rationality. Allah is more powerful than anything, even the force of reason.

Now, Islam teaches that God can change, while Protestantism has never taught this, but that's only because Islam is more theologically consistent than Protestantism in this regard. After all, if reason really is the "whore of the devil," then God cannot be rational. His very rationality would make Him the devil's whore. Lutheran theology in reference to the role of reason and faith is essentially just a restatement of Muslim theology.

5) Divorce is Legitimate
Muslims always permitted divorce - the husband simply says "divorce" three times and that accomplishes the deed.

Once Luther became convinced that marriage was not a sacrament (which was the Muslim position as well, of course), Bucer became the first Christian to draw the logical conclusion. He argued as the Jews and Muslims did, that marriage was simply a civil contract, and divorce was a reasonable solution. Protestants in general and Lutherans in particular quickly followed suit.

6) Polygamy is Acceptable
But even divorce was sometimes troublesome. Luther asserted that nothing in Scripture forbad polygamy. Bucer, Melanchthon and Luther would all advise Henry VIII to simply commit bigamy instead of going through the trouble of annulment when Henry tired of his wife. Henry had not the stomach for the Protestant solution, but that didn't stop the idea.

When Philip of Hesse faced the same problem of having the wrong wife, Luther famously advised him in the same way he had already advised Henry - Philip should simply take a second wife secretly when he tired of the first. Philip acted on the advice and did so with Bucer and Melancthon, Luther's main theological advisor, serving as witnesses to the "lawful" bigamy. John of Leiden had reached the same conclusion in Munster just five years earlier, and the whole city had become bigamous for a time, so Luther wasn't even original in stealing this advice from Islam.

7) Lying is a Virtue in Times of Necessity
A standard of Shi'a Muslim theology is the practice of taqiyya, or lying in order to protect the faith. Luther gave similar advice on the virtues of lying to Philip of Hesse when Philip's bigamy was found out. Unfortunately, the lie was found out as well, and Luther's reputation suffered somewhat from the resulting scandal.

8) Proclaim With Your Mouth
This last is not really Luther's fault - to the end of his life, he insisted on the necessity and efficacy of baptism. However, his rejection of the other sacraments and his sole fide (faith alone) theology led naturally to a very Muslim conclusion: the sinner's prayer is efficacious.

Everyone knows that in order to become a Jew, the man must be circumcised. What most people don't realize is that conversion to Judaism requires a ritual bath: the mikveh.

That's why John the Baptist baptized people - he was giving them the ritual bath that signified the conversion of hearts. While neither the mikveh nor John the Baptist's baptism did anything in terms of grace, the sacrament of baptism, instituted by Christ, was different. For 1500 years, baptism was the sacrament which fulfilled the symbol the mikveh represented. Baptism provides sanctifying grace.

But nearly a millennia of Muslim violence changed many people's idea of what was necessary to convert to a life of faith.

"Laa ilāha illa Allāh, wa Muḥammad(un) rasūl Allāh." Say that sentence aloud and, according to Muslim theology, you are thereby rendered a Muslim, subject to all shariah law, including the law which makes apostates eligible for the death penalty.

Similarly, 19th and 20th century Christianity adopted this Muslim concept and came up with the "sinner's pew" - the first pew in the church, a place reserved for those the preacher intended to focus his conversion sermons on. That, in turn, led to the invention of the "sinner's prayer."

Proclaim with your mouth that Jesus Christ is Lord, believe in your hearts that He is risen from the dead, and you are saved. Not only is that sentence very close to a passage in Romans, it is virtually Muslim in its sentiments.

If you have ever wondered why secular humanism - the fruit of Protestantism - is so favorable towards the Muslims, this may give some of the necessary philosophical connections.

Chris West Evangelizing Government Employees?

Christopher West has long held Hugh Hefner up as an icon, someone who tried to rescue the naked from the Manichean Puritanism (tm) of American religious bigotry.

He has also long held that those who are pure should be able to look on the body of a naked woman without shame. He famously held that he purified himself by seeing an image of the Blessed Virgin's breasts as she was nursing Jesus (and she ain't no flat-chested mama, according to Chris), and recalled every pornographic image he had every beheld, offering it all to her.

Well, government employees are now gaining Westian sensibilities.

At least one senior government executive has gained the purity of thought necessary to look beyond the nudity of the female form and show love and concern for those caught up in the work of pornography and prostitution.

For instance, one senior executive spent at least 331 days looking at
pornography on his government computer and chatting online with nude or
partially clad women without being detected, the records show. When finally
caught, the NSF official retired. He even offered, among other explanations, a
humanitarian defense, suggesting that he frequented the porn sites to provide a
living to the poor overseas women. Investigators put the cost to taxpayers of
the senior official's porn surfing at between $13,800 and about $58,000. "He
explained that these young women are from poor countries and need to make money to help their parents and this site helps them do that," investigators wrote in
a memo.

Now, clearly, Westians should applaud this man for his discernment and holiness!

As Westians frequently point out, "You can't evangelize a woman or man unless you look at him or her." Indeed. And you can't evangelize them unless you talk with them. And if they are paid to talk smutty, well, we can't be prudish about it - we have to make sure they don't lose their jobs, so we are forced to listen to the smut and talk with them, in order to make sure they are receiving a living wage.

As the Washington Times points out, it's all about love, really.

We are saddened, of course, that the man didn't have a chance to show off his anal foreplay skills, but perhaps that should be left for another session.

For now, we must simply do as Chris West does. Pick up the most beautiful artwork we can ever imagine, let Hugh Hefner rescue it from the trash, think pure thoughts, and look at what Hugh offers us.

I'm sure John Paul II would approve.

Chris and the Cult

Below is a quote from Christopher West's response to Dr. Michael Healy's talk at the Personalist Project event. It perfectly illustrates the point Alice von Hildebrand made in her CNA interview about how West fails to understand the inflammability of sexual passion. He sounds truly Manichean in his claim that an engaged couple is not virtuous unless they are capable of being alone together the day before their wedding without sinning.

Dr. Healy's talk was on "Dietrich von Hildebrand on Human Sexuality." West says at the beginning of his response that he composed his talk in advance, based on reading an advance copy of Dr. Healy's talk. So West is not speaking off the cuff when he says on the topic of moving from continence to virtue:

"St. Paul is so clear on this: 'We are called to freedom! Do not take up again a yoke of slavery.' In my travels, I run into all kinds of different perspectives on these things. What is appropriate, for example, for, say, a young engaged couple? They want to be chaste, they want to save themselves for marriage. What would be appropriate in terms of their affection for one another, what would be appropriate in terms of even their spending time together?

"And in some of the more extreme positions on these questions, which are open for conversation, I hear things like this: 'Well, you never better be alone together. Because you know what's gonna happen if you're alone together.'

"Okay. Take a good-hearted couple. If they know their weaknesses, if they know if they were alone together, they would engage in behavior that they shouldn't be engaging in, I will be the first to commend them for not being alone together. Christian, know thyself. But we must not call that virtue.

"Such a couple is continent, but they are not virtuous, in the true sense of the word, in the true Thomistic sense of the word.

"Think of it from this perspective: If the only thing that kept you from having sex before marriage was the fact that you didn't have the opportunity, what does that say about the desires of your heart? And then there is a real and present danger of justifying lust within the marriage.

"Here's the, the kind of visual that comes to me when I think this through: You get this good-hearted engaged couple, they have never been told about the progress of the Christian life, they've been dropped off at the curb of continence, and they think that's all they can expect. 'Okay, so I'll chain myself to this tree, and you chain yourself to that tree, so we can't get at one another.' What then does the honeymoon become?

"'Oh, now we are allowed to cut the chains loose!' [Makes a dramatic sound effect like a person ripping himself free.] Is that an act of love? Is that an act of purity?

"There is no magic trick on the wedding day that suddenly makes what you do that night an act of love. If you could not be alone together the day before you got married and not sin, there is no magic trick, there is no waving at the wand at the altar, that suddenly makes your sexual behavior beautiful, true, good, lovely, and pure.

