21 - 29 of 29 Comments

1. Mark holder

   4 months ago

   As a non Catholic, I don't know what comments are permitted to express disagreement with an article's thesis. Does the Catholic Church require its members to endorse legislation banning abortion, contraception or other moral positions of the church?
   
   If this site does not permit comments expressing disapproval of legislation, it is just a propaganda organ.

2. Mark holder

   4 months ago

   The Catholic Church considers contraception immoral. Should all Americans be denied by force of law access to contraceptives as well as to abortion?
   
   Many Americans rightly place more value on the lifetime of a 13 year old victim of rape or incest than on the potential life of the product of such an evil act. Those Americans are protected by our constitution - through the Supreme Court - from those who would impose their version of morality on us all.
   
   I find the dismissive tone of this article toward one of America's great minds offensive. You may disagree with his reasoning or his sense of morality, but no one's religious beliefs give immunity from error. I would remind readers that the Catholic Church burned men at the stake for agreeing that Copernicus' theory of planetary motion was correct. The church recently apologized, but it's a bit late in coming.
   
   Believe what you will, but allow your fellow Americans the freedom to do the same.

3. Fr. James Farfaglia

   4 months ago

   Excellent article as always. Thank you Andrew. I have been standing at the local abortion clinic almost every week for a number of years when I decided that I had to be coherent with my conscience and do something more on the local abortion situation. Many babies have been saved through our efforts, but many have been lost as well. Roe v Wade will never be overturned in our life time, so let's renew our efforts on a local level: build the culture of life - solid families, solid parishes, successful Catholic schools, stand together at abortion clinics, do what we can with crisis pregnancy centers and homes for unwed mothers.

4. Paul-Emile Leray

   4 months ago

   As another point of interest, what did Mackenzie King (a former Canadian PM) allegedly say about Adolf Hitler? While King apparently criticized Hitler's evil, King also apparently once suggested a comparison with Joan of Arc! Hitler was a lunatic! What was King possibly thinking? A few centuries earlier, another lunatic named King Henry VIIIth pillaged and plundered. CULT-URE is the biggest cult of all, in the words of Abraham Maslov. And "normal" is often very terrifying, when the cult-ure at large is what? Nuts! Since it is usually the nature of truth that it separates itself from the crowd, it then logically follows that the sane one inside the insane asylum is the one who is viewed as the nutbell since the great majority are what? Crazy! Meanwhile, in a democracy majority rules. How to reconcile this logical and very frightening contradiction? The majority is usually wrong, yet majority rules. Well, after 2000 plus years of insanity and 2 world wars in the past century alone, of course the majority is usually wrong. If the majority was right most of the time, over the past 2000 years; world hunger, wars, various famines, economic collapses, etc, would have ended centuries ago to never again occur. And yet? His-story repeats itself. Why? In part, because people don't learn from it. In part, some are indifferent or outright evil. And also, in part, humans are generally simply "normal"; not wanting to question too much of anything that disrupts their "normal" levels of routine-like comfort zones. When "normal" is being asleep, then being awake is painfully horrifying at first. (sort of like an alcoholic, perhaps, who becomes sober........WOW! Is this what the world is like? Time for another dozen beer and 2 shots of whiskey since the world is too nuts!)
   Question political ideologies, politics, and apply the same questions to several timelines; including 100, 50, years out into the future. A long term plan is not 10 years; that's a short term plan, even though bankers and quarterly reports speak a lingo of their own in their sectors of work. "Normal" consciousness needs to rise to levels high enough across the planet so that when the political trains derail most of the wheels remain on the track; without the bridge, track, train, along with the passengers ending up in the ocean.
   
   If certain politicians claim that moral and ethical questions of complexity are often above their pay grade, then why not ask those inside the Vatican who are there to assist and then pass into law positive laws that align with what is being suggested in the Vatican?
   
   I don't want some creepy politician signing laws I don't believe in, when I know well the intrinsic nature of politics itself; a power, control, money, ideology game based on often subjective interpretations, manipulations, and sophistry.
   
   Paul-Emile Leray

5. LRT

   4 months ago

   condemning him will not convert him.

6. vance

   4 months ago

   Thank you for educating us about who and what Justice Blackmun was. The Banality of Evil as was defined in the first two paragraphs describes today's Liberals. This article describes the scary truth about a human condition. I know Catholics who would defend Roe vs Wade to their own death while receiving the Holy Eucharist. These same Catholics will defend Obama to their own death in spite of all the evil he has done against the Church and our country. Blackmun defended his evil deed to his death. The Banality of Evil. How does this fit in with the old saying, "Satan or Evil loves it when good people say and do nothing to oppose him". We have 40 years of millions of butchered babies, yet only a handful of priests and Bishops actively protested this evil. What does it tell you about the 95% who say and do nothing to stop this evil?? Are they a Banality of Evil?? Are the 52% of Catholics who voted for Obama and other candidates of the Party of Death and Deceit a Banality of Evil?? The 95% of Bishops and clergy and the 52% of the Laity are all nice guys and gals. This is a great article that entices one to think and ask questions.

7. Paul-Emile Leray

   4 months ago

   Once again, a courageous article. Normal, these days, frightens me. Why? If the biggest cult of all is cult-ure, then those most "normal" are those 'fitting in with the cult' with the least amount of persecutions. True? True. Another thing I hate hearing is "the good old days". It has been 2000 years or so since Jesus walked on this planet. The past 100 years alone have seen 2 vicious world wars. What is more, both world wars happened in the first part of the 20th C. The good old days, to me, is explicit proof of humans using selective memory conveniently remembering nostalgic (to them) events while forgetting many of the hardships and other realities. Our ancestors, I fear, were often stupid! Why? Because the cult-ure is often stupid and asleep and "normal"; therefore, normal becomes a perfect mirror reflection of the norm in cult-ure. The older I become, the more I honestly think and feel that some of the best ways to assist humans is to wake up (with diplomacy, usually; and peacefully, non violently) as many as possible from their normal states of being dull dimwitted ignoramous types. When marketing and advertising are capable of moving many, it is proof of easily swayed pop cult-ure. It should be a CRIME punishable on some level for being "normal". "Normal", when the norm sees a cult-ure asleep, is terrifying. Thank you for another courageous article.
   Paul-Emile Leray

8. Andrew M. Greenwell

   4 months ago

   Please excuse the following errata (mea culpa): "So wrong that one would hardly be exaggeration in calling it the greatest moral evil in which our country and its institutions of government have participated." should be "So wrong that one would hardly be guilty of exaggeration in calling it the greatest moral evil in which our country and its institutions of government have participated."
   
   "A cowardly jurist or principled federalist would have avoided the question and said the Constitution does not address, and it is a matter reserved to the States." should be "A cowardly jurist or principled federalist would have avoided the question and said the Constitution does not address it, and it is a matter reserved to the States."
   
   "Unlike Eichmann, who was hung to death and whose body was cremated so as not to detract devotees . . . ." should be "Unlike Eichmann, who was hung to death and whose body was cremated so as not to attract devotees . . . ."
   
   Pray for the unborn. Pray for the victims of abortion, those who perform abortions, those who have participated in abortions, and those killed by abortions. And pray for our country's leaders, that our National holocaust, our moral blight, might soon find end.
   
   

9. basco

   4 months ago

   De mortuis nihil nisi bonum

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