Category Archives: Christianity

The Catholic Church Is On The Rack

Christianity, Criminal Injustice, Pseudoscience, Psychology & Pop-Psychology, Sex

The breakdown of boundaries in society may be one of the main sources of all the rot we see around us, but the Catholic Church will not be permitted to survive in the way it was intended to function: as a hierarchical organization.

The Pontiff likely quit because, brilliant prescient man that Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI is, he knows that the Church is no longer a haven from the toxic tides of populism and liberalism. And he is powerless to stop the avalanche.

The clamoring masses believe that they are every bit as smart as men like Benedict. The faithful, moreover, no longer see themselves as members of a community of believers, but as members of gay, lesbian, feminist, black, brown and plain angry clans. Unless the Church recognizes their brand of identity politics—they will bring it down.

Benedict also knows that the Church is on the rack. The victim community has found a way to bleed the Church dry and rob it of its moral authority. Sexual abuse litigation is big business, a racket facilitated by courts that are conduits to this theft.

After “asbestos, tobacco, guns, lead paint,” the next jackpot for tort lawyers was … sex, wrote Daniel Lyons of Forbes Magazine. In 2003, Lyons hashed out all there is to say about the sexual-abuse shakedown to which the Catholic Church has been subjected.

In “Sex, God & Greed,” Lyons pointed out how many of these class-action claims are, if not bogus, backed by the discredited excavation of false memories. (See my “Repressed Memory Ruse.”)

“… The focal point of this tort battle is the Catholic Church. The Church’s legal problems are worse even than most people realize: $1 billion in damages already paid out for the victims of pedophile priests, indications that the total will approach $5 billion before the crisis is over… The lawyers are lobbying states to lift the statute of limitations on sex abuse cases, letting them dredge up complaints that date back decades. Last year California, responding to the outcry over the rash of priest cases, suspended its statute of limitations on child sex abuse crimes for one year, opening the way for a deluge of new claims. A dozen other states are being pushed to loosen their laws. … But this wave of litigation does not end here. Is there any reason to think that the priesthood has a monopoly on child molestation? The lawyers who are winning settlements from Catholic dioceses are already casting about for the next targets: schools, government agencies, day care centers, police departments, Indian reservations, Hollywood. Plaintiff lawyer Roderick MacLeish Jr. and other litigators have parlayed the priest crisis into a billion-dollar money machine, fueled by lethal legal tactics, shrewd use of the media and public outrage so fierce that almost any claim, no matter how bizarre or dated, offers a shot at a windfall.”

UPDATED: Benedict XVI: The Whole Holy Package

Christianity, Intellectualism, Intelligence, Reason

Compared to Pope Benedict XVI, Pope John Paul II was the Lady Diana of the papacy; a well-meaning populist, bereft of Pope Benedict’s intellectual gravitas.

With his brilliant mind and beatific smile, Benedict XVI was “the whole holy package.”

Via The Vatican Today:

Dismay, surprise, amazement and emotion at the words of Benedict XVI who announced his decision to “renounce the ministry of Bishop of Rome”. These sentiments were etched on the faces of the cardinals, bishops and prelates – assembled for the Ordinary Public Concistory on Monday morning, 11 February, in the Concistory Hall of the Apostolic Palace – who heard the unexpected announcement in the Pope’s own voice.
Everyone’s eyes met, a light murmur swelled in the hall and astonishment faded into sorrow. Yet, after the first few moments of confusion, the unanimous recognition that the Pope’s act was a very lofty act of humility made headway among those present – who included the papal masters of ceremony, representatives of the postulations, choristers of the Sistine Chapel Choir, papal chair bearers and technicians.

In a 2005 column, “Unlearned Rabbi Rages at Ratzinger,” I defended my favorite Pope, Benedict XVI, from the insufferable sanctimony of an unlearned Rabbi called Michael Lerner. And in “Benedict The Brave” I chronicled his courage.

UPDATE: “Text And Video Of Pope Benedict XVI’s Resignation Announcement.”