"We must take up our cross and follow. It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. This freedom is a real, living possibility if we are willing to undergo deep and painful purifications. ..."

First: Christopher West seems to think that avoiding near occasions of sin is not virtuous activity. Unfortunately, all the saints of the Church and all the manuals on morality say he is in error on this point. The conscious decision to avoid a near occasion of sin is, indeed, a virtue.

Second: Christopher West seems completely unfamiliar with the theology of the sacrament of marriage. It is precisely the case that actions which are sinful prior to a sacrament can be pure afterward, simply because of the sacrament. Take, for instance, the reception of Eucharist. If I receive Christ while in a state of mortal sin, even if I am most sorrowful for that unconfessed sin, then I have just committed another mortal sin. If, however, I first receive the sacrament of reconciliation worthily, confessed my sin, received absolution, and then receive the Eucharist, that reception is not only NOT a sin, I actually grow in God's grace. Same action, quite different results, all because of the reception of a sacrament.

Similarly, no matter how much I love the woman, if I have sex with her before marriage, it is a sin, while if I have sex with her after having been bound to her in the sacrament of marriage, it is not a sin. St. Paul talks precisely about the power and beauty of the sacrament of marriage when he says, "it is better to marry than to burn with passion" (1 Cor 7:9). Indeed, to deny that sex is sanctified by marriage, which is precisely what these (apparently) carefully considered remarks by Chris West maintains, is a denial of Catholic sacramental theology.

Now, is it possible to have sex with my own wife in a lustful way? Sure. But the very fact that the couple has worked hard to avoid a near occasion of sin prior to their marriage means that they are trying to avoid precisely this sin of lust. As a result, it would be not only wrong, but actually perverse, to impute lust to them on the basis that they tried to avoid sin prior to marriage.

Grace, especially sacramental grace, the most powerful force in the universe, changes us. So, it is, in fact, the case that the divinizing graces of marriage do begin to work immediately upon the newly married couple, helping them to withstand concupiscence, turning us towards the "beautiful, true, good, lovely and pure." Indeed, it is precisely the sacraments' ability to "make us gods" (see CCC #460, 1988, 1999), that is, their ability to empower us to love as God alone loves that allows us to love with purity.

Third: West also seems unfamiliar with John Paul II's summary of the ancient Catholic teaching on the THREE ends of marriage in Love and Responsibility (p. 66), a teaching that simply draws on the writings of the Fathers and Doctors of the Church:

"The Church, as has been mentioned previously, teaches, and has always taught, that the primary end of marriage is procreatio, but that it has a secondary end, defined in Latin terminology as mutuum adiutorium. Apart from these a tertiary aim is mentioned - remedium concupiscentiae. Marriage, objectively considered, must provide first of all the means of continuing existence, secondly a conjugal life for man and woman, and thirdly a legitimate orientation for desire. The ends of marriage, in the order mentioned, are incompatible with any subjectivist interpretation of the sexual urge, and therefore demand from man, as a person, objectivity in his thinking on sexual matters, and above all in his behaviour. This objectivity is the foundation of conjugal morality." (emphasis added).

JPII goes on to point out that the ends are attained on the basis of a personalistic norm, that is, each of the three ends flow from love. But he specifically says that the ends themselves are not subjective, i.e., the ends are not personalistic. Indeed, he goes on to say, "By reason of the fact that they are persons a man and a woman must consciously seek to realize the aims of marriage according to the priority given above, because this order is objective, accessible to reason, and therefore binding on human persons." (p. 67, emphasis added)

He continues by pointing out, "The personalistic norm itself is not, of course, to be identified with any one of the aims of marriage: a norm is never an end, nor is an end a norm." (p. 68) It is worthwhile to read the whole section closely, something which Chris West shows no sign of ever having done.

Indeed, it is noteworthy that JPII's book, Love and Responsibility, and his own TOB audiences almost completely ignore both ends (1) and (3), focusing entirely on end (2). As a result of JPII's omission, most students of TOB, especially those who follow Chris West's rather outrageous version of JP II's teachings, don't have the necessary theological context to present a full and accurate teaching on sex and marriage.

This talk alone shows that West's idea of Hildebrandian purity is deeply flawed, colored heavily with his own memory of growing up in the Mother of God community. Compare his criticism of those who say an engaged couple shouldn't be alone together with these passages from the Washington Post's Mother of God exposés on the community, a community whose attitudes towards sexuality were so distorted that West himself told WaPo reporters "I feel like I have been raped":

Some former members say their marriages were arranged by Mother of God superiors and that they were manipulated into marrying partners they did not love.
Ex-members say they were told where to honeymoon, how to eat, dress and decorate their homes, and how to have sex. [Source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/local/longterm/library/mog/mgod1.htm]

The control began with dating. "It was almost, like, 'Big Brother is watching,' " recalls ex-member Bonnie West [Christopher West's mother!!!]. Parents learned from their heads that their teenaged children were forbidden to date until the community's leaders judged them ready. Even then the community would try to control every step. Many parents say they were taught to distrust everything their own children said and were encouraged to mount a steady surveillance of the community's youngsters.

"We'd be reporting back and forth to other parents: 'We saw your girl talking to this boy,' " Stan Weightman recalls. "We'd be encouraged to look through their dresser drawers for things, to read diaries if they had any." Rick Herald recalls being asked by his head "about how you thought about certain girls, whether you fantasized about them, how far your sexual fantasies went." Roger Cavanaugh says he was asked questions about whether he masturbated, whether he fantasized about particular women and how many minutes it took for him and his wife to have sex." [Source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/local/longterm/library/mog/mgod3.htm ]

Personally, it is clear to me that the influence of the Mother of God cult upon Christopher West's psyche has fixated him on an understanding of human sexuality which is not in keeping with JP II's work or with the work of the Church as a whole.

So, what are we to make of Cardinal Rigali's recent statement of support for Christopher West? We must simply recall that bishops have frequently backed extremely erroneous teachers and teachings. Indeed, nearly every major heresy of the Church was started or actively supported by an ordained man or men. The ordained men who currently advise the TOB institute, a corporation Chris West created in order to create a low-tax revenue stream for promulgating his version of Catholicism, are obviously interested in not bringing scandal upon themselves. Thus, every member of West's board has a vested interest in painting West's statements in the best possible light, even if that judgement is not actually warranted by West's teachings.

Similarly, the theologically incoherent support West has received from people like Dr. Janet Smith or Dr. Michael Healy are not unusual. If even a Saint of the Church could erroneously support an anti-Pope (as St. Vincent of Ferrar did when he acted as advisor to anti-Pope Benedict XIII), then we should not be shocked to see Dr. Janet Smith led astray by the Mother of God community and its product, Christopher West.

Chris West and his supporters have, to date, refused to answer any of the charges brought against West's teachings. Instead, they have banded together into a mutual admiration society in the hopes that the whole controversy will go away.

As long as the cult background West marinated in for years continues to influence his teaching, the controversy will not go away.

Further Reading:
Cardinal Rigali Backs Chris West
In Other News...
Bishop Eusebius Backs Musician Arius
Bishop John Backs Nestorius
Archbishop Cranmer Backs Henry VIII

Christopher West: "I Feel Like I Have Been Raped."
WaPo's Exposé on Christopher West's Cult Background: Mother of God Community
Dr. Mary Healy: Co-Chair, Mother of God Community
Sacred Heart Seminary Professor: Dr. Mary Healy
Sacred Heart Seminary Professor: Dr. Janet Smith
"I Sincerely Hope West's Cult of Personality Is Short-Lived"

Mafioso in America

In the old days, the Mafia ran numbers games, gambling houses, prostitution rings and protection rackets. Even if you ran an honest business, you couldn't escape. You had to pay a percentage of your profit to the man who ran your block. If you didn't, you or your business would be attacked, possibly destroyed.

Today, the government runs the lotto and gives out casino licenses. ACORN helps entrepreneurs set up prostitution rings. Even if you run an honest business it doesn't matter. You have to pay the tax man or he'll kidnap you, throw you in jail, destroy your business.

