It is now possible — and in many cases usual — to airbrush your child's school photo. Normal awkward things that are a part of growing up can now be eliminated. Is this a sign of vanity and self-absorption or what? Where has innocence gone? What message does this send to our children — that they aren't OK the way they are perhaps?
February 2008 Archives
Did you know that St. Patrick's Day falls this year during Holy Week, and that according to liturgical law it cannot be celebrated on the 17th? This is causing a brouhaha of epic proportions all over as bishops plead with cities to move St. Patrick's Day parades and some people refuse to play ball.
Luckily, this won't happen again until 2160. We'll be dead and gone.
That's what one church said to its congregation, not in so many words, urging married couples to know one another daily. Note the name of the church however.
I'm not even going to comment on this one.
What might various biblical events look like on Google Earth?
(Thanks to Mike's List and to Caleb who turned me on to Mike's List)
Did you know that twenty years ago, doctors performing surgery on some preemies did not use anesthesia, because they were convinced the babies could not feel pain? Now we know that they do, as do babies in the womb as young as 20 weeks — although there are of course those who dispute that, including one doctor who has provocatively asserted that babies can't consciously feel pain until their first birthday.
This plays into the battleground over abortion, as pro-life forces strive to educate women and clinic patients specifically about fetal pain.
I think I posted this some other year but if you haven't heard it, I gave a talk on Lent some years ago you may be interested in listening to. Lent is a time of returning to the Gospel with renewed fervor. What we should be doing all year around, we make a special commitment to do during Lent. It is a liturgical journey from the desert, to the Cross, and to the empty tomb — a time of purification and enlightenment.
Did you know that while the term "Lent" means "Spring" (thus incurring the ire of certain fundamentalists), the word in Latin, "Quadragesima", simply means "forty days". Since Latin is the official language of the church, you can tell your fundamentalist friends that when they bring it up.
The Wall Street Journal reports that Mormons have been caught off guard by the virulent opposition they've received
They have a slick apologetic. When one ex-Mormon apologist claimed that Mormons "believe in more than one god", a Mormon apologist called him "wrong on the facts" and said "Mormons pray to one God". Ah, a bit of bait and switch here. The claim was not that they pray to multiple gods. The claim was that they believe in multiple gods, that is to say, they acknowledge the existence of multiple gods, whether they pray to them all or not. (In particular they believe that every believer is destined to become a god. With his own planet, no less.)
Anyway my own perspective is that if a Mormon is more likely to uphold family values (which seems likely given their culture), I'm all for him being elected president. (It's not clear Romney was such a great candidate in this regard, though.) I'd rather have a devout Mormon than a nominal Christian. Of course better still is a fervent Christian.
Here is a quote I wanted to add to my post on voting but forgot to include it. As Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta says, "We are not called to be successful; we are called to be faithful." God judges us on our fidelity to truth, not whether we actually accomplish anything.
I've added the quote in context to the post.
Per my earlier post, I discovered to my surprised the Alan Keyes scored almost 10,000 votes in California and more than a few votes in several other states. Fascinating!
Have you ever thought of what will happen to your pets after the rapture? If so, you can be comforted to know that someone is assembling a group of "heathens pet-lovers" to take care of them when you're gone. (Or maybe you just believe that your pets have something better to worry about than marauding aliens with untoward designs.)
One wonders what the heathen pet-lovers think about all this.
Today is Super Tuesday, when my state and 23 others voted in the presidential primary. A friend and I were discussing our votes this weekend and when I disclosed who I was voting for, she dismissively said that I was wasting my vote.
I resolved in the 2000 election to vote for people I want to be president instead of voting for the one everyone else seems to think will win. At the time I was behind Alan Keyes and when I'd bring him up with my friends, they all agreed he was a wonderful choice, but since he couldn't be elected, there was, they argued, no point in voting for him. In my frustration I wryly noted to myself that maybe if half the people who actually wanted him for president actually voted for him, maybe he'd have half a chance. So I swore that I'd vote, not grudgingly and with reservations, with my nose pinched, but triumphantly and proudly. And do you know what? Having voted that way in 2000 and 2004, I do not regret at all my vote, however inconsequential it seemed to be. I am in fact elated at how things turned out because had I voted for Bush, I would have been hanging my head in shame.
The other thing I hate about this popularity argument — that we should vote only for those who are allegedly electable — is that it is circular reasoning. We have to vote for someone everyone else is voting for. (Why?) But then we're voting for what other people want, not what we want; we're chasing after the wind. You know these cultural phenoms where someone starts doing something, then someone starts copying them, and then everyone gets into the act, until everyone realizes that they're just following one another and there is no actual substance to what people are doing? (Fashion is a lot like this.) I say vote for who you want to be elected, not for who someone else wants to be elected. Show some leadership!
Now let's examine this argument that one's vote is "wasted". Voting is a moral act. We will be judged by God on how we vote. It doesn't matter whether your vote is even counted or not for whatever reason, your vote makes a moral statement before God and for that reason alone it is never wasted. As Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta says, "We are not called to be successful; we are called to be faithful." Second, votes send a message. Even if my candidate hasn't a snowball's chance, someone can look at the results and see, wow, this many people supported him. Third, people who argue in such a way won't argue that voting for a major candidate in a state predominated by the other party is a wasted vote. For example, one could argue that in Massachusetts, a presidential vote for a Republican candidate is always wasted because there is no way a Republican will win Massachusetts in this period in history. One could also argue that unless votes only differ by one vote, then your vote doesn't count either. If you stay home election day, except for that nearly impossible case, your vote won't make a difference.
My point is, one can make various arguments about what voting for so-and-so is a "wasted" vote, but I don't think votes are ever wasted. Even when they are in an extreme minority, they send a message, if only to God.
I know I've been neglecting the blog of late, and I apologize. News stories, or any topics for blogging, have not been as easy to come by. I should do more digging when topics don't present themselves as I'm accustomed to. Anyway, I intend to do better.
You know those impossibly-thin models that have reigned over the fashion world for so many years. Heck, some of them are sickly waifs with exposed ribs, horrible examples of a culture gone wrong. But there is good news: a move to use "real" people is rising up, driven by of all things Internet blogs. And the fashionistas are responding. The Internet is giving them a lot of feedback that they never got before, and this is helping them to realize that people don't want to look at emaciated skeletons. So this is something to be really happy about.