The Peerless Malevolence of Redcoat Piers Morgan

Christianity, Constitution, Founding Fathers, Free Speech, GUNS, Hebrew Testament, Individual Rights, libertarianism, Natural Law, Private Property, Taxation

Below is an excerpt from the current weekly column, “The Peerless Malevolence of Redcoat Piers Morgan,” now on RT (“hoplophobic” in the tagline is courtesy of the editor—I had never heard that word before today. Very cool):

“Piers Morgan is preaching treason from his perch at CNN—and not because he is undermining the dead-letter US Constitution, as some have claimed.

Most people would define treason as a betrayal of one’s country or sovereign. In my book, the book of natural law, treason is properly defined as a betrayal of one’s countrymen—and, in particular, the betrayal of the individual’s right to life, liberty and property. (To your question, yes, this renders almost all politicians traitors by definition.)

A right that can’t be defended is a right in name only. If you cannot by law defend your life, you have no right to life. If you cannot defend your property, you have no right of private property. And if you cannot defend your liberty, you are not a free man.

It follows that inherent in the idea of an inalienable right is the right to mount a vigorous defense of the same rights.

Knowing full well that a mere ban on assault rifles would not give him the result he craved, our redcoat turncoat has structured his monocausal appeals against the individual’s right to bear arms as follows:

1) The UK once experienced Sandy-Hook like massacres.
2) We Brits banned all guns, pistols too.
3) There were no more such massacres.

… This week, the CNN host will be fulminating over the shortfalls of 23 new imperial orders against firearm owners and in furtherance of federal tyranny. Piers believes the president’s extra-constitutional diktats don’t go far enough to void what’s left of the Constitutional scheme (to say nothing of the Hippocratic Oath. The Dear Leader has decreed that, “Doctors and other health care providers … need to be able to ask about firearms in their patients’ homes and safe storage of those firearms”).

Last year, an admirably rebellious Egyptian people revolted against President Mohamed Morsy for issuing a single executive order. America’s “King Tut” issued 23 such directives in one day! But—and by contrast—Piers thinks nothing of this “attempt by the [US] executive to make laws in violation of the Article 1, Sec. 8 of the Constitution” …

… Read the complete column, “The Peerless Malevolence of Redcoat Piers Morgan,” now on RT.

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UPDATE IV: “Jesus, No Radical”? (Jesus’ Jewishness)

Ancient History, Christianity, Classical Liberalism, Hebrew Testament, Islam, Judaism & Jews, Justice

“Jesus was no political radical or rebel. He was God” is how the ever-provocative Jack Kerwick introduces his latest Belief.Net blog to Facebook Friends.

Maestro, pray tell, why are the two categories of the title—“G-d” vs. “political radical”—mutually exclusive?

One might have theological reasons for designating “G-d” and “political radical” as mutually exclusive, but reason is reason. It has to work a priori, surely?

Jews (at least those who think) think of Jesus as a preacher in the great tradition of the classical Hebrew prophets, whose genius, courage and yes, radicalism is hard to match—they were forever telling the stiff-necked people where to get off in no uncertain terms.

UPDATE I: “Yiddishkeit.” In reply to the thread on Facebook: Jesus was indeed a Jew (or a Hebrew), with everything that being a Hebrew would imply. A lot of people describe Jewish traits negatively. But you can be sure that Jesus was not without a dose of “Yiddishkeit,” as my blond, blue-eyed, Jewish mother would call it.

UPDATE II: Meathead: One should never place Russell Kirk in the company in which you placed him. For one, Kirk was against the wars Buckley embraced as a matter of principle. As I read Kirk, he was a classical liberal of enormous talent.

UPDATE III (June 14): The “because” is unfairly placed in yours sentence below, Jack Kerwick.

As for Ilana’s contention that Jesus was a “radical” because, like the prophets of old, He told “the stiff necked people where to get off in no uncertain terms,” how does that make Jesus, or anyone, a radical?

Here is what I wrote in the post above:

In punctuation, the sentence indicates that the last clause is but an example of the “genius, courage and yes, radicalism” of the prophets, and hardly exhaustive.

In meaning, how does the last clause, which you rightly seem to disparage as inexhaustible, qualify the words “genius, courage and yes, radicalism”?

It doesn’t. Yours is a somewhat unfair read of the sentence.

As for conflating, as you do Jack, the views of Jews on Christ with those of Muslims: That, in my view, is a grave error.