Now, with the Chicago Butcher in office, the juice on business transactions is going up. The Democrats will Rahm through a new health care mandate that will fine people $3800 each for breathing, if they dare to do so without first having gotten health care insurance, either through the government or through the private insurers the government intends to destroy. Yeats had it right:

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: a waste of desert sand;
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Wind shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

Cardinal O'Malley vs. John the Baptist

Just a few short days after the commemoration of the beheading of St. John the Baptist, Cardinal O'Malley shared these thoughts on the way John badgered Herod for taking his brother's wife as his own:

At times, even in the Church, zeal can lead people to issue harsh judgments and impute the worst motives to one another. These attitudes and practices do irreparable damage to the communion of the Church. If any cause is motivated by judgment, anger or vindictiveness, it will be doomed to marginalization and failure. Jesus’ words to us were that we must love one another as He loves us. Jesus loves us while we are still in sin. He loves each of us first, and He loves us to the end. Our ability to change people’s hearts and help them to grasp the dignity of each and every life, from the first moment of conception to the last moment of natural death, is directly related to our ability to increase love and unity in the Church, for our proclamation of the Truth is hindered when we are divided and fighting with each other.

Inspiring words indeed!

What?!?.... What did you say?... Wait... he wasn't talking about John?

But... but righteous anger is a sin, as Aquinas clearly... well, alright, maybe not Aquinas, but as the Church.... what??.... alright, not the Church...

But certainly someone doesn't find righteous anger appealing....
Well, yes, Herod, of course... but it seems to me there was someone else opposed to it as well...

Hmmm....

Well, never mind!
Let's start another rousing chorus of Kumbaya!

Next Week's Feature:

Why Jesus was Wrong to Scourge the Money-Changers in the Temple!

Look for the informative sidebar on St. Paul and name-calling!

Also, Ten Reasons Why You Should Never Wish Your Opponent Would Accidentally Cut Off His Own Penis!

Obama Chooses Irrelevance

Over one hundred years ago, the bishops of America had a choice.
They could spend the bulk of their effort catechizing adults, as the Church Universal had done through most of her history, or they could imitate the public school system of the United States and spend the bulk of their catechetical efforts on teaching children the Faith.

They chose the children.
This choice to ignore the adults began their long but inevitable slide into irrelevance. Today, the bishops produce encyclicals that no one reads, trying to save schools that no one sends their children to. By focusing the bulk of their effort on children, the bishops implicitly admitted - whether they meant to or not - that they had nothing of particular substance to offer adults.

In just a few short days, Barack Hussein Obama will follow the lead of the American bishops. For the first time ever, an American President will spend an hour addressing America's schoolchildren.

It is of signal interest that he chooses to do this only after being his vaunted health plan was relentlessly savaged and torn to bits by political commentators and man-in-the-pew adult citizens during the August recess.

The facts speak for themselves.
Barack Obama has begun his own long slide into irrelevance.

This does, however, raise a disturbing question.

For the American bishops, the slide of formerly great office into relative obscurity was marked by increasingly irresponsible behaviour, culminating in the twin scandals of American Catholic education and priestly sexual abuse.

As the President destroys himself, what kind of behaviour can we expect from a this man, a man whose shocking narcissism already outpaces even that of his predecessors?

The dangers increase as the shadows lengthen.

Ted Kennedy Was Catholic

US News & World Report asks if Ted Kennedy was Catholic.

As a practicing Catholic I can definitely affirm that Ted Kennedy was, indeed, Catholic. And Iosef Stalin was Russian Orthodox.

Both Kennedy and Stalin cared deeply about the poor. Both championed the idea that some had to die so that others might live.

Stalin was a great man, the lion of the Soviet Union. Kennedy was a great man, the lion of the Senate. Both left incredible legacies that any mother could be proud of.

Kennedy ranks up there with the Stalin, the "man of steel", and with Che Guevera, Mao Tse Tung, Pol Pot, Fidel Castro, and all the other deeply principled men of history, non-partisan men of the world who knew how to make a deal, men who never got into petty politics, men who loved their faith and loved the people, men who were willing to take from the rich and give to the poor. Like all these other great men of history, like our very Founding Fathers, Kennedy gave everything he had to others, dying penniless but proud.

Ted Kennedy shouldn't be buried - his body should be embalmed and put on display in the Lincoln Memorial or the well of the Senate, so generations can file past it in silent admiration for the magnificent work he accomplished during his tenure. The tattered remains of his clothes should be venerated, touched to the sick and dying so that they may be healed.

He even fulfilled Scriptural prophecy. After all, Ted Kennedy received Eucharist at a papal Mass in America, and was diagnosed with terminal brain cancer just a few short weeks later. Paul prophesied that this would happen in 1 Corinthians 11:17-30.

Why Catholic Schools Are Pernicious

This remarkable letter from a Catholic parent on her child's Catholic school pretty much sums up why Catholic schools don't work. After complaining about how her child's previous school closed and how she is paying through the nose and still being asked to contribute more, she remarks:

Why am I being asked to contribute to upgrading the cathedral and the seminary? Church attendance is down and few are entering the priesthood.

Perfect!
Excellent!
Exactly!

Like most Catholic parents, this Catholic parent sees no connection between her child's education and the mission of the Church!

Priests? Bah! Who needs 'em?

Just give me a decent school for my kid!
The Church itself can go to hell, and I don't care.

She completely ignores the fact that her reasoning towards the seminary also applies to the parochial school her son attends. Why are parishioners being asked to support the Catholic school? Enrollment is down and few are entering! Why should anyone give a dime to these institutions that so signally fail to pass on any understanding of or appreciation for the Faith, how it works, what it does?

Ah, but the delicious irony of her sentiment is lost upon this parent, herself a product of the institution!

And what, exactly, does the bishop mean when he says he isn't getting out of the education business anytime soon? Of course he is getting out of it! Catholic school enrollment is dropping steadily each year. When he can't entice anymore students into the schools, he'll have to shut them down! The economic downturn is merely accelerating a pre-existing downward spiral. He's getting out of the brick-and-mortar grade school business whether he wants out or not.

Sigh.
What do they teach them in school nowadays?

Where Catholic Education Is Headed

As the economy tanks and Catholic schools continue to close due to lack of interest, Catholic bishops have begun slamming together blue-ribbon panels in an effort to fix the problem. Will it work?

No.

Currently, the Catholic school system is the largest private school system in the nation. By 2012, there will be more homeschooled students than any other kind of private school student in the nation. Parents are slowly returning to their roots. The days of the warehouse school are numbered.

To see why, we need only look at history, using Catholic education as our model. There are a lot of ways to discuss the history of Catholic education. For today's reflections, I will divide it up into four phases: pre-printing press, pre-industrialization, pre-Internet and Internet.

Period I - Pre-Printing Press: The Ascension to 1450.
During this period, there were two forms of education: one for children, a different kind for adults. Prior to the printing press, the creation of a book was a one-off, highly expensive undertaking. A book the size of the Bible could cost as much as the church in which it was kept. Consequently, literacy rates were low and most children didn't get much training in that particular skill.

While Romans and Greeks not uncommonly brought in tutors to educate their children, Jewish households homeschooled. For the first 1500 years of the Church, Catholics tended to follow Jewish tradition. Children were taught by their parents. While Catholics did establish schools, these were almost exclusively oriented towards educating adults, training them in adult skills like literacy.

Keep in mind the definition of "an adult." Until the Industrial Revolution in the 18th and 19th centuries, anyone twelve or older was considered an adult. Most people married and started their family somewhere between the ages of twelve and twenty. Indeed, an unmarried twenty-year old, especially a woman, who was not a member of a religious order was considered odd.

Unbaptized adults were taught the Faith in a several-year long process. After baptism, adult instruction was dedicated to the trivium (grammar, rhetoric, dialectic), and the quadrivium (arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, music). "Grammar schools" were called that because they taught grammar first.

