The tribe has spoken clearly on health care: 73 percent want this bill scrapped; 52 percent are against the reforms altogether. President Obama came out Wednesday and said he's just going forward and using reconciliation. But America opposes use of reconciliation by a 52 to 39 percent margin.
And even he seemed to oppose the "50-plus-one" option in 2007:
Are there really 51 Democrats willing to overthrow democracy of this country?
THEN-SENATOR BARACK OBAMA: You've got to break out of what I call, sort of, the 50-plus-one pattern of presidential politics. Maybe you eke out a victory of 50-plus-one, then you can't govern. You know, you getAir Force One , I mean there are a lot of nice perks, but you can't deliver on health care. We're not going to pass universal health care with a 50-plus-one strategy.
More importantly, are there 51 narcissists willing to give up their seat in November in order for Obama to overthrow democracy?
Earlier this week, I got an email from Anne Fox of MCFL saying the current version of the bill is worse than ever.
I'll repeat what I've been saying all along: I think Our Lord has been demonstrating for quite some time that voting the lesser of two evils is partnering with evil any way you slice it and the fruit will continue to it's trajectory of destruction.
I defer to the magnificent Fr. Rutler.
FROM THE PASTOR
February 28, 2010
by Fr. George W. Rutler
February 28, 2010
by Fr. George W. Rutler
In the Transfiguration, Christ showed that everything must center on Him to be of right service to humanity. Moses, representing the law and social order, defers to Him, as does Elijah, representing the intellect and spiritual order. The Church recounts this in Lent, because Jesus revealed His glory in preparation for the Crucifixion.
Christ’s glory sheds light on His three temptations in the wilderness. Satan tested Him to see if He would succumb to the deceits of secularism (turning stones to bread, as though matter were the only thing that really matters) and power (control of governments in exchange for cooperating with evil) and fantasy (attaining celebrity by flouting the laws of nature).
The Catholic Church is, as Pope John Paul II said, “expert in humanity.” Satan’s chief enemy is the Church, for this is Christ alive in the world. From hard experience the Church knows the temptations of secularism (reducing Christianity to philanthropic humanism), clericalism (bartering supernatural grace for social power) and subjectivism (living in a parallel universe contemptuous of moral reality).
To succumb to these temptations is to die, both personally and institutionally. The latest figures show that those denominations that surrendered to “the spirit of the age” are vanishing. The liberal Protestant denominations are evaporating. One of their leaders has said that their numbers are dropping because their members are too well educated to have children. It is hardly intelligent to design one’s own demise. Our social fabric will have to adjust to the disappearance of these groups, which for a long while defined the public face of society. At the same time, the Catholic Church continues to grow, and would have done so even more had not many Catholics themselves yielded to the threefold temptations. In the most recently recorded year, 2007 to 2008, the number of Catholics worldwide increased by 19 million people. Priests increased from 405,178 to 409,166. Seminarians increased from 115,919 to 117,024. As in the religious orders, the growth is invariably in those where the Faith is kept.
In the early nineteenth century, Tocqueville predicted that, one day, the only options in the United States would be Catholicism and unbelief. In the early twentieth century, Chesterton said that “every man would end up either in utter pessimistic skepticism or as a member of the Catholic creed.” In a famous vision, St. John Bosco saw little boats tying up with the Barque of Peter. This September, the Successor of Peter will speak in Westminster Hall on the very spot where St. Thomas More was sentenced to death (and eternal glory) for defending the papacy. This is not a time for self-satisfaction. It is a summons to Lenten penance for our own subtle dalliances with temptations against the Faith, in the hope that we may respond more faithfully to the work of saving souls.
Christ’s glory sheds light on His three temptations in the wilderness. Satan tested Him to see if He would succumb to the deceits of secularism (turning stones to bread, as though matter were the only thing that really matters) and power (control of governments in exchange for cooperating with evil) and fantasy (attaining celebrity by flouting the laws of nature).
The Catholic Church is, as Pope John Paul II said, “expert in humanity.” Satan’s chief enemy is the Church, for this is Christ alive in the world. From hard experience the Church knows the temptations of secularism (reducing Christianity to philanthropic humanism), clericalism (bartering supernatural grace for social power) and subjectivism (living in a parallel universe contemptuous of moral reality).
To succumb to these temptations is to die, both personally and institutionally. The latest figures show that those denominations that surrendered to “the spirit of the age” are vanishing. The liberal Protestant denominations are evaporating. One of their leaders has said that their numbers are dropping because their members are too well educated to have children. It is hardly intelligent to design one’s own demise. Our social fabric will have to adjust to the disappearance of these groups, which for a long while defined the public face of society. At the same time, the Catholic Church continues to grow, and would have done so even more had not many Catholics themselves yielded to the threefold temptations. In the most recently recorded year, 2007 to 2008, the number of Catholics worldwide increased by 19 million people. Priests increased from 405,178 to 409,166. Seminarians increased from 115,919 to 117,024. As in the religious orders, the growth is invariably in those where the Faith is kept.
In the early nineteenth century, Tocqueville predicted that, one day, the only options in the United States would be Catholicism and unbelief. In the early twentieth century, Chesterton said that “every man would end up either in utter pessimistic skepticism or as a member of the Catholic creed.” In a famous vision, St. John Bosco saw little boats tying up with the Barque of Peter. This September, the Successor of Peter will speak in Westminster Hall on the very spot where St. Thomas More was sentenced to death (and eternal glory) for defending the papacy. This is not a time for self-satisfaction. It is a summons to Lenten penance for our own subtle dalliances with temptations against the Faith, in the hope that we may respond more faithfully to the work of saving souls.
4 comments:
How I miss Fr. Rutler!
I know not one priest, be he traditional or otherwise, that speaks like Father. This is what we all need to hear on a weekly basis from our priests instaed of the insipid nonsense about "faith journies" and "social justice". We're being lulled to sleep.
Thank you, Carol, for posting this.
Veronica
I should take a remedial course in spelling. Sr. Jean Baptiste would not be pleased with me!
Veronica
As a parishoner at Fr. Rutler's parish I know how blessed we are in terms of liturgy, preaching, pastoral work, and generally intellectually and spiritually serious Catholicism. Veronica is absolutely right.
As one who grew up near you, Carol, in the South Shore of Massachusetts I am especially grateful to you for your blog which I have just again re-discovered having lost track of the URL for awhile. Keep the faith,
Tom
Thanks to both of you. Fr. Rutler rocks. (BTW to readers - anyone can sign up for his weekly messages. You'll find the link at his parish website.)
Tom, you're lucky to have landed near such a great shepherd. Thanks for the kind words - - and a big welcome hug back. I foolishly change the url thinking the old links in google wouldn't be phased by the change. Oh well - live and learn. People are slowly making their way back now that google crawl is picking up my links.
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