For the first 1000 years, there were no parish schools because there were no parishes. Most schools were built around monasteries and cathedrals (one cathedral per city). Provision was made for poor adult students who did not want to enter orders but did want to learn. Still, training in literacy was mostly confined to those under religious vows: clerics. That's why we still refer to "clerical staff" today.

By the tenth century, parishes were being erected, generally around monasteries and monastic schools in the countryside. In the cities, universities came into existence around the twelfth century: Salerno, Bologna and Paris in the twelfth century, Oxford by 1170. These universities dedicated themselves to three main subjects: theology, the law, and eventually medicine.

Period II - Pre-Industrial: 1450 to 1800’s
The invention of the printing press and the discovery of America fueled a sea-change in education. The printing press allowed inexpensive books. Literacy became affordable for most people. It also made heresy much more pernicious. Once most people could read a book themselves, without an instructor, they could also interpret that book in ways the book was never meant to be read.

Historically, nearly every major heresy the Church faced came from a priest or a bishop, i.e., someone who was both literate and had influence. Their literacy allowed heretical priests to mis-read the Book, their influence allowed them to spread this mis-reading widely. But, for the first time ever, unbridled literacy allowed the theologically insane to seriously distort Catholic society in a much more profound way than had ever been possible earlier.

The Council of Trent agreed that children should be taught, but it did not advocate the creation of schools for children. While it did ask priests and parents to offer regular instruction in the Faith, literacy education was left to the marketplace.

Trent created exactly one new kind of school - a training school for priests called a "seminary." Eventually, every diocese was supposed to have it's own seminary for priestly formation. Theoretically, this would head off theological insanity among priests.

But by now, literacy was so cheap it could even be affordably taught to most children. Martin Luther, an Augustinian priest, was one of the first to realize that the best way to spread his crazy ideas was to propagandize children. His small catechism was designed in a question-answer format for children, he advocated church-state separation, and he pushed for children to be educated at the earliest possible age.

With the discovery of the Americas also came the discovery of its indigenous peoples.During the previous 1500 years, the Church had placed almost all its effort into evangelizing adults. For the first time since 380 AD, when the Catholic Faith became the official faith of the Roman Empire, the Church faced a large number of un-baptized peoples who would listen (Moslems didn't listen).

Now that cheap books were available, She began to put some effort into directly teaching children (i.e., those under the age of 12). She set up a new kind of school: the mission school. Mission schools were dedicated to teaching unbaptized adults and children the tools they needed to enter civilized society, which now included literacy. These schools were also meant to prepare children and their families for eventual baptism.

The Church had always promoted literacy, creating written Germanic and Slavonic long before Gutenburg's birth. But, while literacy was wonderful in helping to spread the Faith, it also created enormous difficulties. Increased literacy increased the probability of doctrinal distortion. So, over the course of time, the Church developed some rules for how schools should work in order to limit the distortions:

• All teachers must be Catholic (the term “professor”, which means "one who professes the Catholic Faith" comes from this rule),
• The Catholic Faith must permeate every aspect of the curriculum,
• Baptized and unbaptized students must be kept strictly separated,
• Girls and boys must be taught separately.

In Europe, literate Catholics tried to teach illiterate Catholics both literacy and Faith. Missionary societies meant to minister to illiterate Catholics spring up everywhere: the Jesuits are the most well-known: in 1540, Spain was still considered a mission field. While teaching groups like the Dominicans had existed prior to the printing press, the most of the great teaching orders come into existence only AFTER the invention of the printing press

Back in the Americas, Catholic missionaries flooded in, trying to teach the illiterate natives through mission schools. They are everywhere: both coasts, the Midwest, South America.

They create their own problems. The Jesuit schools in South America are so successful at civilizing the natives that the entire Jesuit order is eventually suppressed. After all, it is nearly impossible to enslave well-educated natives, and the Jesuits were creating far too many well-educated natives to suit Moslem-influenced Catholic slavers in South America.

Protestants, who were, by definition, almost all literate, settled primarily on the Eastern seaboard of North America. They ignore the Indians, using them only for occasional trade or killing them when they get in the way. Protestant schools are meant for literate Christians. The "school year" is generally only about 12 weeks long, and they really only provide "finishing" skills - students are expected to have been taught literacy and basic math at home before they enter. By the mid-1800’s, these schools are becoming Protestant evangelization centers against waves of poor Catholic immigrants.

During this time, higher education, like the Catholic university system, is still pretty much unique to Europe. In 1900, United States' high schools and universities will permit entry to no more than 2% of the population. Still, the entire population, being mostly Protestant, is extremely well-read, with a 100% literacy rate. Butchers and farmers read Thucydides and Plato.

Period III - Pre-Internet: 1870’s to about 1980’s
The advent of industrialization deeply affects education since industrialization requires the destruction of family artisans and crafts, splitting up the family. In country after country, effective industrialization follows the same pattern. First, children are legally forbidden to work. Then, the newly-idled children are legally required to attend warehouse schools to keep them off the streets while the industrial floor snaps up both parents for a 12-hour workday six to seven days a week.

Vatican I attempts to respond to effects of industrialization by promising a statement on marriage, but it is pro-rogued by the war of Italian unification. Over time, the wage-earning capacities of most adults, whether mother or father, are captured for the corporations.

As a result, family trades and stay-at-home work, the mainstay of the family for thousands of years, largely disappears. Family-based education is essentially wiped out. Family life is distorted in brand new ways.

Industrialists push for warehouse schools across the nation by appealing to Protestant leaders. Protestant communities are able to proselytize the hordes of Catholic immigrants through the schools. The Third Baltimore Council (1884) responds to the threat by mandating parish schools.

Unfortunately, the parish schools do not draw on the trivium, quadrivium tradition. Instead, they imitate the public school warehouse format. Protestants respond by outlawing Catholic schools around the country through Blaine Amendments.

Industrialists end-run both religious groups by subsidizing the creation of teacher "certification" programs and teachers’ unions, which in turn encourage the removal of religion from the curriculum entirely.

The teacher certification programs are meant only to instill in adults the ideas necessary to successfully warehouse children and school them in factory attitudes. Teachers are meant to manufacture factory workers, cogs in the machine, not students liberally educated in the trivium and quadrivium (the disaster that was Jesuit success in South America will not be repeated).

As I outline in my book, the factory schools (both Protestant public and Catholic private) together create America's modern contraceptive society. Seminaries were the first to collapse. Although every diocese is still supposed to have its own seminary, by the mid-1980's most American dioceses can't afford the expense. A handful maintain seminaries. The rest now export their priestly training.

Period IV – 1990’s to now
Once the contraceptive society is firmly established, the number of children in school necessarily flatlines. You can't enroll a child that doesn't exist. Today, with population rate of 2.1 (no growth), public schools experience essentially no growth, apart from the small increase or decrease obtained from the infusion of immigrants' children.

The population of “Catholic” schools not only flatlines, it has actually begun to drop. The reasons are straightfoward. The contraceptive society strips away not only Catholic children, but Catholic identity in general, so the raison d'etre for the Catholic schools disappear. Catholic "intellectuals" worked for years to get rid of the "Catholic ghetto." When the "Catholic ghetto" disappears, so does the Catholic school.

Catholic school losses can be attributed to essentially three major problem areas:
Social: The Desire to Integrate Into Protestant-Secular Society

• Even at their height, Catholic warehouse schools never had more than 50% of Catholic children. Most Catholics wanted to "get out of the ghettoes" and integrate into a largely non-Catholic society. They have succeeded.
  
• The post-Vatican II loss of Catholic identity means the already weak parental impetus to send children decreases. In order to stay open, schools need pupils - they invite in non-Catholic students.
  
• Today, nearly 15% of Catholic school students are non-Catholic. Catholic identity is further watered down to attract even more students in a vicious downward spiral.

Economic: Warehouse Schools Are Too Expensive

• Post Vatican II loss of religious orders means loss of cheap labor,
• Schools eat up parish income. School tuition is now nearly universal, further depressing demand,
• Catholic schools serve increasingly wealthy student population as only affluent parents can pay the bills. This further destroys the medieval Catholic ethos that required making room for poor Catholics.
  

Theological: "Catholic" Schools Aren't Catholic

• Loss of trivium and quadrivium (the classical education), means loss of Catholic identity,
• Most schools and parishes violate the Catholic principle of subsidiarity in sacramental education by removing sacramental instruction almost entirely from the parents' shoulders,
  
• Virtually no "Catholic" school adheres to the Vatican documents on Catholic education.
• Teachers are not restricted to actively practicing Catholics, but to whoever will take the pay.
• Children are not segregated along baptismal or belief status, nor according to sex.
• The curriculum is not permeated by Catholic viewpoint, it uses texts, teachers and teaching philosophy identical to that of secular schools.
• The Catholic Church now runs a string of private schools that are Catholic primarily in label, not content.
  

Like the seminaries before them, Catholic parochial schools are collapsing. To the extent that Catholic bishops realize all of this, most of them can't say any of it out loud because their flock doesn't want to hear it.

We've seen the effect of literacy and industrialization on Catholic education. What effects does/will the Internet have on all of this?

The Future
The internet allows home-based businesses. It also allows the dissemination of information at an even lower cost than the printing press and the public library. Information is now essentially free and parents can return to home employment as artisans/craftsmen to an extent that hasn't been seen since the mid-1800's. This is slowly being reflected in the effects on the nation's school systems.

The public schools per pupil cost hovers between $5000 and $10,000 depending on how the numbers are counted. The are not particularly effective at educating children, but then, that was never really their purpose. Their primary advantage is their ability to warehouse children while the parents work. As a secondary bonus, schools tend to disrupt family life, making all family members dependent on goods and services provided by corporations.

Today, Catholic schools comprise the single largest private school system in the nation. By and large, they do not handle special needs children. They lose 7-10% of their students every five years. Per pupil cost is about the same as public school when straight educational offering is compared. They are 37% more effective than public school in educational outcome. While there is slight growth in suburban areas (where the affluent clients live), that growth is more than offset by losses in the inner city and rural areas. Their primary advantages are their ability to warehouse children while the parents work, and to provide a better educational outcome than public school, albeit at an obvious direct tuition cost to the client.

Since 1999, homeschooling has experienced growth of 8% per year, every year. Per pupil cost is 5% of public school ($500 vs. $10,000) and 10% of Catholic school ($500 vs. $5000). Burgeoning Internet resources and on-line courses will only improve the cost numbers. It is nearly 75% more effective than public school in educational outcome, and 35% more effective than Catholic schools. The primary advantage is the educational outcome, albeit at an obvious direct cost: no two-income or single-parent use of homeschooling is really possible. Given the number of broken families in American society, this is a real roadblock to the growth of homeschooling.

Homeschooling transforms education from a school year endeavor controlled by corporate bureaucrats back into the year-round, home-based, family-centered pursuit that augmented the Church for nearly 18 centuries.

Today, the Catholic parochial school system is the largest single private educational entity (12% of total school population in 1960, 5% in 1990).

Given current trends, by 2012, the homeschooling population will be bigger than the population in the Catholic school system. Assuming Catholics comprise 25% of homeschoolers, by 2035, more Catholics will be homeschooled than will attend parochial school.

If Catholic bishops want to get on board, the train is leaving the station. The school model proposed by the Third Baltimore Council in 1884 has never really worked; at best it never schooled more than 50% of the Catholic children in the nation. Today it is slowly closing down.

Homeschooling is an imperfect return to an educational model that was successful for thousands of years. Given the demographics, it will probably be at least another decade before Catholic bishops can publicly move their support away from the dying Catholic school parochial system and decisively move toward support of Catholic homeschooling. Until then, bishops commission blue-ribbon panels to natter on about What Should Be Done (tm). And they wait.


The Numbers
In 2007, the number of homeschooled students was about 1.5 million, an increase from 850,000 in 1999 and 1.1 million in 2003. The percentage of the school-age population that was homeschooled increased from 1.7 percent in 1999 to 2.9 percent in 2007. The increase in the percentage of homeschooled students from 1999 to 2007 represents a 74 percent relative increase over the 8-year period and a 36 percent relative increase since 2003.

Homeschooling $500 per pupil cost
Year Enrollment Percent Increase
1999 850,000 or 1.7% of nation's total school population
2003 1.1 million
2007 1.5 million or 2.9% of nation's total school population.
36% increase since 2003, 74% increase since 1999

Catholic School $5870 per pupil cost $10,228 2ndary pupil cost
Year Enrollment
1998-1999 2,648,844
2003-2004 2,484,252
2008-2009 2,192,531 17.4% decline since 2000

84.5% of Catholic school population are Catholic students (1,852,635).
14.9% of Catholic school population are non-Catholic students ( 325,835).
This is an increase from 2.7% in 1970 and 11.2% 1980.

Public School K-8 Public School 9-12 Total Private School Enrollment
Year Enrollment Year Enrollment
1995 32.3 million 1995 12.5 million 1995 11.7% of public school total
2005 34.2 million 2005 14.9 million 2005 11.0% of public school total
2006 34.2 million 2008 15.1 million

Improving Catholic Education

With the economic downturn, a lot of Catholic schools are closing. Across the nation, priests and bishops are wringing their hands with concern. "We must save our Catholic schools!" they cry.

I have a simple proposal for not only saving Catholic schools, but dramatically expanding Catholic schools, and at only 5% the current cost.

Indeed, the solution is simplicity itself.
Give a $1000 scholarship per child to every Catholic homeschooling parent.

In numerous documents and public statements, the Vatican has made clear that only the family guarantees authentic education in values.

Obviously, the Catholic school does not guarantee an authentic education in values. Thus, in order to maintain Catholic education while keeping in accordance with the principle of subsidiarity, diocesan money should not go to schools, but directly to families. By subsidizing family homeschooling efforts, the family is strengthened.

The "social values" bishops should be all over this, right? I mean, they're always up in arms about a minimum wage, and putting money into direct subsidies. So put your money where your mouths are, gentlemen. Send money from the collection basket directly back to the Catholic families that homeschool.

"But the parents aren't qualified!" some of you may be shouting. Yes, I'm sure. But take a look at who is teaching theology in many of the Catholic schools around the nation. Certainly it isn't people with theology degrees. Indeed, often-times it isn't even a practicing Catholic who is given the task of teaching the Catholic Faith.

Besides which, when parents do the educating, qualifications stop making a difference. The most recent study of over 11,000 homeschooled students from around the nation shows that the homeschool provides 74% better educational outcomes then public schools, but at a cost of less than $500 per pupil per year (versus in excess of $10,000 per pupil for public schools). This improvement in outcome comes without regard to the number of college degrees the parents might hold and without regard to the household income.

In short, when parents teach their own children, both parties are so motivated that the usual measures for predicting academic success no longer apply. Family income, minority status, college education and certification, all of that is simply not relevant. I think it may have something to do with that whole "love" thing, but that's just an uninformed hunch.

In any case, if we give each homeschooling family a per child subsidy of $1000 per year, it would be generous according to their needs, but only one-fourth the cost of teaching that same child inside of a school whose grounds and staff must be maintained in the style to which they have become accustomed.

In short, the size of Catholic schooling across the nation could be increased four-fold without one dollar of additional expenditure, but with a nearly 75% jump in educational outcomes.

"But we need to simply support our Catholic parochial schools!" you might respond.

Really?

Why?

Catholic schools do perform 25% better than public schools, but the per child cost is actually the same as public schools when you compare dollars spent on a straight educational basis, without throwing in all the bells and whistles that public schools are required by law to maintain.

Indeed, with the advent of on-line learning, the whole institutional school experience is being revealed for exactly what it is - a prison system for underage children.

Our society maintains those buildings for exactly one reason: it wants to capture the dollar-generating potentials of both parents. In order to do that, the children must be warehoused from the earliest possible age, so that neither parent wastes their economic capacities on the family, but instead orients those dollar-generating abilities towards the corporation, where they properly belong. Elementary and pre-elementary schools are meant to orient everyone to build up the corporation, not the family.

Given what we already know about the capacity of homeschooling to improve educational outcome, given the tremendous resources afforded to every family at virtually no cost through the Internet, it is clear the school building still exists only because it's such a fine warehouse. It certainly isn't about education - that is blindingly obvious.

So, by giving direct grants to families, Catholic bishops would be getting a much better educational experience for Catholic students, they would be directly supporting the family using the social justice principles they have so loudly espoused in regards to the minimum wage, and they could increase the number of students involved in Catholic education by a factor of four with no additional outlay.

It has been my experience that people often know what is best for others and loudly tell them what it is when opportunity arises, "You need to pay your employees a living wage!" "Rich people should surrender part of their income to the poor!" etc.

Alright, bishops!

Now you have a chance to do with your diocesan funds exactly what you keep telling corporations they need to do with their funds: give out the money and give up a little direct control, in the sure knowledge - already demonstrated via several massive studies - that the new solution will provide better outcomes than the old.

So, I'll be waiting for that to happen.
I'm sure it will be quite soon.

Yep.

Any day now.

Is It A Rumor?

¹He said to His disciples, "It is inevitable that stumbling blocks come, but woe to him through whom they come! ²"It would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck and he were thrown into the sea, than that he would cause one of these little ones to stumble.³"Be on your guard! If your brother sins, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him.⁴"And if he sins against you seven times a day, and returns to you seven times, saying, 'I repent,' forgive him."

⁵The apostles said to the Lord, "Increase our faith!"⁶And the Lord said, "If you had faith like a mustard seed, you would say to this mulberry tree, 'Be uprooted and be planted in the sea'; and it would obey you.

⁷"Which of you, having a slave plowing or tending sheep, will say to him when he has come in from the field, 'Come immediately and sit down to eat'? ⁸"But will he not say to him, 'Prepare something for me to eat, and properly clothe yourself and serve me while I eat and drink; and afterward you may eat and drink'? ⁹"He does not thank the slave because he did the things which were commanded, does he? ¹⁰"So you too, when you do all the things which are commanded you, say, 'We are unworthy slaves; we have done only that which we ought to have done.'"(Luke 7:1-10)

The USCCB is trying to make news again. They've drawn a Line In The Sand. Aren't you excited? This conglomeration of American bishops is usually just a criminally sinful waste of scarce Catholic resources, but this time!.... well, yeah, nothing has really changed.

Remember how strongly the USCCB came out against honoring Barack Obama at Notre Dame?

What?
You don't remember that?

Of course you don't - the USCCB was absolutely silent on the matter until well after the event took place, even though Fr. Jenkins, the president of the institution, clearly violated the USCCB mandate not to honor pro-abort politicians.

True, several dozen individual bishops made various levels of protests, just as several dozen had individually protested voting for Barack. And why not? There was clearly a groundswell of Catholic lay support for a protest against Notre Dame. It gave bishops a chance to look good. For a bishop of a certain attitude, it certainly made a good show for the orthodox Catholic laity without actually requiring him to do orthodox things in his own diocese.

So, the episcopal protest was a win-win all around. Bishops got to look good, Obama got his honors, Fr. Jenkins got a raise (in prestige, if not in dollars), Notre Dame met it's fund-raising goals early, and several major Catholic websites got their mailing lists increased by several tens of thousands of protester signatures. It was easily the most successful marketing event of the last ten years.

Today, we are supposed to get all excited because the USCCB's Pro-Life Office is saying abortion must be explicitly forbidden in the new ObamaCare health plan. Gosh, Aunty-Em, are we still in Kansas anymore?

Well, yes, we are.
Consider the realities:

1) Does anyone really think Barack Hussein Obama is going to ignore his own science advisor, listen instead to the USCCB Pro-Life Office and strip abortion out of his health care plan? Really? And if you do actually think this, do you have a medical release to smoke that stuff?

2) Alright, granted, the USCCB Pro-Life Office is "insisting" on explicitly removing abortion. Great. Where is the groundswell of dozens of individual bishops all loudly protesting ObamaCare's implicit support of abortion? Remember the dozens of bishops who spoke out about electing politicians like this? Remember the eighty or so bishops that were out in force over the Notre Dame thing? So, where are you guys? Anyone? Anyone? Bueller? Anyone?

But isn't this where the rubber hits the road?

Individual bishops protested his possible election, individual bishops protested him being honored, but now that his policies are actually on the fast track to becoming law, now that he will start using our dollars to kill actual children... hey, where'd all those individual bishops go? Guys???

3) The whole "we are opposed, Mr. Obama!" mantra just smells pro-forma at this point. Nobody got chastised when Obama got elected, nobody got chastised when he got honored, why the heck should we think "opposition" from a single USCCB office is going to make any difference at all? Especially given the number of Catholic Senators and Reps who have merrily promoted legal abortion all these years without a whimper of public chastisement from the bishops? What on earth would stop these men and women from merrily supporting Obama this fall? The USCCB Pro-Life Office? Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh, snort.

But here's the real kicker:
4) So our brave bishops charge the Pro-Life Office with opposing abortion. Fine. When will that office, or any branch or member of the USCCB for that matter, insist that ObamaCare not fund contraception?

Oooohhhh.... listen for the crickets...

Here's a soundbite that long-time readers of this blog may remember:

“No, there is no ‘lobbying to ban abortions for everyone’ as that too has been precluded by the Supreme Court, for the time being,” USCCB Pro-Life Spokesperson Cathy Cleaver Ruse wrote in reply, “rather, there are efforts directed toward achievable goals…” She then went on to list a few of the USCCB goals: “the partial-birth abortion ban, [work] against mandating inclusion of contraception in health benefits packages; against making its acceptance a condition for providing other kinds of developmental assistance; protecting parents' rights in the case of minors, [etc.]” -

Let's stop playing around.
Contraception causes abortion.
Until we get rid of contraception, we will not get rid of abortion.

Every Catholic bishop knows it, or should know it.
NOT ONE active Catholic bishop in North America has publicly spoken out on the subject of federal funding for contraception in forty years. Joseph Califano knows why.

Indeed, as you can see above, as recently as 2004, I was specifically told by the USCCB Pro-life spokesperson, Cathy Cleaver Ruse, that the Catholic bishops had no intention of upholding Catholic teaching either in reference to abortion or contraception. In fact, the bishops not only didn't punish pro-abortion politicians, they actually appointed pro-abortion politicians to stand as judges over the actions of US bishops.

So, today, the USCCB office protests abortion.
Again.

Who cares?
Who really cares?

What are we supposed to say?
"OOHH-LA-LA! Edith, call the newspapers! The USCCB Pro-Life Office is actually insisting on one point of Catholic doctrine! Who would of thunk it? "

If the bishops actually had any faith in the Catholic position, they would hold to all of it and promulgate all of it. Instead, we get not even half-measures, but half of half measures. No mention of contraception. Empty words thrown against abortion when it is politically safe to do so, with no actions to back it up. We get nothing but the flaccid excuse that the culture isn't ready to see punishments against pro-abortion politicians or hear how bad contraception really is.

Alright, I'll grant them the points.
Yes, it's probably true.
The culture isn't ready.

And that's relevant HOW exactly?

The culture also wasn't ready to hear that a man rose from the dead, or that God took on human flesh, or that we eat the flesh of God every Sunday, but that didn't stop bishops in the first century from pointing out the facts.

Over at Catholic Culture, Phil Lawler and Diogenes feels it is necessary to debunk the "nasty rumor" that Catholic bishops are ready to sell out the unborn in exchange for $100 million for Catholic Charities from Barack Hussein Obama. "Some people need to be rebuked for spreading this nasty rumor."

Let's just take a look at the history of the USCCB's opposition to contraception and its fruit.
If anyone can point out to me where the USCCB or, indeed, any group of American bishops, have publicly spoken out against federal funding for contraception or publicly chastised or punished any Catholic politician for their public support of legal abortion, then I will agree that Diogenes is correct and heads should roll. But if this evidence cannot be found, then only one question really remains:

Is it really a rumor?

Obama's Hero?

In October, 1921, Hitler began to organize a private army under Ulrich Klintzsch, a twenty-two-year-old former member of Ehrhardt's Brigade. On November 4, 1921, Hitler had his forty-two member army primed to fight Communists who heckled him with the Communist slogan "Frieheit!" ("Freedom!"), as he spoke at the Hofbrauhaus in Munich. Under their new leader, Emil Maurice, the soldiers hurled themselves repeatedly against the seven hundred Communists until the Communists were driven from the hall. This bloody night would later be viewed as the foundation date of the Sturmabteilung, the SA. This group became the prime force for movement of the National Socialists out of the meeting halls and into the streets, where they confronted the Social Democrats and the Communists. To the Nazis, political power not only in Munich, but in the state, became synonymous with domination of the streets. At that time, Hitler saw the storm troopers as the force which would ultimately bring the existing government to its knees.

In January 2008, Obama began to organize a private media under Rahm Emmanual, a member of the Chicago machine. In August, 2009, Obama had his media army primed to fight Americans who heckled him with the American slogan "Don't Tread on Me!", as he spoke at the telemprompter in Washington DC. Under their leader, Rahm Emmanual, the media hurled themselves repeatedly against the several million Americans until the Americans were driven from the conversation. This bloody event would later be viewed as the foundation date of the Sturmabteilung, the SA. This group became the prime force for movement of the American National Socialists out of the community organizing halls and into the streets, where they confronted the Republicans and Independents. To the Obamas, political power not only in Washington, but in the state, became synonymous with domination of the media. At that time, Obama saw the media as the force which would ultimately bring the existing government to its knees.

Simple Health Care Reform

Guest Post by Joseph Morris

The current debate over health care reform in the United States is centered around the question, “Who should pay, and how do we cover those who cannot pay?”

I believe the more directed question should be “How do we get health care to those who cannot pay?” As most of the country is covered by private health insurance and is happy with the cost and care they are receiving, let us only address that minority who are uncovered and leave the rest alone. What they need is free care.


A simple proposal:

Allow every health care professional; doctors, nurses, chiropractors, physical therapists, homeopaths, etc. to deduct from their personal federal income taxes, dollar for dollar, at their going rate, for every hour of free care that they give.

Allow every care facility; hospitals, clinics, etc, and manufacturer/distributor; pharmaceutical companies,. pharmacies, wheelchair companies, bandage mmanufacturers, etc. to deduct from their corporate income taxes, dollar for dollar, at their market rate, for every product or service that they give.

The Results:

Patients who cannot pay will be provided with private, local care unencumbered by federal or state government bureaucracy.

Medical providers can donate their services to whatever income level they seek to achieve. 50/50 to pay no taxes, 60/40 to pay some taxes, donate all their time in order to offset other income streams, etc. They can schedule their free hours within their offices, or spend time at free clinics.

Medicare/Medicaid will be rendered obsolete before they become insolvent.

Enforcement falls to the IRS which carries an established reputation and would only audit the hours given in service and would not be concerned with the care given.

This will be a new incentive for prospective medical professionals to enter the field. Watch the no tax days at the beginning of the school year to understand the inordinate joy that the public takes in sticking it to the government.

Accessibility to free care will be limited by provider choices and thus will serve as an incentive for those who can pay to stay insured.

Health care providers will advertise for uninsured patients as the fiscal year closes.

Even if every provider overstated his donations by 100% every year, it would still be cheaper than anything else being proposed.


Joe Morris, small business owner

Tin Foil Hats

In February, 1904, Scientific American provided a description of N-rays:

CHIMERICAL RAYS--"M. Aug Charpentier brings out the interesting point that the rays given out by living organisms differ from the N-rays discovered by M. Rene Prosper Blondlot, and the thinks they are formed of N-rays and another new form of radiation. This is especially true of the rays from the nerve centers or nerves, whose striking characteristic is that they are partially cut off by an aluminum screen. A sheet of 1/50th of an inch is sufficient to cut down considerably the rays emitted by a point of the brain..."

Well, it turns out that N-rays don't exist, but the "tin foil hat" subsequently took on a life of its own. It is now the mark of the conspiracy theorist. It is usually applied to anyone who opposes the worldview of "Main Stream Media" (MSM) journalists. But just how mainstream are those journalists?

We could shoot fish in a barrel by pointing to eminent MSM nutcases like Dan Rather. He not only insisted that George Bush's military service in the Air National Guard was bogus, he sued CBS for forcing him to drop the story:

"Rather alleges that he was forced to apologize for the Bush story as part of a conspiracy by top CBS management to ensure that no further damaging revelations about the president’s time in the Texas Air National Guard would become public."

Similarly, Hillary Clinton's tin-foil hat was showing when she started making rambling comments about the "vast right-wing conspiracy" that sought to destroy her family. That was right about the time Bill told us what the meaning of "is" is.

And during one of Joe Biden's more recent trips to his vacation retreat in the Land of Aluminum, he insisted Barack Hussein Obama would be seriously tested within six months of his swearing-in. The clock is ticking to a close on that six months, but no world-wide disaster-level test for Barry seems to be in the making. I guess the world just isn't that into him.

As I say, we could take the most obvious cases of MSM conspiracy theory, roll our eyes and call for the men in white suits. But the charge merits a deeper look. After all, when you think about it, the MSM is really a major tin-foil hat manufacturing industry.

Consider MSM insistence that there is no link between abortion and breast cancer. The tin-foil hats that head up the MSM and at least one American cancer institute refuse to engage the reality of dozens of scientific studies. Instead, Americans deny that there is any correlation, despite mountains of evidence that abortion does cause breast cancer.

Why the state of denial? Because these "mainstream" tin foil hats fear that admitting the truth would allow the camel's nose into the tent. Religious types would take over science or the United States or their bedroom or... whatever. So they deny any aspect of reality that comports too closely with what religion teaches to be true.

As a result, we keep being told that condoms are a solution the the AIDS crisis, that abortion is essentially harmless (in their world, it never causes subsequent pre-term birth, increased incidence of cerebral palsy, or post-traumatic stress disorder), and that promoting abstinence or monogamy is a bad idea.

In all of these cases, various elements of the "mainstream" refuse to engage the reality and instead insists that these facts are not actually facts, rather, these facts are really part of a larger conspiracy, a nefarious attempt by Rome or the Southern Baptists or the Mormons to go on the rampage and enslave people. Religious patriarchy and all that.

The liberal tin foil hats even have a Council of Elders now, I suppose to combat the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. It's hard to say really, especially considering that at least one of the members the new Council (a former American President) once swore he was visited by a UFO.

So, why do "mainstream liberals" (a contradiction in terms if ever there was one) take hold in the public psyche? Because they shout their conspiracy theory loudly. Because MSM'ers believe a conspiracy of powerful religious interests want to take over everyone's lives.

Whether it's Dan Rather, Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden, Whoopi Goldberg, or Barack Obama, they are all various degrees of nuts.

So, what can we conclude?

1) The "main-stream media" is already conspiracy-theory driven.
2) The "main-stream media" is essentially becoming a minority fringe group,
3) It really is appropriate to describe people who follow MSM positions as tin-foil hat groupies.

Why mention all of this?
Well, today, we face another MSM tin-foil hat conspiracy theory.

The MSMer's insist that anyone who questions Barack Obama's eligibility to be President is part of a vast, right-wing (is there any other kind?) racist conspiracy intended to turn America away from its marvelous upward course towards enlightened atheistic secular humanism. MSM'ers are terrified that such questions about Barack Hussein Obama's person will instantly turn the good old US of A back instead towards the Dark Ages of Religious Intolerance (tm).

Uhhh.... yeah.
I'm sure.

Let's try to be rationale, shall we?

My brother-in-law is a cop. If he were to pull me over, he would ask for my driver's license. He expects to get it.

Now, he knows I have a driver's license. But if he knows I have one, why does he ask for it? Indeed, why ask anyone for it? Isn't the fact that someone has a car proof enough that they must have a driver's license? What possible reason would anyone have to give a car to someone without a license?

Someone must have vetted the driver! It would be crazy to let anyone have a car without vetting the driver. There are laws against that sort of thing! So, asking for a driver's license... it's crazy talk, I tell ya'! That cop is a right-wing conspiracy theory NUT! And I can prove it! After all, he actually asked for my driver's license!

Keep in mind that the person behind the wheel almost always does have a license. My brother-in-law still asks because... well... because that's the law. He has to ask for it, I have to produce it.

So, which is more bizarre? To ask a man to release his medical records, his college transcripts, his writings, his birth certificate, if he decides he wants to run for or be sworn in as President? Or to insist that even allowing the human mind to form such questions is the sign of incipient insanity?

Now, the Constitution itself stipulates that you need only be a "citizen" to be a Senator or Representative, but you must be a "natural born citizen" to be president. So, which is more bizarre? To insist that the Law of Nations, the US Constitution, and continuing American legal precedent has already defined the phrase "natural-born citizen" to mean a man who is BOTH born on US soil AND whose parents are BOTH US citizens, or to ignore all of this history and legal precedent and instead insist there is no difference between being a "citizen" and being a "natural-born citizen"?

What is this "natural born citizen" law?

The Constitution’s Article 1, Section 8, Clause 10 states that a power of Congress is to “define and punish… offenses against the law of nations.” The Law of Nations has been international law, which as documented by Emmerich de Vatel (1758) states, in Chapter XIX, paragraph 212, “The natives, or natural-born citizens, are those born in the country, of parents who are citizens. As the society cannot exist and perpetuate itself otherwise than by the children of the citizens, those children naturally follow the condition of their fathers, and succeed to all their rights.”Vatel follows with paragraph 215, in which he asserts, “It is asked whether the children born of citizens in a foreign country are citizens? The laws have decided this question in several countries, and their regulations must be followed.(59) By the law of nature alone, children follow the condition of their fathers, and enter into all their rights (§ 212); the place of birth produces no change in this particular, and cannot, of itself, furnish any reason for taking from a child what nature has given him; I say ‘of itself,’ for, civil or political laws may, for particular reasons, ordain otherwise.” The chief framer of the related 14th Amendment of the Constitution, John A. Bingham corroborated this dual criteria stating, “every human being born within the jurisdiction of the United States of parents not owing allegiance to any foreign sovereignty is, in the language of your Constitution itself, a natural born citizen.”

In the 1st Congress, second session, Chapter 3, the issue of who might be a natural born citizen, as opposed to just a citizen, was again defined:

And the children of such persons so naturalized, dwelling within the United States, being under the age of twenty-one years at the time of such naturalization, shall also be considered as citizens of the United States. And the children of citizens of the United States, that may be born beyond sea, or out of the limits of the United States, shall be considered as natural born citizens: Provided, That the right of citizenship shall not descend to persons whose fathers have never been resident in the United States... (emphasis added) Approved, March 26, 1790.

The Constitutional Framers clearly understood and distinguished the differences between what it means to be a "citizen" and what it means to be a "natural born citizen." Obama's father never applied to become a US citizen. He was always a citizen of Kenya and always owed allegiance to Kenya or Great Britain, when Kenya was a colony of Great Britain.

In Elk v. Wilkins, 83 US 36 (1872) the Supreme Court denied Elk, a Native American, the right to vote as a US citizen even though he was born on US soil, because he was born on an Indian reservation. Elk was not born subject to the jurisdiction of the US, because he “owed immediate allegiance to” his tribe, a vassal or quasi-nation, and not to the United States. The Court held Elk was not “subject to the jurisdiction” of the United States at birth.

Barack Obama's father was British, Barack was a dual citizen at birth.

In Minor v. Happersett (1874), the court pointed out that

"The Constitution does not, in words, say who shall be natural-born citizens. Resort must be... had elsewhere to ascertain that. At common-law, with the nomenclature of which the framers of the Constitution were familiar, it was never doubted that all children born in a country of parents who were its citizens became themselves, upon their birth, citizens also. These were natives, or natural-born citizens, as distinguished from aliens or foreigners. Some authorities go further and include as citizens children born within the jurisdiction without reference to the citizenship of their parents. As to this class there have been doubts, but never as to the first."

In other words, both parents have to be citizens and the child has to be born on US soil in order to be a "natural born citizen," as distinguished from a regular citizen. Barack's father was not a US citizen.

In Perkins v. ELG, U.S. 325 (1939) the U.S. Supreme Court concluded that Marie Elizabeth Elg, who was born in the United States of Swedish parents naturalized in the United States prior to her birth, had not lost her birthright US citizenship because of her removal during minority to Sweden and was entitled to all the rights and privileges of that U.S. citizenship. In this case, the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed the decree that declared Elg "to be a natural born citizen of the United States."

Elg was "natural born" because she born of two American parents on American soil. Barack Obama's father was Kenyan. It sure seems unlikely that Barack matches a definition which is so heavily weighted against him.

So, why would anyone insist that it is crazy to ask for simple bona fides to be produced? Why would anyone insist it is crazy to look to previous legal precedent to determine the meaning of a Constitutional phrase? When even the liberal pro-abortion lesbian Camille Paglia sees a birth certificate problem, why is it unreasonable to ask for the problem to be addressed?

People who oppose the "Birther" request and arguments do so on the basis that Birthers are really just a conspiracy of ultra-right wing freaks who mean to overthrow the democratic government of the United States and replace it with a religious oligarchy.

The MSM, a veritable zoo of tin foil hat conspiracists, are terrified by their imaginary conspiracy of religious freaks.

The people who oppose these reasonable requests for information don't have anything to support their opposition. Instead, like the motorist who refuses to produce a license, they simply keep insisting that the cop is nuts to ask for it.

No matter how much evidence is brought forward to show the MSM types that their blind support of Obama's eligibility is based more in religious fervor than in law, the MSM'ers refuse to accept it. There's no way to demonstrate the logic or the law to a tin-foil hat type. Whether it be abortion, sodomy, contraception, history or Obama eligibility, they won't pay attention to the facts.

Instead, they continue to insist that the conspiracy is out there, in the dark, and it will eat them all up if they give even an inch to the request for documentation or concede even one jot or tittle to the legal arguments brought forward.

Nothing can convince these people.
They're just nuts.

The facts, on the other hand, are easy to ascertain.

Barack Obama is an inveterate liar, thief and murderer.

Even now, as National Review testifies, he lies to the American people about what is in his health plan.

He stole General Motors from its own executives.

He actively spoke out in favor of murdering born children on the floor of the Illinois Senate when he opposed the Infant Born Alive Protection Act.

The facts show Barack Hussein Obama cannot be trusted.
Consequently, if he told me the sky was blue, I would look up to check.

Now, we must concede that even a stopped clock is right twice a day. It is always (barely) possible that the tin foil hat MSM'ers are right about the birth certificate or the law. Perhaps Barack is, indeed, eligible to be POTUS.

But, the law has so far demonstrated Barack Obama is not a natural born citizen within the meaning of the Constitution.

Barack Obama's birth certificate has not been produced, nor has his college records, his medical records or, in fact, any other record concerning his past. To a degree unmatched in presidential politics, Barack Obama is a cipher, his history known only through his own two autobiographies.

The only thing we know about him is what he told us.
Comforting, eh?

As soon as Barack Obama's Hawaiian birth certificate is released to the general public, I'll stop supporting the request to see the birth certificate.

As soon as the Supreme Court rules on the meaning of "natural born citizen," I'll stop questioning his eligibility to be President due to his father's, and his own, British-Kenyan citizenship at birth.

But until these questions get resolved, I refuse to back down from a bunch of MSM tin-foil hats conspiracy nuts, even if they are the anchors of major television news programs, even if they do claim to be expert political commentators, even if they are elected officials.

Sorry Dan, Hillary, Joe.

There just isn't much evidence any of you are sane.